Meatless May: Bonus Recipes!

There’s more to this life than flesh and blood

From Mom’s Cook & Tell Column (July 22, 1976)

You can ask my old boss of years ago, a character from another segment of my checkered career in publishing. We both worked on a sailing magazine in Maryland, on the Chesapeake Bay. Not a vegetarian in any ethical sense any more than I am, Mike ate heartily and meatlessly. It had to do with a health condition when he was a very young boy and his parents fed him raw liver to build up strength. When he was ten, he rebelled (who could blame him?), foreswearing all meat in favor of only grains, greens, eggs, cheese, and variants thereof. He lived to tell the tale, for sure, a strapping guy who could order, with a straight face, a cheeseburger without the meat. He made the best omelets in town.

Mike cooked without recipes, so he’s of no use to us here. Instead, meet Lita, sweet and petite, who makes a meat-free treat that’s neat to eat. Not everything in her repertoire is as susceptible to schmaltzy poetry as this dish, and it’s not all vegetarian. But everything from her kitchen that I’ve tasted is delicious.

It’s fun getting to know someone who lives on a houseboat – that’s Lita on the Easy Life, tied up at the Boothbay Boatel. She’s someone who enjoys thrusting samples of just-made goodies at you and standing back, waiting for your inevitable approval. In that respect, Lita and I are two of a kind.

To be clear, I have nothing against meat. It’s like Christmas when my mother comes to visit, showing concern for my diet and my budget by stuffing my freezer with steaks and chops. It’s just that when the time comes that the old wallet has nothing more to give, you come to realize rather suddenly that the outgo for food is one item that can be drastically reduced. Vegetarians have it worked out to a science. My meat-free approach is casual. They use only the best ingredients and combine all the right things from this protein group and that one to make the equation come out right. I use my instincts and wing it. Somewhere I picked up the incidental intelligence that recommends including something from the nutsy-beansy group on the same menu with a dairy-product main dish. My carefree, occasionally vegetarian cuisine calls for a handful of peanuts tossed down while waiting for Lita’s Meatless Dish to emerge from the oven. Presto: protein-y peanuts plus cheese, in a meal that’s not only balanced in a somewhat vegetarian way, it makes your tummy happy, too.

Meatlessness isn’t all that bad. Eatlessness would be worse.

Here’s Lita’s neat treat that’s not only no-meat, it’s no-fuss. And, no fooling, it’s darned good.

LITA’S MEATLESS DISH

• 4 to 6 eggs, whatever you’ve got

• 1 lb cottage cheese

• Two 10-oz pkg frozen chopped spinach or broccoli, thawed and well-drained OR 2 bunches scallions, chopped and sautéed

• 1/3 c grated Parmesan cheese

• Salt and pepper to taste

• A few very thin slices Swiss, Muenster, or Provolone cheese

• Frozen onion rings, if desired

Preheat the oven to 375. Combine everything except the slices of cheese and pour into a greased casserole or nine-by-thirteen baking pan. Place a layer of thinly sliced Swiss, Muenster, or Provolone cheese on top and bake for about 20-25 minutes. Then brown under the broiler for about 4 minutes. Sometimes Lita spreads frozen French-fried onion rings over the top before baking.

Amie’s Endnotes

Somewhere between my late teens and early twenties, I became a vegetarian for environmental reasons and because I was passionate about animal welfare. My shelves were crammed with vegetarian cookbooks of the era—the Moosewood Cookbook and Vegetarian Epicure (both volumes), to name a few. My Lucite card file, a gift from my first mother-in-law and still used today, was stuffed with handwritten recipe cards: 5-can Casserole; Barley & Mushroom Casserole; Magic Mountain Vegetable Stew. Over the years, I’ve evolved into a cross between vegetarian and pescatarian, although some summers you might find me enjoying a gigantic cheeseburger from the Eagle’s Nest overlooking the river in Brewer, Maine—a menu choice second only to their equally gigantic lobster rolls.

So yeah, sometimes I eat meat. I’m not opposed to it. If you want to sing out, sing out. If you want to eat meat, eat meat.