Trick Your Treaters into Healthy Eating

Cookin’ Quick By Colleen Walsh Fong

Halloween meals present us with different challenges, which depend upon our place in the lifecycle and family cycle. (And maybe how much time we’re spending on the bicycle.) Preteens concern themselves with the coolness factor of their costumes and wracking up the maximum number of houses at which they make their “trick or treat” pleas. Teens may be on the hunt for party invitations, while college students and young adults focus on creative costumes.

Parents of marauding children must try to squeeze a little nutrition in between the many treats lavished upon their children at school and community parties; and on the trick-or-treat circuit. Both chaperoning and treat-distribution duties necessitate cooking—and eating—quickly. Empty nesters who remain at home to avoid pranks being perpetrated upon their properties benefit from meals that let them beat the bell.

Grab your vegetable peeler and get ready to prepare a quick, tasty, and nutritious dish to satisfy whichever way you choose to celebrate this spookiest of autumn days.

Falling Leaves Focaccia

Serves 4

Technically focaccias are made by kneading, and baking, pizza-like dough. We’ll pay homage to this Italian classic, but take shortcuts to get us to our Halloween destinations more quickly. The finished product will please both your palate and design aesthetic, evoking the spirit of fallen autumn leaves and tasting like a yummy pizza.

I recommend using the following for best results:

Bread: Ciabatta

Cheese: Sargento Shredded, 6-Cheese Italian

Tomatoes: Compari or Cluster Tomatoes

Basil: Herb blend tube found in cold case in vegetable department

Ingredients:

1 Loaf Crunchy-crusted Bread, sliced into 8 thick slabs

2 T Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1 t Basil

3-4 Compari Tomatoes, sliced paper-thin

2 Garlic Cloves, peeled

4 Slices Prosciutto, paper-thin

1 8-oz pkg Shredded Italian Cheese

1 medium Yellow Squash, tips chopped off, and halved horizontally

1 Orange Bell Pepper, seeded and cut into paper-thin strips

Equipment:

Chef’s Knife

Cutting Board

Vegetable Peeler

2 Cookie Sheets

Small Whisk

Pastry Brush

Small Mixing Bowl or Ramekin

Paper Towels

Preparation:

Heat oven to 425°.

Use vegetable peeler to slice yellow squash paper-thin. Place slices onto paper towels and pat dry to remove all water.

Slice bell pepper into paper-strips. Place onto paper towels and pat dry to remove all water.

Place bread slices onto cookie sheets.

Whisk basil into olive oil. Distribute evenly on top side of bread slices using pastry brush.

Lay 4-5 slices of tomato across the oiled top of each slice of bread.

Use vegetable peeler to peel garlic cloves into paper-thin slices, placing 4-5 atop tomatoes on each piece of bread.

Slice prosciutto in half length-wise. Place one slice atop garlic and tomatoes.

Spread 1 T cheese over prosciutto on each bread slice.

Lay 4-5 slices of squash over cheese on each slice of bread.

Lay 5-6 slices of bell pepper on top of squash on each slice of bread.

Place sheets into pre-heated oven. Bake for 12 minutes. Exposed edges of bread should be golden brown and cheese just melted.

Remove “focaccias” from oven.

Serve 2 focaccias to each person.