The beauty of lettuce

I don't know too many kids who enjoy eating lettuce.  For the most part they seem to take a bite then spit it out, with a "what's the point of this?"sort of look.  At one of my recent coeliac meetings, I met with a lady who wanted to know if I had a good recipe for wraps.  I had to confess that I didn't.  I've tried a few recipes and they were pretty disgusting, so I decided to go around the problem.  I told her about our love of tortillas, but I had to admit that as far as "wrapping" is concerned, probably not such a great idea.  You can fill them with chicken, rice, vegetables etc. but most of the filling will end up in your lap and they certainly don't lend to "wrapping".

A week after this encounter I remembered the beauty of lettuce.  Sometimes, I use lettuce leaves as wraps to hold chicken, fish, burgers, anything really and the children love them.  It's an idea I've borrowed from Vietnamese cooking. 

This week, I made some fish fingers (recipe on page 60 of The Gluten Free Cookbook for Kids).  I set these out hot from the oven in a big bowl, sorrounded by other bowls containing fresh pea shoots, grated carrots with rice vinegar, strips of red pepper and a bowl of fresh home made guacamole.  A little bowl of fish sauce, lime juice and a bit of sugar served as a dipping sauce. The children made little parcels using all the different fillings and then drizzled a bit of sauce on top.  The verdict was a huge thumbs up from both Ruthie and Lucia.  Marc seemed pretty happy too.  It made for a very light, healthy evening meal.  Thinking out of the box isn't always this successful but this time I managed to pull the rabbit out of the hat. So next time you have a craving for wraps, think lettuce.

 

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adriana's picture
adriana wrote 14 years 26 weeks ago

Bertinet Kitchen Maize Wraps

 

Hot off the press, for the lady requesting a recipe for wraps.  I recently assisted on a course at The Bertinet Kitchen in Bath where one of the recipes on the course included maize wraps.  These were pretty straight forward to make and tasted really nice.  I shall ask Monsieur Bertinet if he would like to share his recipe (be warned he may not want to), but lovely lady if you are still out there, keep checking the recipe section on this web site - as it may one day be listed.  Wow, you will be so happy!