The Balanced Kitchen

Time for food. Time for Life.

Honey Greens: A Taste of Spring!

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Early spring is by far my favorite time of year. I love it when the colors start to creep back in—the grass becomes more vibrant, the evergreen leafs get brighter, and the buds on the trees start to come to life. And then there is always that one day when it all suddenly POPS! As I was driving my kids to school yesterday I suddenly noticed how GREEN everything was looking and I realize that it was that POP day!

That green showing up everywhere always gets me thinking about and craving green vegetables. Sadly, though, salad greens are kind of tough and lame at this time of year, but the sautéing greens, such as kale, mustard, and chard, are all great, so I figured now is the perfect time to share my tried and true honey greens recipe with you!

Honey Greens

This is a spin off on a recipe my brother introduced me to years and years ago that used brown sugar instead of honey. Before having his version I had never really enjoyed chard or mustard greens, but once he put these sweet and sour greens down on my plate I was hooked! This is a recipe I often share with clients who are skeptical of greens and is also a side vegetable that I can (usually) count on my boys to enjoy with gusto. If you have lots of mouths to feed and will be doubling or tripling the recipe, I am a big fan of a mix of chard and mustard greens, but you really can’t go wrong with any of them!


Honey Greens
 
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Recipe type: Vegetable, Side
Serves: 4
Ingredients
  • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
  • Dash of cayenne (optional)
  • ½ cup onion, chopped
  • 1 bunch of kale, mustard, or chard greens. Stemmed, rinsed, and torn into bite-sized pieces.
  • 1 tablespoon rice or apple cider vinegar
  • ½ tablespoon honey (or more, to taste)
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
Instructions
  1. Heat the oil on medium-high head in a large frying pan and add a dash of cayenne (if using).
  2. When the oil is hot and shimmering, but not smoking, add the onion and cook until it is translucent.
  3. Turn the heat down to medium and add greens, stirring constantly. When the greens have turned bright “army” green, turn off the heat.
  4. Add the vinegar and some salt and pepper. Stir to mix and then drizzle the honey over and give it one last stir. Serve immediately.

 

Cheesy Broccoli Tots

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“By posting this recipe I am entering a recipe contest sponsored by Kikkoman and am eligible to win prizes associated with the contest. I was not compensated for my time.”

I have a confession to make: I hate tater tots. Maybe it is because I never tasted one until I was in my late 20s and so I don’t have any sentimental attachment, but to me they just taste like clumps of sad, soggy, kind of greasy, overly salted French fries. I just don’t get the appeal. And yet, when I started seeing recipes for vegetable tots floating around I was curiously intrigued. I loved the idea of small nuggets of vegetables that could be made to go along with a meal, could be a new spin on vegetables in the lunch box, or could be a fun new snack option, so I started experimenting to see what would work well, because more than anything I didn’t want to end up with a tater tot equivalent that would leave me feeling bummed out and disappointed.

And I have to say, I think that the idea resonated with some of you as well! As I have started posting my weekly meal plans (new in 2017! If you don’t follow me on Facebook yet, I’d love to have you join in the fun!) people have noticed the veggie tots listed and have asked about them more than any other dish. I guess it is a sign!…

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Baked Egg Rolls with Peanut Dipping Sauce

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This week I have something new to share with you! I was recently accepted into a really special community of food bloggers called Recipe Redux. Each month we are assigned a theme or challenge around which we have to create a new recipe. I am so excited to be a part of this community and also to have this new source of inspiration for developing delicious, healthy, easy recipes to share with you! So this month the theme was:

Stir up some of your earliest culinary recollections. Did you stand at your grandmother’s elbow to learn to cook? Or did you learn by stumbling through a cookbook by yourself? Share a healthy recipe and the accompanying story about one of your first cooking memories.

For me, it is all about my mom. I have so many warm and wonderful memories of her cooking, about how she always welcomed us into the kitchen to cook with her (which, of course, I largely rejected). I remember her ability to make any meal feel special, her enthusiasm for trying new things, and her passion for cooking from scratch. My mom also really wanted us to be good cooks and when I was in high school she announced one day that from that moment on my brother and I were each going to be responsible for dinner one night a week. We had to plan it and cook it. I was horrified!! But I started poking around in cookbooks and making dinners, some of which were absolutely inedible! One of the first dishes that I truly enjoyed making was eggrolls. I loved the ritual of it: the creation of a filling, the rolling them just right, the frying, and then the hot crispy pockets that you got to enjoy.

But, of course, they were deep fried, so as I got more and more wrapped up in teen body image issues I rejected them and forgot about how much I loved to make them… until this challenge!…

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Vegetable Chips

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I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the ebbs and flows of appetite that come with the seasons. For me, during the summer I tend to not be as hungry as I am in the winter. I also tend to crave more fruits, salads, and finger foods. I have also noticed that my boys tend to give me a harder time on vegetables in the summer than they do in the other months—they seem to be constantly seeking out sweet fruits and salty snacks. My theory on that is that they are craving high water content fruits and the salt to stay hydrated.

But they still need to eat vegetables! And since I don’t want it to become a huge battle, I have been working to present vegetables in ways that they are likely to find more appealing—vegetable soups, smoothies, and vegetable chips are some of our go-tos.

beet chips

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