When we returned from a short vacation last week, there were plenty of ripe strawberries to pick. Lil asked sweetly, "Can we make strawberry shortcake please Mama?" She is hard to refuse. But after four days of restaurants and treats, I wanted to make dessert a little healthier. I adapted a recipe my mother uses for shortcake by lessening the sugar, using white whole wheat flour, and substituting skimmed milk. The recipe might originally be from an old version of a Betty Crocker cookbook but I'm not sure.

Served with a heaping portion of strawberries, one eighth of this cake has 213 calories, according to Spark People online recipe nutrition calculator. It has 4 grams of protein, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 8 grams of fat, 50 mg of potassium and plenty of other vitamins. While still falling into the category of a 'sometimes food' in my opinion, this version of strawberry shortcake is reasonable to serve as a weeknight dessert.

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Strawberry Shortcake Makes: 8 servings Time: 20 minutes preparation, 35 minutes cooking

1/4 cup vegetable shortening

1/2 cup white granulated sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cup white whole wheat flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 cup 2% milk

1/2 cup (local in season) strawberries per person, chopped

Heat oven to 350 degrees F.

Cream shortening and sugar with an electric mixer.

Add egg and vanilla and cream again.

In a separate bowl, mix flour, salt, and baking powder. Add to creamed shortening and sugar alternately with milk.

Spread in a 8 inch circular cake pan and bake for 35 minutes at 350 degrees F. Allow to cool slightly and top with strawberries.

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