By Lisa Messinger
Food and Cooking at Creators Syndicate

Move over, blueberry and bran muffins, pot pie muffins are a force with which to be reckoned. Pie pans have traditionally been the "pot" for American pot pies, a foodstuff that actually goes back centuries to the Roman Empire and used to draw bragging rights for whichever pie had the most live birds fly from its "filling."

Muffin tins, though, are a neat modern way to conveniently improve on the old process. Whether it's your own homemade crust or an easy refrigerated biscuit dough or thawed puff pastry one, it's as simple as greasing the muffin tin and pressing the dough into it and up its sides with a slight hangover.

You can then pull up the hangover and push the pieces together for a top crust. Best of all, you've also got a miniature flaky bottom crust --- a comfort food element some of us feel gypped about when restaurants or recipes decide to go bottomless.

Tasty food like this also proves cooking can be easy, nutritious, economical, entertaining - and fast. They take just 10 seconds each to read and are almost that quick to prepare. The creative combinations are delicious proof that everyone has time for tasty home cooking and, more importantly, the healthy family togetherness that goes along with it! Another benefit: You - and your kidlet helpers - effortlessly become better cooks, since there are no right or wrong amounts. These are virtually-can't-go-wrong combinations, so whatever you choose to use can't help but draw wows.

Following are a few filling suggestions that can be paired with the aforementioned muffin pan crust suggestions. Liquids should only be in about a 1:4 ratio with the other ingredients. Preheat oven to 375 F and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until edges of crust are deep golden brown.

• Cubed, cooked chicken or turkey; thawed frozen broccoli; low-fat cheddar cheese; soy milk; poultry seasoning.
• Cubed firm tofu; thawed frozen Asian-style vegetables; almond milk; ponzu sauce (a flavored sauce, lower in sodium than soy sauce found in the soy sauce aisle of many major supermarkets) or light soy sauce.
• Cubed cooked browned ground turkey; thawed frozen corn, low-fat Swiss cheese; soy milk; pumpkin pie spice (or individual dashes of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and allspice).
• Cubed, cooked lamb; diced cooked red potatoes with skin left on; low-fat milk; minced fresh mint and rosemary.
• Cubed baked apples, pears and sweet potatoes; almond milk; ground cloves and allspice; stevia or another natural calorie-free sweetener.


QUICK TIP OF THE WEEK:  Sweet potatoes are nutritional powerhouses featuring vitamins A and C, calcium and potassium. However, although they do have a somewhat sweet flavor, sometimes it's still difficult to get kids to eat them - even if you've transformed them into fries. Consider making them even more desirable - and crunchy - by taking the peeled sticks you've cut for fries and dipping them into a mixture of almond milk and olive oil, then lightly into a combination of whole-grain flour, well-crushed whole-grain flake cereal and dashes of black pepper and ground cinnamon. Bake on an ungreased (if you've used oil in the aforementioned mixture) cookie sheet in a preheated 450 F oven for 15 minutes, carefully turn with a spatula and bake for 5 or 10 minutes longer, or until crisp. Be careful not to burn them.

Lisa Messinger is a first-place winner in food and nutrition writing from the Association of Food Journalists and the National Council Against Health Fraud and author of seven food books, including the best-selling The Tofu Book: The New American Cuisine with 150 Recipes (Avery/Penguin Putnam) and Turn Your Supermarket into a Health Food Store: The Brand-Name Guide to Shopping for a Better Diet (Pharos/Scripps Howard). She writes two nationally syndicated food and nutrition columns for Creators Syndicate and had been a longtime newspaper food and health section managing editor, as well as managing editor of Gayot/Gault Millau dining review company. Lisa traveled the globe writing about top chefs for Pulitzer Prize-winning Copley News Service and has written about health and nutrition for the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, Reader's Digest, Woman's World and Prevention Magazine Health Books. Permission granted for use on DrLaura.com.