Healthy Home-made Pumpkin Cheesecake

hot off the presses

I am always on the look-out for healthy alternative desserts. Sometimes I buy chemical-laden products straight off the shelves of a supermarket, but I prefer to create my own. When it comes to calories coming from dessert, I’d like to know where they are coming from and what ingredients are involved. Enter my attempt at a Pumpkin Cheesecake.

Here’s a view of all included items:

Plus some whipped egg-whites:

separate and not equal

whip it

After everything is incorporated into one bowl, this is what we’re dealing with:
Without any specific measurements, the final product came out better than expected. It was smooth-ish, but also has a semi-pudding consistency that was best used as a yogurt topping, rather than a slice of pie. You can’t expect the best cheesecake when substitutions are widespread, but this was one of my best efforts –

Mythos: authentic hellenic cuisine – Octopus & Squid in New York (Part 4)

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

It’s been FAR TOO LONG since I’ve visited my own blog. Attempting to ease back in after my 3 readers demanded a new post. This dates all the way back to November, but since I want to finish this eating series, well……. I am (plus I already have the pictures ready to go.)

On my way to the La Guardia airport, my dad took me to lunch in Flushing for some self-proclaimed ‘authentic’ hellenic cuisine. Hellenic (it’s all Greek to me) food is probably one of my top 2 favorite cuisines (tough match with Japanese) and Mythos had fresh and well-prepared food.

We started with a variety of dips with pita and cucumbers:

eggplant, red pepper, yogurt, fish roe

We also shared grilled calamari and octopus – I definitely dominated the octopus portion:

simply grilled with fresh lemon

And there you have it. Let’s see if I can make this a habit….

Mythos Authentic Greek Cuisine (names vary per review site)

19629 Northern Blvd
Flushing, NY 11358
(718) 357-6596

Would you eat this…Greek delicacies?

Octosquid is still out of town, but let’s give a warm welcome to the next guest blogger, OctoSis (the one who bought macarons, not the one who ate at Mother Kelly’s):

Hi Octosquidlets! Even before this baby blog was born, Octosquid loved to look at pictures of food. So last summer, when OctoBrother-in-Law and I went on our honeymoon in Greece, I made sure to document many of the delectable meals we ate so I could share them with my sister. Today, I will share two of the more unusual ones with you, and it seems appropriate to ask — would you eat this?

The wedding diet is OVER.

On our first night in Athens, OctoBrother-in-Law dove right in and went for a big, juicy octopus. He was kind enough to let me taste it. Like most of the Greek delicacies we would come to know and love, the octopus was prepared simply — grilled with olive oil and seasoned with simple salt, pepper and other spices — to allow the succulence of the octopus meat to shine through.  OctoBrother-in-Law recalls, “It was grilled nicely and was squishy on the inside.  The suction cups were sticky on my tongue, and the olive oil had fresh citrus notes.”  As you can see, it was served over a salad of fresh tomatoes and cucumbers.

A few Greek islands later, I tried an adventurous meal of my own:

Way too good to be canned.

We were on the island of Naxos, dining Aegean Sea-side, so seafood was a no-brainer. This lunch of sardines was perfect! Grilled in olive oil and served over a bed of arugula, their flavor was reminiscent of whitefish.  (As any self-respecting New York Jew knows, this is a good thing.)  The fish meat was white in color and flaked easily off of the bone.  The sardines were accompanied with a light vinaigrette and some lemon for the diner to use as desired.  Since the best way to eat these little fishies was to use my hands to pull the meat off the bone, the lemon served an important second purpose of cleaning up my sardine-scented fingers when lunch was over.

Foreign slimy octopus and bony fish that require you to get your hands dirty — would you eat it? (I would. And did!)

Bounty from the Sea

I’m heading out of town for the next week (Florida for pleasure and New York for work). Octosquid must live on during the interim, so please give a warm welcome to the guest bloggers that appear in the coming days. First up, we have Octosquid’s mom!

If you love seafood (and who doesn’t?), and you live near Hewlett, NY, then it’s definitely worth a trip to the Hewlett Fish Market. Here you can find a vast array of both fresh fish and seafood, as well as a plethora of delectable prepared salads, soups, main dishes, and vegetables.
Recently, I purchased some of my favorite “ready-mades” to have for lunch and/or snacking.
The marinated mussels are rich and flavorful – swimming in olive oil, loads of diced garlic, chopped scallions, and a touch of red pepper.

Savory specialty from the sea

The calamari salad is a particular favorite. Not only is it chock full of firm calamari rings, but there is always a multitude of yummy tentacles as well. The fish is dressed in a light garlicky vinaigrette, and combined with crunchy celery, sweet red pepper, and black olives.

What more could you want?

Picking out the best parts

While at the market, I decided to buy some fresh fish for dinner. After vacillating about the many tempting choices, I decided to go with the tried-and-true tilapia (St. Peter’s). At home I concocted a zesty marinade of olive oil, orange juice, ginger, tabasco sauce, salt and pepper. The fish rested and soaked up the marinade for about an hour.

Waiting to be fired

The fish was then grilled, and quickly devoured.

I may not be pretty, but I am delicious!

Hewlett Fish Market has been a mainstay in our family for years – I think it’s clear why!