I heard Gwyneth Paltrow was coming out with a cookbook and it kind of scared me. I was expecting it to be a collection of recipes that contained bizarre ingredients that I’d never heard of, corresponding with her macro biotic lifestyle. I was pleasantly surprised to find when I thumbed through the pages of My Father’s Daughter while at Target, that my assumptions were all wrong! (That is why you don’t assume!) I was looking forward to receiving my copy all week. (Sorry Target, I found it cheaper on-line thanks to my stealth “Red Laser” iPhone app~Thanks Jobin for that recommendation). I read through Gwyneth’s anecdotes about her family and what a key role food plays in their lives (past and present). It is so refreshing to read about a popular actress embracing food in a positive way, as oppose to the tales we tend to hear about eating disorders and weight obsession.
I was excited to find that I had most of her “well stocked pantry” ingredients in my “well stocked pantry”. Sure there are a few things I need to figure out, like what “spelt flour” is and if I am brave enough to try “Vegenaise”. The thing I really like about this book is that she has a lot of fish recipes. Fish is one of the things I don’t know what to do with in the kitchen. My mom is allergic to fish (and shellfish) so we rarely ate fish at home, beyond the occasional fish stick. I never got to observe how to prepare fish, as I was able to with so many other things that my parents cooked.
So for this week, I decided to try out Gwyneth’s recipe for both Fish Tacos. These were surprisingly easy to do. I picked up tilapia for my tacos, under the recommendation of the fish monger at Stew Leonards. I made fresh guacamole and salted cabbage based on her recipes. I used salsa I had on hand, as well as sour cream as opposed to her recipe for Lime Cream (simply because I haven’t gotten the Vegenaise yet.). I also added some black beans (like Gwyneth’s in the video below) and brown rice to my spread of taco filler options. Simple and tasty!
Here is a video from GP’s Goop Blog for her Mexican family dinner of Baja Tacos in which she reviews her recipe for the guac, and fresh salsa. Yum!
Photo Credit – Raquel Casas / 20 Minutos [CC-BY-SA-2.1-es], via Wikimedia Commons
The Souzapalooza Blog 
I heard she is going to give Martha Stewart a run for her money. Gwyneth is the real deal!
It wouldn’t surprise me!
This sounds like a delicious dish. I am starting this week trying her recipes every week. I am cooking my way through her cookbook! 🙂
This one was tasty! I also tried the brownies last week, they are more cake like than brownie, but still good