Rabbit Food

After publishing that factoid about rabbits not needing to find additional water, it made me think of how to stay hydrated by EATING -- instead of ingesting all this blasted water (though I'm doing well, Seymour, thank you very much, by adding one large Thermos in the morning and one in the afternoon).

Fruit, of course works, and salads. Grapefruit (90% water) added to breakfast and a side salad of cucumber (97% water) and tomato (95%) at lunch definitely contribute to your daily total. (Meat, by contrast, is just 15% water.) But it's a little chill for salads all day; so if you're craving comfort food check out this spinach creation -- at 92% water, totally qualifying for rabbit food.

Spinach is a fairly recent vegetable in Western cooking; brought to Spain by the Moors in the 11th century, spinach's popularity rapidly spread. (Though the English for a while called it that "Spanish vegetable".) One fan was Catherine de Medici, who is said to have brought her own cooks with her from Florence, Italy, when she wed the King of France, to make her fave spinach dishes. Hence, anything on a bed of spinach is said to be a la Florentine....

not beautiful, tastes great!!

Spinach a la Rebecca

named for my mom, who made this up

32 ounces of frozen spinach or large clamshell organic baby spinach*
1 teaspoon butter
1 large shallot
2 cloves garlic
1 cup cottage cheese
2 eggs
1/2 cup shredded Gruyere or other hard cheese
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
optional: small can of water chestnuts, diced

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Defrost spinach or blanch baby spinach by adding to a large pot of boiling water until wilted. Discard the water, as spinach has a high acid content and it will leech into the liquid.

Chop the shallot and garlic finely. Melt butter in a skillet and saute the garlic and shallot until golden. Add spinach to combine.

Add cottage cheese, egg, salt and nutmeg to a food processor and whiz until cottage cheese is smooth.

Fold cottage cheese and shredded cheese into the spinach, along with water chestnuts if you like a bit of crunch. Bake for half hour, or until tawny on top.

*Environmental Working Group has named spinach is one of the top six vegetables most likely to carry pesticide residue in their "dirty dozen". So beware your source.

Sante!