I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that pancakes can be like oatmeal. I know quite well how to top a bowl of oats and create a huge variety of concoctions, from pumpkin pie to peanut butter and jelly. But pancakes (ooh, and probably waffles, too!) can be just as versatile, in much the same way! The only crucial key is making sure you keep the right balance between wet and dry ingredients, and the sky’s the limit!

So I took out our trusty copy of The Joy of Cooking and found the base pancake recipe…

Dry ingredients: 1.5 cups flour, 3 tablespoons sugar, 1.75 tablespoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon salt.
Wet ingredients: 1.5 cups milk (I used skim), 3 tablespoons melted butter, 2 eggs, 0.5 teaspoon vanilla.

So far, so good. Keeping in mind the idea of “mix your own,” I separated the sifted-together dry ingredients into three separate bowls (Eric wasn’t home tonight, so this was just to be for me and my kids). Then I added equal amounts of the mixed-together liquids to each bowl.

At this point, after stirring wet into dry, Gabe’s bowl was ready to go, since he didn’t want anything in his actual pancakes. Sam wanted chopped bananas and dates, so I added those to his bowl and let them rest in the liquids while I cooked Gabe’s pancakes (Joy suggested that step). After the fruit had rested in the milk for a bit, I stirred his and cooked them.

My bowl was more interesting. To my bowl, I added: 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder, 1 tablespoon Kahlua, a splash of extra vanilla, and, after stirring the rest, two tablespoons of part-skim ricotta cheese. I wanted the ricotta to stay mostly unmixed, so that I could mimic the separate cheese layer in a dish of tiramisu.

Then I cooked.

They look like chocolate pancakes, and they’re delicious. But the best part…

See that hunk of ricotta? Soft, creamy BLISS.

So! Go forth and make your own pancakes! The world is your oyster! I’m glad I started with these. (Oh, and – yeah, one-third of the recipe from Joy is quite the caloric hit. It made six good-sized pancakes. You probably don’t need all six…but I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me!)

Per tiramisu pancake (plain and banana-date pancakes are different!) – Fat: 3g; Carbohydrates: 14g; Calories: 96; Protein: 3g.

“Hello, friends! I’m Mr. Spaghetti Squash! And the lady in front of me clearly has either too much free time, or else children who will need to be coaxed into trying new things! Ahem!”

“This…may end badly for me.”

“Okay, I’ve had holes poked all over me, and now – oh, this is hot! I’d say about 400 degrees!” (Yes, I had to narrate this way the whole time for my four-year-old son. Maybe it’ll sink in, though, and my future daughter-in-law will be immensely grateful for a husband who loves to cook? )

An hour later…

“Let me tell you about the day I’ve had. Couldn’t possibly get worse, though, I suppose.”

“I WAS WRONG.”

“AUUUUUUUUUUUGH!”

“Better. Much better, in fact. I feel free! And I’ve been adorned with a few tablespoons of toasted pine nuts, half a cup of seasoned bread crumbs, and some salt and pepper.”

“Like my new look? One cup of marinara sauce and a cup of mozzarella cheese, and I’m a whole new squash.”

And after being covered in foil and going back into the 400-degree oven for ten minutes, then doing five more without the foil:

“How ya like me now?”

Mmmmmmm.

Nutritional info will depend on the size of your squash, but for mine, which filled a 9×11 casserole, and on which I put Sargento Reduced Fat cheese, and which made 6 really big servings: Fat: 6.0g; Carbohydrates: 30.2g; Calories: 201.3; Protein: 9.2g.

Plop it into a greased square casserole pan, and put it in the fridge for an hour; it will get nice and firm. Then slice it into blocks, put it onto a baking sheet, and broil it for about 7-10 minutes until it’s brown on top. Voila!

It was delicious, especially with marinara sauce. Eric ate his with salt and a little olive oil, and Gabe actually took a few bites of his with mozzarella cheese (before he decided that he didn’t like it anymore, which I predicted). It gave me lots of ideas, too, about different things I could put into polenta like this: roasted red peppers, mushrooms, tart dried fruit – heck, I can get as creative as I want, since the kids (such Philistines!) won’t be eating it, anyway!

Serves 4. Per serving – Fat: 8.2g; Carbohydrates: 28.1g; Calories:194.7; Protein: 5.1g.

Enter…chilaquiles.


In essence, it’s a “Mexican lasagna.” I got this particular preparation from Quick Vegetarian Pleasures, but it’s apparently a pretty common dish, with tons of varieties. It also seems easily adaptable to one’s own preferences, given a few parameters:
* A sauce, tomato-based
* Cheese/cream layers
* Bread, in the form of tortillas or tortilla strips

There would be lots of room for customizing the sauce, especially. Here’s what I did!

Chop two onions finely, along with a couple of cloves of garlic. In a skillet, heat some oil (I used 1.5 tablespoons of olive oil) and saute the onions and garlic until they’re translucent. Then add in 28 ounces of diced tomatoes (canned is fine), a cup and a half of kidney beans (if you use canned, make sure to rinse them), and some peppers. I used a whack of chipotles and a little adobo sauce, but this is one of the areas you’ll want to customize, based on your tongue’s asbestos rating! Also, the cookbook doesn’t call out any seasonings or spices, which I found bizarre; I added salt, fresh ground pepper, cumin, and a bit of cinnamon. When the sauce starts to thicken, take it off the heat.

In a casserole dish (I used a 9″x7″x2.5″, which was JUST big enough, so go a touch bigger if you can or if you prefer a “shorter stack”), put down about half the sauce, and then cover it with 1″ strips of corn tortillas. The recipe in the book calls for twelve tortillas, cut like that and divided in half, but I only had eleven. No big; if you use all twelve, you can account for it in your own nutritional info. Top with half of what will be one full cup of sour cream. (For the nutritional info listed here, I used reduced fat – NOT FAT FREE!) Then add four of what will be eight ounces of shredded cheese; I like Sargento’s reduced fat blends – one of the few brands that makes a good reduced fat line, in my opinion – so I used their reduced fat Mexican blend. Add the other half of your tortilla strips, the other half of the sauce, the other half-cup of sour cream, and four more ounces of cheese.

Then bake the whole thing at 350 degrees for about 35 minutes or until it’s bubbly and melted.

The book said that it would serve four, but they must be talking about really, really hungry people. I cut it into six pieces, and they’re substantial!

Serves 6. Per serving, as written – Fat: 13.2g; Carbohydrates: 41.7g; Calories: 339.8; Protein: 17.4g.

Eric here – I cook, too.  Tonight, I made cheese ravioli.

Step one: mix one cup of high-protein flour (bread flour, for example) with 1/2 teaspoon of olive oil, one large egg, and a pinch of salt.  I use a food processor to mix it all together, but you could just as easily use a stand mixer, or do it the old fashioned way.  Once a nice, smooth dough forms, wrap it in plastic and rest for 10-20 minutes.  During the rest, you can make the filling.

I used a mixture of eight ounces of ricotta cheese, four ounces of cottage cheese, one large egg, about 1/2 ounce of grated parmigiano-reggiano, 1/4 cup of shredded mozzarella, and some dried basil and oregano.  (Yes, fresh would be better, but the dried herbs will do fine here – they’ll have plenty of time to soak up moisture while we’re working the noodle dough.)

I stuck the filling in the refrigerator to tighten up a bit, and started to work the dough.

I use my stand mixer with the pasta roller attachment to roll out the dough into sheets.

Then, spread out little mounds of filling on one of the sheets, brush the noodle with water (to help the pasta sheets stick together and seal), and cover with the top sheet.  As you press the top sheet down, make sure to press all the air out of the areas around the filling – you don’t want the ravioli to explode while they’re boiling.

I used to do this part with a knife and fork (cut with the knife, and make the pattern around the ravioli with the fork), and make square ravioli.  This little stamper/cutter makes the process much more enjoyable, and works much better.

Kids can use it too.  Easy-peasy.

Once they’re all stamped out, pop them into boiling water for about a minute.  When they float, they’re pretty much done; I like to let them go another 15 seconds or so.  Sauce with whatever you like – melted butter, with or without herbs cooked in it (I like to fry sage leaves in butter), or tomato sauce, or béchamel, etc.  We used a red pepper sauce and a béchamel tonight.

Enjoy!