Turkey Leek Soup - Kidney Diet / Renal Diet

This recipe is the first in a series of indeterminate length on kidney-healthy foods.
The goal is to cook food that takes good, and meets the following nutritional guidelines:

1. <2000mg / day potassium
2. <1500mg / day sodium
3. Low to moderate protein content

Along with each recipe, I'll post the nutrition breakdown based on the USDA nutrient database.

Turkey Leek Soup

Leeks are a kidney friendly vegetable, and I like them in soup, so I thought I'd give this a try.  The ingredients are:

• 0.5lb cooked (in my case smoked) herbed turkey breast
• 4 cups low sodium chicken broth (from TJs, note: do not buy broth containing Potassium Chloride as a salt substitute)
• 5 medium leeks, just the bulbs and lower leaves (~3 cups diced)

The prep was easy. I finely cut the bulb ends and top leves off the leeks and halved them, before blanching in boiling water for ~5min.  Then I rinsed them in a collander and chopped them finely.

I cut the leftover turkey into chunks, threw everything in a  pot and let it all simmer for 2hrs.

First let me say that my salt-loving palate this soup tasted bland.  It definitely needed more bite, and I will play with that in future iterations.  That said, the smokiness from the turkey really added needed flavor, so I recommend using smoked meat.  The herbs from the turkey (a standard herbs de'provence mix) also helped. 

Extreme Soup close-up

Serving suggestion:  We ate this with sourdough bread, and found the sourness complemented the coup well and added some of that missing bite.  I definitely recommend this, especially as sourdough bread is high in neither potassium nor sodium.

Nutrition

Recipe makes 4 servings (~2cups each)

Nutrient	Unit	3cups boiled leeks	4 cups low Na broth	250g roasted turkey breast	Total	1 serving
Water	g	283.3	921.6	169.7	1374.6	343.65
Energy	kcal	97	154	367.5	618.5	154.625
Protein	g	2.53	19.2	75.325	97.055	24.26375
Total lipid (fat)	g	0.62	5.76	5.2	11.58	2.895
Carbohydrate, by difference	g	23.77	11.52	0	35.29	8.8225
Fiber, total dietary	g	3.1	0	0	3.1	0.775
Sugars, total	g	6.58	1.25	0	7.83	1.9575
Minerals				0	0	0
Calcium, Ca	mg	94	38	22.5	154.5	38.625
Iron, Fe	mg	3.43	2.02	1.775	7.225	1.80625
Magnesium, Mg	mg	44	10	80	134	33.5
Phosphorus, P	mg	53	288	575	916	229
Potassium, K	mg	271	826	622.5	1719.5	429.875
Sodium, Na	mg	31	288	247.5	566.5	141.625
Zinc, Zn	mg	0.19	0.96	4.3	5.45	1.3625
Vitamins				0	0	0
Vitamin C, total ascorbic acid	mg	13.1	0	0	13.1	3.275
Thiamin	mg	0.081	0	0.0875	0.1685	0.042125
Riboflavin	mg	0.062	0.288	0.5125	0.8625	0.215625
Niacin	mg	0.624	13.152	29.375	43.151	10.78775
Vitamin B-6	mg	0.353	0.096	2.0175	2.4665	0.616625
Folate, DFE	µg	75	0	22.5	97.5	24.375
Vitamin B-12	µg	0	0.96	0.975	1.935	0.48375
Vitamin A, RAE	µg	128	0	7.5	135.5	33.875
Vitamin A, IU	IU	2533	0	27.5	2560.5	640.125
Vitamin E (alpha-tocopherol)	mg	1.56	0	0.15	1.71	0.4275
Vitamin D (D2 + D3)	µg	0	0	0.75	0.75	0.1875
Vitamin D	IU	0	0	25	25	6.25
Vitamin K (phylloquinone)	µg	79.2	0	0	79.2	19.8
Lipids				0	0	0
Fatty acids, total saturated	g	0.084	1.718	1.4825	3.2845	0.821125
Fatty acids, total monounsaturated	g	0.009	2.63	1.565	4.204	1.051
Fatty acids, total polyunsaturated	g	0.346	1.21	1.32	2.876	0.719
Cholesterol	mg	0	0	0.06	0.06	0.015

Ratatouille

OMG, a new post!
The horrid summer heat of Walnut Creek is receding, and a young girl's thoughts turn once more to ovens.

I looked in my fridge Thursday and realized that the only thing in there was all the ingredients for ratatouille.  Sio that had to happen!

There are a million ways to make this dish, but I primarily read Julia Child's recipe, the wikipedia article and a nice article in the Guardian.  (A shout out here to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, my 2yr home town paper).

Rifling through these I evaluated all steps for a) necessity and b) difficulty.  Here is what I did:

Step 1) make a piperade

• Saute one large onion (finely diced) and 2 bell peppers (finely diced) until soft
• Add minced garlic to taste, bay, thyme, and herbs de provence
• Add 2-3 small tomatoes (also finely chopped but neither peeled nor seeded) and simmer down till thick

Piperade

Grilled veggies are yumm

Step 2) grill veggies slices

• Slice up equal amounts of eggplant (1med-peeled)  zucchini (2 large) and tomatoes (3 med)
• Grill the zucchini and eggplant slices.  I did this on my cast iron griddle while simmering the piperade and it was very little effort for big payoff.

Step 3) bake it

• In a pot (I used the same cast iron one I had made the piperade in) layer piperade, zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, more piprerade.
•   I think I should actually have put the tomatoes between the eggplant and zucchini.
• Place in a 350F oven with a lid 3/4 on, and leave to bake down for 90min-2hrs/when your house starts smelling like deliciousness

I ate it with some Parmesan cheese over rice.  My only two criticisms:   Needs more eggplant!!!  Also, it seems a waste to cook heirloom tomatoes, given how delicious they are raw.  Especially in caprese.

Fun fact:  I found out while doing research that Thomas Keller was the consulting chef for the film Ratatouille.  I suspect this was just so Pixar guys could try and work expense meals at the French Laundry (The first place I will eat upon becoming filthy rich).

Heirloom tomatoes in all their glory

My camera is useless once the sun goes down.  I promise this looked more appealing than the amorphous yellow blob leftover when I remembered to take a pic at 10pm

Lentils and Rice with Salad

As summer turns our kitchen into a 95F sweat-box I will be cooking less, and you will see a lot more recipes based around not turning on the stove.

This is my attempt to re-create a dish I had at Aladdin's Eatery in Squirrel Hill.
The dish is a mix of rice, lentils and fried onions, topped with a salad of cucumbers and tomatoes.  The base makes enough for leftovers, but I assembled the salad fresh each time.

Part one, the base: (4-6 servings)

• Put 2 cups of brown rice in a rice cooker along with 2 chicken bouillon cubes, the juice of one lemon and 2 tbspns of olive oil (plus the recommended water for your cooker)
• Open and rinse a packages of Trader Joe's precooked lentils.
• Mix all these together, along with ~ 1 cup fried onions-- we bought ours at a middle eastern grocer, but I think you could also substitute sauteed onions made at home

Part two, the salad (2 servings)

• Take 1/2 a package of cherry tomatoes (1.5 cups)
• Add 3 Persian cucumbers, sliced
• Mix with salt, pepper, lemon juice, and olive oil to taste

Then you just put everything together like in this picture:

Without the bouillon this is a vegetarian dish (replace the water with vegetable stock for the rice).  I found it very tasty and filling.