Happy accidents occur quite a bit in Carol Maglio’s aromatic kitchen. And they happen most often when her cookbook-writing partner and acupuncturist, Dr. Ken Grey, is in the kitchen with her, chopping herbs, pan-toasting spices or coddling coconut oil. One of them will toss out an idea and the other will build upon it in a culinary call-and-response that results in something truly delicious.

Take the summer tacos, for instance. What began as a simple thought – a bean-filled taco – evolved into a dish they call “Kick-A-My Butt Jicama Tacos,” an exquisite variation that’s wrapped in a shaving of jicama and filled with sweet corn, hot peppers, bright tomatillo, fresh cilantro, smashed avocado, watermelon rind and adzuki beans.

As one might imagine, it’s a dish that requires a considerable amount of slicing, shaving, dicing, mincing and smashing. It involves a mandolin slicer for the jicama and a quick dunk in boiling water to slightly soften the sweet, crunchy tuber. It involves slicing the kernels off fresh corn cobs, peeling and pitting avocados, and plucking leaves from sprigs of cilantro. But the process allows the duo more brainstorm time – and, more important, it also reinforces the worth of each ingredient.

This is the force that drives the authors of Health in Balance: Summer Cuisine, a newly released e-book by the Jupiter area duo. The deliberate use of healing ingredients can be delicious. Meaty adzuki beans, for example, support kidney and adrenal functions, helps heal the heart and small intestine and detoxifies the body, says Grey, an acupuncturist at Jupiter Medical Center. The Serrano and red cherry peppers help boost immunity and increase circulation. The jicama offers all kinds of Vitamin B and C action, among other things. That’s just the start of the goodies stuffed into that crunchy taco.

Grey and Maglio, who call their collaboration Juice & Essence, came together as cooking and writing partners during Maglio’s recovery from cervical cancer. For more than a year now, they’ve been meeting regularly in Maglio’s Jupiter Island kitchen to riff on ingredients and take on culinary projects that are sometimes quite ambitious. (Hello, scallops with jalapeño-infused walnut oil and stuffed leeks.)

Their cookbook, available for $9.99 on amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com, is a treasury of the summer recipes that came out of their free-wheeling cooking sessions. (They plan additional seasonal Health in Balance e-cookbooks, the next one scheduled for a fall release.) Each entry offers a blurb on the dish’s origins and inspirations, as well as an explanation of its health benefits.

“When we come up with an idea, we immediately build on it and ask, ‘how can we increase the nutritional value?’” says Maglio, an avid cook since childhood.

When she and Grey talked about boosting the healing properties of a chocolate dessert, they began to build an extraordinary cupcake moistened with coconut oil and tart cherries (“Which are great blood-builders,” says Grey), sweetened with demerara sugar and raw coconut crystals, and deepened with intense dark cocoa powder. The result, topped with a coconut-pecan frosting, is one decadent little cupcake. (And it’s gluten-free.)

“We are always amazed at out it all comes together when we cook,” says Maglio.

If there is an identifying characteristic to Maglio’s cooking, it’s the attention to nuance and detail. She doesn’t simply use grape seed oil on her salad, she uses grape seed oil that’s been infused with orange.

“Look how easy it is to make this dressing,” she says as she whisks that oil into a small bowl with clementine zest, scallions, mustard and salt on a recent day in her kitchen.

She would drizzle the delicate emulsion over a mix of haricots verts, radicchio, arugula and sliced white peaches for a bright, flavorful salad.

“These foods are energizing,” says Grey, who stays true to his family’s Trinidadian roots in his choice of natural, island-inspired ingredients, be they immunity-boosting scotch bonnet peppers or invigorating ox tails. “People ask me, ‘How do I fix my adrenals?’ But if you don’t have the proper nutrition, how do you begin to fix it? How do you take water from a rock?”

Recipes and excerpts: from ‘Health in Balance: Summer Cuisine,’ by Carol Maglio and Dr. Ken Grey.

KICK-A-MY BUTT JICAMA TACOS

These tacos use sweet, crunchy jicama slices as shells to wrap a colorful saute of veggies and legumes.

“Adzuki bean is healing to the heart and small intestine, tonifies the kidney-adrenal function, detoxifies the body, reduces heat, reduces swelling… Grape seed oil is high in vitamin C and is a significant source of Omega-3 and 6 essential fatty acids. Celery is healing to the stomach and liver channels, clears heat, treats high blood pressure and dizziness. Corn is a healing agent to the heart, lung, spleen, liver, stomach, gallbladder and bladder… Red cherry peppers and Serrano peppers offer immune boosting, circulation increasing… Avocados are rich in healthy fats and benefit the skin as well as the brain, liver, lungs and large intestine. Jicama is rich in B complex vitamins, folate, riboflavin, pantothenic acid and thiamin… Watermelon rind reduces toxins and clears heat, treats summer heat symptoms…”

Serves 12

To prepare the filling:

1 tablespoon grape seed oil

½ cup minced red onion

1 teaspoon seeded and minced fresh hot red cherry pepper

1 teaspoon seeded and minced fresh Serrano pepper

1/3 cup chopped celery

1/3 cup minced tomatillo

2 teaspoons minced garlic

1 cup chopped tomato

2 cups fresh corn kernels, cut from about 4 cobs

1-15 ounce can adzuki beans, washed and drained

4 teaspoons minced fresh cilantro

½ teaspoon sea salt

½ teaspoon white pepper

Heat the oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add the onion, hot red cherry pepper, Serrano pepper, celery and tomatillo. Sauté for 3 minutes and add the garlic. Continue to sauté for one minute. Then add the tomato, corn, beans, cilantro, salt and pepper and sauté for 3 more minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.

Prepare the avocado:

2 Haas avocados, peeled and pitted

1 lime, juiced

½ teaspoon sea salt

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

½ teaspoon cumin

Place the avocados into a bowl. Add the lime juice, salt, pepper and cumin. Mash the mixture until the avocado is smooth and everything is incorporated. Set aside.

Prepare the jicama and watermelon:

2 large jicama, peeled

4 cups water

1 cup dry white wine

Watermelon rind from about 2 slices that are 1” wide

Heat the water and the wine in a large saucepan until it boils. Reduce heat to medium and maintain a simmer.

Using a mandolin, thinly slice the jicama to create rounds about 1/8th of an inch thick.

With the water at a simmer, drop a couple of the slices of jicama into the liquid. The slices will immediately sink to the bottom. When the slices float up to the top, remove them to a wax paper lined sheet pan. Continue with the remaining jicama slices. Set aside to cool to room temperature.

For the watermelon, use a vegetable peeler to thinly slice strips from the light green, inner part of the rinds. Then cut the strips into very thin, 3” long pieces. Set aside.

To assemble:

Prepared jicama

Prepared avocado

Filling mixture

About 50 cilantro leaves

Watermelon rind strips

Place one piece of jicama onto a work surface. Spread some of the avocado onto the middle of the jicama. Top with the filling, some cilantro leaves and a strip of watermelon rind. Fold in half like a taco and place on a serving platter. Serve immediately or the tacos can be prepared 8 hours in advance. Cover and refrigerate. Remove from the refrigerator and let them sit, still covered, for about an hour before serving.

HARICOT VERT, ARUGULA & RADICCHIO SALAD WITH WHITE PEACHES IN A CLEMENTINE DRESSING

“Haricot vert, the star of this medley, has a neutral nature and sweet flavor with benefits ranging from spleen-pancreas and kidney strengthening to assisting with the frequent thirst accompanying most cases of diabetes… The peaches in this dish help to lower blood pressure…”

Serves 4

For orange-infused oil:

2/3 cup grapeseed oil or other neutral oil

1 orange, zest removed in strips from whole orange (Reserve orange for another use)

Bring ingredients to a simmer in a small saucepan. Simmer for 5 minutes the set aside to cool. Once cool, strain out the orange peel and discard. Reserve 1 tablespoon of the orange-infused oil for roasting the haricots verts.

For the clementine dressing:

3 clementines, grated zest from all and juice from all

2 scallions, finely chopped, white and light green parts only

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

Pinch of salt

2/3 cup (less 1 tablespoon) orange-infused oil

Combine the clementine zest and juice, scallions, mustard and salt in a small bowl. Whisk in the orange infused oil in a thin stream until dressing is emulsified.

Make the salad:

8 ounces of haricots verts

1 tablespoon orange infused oil

1/8 teaspoon freshly ground Himalayan salt

1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

8 ounces arugula

1 cup radicchio, sliced in strips

2 white peaches, thinly sliced

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place haricot verts on a rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle with orange infused oil, salt and pepper. Mix to coat beans well. Spread out in a single layer on baking sheet. Roast for about 10 minutes until lightly browned. Let cool.

In a large salad bowl, mix the arugula, radicchio, white peaches and haricot verts together with enough dressing to coat. Add salt and pepper if necessary. Serve immediately.

TART CHERRY-CHOCOLATE MINI CUPCAKES WITH COCONUT-PECAN FROSTING

In these gluten-free cupcakes, say the authors, “baking science met intuition.”

“Cherry benefits the spleen, stomach, lung, heart and kidneys. Cherry is an energizer which also increases circulation and can help with dry sore throat and build blood. Coconut benefits the spleen, stomach and large intestines… Cocoa aids in decreased blood pressure, improved blood vessel health and improvement in cholesterol levels.”

Makes approximately 72 cupcakes

Prepare the cupcakes:

2 ¼ cup Bob’s Red Mill All Purpose Gluten Free Baking Flour

½ cup unsweetened dark cocoa powder

1 ¾ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon iodized salt

¾ cup GARDEN OF LIFE - Living Foods Extra Virgin Coconut Oil, solidified

1 cup organic raw coconut crystals

1 cup demerara sugar

1/3 cup minced canned tart cherries (in water – drained)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 eggs

1 cup organic unsweetened tart cherry juice

1/3 cup cold water

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place the mini cupcake liners into the pans and set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

In the mixing bowl of a stand mixer, place the solidified coconut oil, raw coconut crystals sweetener and Demerara sugar. Mix on medium speed for about 30 seconds to combine.

Add the tart cherries and vanilla extract. Beat for another 30 seconds to combine. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each.

Combine the tart cherry juice and cold water. Add the dry mixture and juice mixture alternately to the beaten mixture. Beat on low speed after each addition just until combined.

Pour the batter into the cupcake liners until just over half full. Bake for 12 minutes or until the tops spring back when lightly touched. Cool in the pans for 10 minutes.

Remove and let cool completely on a wire cooling rack.

Prepare the frosting:

1 egg

2/3 cup evaporated goat milk

2/3 cup organic raw coconut crystals

¼ cup ghee (clarified butter)

1 ½ cup organic unsweetened coconut flakes

½ cup finely chopped roasted pecans

In a medium saucepan, combine the egg, evaporated goat milk, coconut crystals and ghee.

Stir to mix well. Cook while constantly stirring over medium heat for 10 to 12 minutes or until thickened and bubbling.

Remove from the heat and stir in the coconut and pecans. Set aside to cool to room temperature.

Spread the cooled frosting over the top of the cupcakes.