Dieting? Don't Be Afraid to Indulge

It's difficult not to eat stuffed peppers, pot pies, burgers and quesadillas without thinking you're going to have to compensate for it with an hour on the treadmill and 50 laps in the pool.

But all those things can actually be good for you. Honest.

Claire Criscuolo is the founder and proprietor of legendary health food emporium Claire's Corner Copia, in New Haven, Connecticut (www.clairescornercopia.com), and as she nears the restaurant's 35th Anniversary in September, she wants to deliver a message to the rest of the world: Healthy doesn't have to hurt.

"For more than three decades, we've been working on creating healthy foods that don't taste like healthy foods," Criscuolo said. "When most people think of health foods, they think of bland, gritty or virtually tasteless substitutes for the fatty, unhealthy foods they'd prefer to eat. Instead, we don't try to imitate anything - all our recipes and dishes are created from scratch, with originality and creativity. We work hard to buy sustainable and organic ingredients because we think we should take as much care in preparing our menu items as people should be taking in their health and diets. For instance, we eliminated trans fats from our menus in 2001, replacing shortenings in our pie crusts with organic and trans fat free and our pie crusts remain tender yet flaky, the way most people like them."

Criscuolo's gourmet vegetarian restaurant, a hub of the healthy eating population worldwide, opened in 1975, and probably owes its being a few years ahead of its time to being close to Yale University's progressive campus. The restaurant was handicapped accessible long before the law mandated it, eliminated trans fats from its menu before most people knew what they were, before accessibility laws were enacted, was declared kosher nearly a decade ago and has had a Braille version of its menu since the 1980s.

"Popular foods that are loaded with delicious and healthy vegetables include comfort foods, like stuffed peppers, vegetable pot pies, and our Portobello stacks with braised organic baby spinach, sun-dried tomato pesto, and feta cheese," Criscuolo said. "Our Quesadilla Zio Javier has organic black beans, tomatoes, chili peppers, onions, and salsa verde with organic avocado, and we make our own veggie burgers. We make a Greek Veggie Burger with organic oats and brown rice, carrots, walnuts, onions, mushrooms, and we top it feta, cucumber, and yogurt. It's all healthy, but it all tastes like the richest gourmet fare."

With entrees like that, there's room for a little indulgence with Claire's world famous Lithuanian Coffee Cake, a signature staple of Claire's menu.

"Our Lithuanian Coffee Cake started out with the name, Sally Tessler's Mother's Coffee Cake, because the base recipe started out as our beloved employees Mom's family recipe," Criscuolo said. "I added coffee and vanilla to the batter and added coffee grounds and brown sugar and walnuts to the filling. After a short while, we realized the name was a bit lengthy and I wanted to name it after the place Sally's Mom's family came from; Sally told me that her Mom's family came from what was Lithuania, and at the time that was part of the Soviet bloc. Well, I suggested we help the ‘revolution' with the cake and declare it Lithuanian Coffee Cake. I wish democracy came that easily, but Sally loved the idea and years later when Lithuania became an independent country once again, she called to ask ‘So what do you think, did the Lithuanian Coffee Cake have anything to do with the freedom?'"

Claire Criscuolo graduated from East Haven High School in Connecticut (where years later, she was given the Distinguished Graduate Award) and went to the University of Bridgeport School of Nursing where she graduated and earned her RN. Happily married since 1975 to her husband and co-founder of Claire's Corner Copia, Frank Criscuolo, she has written three cookbooks of healthy recipes.