Chicken Lavash Soup Recipe (Tortilla Lime Soup)

As a child, Maman would always tell us kids not waste food; it's "tội chết" ("dreadfully sinful" in Vietnamese). Now that I'm an adult, I intend to follow in her footsteps and teach the same values to our future children. Whenever there are left-overs, I try to come up with creative ways to use them. Today, I had left-over chicken broth and roasted chicken, so I combined them to make a hearty chicken soup. I had whole wheat lavash on hand, so I decided to slice it into strips and use it as I would when making tortilla soup. The lavash also made a good thickening agent in the soup.

To the large pot of soup, I added left-over shredded roasted chicken, tomatoes, tomato paste for a little tartness, jalapeños for a little heat, lime juice, cumin, avocado and some edamame beans for texture. The lavash soup is a hearty, tasty dish that makes a complete meal that's a hit even with the kids. Well, at least the non-vegetarian kids in my house!

Cold Pasta Salad Recipe

Cold pasta salad is usually made with mayonnaise dressing. One member of my family is allergic to eggs, so this recipe suits her perfectly; as no eggs are used. Even though there are no eggs, I wanted the dressing to be creamy and flavorful, so I mixed in goat cheese with the usual vinaigrette ingredients. For a little extra kick, I added onions cooked down in white balsamic vinegar.

I used cork-screw-shaped pasta, but any other shape such as bowties, shells or penne would work as well. In addition to the diced tomatoes and steamed zucchini, I added black lentils and pan-seared tofu to give this vegetarian pasta dish some protein. Cooking does not always have to be complicated. If you have fresh ingredients and a lot of love, you’ll have a wonderful meal. Bon appétit!
 

Healthy School Lunch: Raspberry Spinach Salad Recipe

I have to admit, we haven't had much problem getting the kids to eat their vegetables. How, you may ask? Well, my first rule is never trick them. Second, get your children involved in the kitchen. Once they start to enjoy cooking, they will become more emotionally interested in creating new dishes, which is exactly what you want them to do! Trust them and let them experiment with new flavor combinations.

They recently came up with a savory fruit salad with greens, which was delicious. Since today was my husband's little 7-year-old sister's first day at school, I packed a plastic container with the raspberry salad (my munchkin's favorite fruit) and raspberry salad dressing on the side. You could also make a sandwich layering a slice of cheese, raspberry salad and a slice of cold meat between toasted slices of bread.

Tuna Nicoise Salad with Goose Eggs

Today, I made a French salad recipe called nicoise salad. I filled the salad with a combination of salad greens, capers, tuna and goose eggs. I was testing the recipe because school is about to start, and I'm not a big fan of the ready-made all-inclusive food trays. They don't contain much except a few crackers and small pieces of cheese and cold meat that are usually packed with salt, sugar and fat.

The salad received two thumbs up from my little munchkin. She loves hard-cooked eggs, which makes folding in the other ingredients much easier. As an added bonus, hard-boiled eggs are easy to pack. If you're planning on making this for your kids, the nicoise salad dressing can be packed separately so the salad is still crunchy and fresh when lunch time finally arrives.

A Pham Fatale reader named Karen left a wonderfully insightful comment last week where she described the challenges of preparing lunches for her kids. While my little munchkin hasn't experienced the teasing from her classmates (yet) even though her lunch box is different from her friends, I understand the issue. It has inspired me to come up with back-to-school recipes that covertly sneak nutritious ingredients into dishes that are familiar to kids. What could be more femme fatale worthy than that?

Tofu Asparagus Stir Fry Recipe

This tofu dish usually accommodates everyone in my family; the tofu is fried, then sautéed along with vegetables (I cooked with asparagus and green beans today) in a mixture of black bean and chili garlic sauce.

The story behind this dish is funny. The dish is named after my father-in-law, Mir. Several years ago, he went to a Chinese restaurant for a dinner meeting and they serve this as an appetizer, similar to chips and salsa in a Mexican restaurant. It was much saltier and spicier than the recipe I make now. He liked it so much he asked the waiter to bring him a whole plateful so he could have it for dinner as a main course. And thus Mir's Special was born.