Good Food Hunting

Quick
Healthy
One Dish

This dish has it all. And Chris liked it too!

I pulled this recipe from the latest issue of Eating Well magazine. Its a great magazine and I highly recommend it for reading beyond the recipes. Fortunately for everyone, pretty much every recipe in the magazine is on the website.

At the grocery store, I nearly bought kale instead of chard by mistake but I don’t think it would have mattered that much. I did see the chard in time so was able to get organic rainbow swiss chard, from Meijer! The bundle was 6 stalks which seemed like a lot for this recipe even if it was going to wilt down significantly. I ended up using half so I’ll have another 3 stalks for something else later this week. Soup and salad, perhaps?

Skillet Gnocchi with Chard

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1 16-ounce package shelf-stable gnocchi (see Tip)
1 medium yellow onion, thinly sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup water
6 cups chopped chard leaves (about 1 small bunch) or spinach
1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes with Italian seasonings
1 15-ounce can white beans, rinsed
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1/2 cup shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
1/4 cup finely shredded Parmesan cheese

1. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add gnocchi and cook, stirring often, until plumped and starting to brown, 5 to 7 minutes. Transfer to a bowl.
2. Add the remaining 1 teaspoon oil and onion to the pan and cook, stirring, over medium heat, for 2 minutes. Stir in garlic and water. Cover and cook until the onion is soft, 4 to 6 minutes. Add chard (or spinach) and cook, stirring, until starting to wilt, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in tomatoes, beans and pepper and bring to a simmer. Stir in the gnocchi and sprinkle with mozzarella and Parmesan. Cover and cook until the cheese is melted and the sauce is bubbling, about 3 minutes.

Nutrition
Per serving: 325 calories; 7 g fat (2 g sat, 3 g mono); 8 mg cholesterol; 55 g carbohydrate; 14 g protein; 6 g fiber; 616 mg sodium; 360 mg potassium.
Nutrition bonus: Vitamin A (50% daily value), Vitamin C (40% dv), Calcium & Iron (19% dv).
3 Carbohydrate Servings
Exchanges: 3 starch, 1 vegetable, 1 lean meat, 1 fat

Serves 6

My amendments

1. Before the onions went in the pan, I browned 3 strips of bacon, roughly chopped. I used the bacon fat to brown the onions instead of adding more olive oil. This certainly changed the fat content but I felt it added a nice dimension to the flavor. One could easily substitute pancetta, a small amount of crumbled sausage or omit all together.

2. Instead of straight mozzarella and Parmesan, I used these Artisan blends from Sargento: Mozzarella and Provolone, Parmesan and Romano. I used them because we had them in the fridge already. I actually have really good Parmesan right now but it wasn’t grated yet. This night was about quick so I could get my homework done.

3. With the cheese, I generously sprinkled some dried basil over the top.

Despite some initial misgivings from Chris: No meat? Beans?, I’m “allowed” to make this dish again and he went back for seconds.