Tuscan Kale Salad - It's Not Just For Breakfast Anymore

Now…Do I have your FULL attention?

Tuscan Kale Salad with Feta and Pine Nuts and a bit of
crumbled Low Carb Spinach Crackers with Pascal Manale Shrimp 

Look, I could sit here and probably create a cute story of how my mama hand-picked the kale from our back yard on Reed Road, when we were growing up. But the truth is to my knowledge, the only thing Mama and Daddy thought kale was fit for was as a decorative embellishment on a tray of fattening and wholly comforting appetizers, or maybe as a "platter carpet" for a plate of oozing and unctuous barbequed duck!

I was 48 years old before I figured out that I could eat the stuff planted in the border of my front flower bed. I was 49 years old before I decided kale was for kids and not for tricky rabbits!

So let me say that again slowly…in English. Kale is an acquired taste. Yep, I'm tellin' you the honest truth. I am.

Low Carb Zucchini & Yellow Squash Linguini With Garlic and Tomatoes - It's Gluten Free Too!

Zucchini & Yellow Squash Linguini served with
LC, GNS-Free Salmon Croquettes make a perfectly light meal.

Get Behind Me Satan (er, oommph, I mean Pasta)!

In the old, pre-low carb days – you could call it my PLC Days, I was a pasta ho.

Really.

People on the street inelegantly called out to me, “Hey, Pasta Ho. How ya doin? I see you’re wearin’ last week’s pasta on your booty today!”

*sigh*

It was true. I could “look” at pasta and simply bypass my mouth, tape it to my thighs and call it a day. Pasta was my kryptonite. And I would have happily eaten it every day and frequently did, alas my 314lbs of fluffiness. There was something about twirling and dancing with it. It was as much about the habit as the taste although my pasta was TDF! TDF! TDF!!!!

Oven Fried, Low Carb, Gluten, Nut, Soy-Free (GNS-Free) Salmon Croquettes

All The Flavor – Hold The Guilt!

Healthy, Oven Baked, Low Carb, Gluten, Soy, Nut-Free
(GNS-Free) Salmon Croquette Patties taste awesome!

Growing up in a three-bedroom house with five kids, a mom, a dad and grandmother often meant eating on the cheap. But even though Mama could out-frugal the entire neighborhood, food in our house never tasted less than marvelous.

Two cans of pink salmon cost less than a dollar back then and could feed a family of eight. Do you wonder why Salmon Croquettes frequently appeared on the menu with only slight resistance from Dad and the boys?

See, Mom had it figured out. Salmon Croquettes provided a great calcium delivery system for growing bones. They cost pennies to make, could be extended

Low Carb Sugar Free Chocolate Dipped Peanut Butter Eggs In a Post-Apocalyptic World

What a difference a year makes…

One year ago on Good Friday at 2:00PM, the telephone rings.

The face of cancer. Dead eyes. Profoundly grey in weeks.
Mid-stage of hair loss. Sick to death. No eyebrows. Few lashes.
And a moon face. Sweet. Cancer disfigures literally
and emotionally.

I’m pooped and don’t know why. I’ve been pooped for months with no clear reason other than being 48, post-menopausal, fat, eating poorly again (yep, another episode of The Days of A Backslider’s Life), and not exercising.

I pick up the phone, “Hello? This is Susie.”

“Hi Ms. Gibbs. This is Natalie from Dr. K’s office.”

“Hi Natalie and Easter blessings to you,” I said.

“Thank you,” she said. “Ms. Gibbs. Um. Well, Ms. Gibbs, we received the results from your mammogram today. I wanted to let you know I’m writing an order for you to have a biopsy on

Low Carb Sugar Free Chocolate Dipped Pudding Eggs Make Easter Fun!

“No, I like them crunchy. I could eat a hundred melted Peeps!”

Low Carb Sugar-Free Chocolate Dipped Pudding Eggs
taste like chocolate dipped melted Peeps!

That’s what Joey from Friends woulda said had he eaten these Low Carb Chocolate Dipped Pudding Eggs.

It IS what Denny said when I proclaimed in discouragement that I felt like I should have taken a bit more time to get the erythritol and xylitol blended into a finer powder.

Powdered Erythritol and Xylitol is smoother and blends into confectionary better than granular because Erythritol, especially, LOVES to be a crystal and resists changing composition. So the Low Carb Chocolate Dipped Pudding Eggs have a little "attitude" and crunch bit with their meltingly soft center.

Low Carb Healthy Orange Cake - Is It a Cake or a Muffin?

Orange You Glad I Didn’t Say Banana? And Only 3.9 Net Carbs Per Cake With Glaze - Hurray!

Orange ya glad I made this cake? Low Carb Healthy
Orange Cake with Orange Glaze and Blackberry Garnish.
Only 3.9Net Carbs per cake not including blackberries.

Don’t you love it when kids start “getting” jokes and try to tell their own? Our great niece EJ is telling knock knock jokes that never quite end the way you expect them.

EJ: Knock Knock

Denny: Who's there?

EJ: Banana

Denny: Banana who?

EJ: Knock Knock

Denny: Who's There?

EJ: Banana

Denny: Banana who?

EJ: Knock Knock
Denny: Who's there?

EJ: People!

*snort* It may be locational, but oh my gosh, she starts giggling and it's just the cutest thing!

The Banana joke got me thinking about the orange-you-glad punchline…which led to me

Healthy Oven Fried Fish Rocks Low Carb - Just In Time For Good Friday

The Fluffy Chix Oven Fried Fish recipe morphs two ideas into one easy dish! We were children of the 60s. And of Luby’s Cafeteria. In Houston during the 60s, cafeterias ruled. We had Piccadilly, Wyatt’s, Cleburn’s and Luby’s among others. But nothing could beat the LuAnn Platter at Luby’s.

I could talk for hours about how the flaky fish seemingly dissolved on the tongue or how I greedily rationed each heavenly, crispy crumb of breading. I would eat the mac 'n cheese delicately, one elbow at a time. Ahhhh the innocence of youth!

I didn't know! Sure I was a roly poly kid, but Mom always told me I was big-boned. *wink wink* No really, she blamed it on the steroids I took most of the first 11 years of my life.



Low Carb, Low Gluten, Soy Free, Nut Free White Bread Wars

Will Wonder Never Cease? Oops, I mean “wonders”…

Low Carb Low Gluten, Soy Free, Nut Free White Bread Back In The Hiz-ouse!

*Warning: Some people with gluten sensitivities have problems with oats. Although oats do not contain the same kind of gluten found in wheat, there is sometimes cross contamination due to the fields where oats are grown. Additionally, there may be cross-contamination in the processing plants where the same plant processes grains that contain gluten. If you cannot handle oats (I use Bob's Red Mill certified gluten free rolled oats) - then please sub out another fiber like rice bran or hemp or maybe even a bean flour for the oat fiber called for in the Bread Mix.

Comparisons of White Bread Recipe using three different
Bread Mix Bases. Success with all three!

Hi honey, I’m home from the White Bread Wars! Yeeeee gads! I have about eleventy gazillion slices of white bread in my freezer. I had to sell Denny and the boys to the gypsies cuz there was no more room for them in the deep freeze.

As to why they were in the freezer in the first place? Well it’s best not to ask. Maybe they simply pissed me off one too many times? You do recall when they called me Cue Ball the whole time I was bald during chemo and treatment? But truthfully, they just like it in the

I Want To Be A Vegetarian When I Grow Up Cuz I Love Working With Animals So Much!

Vegetarian Yellow Squash Tomato Bake - an efficient use
of leftover Grilled Veggies

Quick Meatless Yellow Squash and Tomato Bake Hits The Spot

Calling all Southern vegetarians! Heck, you don’t even have to be vegetarian. Or Southern. I won’t tell. And I won’t even ask if you’re Catholic and eating Fluffy Chix’s Yellow Squash and Tomato Bake on a day other than Friday. It’s just that good!

Hey but who knows where the title came from? Write in the comments if you remember that line! (Hint: It was said by a blonde bombshell on tv...)

Remember the 60s and 70s when we still thought parmesan cheese only came in a green can and was pronounced par-meee-seee-an cheese? (Déjà vu, yes, I’ve said that before…more than once – see? You WERE listening!) I was part of the group

Grilled Vegetables - Another Foundation Recipe

Mama said, "Eat your vegetables!"

(Click on the images to enlarge them.)

Grilled Veggies - Yellow Squash, Zucchini, Mushrooms
and Fennel

I hope by now you are coming to realize that I love foundation recipes – or mother recipes – as I like to call them. Foundation or mother recipes come in useful when learning to cook because they represent building blocks and short cuts to more complex recipes.

Grilled veggies are a foundation recipe because once you make them, the grilled goodies can morph and springboard into several different recipes as an ingredient rather than a “destination.” You can flavor them creatively which adapts their flavor to fit many different cuisines.