A platter of pigs in a blanket. A
second helping of green bean casserole. For many, celebrating the holidays is
synonymous with multi-course dinners, parties and endless amounts of holiday
sweets, making it difficult for health-conscious eaters to stay on track. To
help, Lucinda Scala Quinn, author of “Mad Hungry: Feeding Men and Boys,”
executive food director of Martha Stewart Living, host of the “Mad Hungry”
cooking show and mom to three boys, offers some guidelines for a lighter—yet
equally as delicious—holiday.

Even health-conscious eaters want to enjoy their favorite holiday dishes. What are your suggestions for making classic recipes more nutritious?

I like to use non-fat, thick
Greek yogurt wherever sour cream is called for. I’ll even drain the yogurt and
make it super thick; if you drain it, put it in a sieve lined with cheesecloth
and set it over a bowl in the fridge overnight–the liquid will come out and it
will be just like sour cream. Most of the time you can’t tell the difference,
because it’s really that acidic tang that you like in sour cream, and you get
that with yogurt. You can even substitute non-fat yogurt for sour cream in your
baking.

I’m also a huge fan of roasted
vegetables in place of creamy casseroles—if you slice cauliflower very thin,
add olive oil, salt and pepper, lay it flat on sheet trays and roast it at a
high temperature, you’ll have a beautiful golden cauliflower—it’s healthful and
easy. Instead of candied yams, which have a lot of butter and sugar, I cut
sweet potato into wedges, toss with spices and bake them to bring out the
natural caramelization. Instead of a green bean casserole, I do a flavorful
ginger garlic green bean.

You’re a busy NYC working mom—how
do you feed your family every night without resorting to takeout?

I’m a big planner, and I have to
be, because ordering Chinese takeout for my family is an $80 bill. I don’t
necessarily plan down to the meals, but on Sundays we go shopping [for the
week]. I know that I’m going to have a meat night, a chicken night, a bean
night, a pasta night. I also try to stay one step ahead. Sometimes before I go
to work I’ll put the chicken in the marinade, slice the broccoli and wash the
potatoes, so when I get home, it’s all ready.

One of your mottoes is “never
be caught without bacon”—which doesn’t quite speak to healthy eating. Can
you enjoy your bacon as well?

Of course! I’ll take two or three
strips of bacon, dice them finely and sauté it with a little onion—it’s a good
base for adding collard greens, cabbage or Swiss chard. Or you can add a bit of
diced bacon and onion in a tomato sauce—it gives it a bit of a smoky flavor. It’s
just moderation—I don’t eat bacon every day, maybe a couple times a month, and
then sometimes as a flavoring for vegetables.

 Lucinda’s Recipes

Ginger Garlic Glazed Green
Beans
Serves 4 to
6

 One of my
sons called looking for a green bean recipe that could accompany the Vietnamese
lemongrass chicken that he was making from a cookbook. I rattled off a few
ideas, and this recipe for Ginger Garlic Glazed Green Beans is what he created.

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons
peanut or vegetable oil
1/2 inch of
fresh ginger, peeled and grated
3 garlic
cloves, half sliced and half minced
1 pound
green beans, rinsed and stemmed, with water still clinging to them
1
tablespoon soy sauce
4 teaspoon toasted sesame oil

For green beans:

1. Heat a
large sauté pan over medium heat. Add the oil, ginger, and minced garlic and
sauté for 30 seconds. Raise the heat to medium-high, add the beans and sliced
garlic, and stir-fry for 2 minutes.

2. Add 1/4 cup water to the pan. Cook for another 4 minutes, partially covered.

With 1 minute left, add the soy sauce and sesame oil and swirl around the pan
to
form a glazy sauce.

# # #

Spiced sweet potato wedges
Serves 6 to
8

A fantastic
accompaniment to grilled pork or roast chicken, these salty-sweet wedges also
make a stealthily healthy snack for ravenous boys. The sweet potato truly is a
super vegetable: it is packed with antioxidants and four times the daily
recommendation of beta-carotene needed for healthy skin, hair, and eyesight. In
several vegetable rating roundups, it consistently beat most other vegetables
in overall nutritional power. No wonder it’s one of the first foods we feed to
babies.

Ingredients:
2
tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon
coarse salt
1/2
teaspoon ground cumin
1/8
teaspoon cayenne pepper
4 medium
sweet potatoes, peeled, sliced in half lengthwise, and cut into wedges about 4
inches long
1
tablespoon vegetable oil

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350%uFFFDF. Cover a rimmed baking sheet with baking parchment or
foil.

In a large bowl, combine the brown sugar, salt, cumin, and cayenne. Spread the
sweet potatoes on the baking sheet. Drizzle the oil over the wedges and toss to
coat.

Transfer the wedges to the bowl and toss completely with the spice mixture to
coat each piece. Return the potatoes to the baking sheet and spread out in a
single layer.

Bake for 10 minutes. Turn over the wedges. Raise the heat to 400%uFFFDF. Bake for 10
to 15 more minutes, until the potatoes are golden brown and tender.

###

Chunky Mashed Potatoes
Serves 5 to
8

 These are
the mashed potatoes we grew up on, a true testament to my partially wasp
upbringing. My mom always put cottage cheese—not milk or sour cream or anything
else—in our mashers. We also liked them chunky, not smooth. Until I was an
adult, I thought it was the normal way to eat mashed potatoes, and only altered
my habits when my husband began substituting ricotta cheese for cottage cheese.
Give it a try before you snarl; it’s a good heap of protein on top of the deliciousness.

Ingredients:

5 4- to
5-inch russet or Idaho potatoes, washed well but not
peeled
4
tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/3 cup
milk
1 cup (8
ounces) small-curd cottage cheese or ricotta cheese
Coarse salt
and freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

Place the potatoes in a large pot
and cover with water. Bring to a boil and cook until the potatoes are tender,
about 45 minutes.
Insert a knife into the center of the potatoes to ensure
accurate soft tenderness; the potatoes should be soft but not falling apart.

Drain.
When cool enough to handle, hold each potato in a clean kitchen towel
and peel off the skin. Cut into chunks. (If in a hurry, peel the potatoes first
and cut into small chunks for boiling.)

Add the butter and milk to the same pot and place over the lowest heat to
melt the butter and warm the milk. Return the potatoes to the pot and mash
until almost smooth. Add the cottage cheese and stir to combine. Season with
salt and pepper. Stir briskly before serving.

###

Recipes and photo excerpted from MAD HUNGRY by LUCINDA SCALA QUINN
(Artisan Books). Copyright 2009. Mikkel
Vang photographer.