low-fat = low-fun?

A result of Mr. Tart's recent gall bladder surgery is that he needs to eat low-fat food for a while until his liver gets used to doing the GB's work. While we generally eat healthily when I cook--no red meat or pork, lots of vegetables, not many desserts--I realized that that's not good enough. Cheese, for example. We eat cheese whenever possible. And we'd both rather go without--or just enjoy a small taste of something exquisite--than eat, say, low-fat soy cheese instead. (One of his friends promises us that "rice cheese" is delicious, but that concept is so wrong I can't even begin to consider it.) I've been doing my best, like making turkey burgers and baked french fries when he craves cheeseburgers and fries, and finding versions of hummus without lots of oil and tahini (with mache to brighten things up) and pasta salads without mayo (and with tons of fresh herbs) and buying baked tortilla chips to snack on with Katie's homemade salsa, but they just haven't seemed that great. The worst disaster was the low-fat pots de creme made with plain yogurt and ricotta cheese and powered hot chocolate mix. They tasted like, well, chocolate-flavored runny ricotta. Basically, we're discovering that any dish that normally has fat in it doesn't work so well when you take the fat out. We're better off just eating lots of salads and lean meats and Egg Beaters and fruit for a while! Thank goodness for Cooking Light magazine and fellow blogger Never Trust a Skinny Chef, who offer some creative and enthusiastic low-fat options. (CL's creme brulee made with 2% milk thickened with nonfat powdered milk is actually pretty good, especially when topped with backyard raspberries.)