A Better Bag of Groceries

Miss Conduct’s Easy Greek Casserole

Thursday, November 19, 2009 at 06:55 AM

When I was setting up my new blog, I decided to divide my recipes into Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and Snacks.  This categorization quickly made me realize that I’ve been remiss in giving you some good lunch recipes.  This is probably an indication of my lifestyle.  In my life B.C. (Before Children), there was time for lunch.  I could make a great salad in my company’s cafeteria, head out with some co-workers, or even better – when I worked in Manhattan – shop on Fifth Avenue.  Those were the days.  Fast foward to now.  Working Moms do not eat lunch.  They work through lunch.  They type with one hand while balancing a quick sandwich in the other.  And Stay-At-Home Moms suck down a Campbell’s Soup in Hand while driving from here to there.  It’s pitiful.  But with the daycare deadline looming (and some of them charge by the minute if you’re late), most working moms (and dads!) have no choice.  I’m asking you all to step away from the keyboard, take a few minutes and warm up a nutritious lunch this winter. 

One of my favorite lunchtime recipes comes from Robin Abrahams.  Robin has become a virtual friend of mine these past few years and I credit her with being the first Blogger to whom I became a devotee.  Robin is also known as Miss Conduct, the witty author of the Sunday etiquette (well, she calls it social advice) column in the Boston Globe Magazine.  Robin can help you with all your etiquette dilemmas, such as should you say “Bless You” to a sneezing atheist.  She also has a great book, Mind Over Manners, and I am the proud owner of an autographed copy.  Now and then, Robin throws a little recipe into her blog and I’ve been making her Easy Greek Casserole for a few winters now.

1 1/2 cups cooked brown rice (or other whole grain)

1 T olive oil

1 small onion

1 bulb garlic, chopped or one T minced garlic from a jar

1 bag baby spinach

herbs

1 pint grape tomatoes, sliced in half, or one can diced tomatoes

1/4 to 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese

1/2 block firm tofu, drained and pressed

sliced black olives

I also add chopped roasted red peppers out of a jar

Cook rice or other grain. Preheat oven to 375. Heat olive oil in skillet and add onion and garlic. Wash the spinach and squeeze dry.  When the onion has become limp and tractable, add the spinach and whatever herbs you like (Robin uses dill, oregano, basil and black pepper – she advises against adding salt since it’s already in the feta).  While that cooks, spray the pan with non-stick spray and spread the rice or other grain evenly across the bottom.  When the spinach mixture is jsut barely cooked, put that on top.  Put the tomatoes on top of that, cover in foil and bake for about 20 minutes. 

Squeeze the tofu between your fingers and into a bowl.  Add feta cheese.  Mix together until it’s all just crumbly white stuff. 

Remove the casserole and add the feta cheese & tofu topping.  Add sliced olives and chopped roasted red peppers on top

and baked uncovered until topping browns, about 15 more minutes.

Robin says – and I quote – if you like your casserole servings to have neat edges and structural integrity, you should add a beaten egg or two somewhere, probably in the spinach. I’m a control freak so I go for the egg.

How Does It Score?

Pretty Darn Good!  Baby Spinach scores a 100 on the NuVal scale.  Remember 100 is best.  Brown rice scores an 82.  I often use a pre-cooked brown rice from Trader Joe’s to save time.  This time, I used wild rice which gets a score of 91.  Wow!  The olive oil gets an 11 (hey – it’s better than the butter in yesterday’s recipe).  Garlic gets a 91 and the grape tomatoes, a 96.  As for the tofu, we have not yet scored it.  NuVal is scoring all products in grocery stores (more than any other nutritional scoring system out there).  We just haven’t finished tofu yet.  I used Athenos Mild Feta Cheese crumbles which score a 24.  If I I had left off the final toppings (kalamata olives, 10 and Pastene’s roasted red peppers, 7), it would have been healthier.  But that’s how I like it!

So, enjoy your lunch and look for more high-scoring lunch recipes to come!

Question of the Day:

What are you having for lunch today?

Posted by: Melissa 9 comments

Posted in: Uncategorized

Tags: baby spinach, Greek Casserole