Another Fantastic Dinner!

I'm on a roll! We had yet another delicious dinner last night and it's really motivating me to find more recipes to try. Best part is that I don't feel like I'm on a diet at all! We also had another first in our home last night, Scott and I cooked dinner together without driving each other crazy. You may find that silly, however, what you need to understand is that we have a tiny kitchen and Scott's a chef and when he's in the zone you don't get in the way. So, last night we had a great time and really enjoyed cooking together and the dinner we made. I'll be giving a couple of options with this dinner and you can make it your own like we did. The dinner was Baked Tilapia with Veggies and Rosemary and Parmesean Polenta.

For those who don't know, polenta is basically yellow grits and you can create polenta with either yellow cornmeal or purchased polenta at the grocery store. What's the difference between yellow cornmeal and polenta? I'm glad you asked, actual polenta is a finer grain and yellow cornmeal is slightly larger. Polenta's history is quite interesting actually, I thought it was more of a southwestern/hispanic sort of dish when it actually came out of ancient Rome. For quite sometime it was in the form of a buckwheat polenta until the New World introduced them to the maize version. As for tilapia, the health benefits really coincide well with the anti-inflammatory diet. Tilapia contains the Omega-3s that are so healthy for our heart and bodies, which of course also provide the anti-inflammatory properties of the fish. In recent years tilapia has been given a bad rap for it's content of Omega-6 fatty acids, while omega-6 is still a ployunsaturaed fat they are thought to contribute to potential clotting and possibly have inflammatory properties too. I want to present this to you because if you are uncomfortable with the omega-6 fatty acids then you may want to consider changing the kind of fish you use in this recipe, which is suggested below within the recipe.

Baked Tilapia with Veggies

1 tsp. olive oil
1 cup diced zucchini
1/2 cup minced onion
1 clove garlic, peeled and minced
2 cups diced fresh roma tomatoes
2 tbsp. fresh basil, chopped
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. ground black pepper
4 tilapia fillets, about 6 oz. each (you can also use halibut)
1/3 cup feta cheese, crumbled
Splash of balsamic vinegar

Preparation:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Lightly grease a medium baking dish or spray with vegetable oil. In a medium saucepan, heat olive oil over medium heat and stir in zucchini, onion and garlic. Sauté lightly for about 5 minutes, or until tender. Turn off heat and mix in tomatoes, basil, salt and pepper. Arrange tilapia in the baking dish. Top each fillet with an equal amount of the zucchini mixture and sprinkle with feta cheese and splash with balsamic vinegar. Bake 8-10 minutes, or until fillets flake easily with a fork (if using halibut you will bake for 15 minutes).

Rosemary and Parmesean Polenta

Ingredients:
3/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth
2/3 cup water
1/2 cup vanilla soy milk
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
3 tablespoons shredded Parmesan cheese, or more if desired
salt and black pepper to taste

Directions:
In a saucepan, bring to a boil the chicken broth, water, milk, garlic, rosemary, and salt. Gradually whisk in cornmeal, set heat to medium-low, and simmer the cornmeal mixture until thick and creamy, stirring often to prevent lumps, about 15 minutes. Remove from the heat, and stir in the Parmesan cheese until well combined. You can choose to stop here and have a nice creamy polenta of if you want to add some crunchy texture to your meal continue below.


Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease a casserole dish. Spoon the polenta into the prepared casserole, adding more Parmesan cheese if desired. Sprinkle the top with salt and pepper.

Bake in the preheated oven until the polenta is bubbling and golden brown on top, about 15-20 minutes.

I found the tilapia dish on Dr. Perricone's website who is a big supporter of the anti-inflammatory diet and his website is a great resource for other recipes. The polenta recipce came from http://www.allrecipes.com/ where there is a small listing of some gluten-free recipies that you can modify to fix into your particular diet. Enjoy!