A lot of people think that heart healthy cooking means eating healthy but tasteless food. You can’t have fried chicken or fried okra or hammy green beans or pizza. They think eating healthy means a plateful of salad greens with a tasteless dressing and not much else going for it. All the good stuff people crave you can’t have and still be eating heart healthy.

The fact is, you CAN have all those foods, with a few minor changes in how you prepare them. Coat your chicken with egg whites and then a dredge of flour mixed with some herbs and just a sprinkle of sea salt before cooking in the oven on a wire rack in a baking dish. Same with okra, just mix in a bit of cornmeal with the flour. Use ham flavoring in your green beans instead of a hamhock or ham bone.

And pizza? How about a pizza that’s low fat, low carb, low sodium, and easy on the budget? Plus super tasty? And easy to make? For me, that’s a count me in item, especially on a busy day when I really don’t want to do anything too complicated, but I would like something better than out of a box from the freezer.

This recipe started as a tomato galette, but I wanted some healthy protein to make it a complete meal. I’m on a low sodium diet and my husband’s on a serious low fat diet, but that actually ended up with me creating a new family favorite. The only issue we had was I didn’t make enough; even my picky eater wanted more.

Tasty Heart Healthy Pizza

1. Preheat your oven to 350, and while the oven is preheating, slice about 4 medium tomatoes from your garden about a 1/4” thick, and maybe a few bitty ones. Put them on a clean dish towel for about 15 minutes to draw out excess moisture.

2. Unroll your store bought pie crust or pizza crust onto a lightly sprayed cookie sheet. If you’re gluten intolerant, use a store bought gluten free pizza crust. If using the pizza crust, follow directions about pre-cooking it before putting the toppings on

3. Place a layer of thin sliced low fat provolone cheese and cover with a couple of dollops of low-fat cottage cheese, spread thin.

4. Place your choice of fresh herbs on top of the cottage cheese. Oregano and basil are good choices.

5. Cover the herbs with your sliced tomatoes, overlapping just a bit, and brush the tomatoes with pesto sauce, using a pastry brush and bake for about 30 minutes.

Serves 2

I included a picture below of a stir-fry made with spiralized zucchini, tomatoes, lean chicken, and pesto sauce.