Penne, Peas & Carrots

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By Marilyn Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

There are certain food combinations that will forever be associated with children – peanut butter and jelly; macaroni and cheese; and peas and carrots. Our boys love them all but prefer to eat their peas and carrots in a simple pasta dish that I’ve been making since they were toddlers.

This simple dish is perfect when you're in a hurry, but still want to prepare something wholesome and tasty. I use frozen peas and carrots to save time. Skip the half-and-half if you're counting fat grams and add a little more chicken stock instead.

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Saguette’s Carrot Soup

By Marilyn Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

Sometimes a book inspires a meal.

One of our boys’ favorites, Monsieur Saguette and his Baguette, tells the story of a young Frenchman who makes a delicious pot of hot carrot soup only to find he has no bread in the house. He sets off to a boulangerie to buy a baguette and on his way home meets with many challenges that his baguette triumphantly pulls him through.

I’ll bet we have read this book aloud as a family at least a hundred times. It’s a rare read because both boys enjoy it and have for years. Saguette uses his baguette for crazy things on his walk home, like propping open the mouth of an alligator, using it as an extension of his arm to save a kitten from a tree and as a ladder for getting out of a giant hole he fell into.

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The Secret to Getting your Kids to Eat Spinach

By Marilyn Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

Want to know how to get your kids to eat spinach? Simple: add a little crispy bacon. I don’t know about you, but my boys literally vibrate when they can smell bacon cooking. They would eat just about anything with bacon crumbled on top. This old school salad is perfect for finicky kids and not bad for adults, too.

I stopped frying bacon in a pan years ago … now I bake it in the oven. For those of you who don’t know this trick, place a baking rack on top of a sheet pan, then arrange the bacon slices in rows on the rack and bake in a preheated oven at 350°F. The bacon won’t shrink as much as in a pan, the rack keeps the bacon from soaking in fat and most of all, there’s no splattering grease, making clean up so much easier.

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Oyster Po’ Boys

By Marilyn Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

I was always told the best way to describe the difference between Creole and Cajun cooking is city food vs. country food. Some people say a Creole feeds one family with three chickens but a Cajun can feed three families with one chicken.

One thing’s for sure, the classic po’ boy, which began as a 5-cent lunch for poor boys, crosses all boundaries. Po' boys can be found on the menus of greasy spoons deep in the bayou to white-tablecloth restaurants in the heart of New Orleans. It’s delicious and very easy to make.

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Mother’s Day Breakfast

By Marilyn Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

I remember the first time I delivered a breakfast tray to my mom on Mother’s Day morning. I couldn’t have been more than eight years old. I don’t recall what I made, though I’m sure it was something simple. It certainly wasn’t a fancy tray of food, nor a gourmet one, but what I lacked in skill, I made up for in effort. I couldn’t remember ever seeing mom so happy.

Many years later, now a mom myself, I must admit I’m overjoyed to see my boys go out of their way to do the same.

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