KISRA Cooking Series

KISRA Cooking Series

The cooking series at KISRA started off with lots of fun and excitement.  Our menu included collard greens, honey crunch chicken and creamy applesauce pudding.

What I think was most exciting was being able to prepare the most delicious collard greens with ham seasoning  (which is not ham but a vegetarian-based product that tastes like ham), by cooking the collard greens in this ham based seasoning, and then after the greens were cooked and draining off the liquid, adding a little bit of olive oil.  Those who wanted to add a little salt and pepper could, but the truth is the salt and pepper was not needed.  The collard greens were an absolute hit!

I also want to always tell the truth, and I have to say this was my first time in all of my life to ever eat collard greens and they were fabulous.  One of the reasons I never ate collard greens is because according to tradition from a soul food perspective, they are always cooked in a ham hock, bacon grease or many pieces of bacon.  For that reason I have always avoided tasting the vegetable.  I believe the same thing has been true for green beans, mustard greens, turnip greens and kale, and while they are very healthy vegetables – dark green by nature and so good for us – because of their accepted cooking method, I’ve always steered clear.  Well, that belief is over because we introduced the way to make them in a healthy fashion.

Please try them – by the way the Ham Seasoning is available at the Shape Shop – and if you’re reading this and are from outside of Charleston – ham seasoning can be shipped directly to you.  It is just an incredible product.  Our chicken bouillon is quite dynamite too.

The honey crunch chicken, which is in the Lean and Luscious cookbook, is not only easy to make but it calls for four ingredients and everyone in the cooking class loved the end result.  Our creamy applesauce pudding dessert was equally stupendous and we made that first so it could be refrigerated and add that cold finishing touch to a perfectly delightful meal.

We’re doing great things with our Lean and Luscious recipes and the next cooking series class is Monday, March 9 from 6-8:00 p.m.  We’re going to have an equally exciting meal and we’ll tell you about it in next week’s post.  If you have gotten your copy of Lean and Luscious, it’s available on Amazon.com, the Shape Shop, Taylor Books, and Kroger at Ashton Place – so the resources are many.  Stop in and get your copy and the recipes will speak for themselves.

Thanks for reading!

Millie Snyder