The vineyard is starting to green-up again after April’s frost damage. Over the weekend we pulled the last of the trellis wires over the two-year-old vines, so everything is ready to flourish. The herb garden is also thriving and Sunday afternoon was spent weeding and cleaning that patch. It was a beautiful weekend and a lovely Mother’s Day.

My boys served hamburgers cooked on the grill and baked baby potatoes for dinner on Sunday. I made it diet-friendly by placing my patty on a thin whole wheat roll with onions, lettuce and mustard. Just a dash of garlic salt seasoned the potatoes. It was a minor diet divergence, but I had been good all week.

One low-fat dinner that came out really well was the salmon patties served with fresh vegetables and a dollop of yogurt sauce. I’m not a big fan of canned meats, but I bought canned salmon. The can was a dollar more than the other brands and I hoped that would imply fewer bones to pick and discard. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.

Salmon Patties
16-oz canned salmon, picked for bones
1 small onion, diced
1⁄4 cup bread crumbs
4 egg whites
1 tsp. lemon juice
1 Tbsp. parsley, chopped
1 pinch salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Combine all ingredients. Form 8 patties and place on a pan sprayed with cooking oil. (I placed mine on a Silpat mat and no oil was needed.) Cook for 15 minutes until brown.

I had a bunch of asparagus spears ready with a light spray of olive oil and a dash of garlic salt and placed them in the oven for 10 minutes. I also steamed a head of cauliflower with a sprig of rosemary while the patties and asparagus cooked.

I love tartar sauce with fish, but instead I added about a quarter cup of chopped cucumber and 1 chopped green onion to a cup of fat-free Greek yogurt. I added a dash of salt, a tsp. of honey and 1⁄2 Tbsp. of chopped fresh dill.

With two patties per serving, the dinner feeds four. Each serving had 268 calories and 8 grams of fat.

That dinner didn’t seem like diet-food. Perhaps I’m just getting used to less fat. The next day for lunch I had a cold salmon patty with mustard on wheat bread with lettuce and tomato slices. The patties are great served hot or cold.