Kelly has been begging me for “fish, anything with fish…please Mommy”, as of late. Monday night seemed like a good night for a potato-encrusted cod, paired with asparagus and Karen Le Billon’s “Vicious Carrots”. Oh how I love those Vicious Carrots (properly pronounced is Vichy Carrots, but a friend mispronounced them while visiting for dinner, and so delighted her daughters, that this dish will forever be known as “Vicious Carrots” in the Le Billon household).

I am quoted in Getting To Yum as saying, “Wow. The prep was so simple, and I can’t say enough about the texture. You were right…it took cooked carrots to an entirely different level.” I was worried about making them in this little apartment on an electric stove top, after struggling to make so many of my favorite foods outside of my usual surroundings. But, as luck would have it, they were scrumptious. Easy to prepare, gorgeous to devour.

My point here is this: if you cannot imagine your children licking a plate of cod, asparagus, and carrots, then enter my giveaway for Karen’s latest book. You can leave a simple comment here, and you are entered to win Getting To Yum, The 7 Secrets Of Raising Eager Eaters. I did not magically wake up one morning to children begging for fish and asparagus. I used Karen’s loving and simple steps to train their taste buds to love good food. I say “good food”, not “healthy food”, because healthy makes me think of iceberg lettuce with a wedge of tomato, begrudgingly chewed while wearing sweaty gym clothes. Ugh. Beautifully-prepared, thoughtful, real food IS healthy food. Sitting down to candles and the wonderful scents of a family dinner (see Karen’s book, French Kids Eat Everything for these hints) IS healthy living.

Join me, as this summer we’ll be working our way through this book, and sharing our stories with each other.

My basic dinner prep is as follows:

You can encrust your own fish, which is best done in advance, and thrown in the fridge. It will most likely require a frying pan. There are countless recipes for encrusted fish, and I do enjoy making them. BUT, on a MONDAY (when we’re all tired from not sleeping well on Sunday night), you could stop by your favorite fish market and BUY freshly encrusted fish, and just bake it. And you thought I made everything from scratch. Ha! The prep was the 10 seconds it took me to open the package and put it on the baking dish.

Rice pilaf: there are plenty of boxes of this stuff without any added dyes, flavorings, using non-GMO rice.

Asparagus: Snap at the ends at the natural break. I lightly peel or scrub, depending on how much time I have. Cook bacon until it’s 75% done, and wrap around serving size bundles. Lightly drizzle with grape seed oil (olive oil works too, but I’ve found grape seed to be my favorite with asparagus…I used it accidentally a few months ago, and have never looked back). Salt and pepper. Throw it in with the fish for the last 7-10 minutes of baking.

Vicious Carrots: Get the book. You won’t be sorry.