One of your suggestions for improvement was changing my recipe location; I was asked to present my recipe FIRST and provide my hints, tips and suggestions afterwards. So that's what I have done. I hope you enjoy the improvement!
Shavuot
is over and it's time to get "back into the shvung" of better eating! Let's start with a recipe that is incredibly versatile;
great for light summer meals, Se'udah Sh'leshet, get-togethers and a welcome side dish. It's also a great favorite of our
group in Weight Watchers Hadera; I served these wraps for Sid and my Mishkal
Kavod (goal weight) parties.
I
am talking about Rice Paper Wraps.
These little darlings can be made fleishkes, milchicks or pareve and
can served hot, cold or at room temperature.
Yochi's Rice Paper Wraps
Ingredients:
·
Rice papers wraps.
These wraps come in two
sizes: large (dinner plate size) and small (dessert plate size) wrap rounds. In my opinion the smaller size is great for
parties, while the larger size is perfect for meals. Whatever the size, the
preparation is the same.
·
Sliced vegetables:
cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, onions, baby corn on the cob and so many
others. The vegetables can be cooked or served
raw.
I would stay away from very
hard vegetables, such as carrots, unless they are sliced very thinly as
they can easily puncture or tear the rice papers.
·
Fleishkes, milchicks and pareve
filling ideas:
o
Fleishke
filling: cooked, thinly sliced (any part) chicken or turkey (this is a great way to
use leftover poultry) or pastrama (I talked about this in a previous article).
o
Milchick filling: light, low-fat
cheese. This can be thinly sliced yellow
cheese or thicker soft slices of feta cheese.
o
Pareve filling: tuna, salmon or tofu.
·
Water
·
Pan or dish large and
deep enough to easily hold a rice paper flat in water.
How to work:
1. While the most important element of this recipe is the preparation
of the wraps, you must first prepare all the stuffing
ingredients. The best way to work is in assembly
line fashion: prepare each of your ingredients in a separate
plate and then line up the plates in order. You are now ready to make these puppies in a flash!
2. First clean, cut and thinly slice your vegetables lengthwise. Make sure your vegetables are smaller than the
wrap and can fit into the Food Area marked below.
3. If you cook your vegetables, make sure they are absolutely stone cold
before your place them in the rice papers or they will just tear through them.
4. Next prepare your filling. If you are
using fresh chicken or turkey, remember to bake or cook it first and then make sure it is stone
cold before you thinly slice it.
5. Place each ingredient in its own plate and set the plates down in the
order you will use the ingredients.
I always start with lettuce or spinach, then my other vegetables and end
with the filling.
6. Once your filling items are set up, we can begin to prepare the rice papers.
7. Prepare a pan with water. The
water does not have to be more than a few centimeters deep. Hint: The warmer the water – the quicker the
rice papers will be ready to wrap and roll. With this in mind, I suggest that the first time
you make this dish you should fill the pan with cold water. This way you can work a little slower at
first.
8. Spread a clean, dry, not fleecy, kitchen towel next to the pan of
water. You will place each rice paper on the towel, as they become pliant, to dry
off some of the excess water.
9. Place one rice paper
sheet in the water and gently push down in the water to make sure all the "sides"
are submerged, as sometimes a "side" will pop up over the water and
not get soft. The rice papers are white
and nearly translucent when they are dry; they become see-through once they are
softened and ready to be filled and wrapped.
10.
Touch the rice paper: when
they first hit the water they will be hard and brittle, but within a few
seconds (or less) they will become pliant.
Once the entire rice paper is pliant, but still a little firm, slowly pick it up with your
fingers, holding the two top "ends" of the rice paper and letting
excess water drip into the pan.
Don't let the rice paper
stay too long in the water or it will become too soft and simply tear
apart. Once the rice paper is completely
pliant it is ready to stuff and roll. Don't
worry about ruining a few rice papers before you can successfully roll a wrap. It
takes a bit of practice.
11.
Next place the wrap
carefully on the towel. Make sure that
the rice paper is lying flat and is as round as possible. Using a free edge of the towel, gently dab
the rice paper to absorb any excess water. Work
very gently and gingerly, these rice papers are very delicate.
Don't let the wrap stay
on the towel too long or it will stick and get ruined. This is the reason that I have everything
prepared in advance and work as quickly as possible!
Once I take one rice
paper out of the water, I usually put another dry rice paper into the water for the
next wrap. If this is the first time you
are doing this, I advise you to work with only one rice paper at a time. Once the first rice paper is filled and
rolled, start to prepare the next one. As
you prepare the rice papers, you will get the "hang of it" and be
able to work more quickly.
12.
Put the first vegetable
in the middle and closer to one side of rice paper. Then pile the other vegetables and filling on
top of that. The order and placement
does not have to be perfect or pretty, unless that is "your thing".
The amount of food you
fill is up to you. As you work with and
eat these rice paper wraps you will get a sense of how much is the "perfect
amount" for you. Also different
types of fillings will require different amounts of food per rice paper.
13.
Next fold over the bottom
and top areas of the rice paper towards the middle, partially covering the stuffing.
14.
Now begin to roll the rice
paper from the food side to the empty side. Hold the filling as you slowly wrap and roll
your way to the other end.
15.
There is no need to wet
or in any other way seal the end of the wrap.
The rice paper will stick together as soon as you roll it up.
These rice paper packages contain
tens of rice papers; so any dry, unused rice papers can be stored in their
original package, inside a plastic bag for use at a later date.
At Sid's Weight Watcher Mishkal Kavod party.
Foods
the kids can live without!
Before
Shavuot we talked about achieving five simple goals in 30 days. Those goals were all food-based. Today I want you to continue to get rid of
any "offending" foods that may have been left behind or maybe foods
the "kids like, but you shouldn't eat".
One
of my kids once complained to me that when they were young, they got used to vegetables
because we never had any nosh in the house. What a "sad", but true story! However, it is not a hundred percent
true – we did have nosh in the house around Purim time; that is from the
moment we bought our Mishloach Manot booty and until about 20 minutes after
we received some 30 plates piled high with candy on Purim. (I have, by the way, stopped creating plates
full of candy-Mishloach Manot. Today my Mishloach Manot consist of home-baked
cake or a gaggle of home-baked cookies and place them in a reusable serving or storage
dish with some fruit and wine, but that's another story.)
Anyone
that wants to cry over my kids' deprived lives has to remember that candy and
nosh is and was freely available in every school yard, kiosk, supermarket and in
the homes of ALL their friends.
The
lesson here is simple: kids can live without candy and nosh in
your home and so can you! But I want to
take it just one additional step further.
Remember that the foods that are bad for you are just as bad for
them. Sweetened soft drinks can be
removed all together or at least seen only on Shabbat. The same is true for baked goods of all
kinds. Keep them out of the house or only
bring in just enough for special occasions.
Just
be careful, we had an only-on-special occasions rule for baked goods, which
turned into an only-on-Friday-morning rule, which became a Friday-and-Shabbat
rule and then the one or two dainties serving portion became a bag full, which
ultimately begat an even larger bag of baked goodies. Be careful of these once-in-a-while
treats, they can get out of hand as well!
Our
newest acquired habit is to ensure that any points-heavy food (whether homemade
or home baked or store-bought or guest-brought) is transported to Sid's work the
very next morning for distribution! It cannot be allowed to
remain in the fridge, freezer or pantry for a minute longer than necessary. Remember what your mother taught you is still true today:
It Is Always Better To Give Than Receive!
Write
me - I'd love to hear how things are working out for you!
Next
week we will discuss Working with a Partner!
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