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If You Can Find The Correct Aisle, Get Soup For These Pita Pockets

Merri Lou Dobler Correspondent

Some people are content to shop in the same grocery store all the time. Others like the thrill of checking out different stores.

If you cruise the supermarkets, you’ve probably noticed that you have to reorient yourself to each store and its idiosyncrasies. Breads are in one place, dairy products in another. Count yourself lucky if you can find the flour tortillas without walking from one end to the other.

Here’s what I’d like to see at grocery stores:

Chain stores all laid out in the same way - for example, going into any Safeway or Rosauers and knowing right where to go for evaporated skim milk or canned kidney beans.

New foods displayed prominently, in special sections or highlighted with colored tags on the shelves.

More taste testing and product comparisons, such as samples of three different brands of frozen pizzas with coupons for each.

More free recipes. People are always looking for new ideas. Albertson’s stores feature quick and easy recipes displayed with everyday products.

Nonfat foods offered in the same size packages as regular foods. Right now you have to settle for a 1-pound size of nonfat sour cream, for example, when what you really need is the 8-ounce size.

If you’re looking for a neat recipe that uses one of the newer canned soups, then here’s one right up your alley.

Pita Pockets

From “Healthy Choice Recipes For Today” (Publications International).

1 can Healthy Choice Recipe Creations Tomato With Garden Herbs Condensed Soup

1/4 cup fat-free sour cream

Vegetable cooking spray

1 pound ground turkey

1/2 cup fat-free shredded Cheddar cheese

1/2 cup sliced green onions

1/2 teaspoon salt, optional

3 pita bread rounds, cut in half to form pockets

1 cup each shredded lettuce and diced tomato

In small bowl, combine soup and sour cream; mix well. Set aside.

In large nonstick skillet sprayed with vegetable cooking spray, cook turkey over medium-high heat until no longer pink; drain. Add soup mixture, cheese, onions and salt to skillet; mix well. Reduce heat, cover and simmer 5 minutes or until cheese is melted.

Fill pita bread pockets with turkey mixture. Garnish with lettuce and tomato.

Yield: 6 servings.

Nutrition information per serving: 270 calories, 21 grams protein, 7 grams fat (23 percent fat calories), 430 milligrams sodium.

, DataTimes MEMO: The goal of Five and Fifteen is to find recipes where you can do the shopping in five minutes and the cooking in 15. Merri Lou Dobler, a registered dietitian and Spokane resident, welcomes ideas from readers. Write to Five and Fifteen, Features Department, The Spokesman-Review, P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210.

The following fields overflowed: SUPCAT = COLUMN, RECIPE - Five and Fifteen

The goal of Five and Fifteen is to find recipes where you can do the shopping in five minutes and the cooking in 15. Merri Lou Dobler, a registered dietitian and Spokane resident, welcomes ideas from readers. Write to Five and Fifteen, Features Department, The Spokesman-Review, P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210.

The following fields overflowed: SUPCAT = COLUMN, RECIPE - Five and Fifteen