Shrimp Civeche

One thing that I really love about living in Northern California, is the access to such a wide variety of fresh foods.  Within a 100 mile radius, this area produces almost every fruit, vegetable and meat one typically eats.  Olive groves for fresh olive oil.  Fields of artichoke plants.  Acres of citrus trees. Miles of pasture lands for animals.  Tomato fields.  Fresh and salt water fish.  Rice paddies.  Dairy farms.  You can even grow some varieties of bananas! If I were to go on a strict locavore diet, I don't think I would really miss out on anything at all.  Everything I love is grown around here. 

I'm still surrounded by bags of fresh lemons, so they are making their way into almost everything we eat.  And, even though it's only mid March, the temperatures have been creeping their way into the mid to high 70s!  When it starts to get warm outside, I only want to eat cold foods.  I decided to make my take on a shrimp civeche.  It was great eaten as is, but I also enjoyed it on a bed of butter lettuce leaves and scooped it up with organic tortilla chips. 

Shrimp Civeche

1 pound very small cooked shrimp, rinsed (I used 100 count shrimp)
2 Tbsp salt

Juice from 3 limes 

juice from 4 lemons
1 red onion, chopped
1 bunch cilantro, large stems removed and chopped
1 cucumber, peeled and diced

1 bunch of radishes, diced

Green Tobasco to taste
1-2 avocado, peeled, seed removed, cut into small chunks

Fresh butter lettuce (optional)

Organic corn tortilla chips (optional)

 

Place shrimp in a large glass bowl (do not use metal). Mix in the lime and lemon juice, red onion, cilantro, cucumber, and radishes. Refrigerate until ready to serve (at least 1 hour)  Right before serving, add the Tobasco and avocado. Serve chilled on a bed of fresh lettuce or as a dip with organic corn tortilla chips.  Leftovers will keep in the refrigerator for up to 2-3 days.  

Chicken lettuce wraps

I love my crockpot.  I really do.  I have two full size crockpots, a mini crockpot for dips, and now I have a small lunch crockpot for my desk.  I love the fix it and forget it method of cooking.  I love that I can put something in when I leave for work and when I get home, it's ready to eat. 

(Except the other night.  My work day plus commute is fairly long and a tomato sauce based recipe that cooks 

for 6-8 hours on low ended up burnt and inedible and my house uninhabitable after an 11+ hour day...)

When I discovered the website Crockpot 365 , I was really excited to find many new recipes so I could expand the use of my crockpot.   Even better that all of the recipes are gluten free! 

The hardest part of eating gluten free is no more Chinese food, so I was very excited that she put up a few make your own takeout recipes.  And even better yet, they were all for the crockpot.  It's practically exactly like takeout, but waaaaaaay cheaper and healthier. 

I know many people (especially me) look at their favorite over or stove top recipes and try to figure out some way to make it a crockpot recipe.  But for ones, I was looking at a crockpot recipe and wondering if I could make it a stove top recipe.  I was desperately craving lettuce wraps, and wanted them NOW (along with a golden goose) and I didn't want to drive the hour to the closes PF Changs and didn't want to wait the 4+ hours it would take for them to cook in the crockpot.  So I looked at the ingredient list and cooked the old fashioned way, slaving over a hot stove. 

Chicken Lettuce Wraps

(Adapted from Crockpot 365)

1lb of ground chicken
1/2 onion, diced
6 cloves of garlic
1-2 tsp fresh grated ginger
1 can of water chestnuts, drained and chopped
1/4 cup gluten free soy sauce or coconut aminos
1/4 cup white wine
2 tbl balsamic vinegar
Fresh ground black pepper
1 bunch of green onions, sliced thin
1 head of butter lettuce

Brown chicken in a large deep skillet.   While cooking, break chicken into small pieces.  I love to use my PC hamburger chopper for these kinds of jobs.  When the chicken is almost done, and sufficiently broken up into small bits, add the diced onion and cook for about 3-5 minutes until the onion is soft.  Add the garlic, ginger, and water chestnuts and cook for about a minute.  Add soy sauce, wine, and vinegar.  Cook for about 5 minutes until the sauce is reduced by about half.  Season with pepper to taste.   Spoon a bit of the chicken mixture into a lettuce leaf.  Sprinkle with green onions.  Serve while chicken is warm.  Makes a great appetizer or light dinner!

Maple Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes

Before I started on my journey for a healthier diet, I used to think sweet potatoes were reserved for Thanksgiving dinner and were only to be eaten with scorched marshmallows on top.  I never cared for them because they were too disgustingly sweet.  I think there was more sugar in the dish than actual sweet potatoes.  

As I began to learn more about cooking, especially after beginning my food allergy journey, I began to realize that there was a beautiful world of sweet potatoes out there beyond the marshmallows.  

Baked Sweet potatoes with butter and maple syrup.  

Sweet potato fries. 

Sweet potato tots.

Sweet Potato hash. 

Roasted Sweet potatoes.  

Now that I've found that I need to limit my consumption of potatoes (and all nightshades), sweet potatoes (not nightshades) are my new favorite menu items.  

Lately, I love preparing them roasted.  Theres something about roasted veggies that just a staple of winter-time meals.  Plus, turning on the oven also gives the house an extra boost of heat to the chilly house. 

This recipe is great served any time of day. For breakfast with a side of bacon and topped with a fried egg.  For lunch topping a salad with a leftover chicken apple sausage.  For dinner as a side to roasted chicken.  Mmmmmm! 

Maple Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes


2 large sweet potatoes
1 tart apple (I like pink lady or Arkansas Black)
1tbl coconut oil melted
Salt, pepper, and cinnamon
2 tbl maple syrup

Peel sweet potatoes and cut into small cubes.  Core apple, peel if desired, and cut into cubes.  Melt coconut oil and toss with sweet potatoes and apples.  Season with salt, pepper, and cinnamon to taste.  Spread onto a cookie sheet in a single layer.  Roast at 400* for 25-30 minutes until soft and slightly browned (or desired level of done-ness).  Drizzle with maple syrup and serve immediately.

Quinoa Edamame Salad

When we went to Game 6 of the NLCS, we stopped at the store and got some snacks to eat before the game. We got some quinoa edamame salad (the only gluten free choice) in the deli along with a bunch of other goodies.  After one bite, I knew I had to try to recreate it at home.  Luckily the ingredient list was on the container so it didn't take too much to figure out what I would need.

It is great as a meal or a side dish. I've made this several times and so has my friend.  Last time she also added a can of drained  and rinsed black beans and it was even better!

Quinoa Edamame Salad

1 cup of quinoa, cooked according to package directions and cooled to room temperature
2 cups shelled edamame
2 cups corn kernals
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 bunch of cilantro leaves, chopped
6 ounces crumbled feta cheese (I use raw goat feta)
1 small red onion, diced
2 celery stalks, diced
1 small jalapeño, seeded and minced
1/2 cup olive oil
Juice from 2 lemons (at least 1/4 cup)
Salt and Pepper


Mix together all ingredients in a large bowl, seasoning to taste with salt and pepper.  Serve at room temperature or chilled.

Homemade Ghee

I don't know about you, but I have always had an aversion to all foods "diet."  

Diet sugars taste like chemically dirt. 

Diet milk tastes like white water. 

Diet butter tastes like the plastic tub it comes in.

Diet cream cheese tastes like paste. 

Diet desserts taste like their cardboard packaging. 

It just never made sense to me....

Why eat a bunch of diet foods, when you can just eat a small bit of the real food?  If you eat 2 boxes of diet cookies, you are still overeating...

But like every young, overweight girl, I fell prey to the media marketing of girls needing to have a body that looks like an 8 year old boy.  I ate my fare share of everything diet, sugar free, and fat free.  Those foods never satiated my appetite and always left me hungry and craving more food, as well as craving REAL food.

As I got older and started to have so many health problems, I always knew that my problems were somehow connected to diet despite what my doctors were saying.  I spent hours researching about all the harmful pesticides on and in our foods, the genetically modifying of crops, the chemicals, preservatives, and additives that are in so many of our foods.  I really started becoming mindful of what we ate, choosing organic over conventional, as well as drastically reducing the amount of processed foods we ate.  We started eating real foods. 

I found that eating a small portion of real food kept me energized and full for much longer than a large portion of diet foods.

One thing I have always had a love affair with was butter.  Real butter.  

Mmmmmmm!  

Paula Deen has it right on the butter part for sure. 

Butter became a staple in my kitchen once again.  However, it was used in moderation, just like everything else.

But then the food allergy/intolerance tests came back and I had to eliminate dairy.  

I have felt so much better since going dairy-free, and can definitely tell a difference in my overall health if I have dairy.  Bleh.   I miss cheese and butter. 

But then I hear about ghee. It's butter that has been clarified, thus removing all the milk solids which contain the lactose and casein, which most people are allergic and intolerant to.  I gave it a try and was happy to find out that I was able to tolerate it.  YAY!!!  I could have butter back.  

If you have ever purchased organic ghee from grass-fed cows, you know it can be pretty expensive.  I was paying $7 for an 8 ounce jar at the grocery store.  Ouch! I figured that it couldn't be that hard to make, so I found a recipe and tried it on my own.  

It turned out just as good as the store bought stuff!  I was so happy.  

I followed the DIY Ghee Recipe from Nom Nom Paleo exactly and will make it over and over again. Because I'm so busy and ghee keeps for a long time, I tripled the recipe, using 3 pounds of organic grass-fed butter.  It make a quart size jar, plus filled up my little 8 ounce jar from the grocery store.

Supposedly, you can keep it at room temperature, but I keep it in the fridge just to be safe. 

I was surprised how easy it was to make.  This is one DIY project that is worth the minimal time and effort! 

Spaghetti Squash Casserole

I discovered this adorable tiny little farm stand out in the country when I went to pick  up the last of the chickens from the now closed Soul Food Farms.  

Can we please have a moment of silence?  

I had a nice conversation with the farmer, Michael, and got a little star struck when I found out he sells his produce to Alice Waters at Chez Panisse. The little stand is set up on the honor system complete with a scale and a money jar. Love love love! I was so excited to find that they sold organic winter squashes for a really good price. Usually organic anything is expensive, so I had to stock up and walked away with 3 giant spaghetti squashes.

I, like so many other people, have a bad habit of buying winter squashes and letting them sit on the counter until the bottom rots out.  I love them, but they can be time consuming.  I do not have the patience to cook a squash for an hour after I get home from a 12 hour work day.  But not this time.  I immediately cooked it up, ON THE WEEKEND, using my friend's tutorial as a guide.  It came out perfectly and we ate it that night with spaghetti sauce.  

But I still had a ton of squash leftover and no sauce left.  What to do, what to do.  

Normally, I would just put butter and parmesan cheese on the top, but the pesky dairy allergy is keeping that from happening.  Booooo.  

So I searched on all my favorite cooking websites and blogs and finally came across this yummy sounding Spaghetti Squash Casserole from Peas and Thank You.  Doesn't it look mouthwatering? 

I changed it up a bit to fit our tastes and added some organic, grass fed and finished hamburger because it just sounded good.  It was so yummy and made a huge dish.  I made this on the weekend, covered and refrigerated it and then cooked it during the middle of the week.  The leftovers were even better, and I portioned out half of it into single servings and froze them in microwaveable containers for work lunches.  

Spaghetti Squash Casserole

Yum!  I want to make this every week!!!

1 large organic spaghetti squash

Coconut oil

1lb organic, grass fed and finished hamburger

1lb sliced mushrooms

15-16 oz tomato sauce (home canned or organic brand)

1/4 c chopped fresh parsley

8oz non-dairy cream cheese (organic cream cheese if not dairy-free) 

1/4 c. nutritional yeast (Parmesan cheese if not dairy-free) 

2 c. non-dairy shredded mozzarella cheese (organic mozzarella if not dairy-free) 

Prepare spaghetti squash and set aside.  

Preheat oven to 350*.  Heat a large skillet over medium heat.  Add coconut oil and melt.  Add hamburger and cook completely and crumble.  Remove hamburger from pan to a bowl and set aside. In the same skillet, add a little bit more coconut oil, if necessary, and cook the mushrooms until they are completely cooked but not yet beginning to caramelize.  Add the hamburger back to the pan with the mushrooms.  Add the tomato sauce, non-dairy cream cheese, and nutritional yeast.  Cook until the cream cheese has melted down and the sauce is warmed throughly.  Turn off heat.  Mix in spaghetti squash and parsley.  Transfer to a large oven safe baking dish (like a 9x13) that has been greased.  Top with mozzarella cheese.  Bake uncovered for 30 minutes until cheese is melted and dish is bubbling in the middle.  Makes 6-8 servings.  

If you are making this ahead of time, do not bake.  Just cover and put in the fridge or freezer.  If frozen, thaw overnight in the fridge.  Then bake for about 45-60 minutes until bubbling in the middle.  

Vegetarian Tostadas

After I made that yummy Taco Bell wanna be sauce, I knew I had to use it for more than just eating like soup.  I wanted to make bean burritos, but gluten free tortillas just never seem to want to be made into burritos.  They are always cracking and falling apart so you end up with a burrito in your lap instead of in your belly.  

I needed a quick dinner, so I ended up deciding on bean tostadas.  

I took my gluten free tortillas, crisped them up in the oven.  Then I topped them with refried black beans, an extra generous portion of the sauce, and then topped it with lettuce, tomatoes, olives, and avocados.  After I took the picture, I dumped on at least 3 gallons of the sauce, but didn't want to show that my finished product looked like a crime scene....which may be ok, since Halloween is this week, but not very appetizing to stare at. 

Vegetarian Tostadas

2 brown rice tortillas

Your choice of oil or cooking spray

1 can refried beans

Taco sauce

Assorted veggies (lettuce, tomatoes, avocado, olives, jalapeño slices, onions, bell peppers, etc)

(Non-dairy) Cheese and sour cream (optional)

Preheat oven to 400.  Brush or spray tortillas on both sides with oil or cooking spray.  Bake in the oven for about 5 minutes until crispy.  You can turn them halfway during cooking but it's not completely necessary.  Be careful to watch the tortillas closely because they will finish suddenly and will go from done to burnt in what seems like half a second.  

While the tortilla is cooking, heat your beans, chop up your veggies, and get out any other toppings you may want.

As soon as the tortillas are done, put them on your dinner plate.  Spread each tortilla with half the beans.  Top generously with sauce.  Pile on your toppings and then finish with more sauce.  

Enjoy right away or your tortilla will get soggy.  Enjoy!!!!

Making comfort foods allergy friendly (and healthier)

Just like every other kid that was born in the 70's and early 80's, you probably had red-labeled condensed cream of something soup based casseroles make frequent appearances on your dining room table.  Those soups were great dinner starters/helpers.  

Mom even had a cookbook published in the mid '70s dedicated to soup based meals.  My sister was helping mom reorganize the house recently and found this recipe and texted it to me.  I'm so glad mom never made this recipe.  Instantly, the old Sesame Street song came to mind..."One of these things is not like the other...one of these things just doesn't belong..."

Besides the traditional green bean casserole, mom made two cream of mushroom soup dishes that us kids ate without too much complaint and we even requested that she make them.  The first was "pea patch chicken."  It was a one skillet meal of chicken pieces, a can of soup, and a bag of frozen peas.  Let that cook for a while and serve on top of rice.  Another was hamburger gravy.  Same concept, just hamburger and soup served on top of rice. 

Those two meals are a couple of my favorite childhood dinners.  Maybe it's just the memories associated with the dinners, but occasionally I find 
myself craving them now, especially after a rough day at work, or when I'm sick.

I don't buy the condensed soup anymore because it's full of things I'm allergic to, as well as preservatives and additives that I choose not to eat anymore.

One day, while surfing around on Pinterest for allergy-friendly recipes, I saw a recipe for "Homemade Cream of Something Soup" with many different options to make it allergen free, vegetarian/vegan, etc. I was so excited when the pin took me to a legitimate website and I ended up at Once a Month Mom, a website dedicated to once a month freezer cooking.  I was pleased to see that there were so many options for making all the cream of something soups I had grown up eating.  

I decided to make a cream of celery soup.  Because this recipe has several steps and can take a bit of time (and I am always pressed for time), I decided to quadruple the recipe, and freeze the equivalent of one can of soup into a Ziplock.  

Make sure to use a large pot if you quadruple the recipe, because you will outgrow your standard sized sauce pan...not that I know this from experience or anything...

Condensed Cream of Celery Soup
from Once a Month Mom

1 tbl of coconut oil
8 cloves garlic, minced
2 small onions, diced
2 cup celery, diced
1 cup Earth Balance Coconut Spread
1 cup brown rice flour
1 quart rice/almond/coconut milk
3 cups chicken stock or vegetable broth
salt and pepper
1 tsp dried thyme

Heat a large, deep skillet or dutch oven over medium heat.  Add about 1tbl of coconut oil and heat.  Saute garlic, onion and celery and set aside. Melt coconut spread over medium heat. Whisk in brown rice flour. Cook for about 3-4 minutes. Add “milk” and stock/broth. Add sauteed garlic, onion and celery mixture and thyme to the milk. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, stirring regularly, until it reaches desired consistency (about 20-30 minutes). Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Makes the equivalent of 4 cans of cream of celery soup.  Each can is approx. 1.5 cups of soup.  Store in the refrigerator for up to 3-4 days.  You can also divide into separate portions and freeze in freezer bags.   

looks better than the stuff from the can!

Pesto tuna salad

I was looking for new ways to use up all the spinach pesto that I made and I found this cool list from the Food Network called "50 Ways to Use Pesto."

I'm always looking for new ideas for lunch and #25 caught my attention: Pesto Tuna Salad. 

I'm not a huge tuna fan, especially when I was a little kid and my mom let me watch 60 Minutes sometime, and once they had a report about bugs in your food and tuna, ketchup and peanut butter were the top three buggiest foods on the market.  I stopped eating all three right then.

***GAG***

But since I'm on such a restricted diet, I'm giving some old foods another chance to earn their way back into my diet.  Tuna is really good for you, so I'm really trying to learn to like it.  I can't eat tuna the way mom used to make it with mayo and pickle relish, so I'm searching for new recipes that fit in my restrictions.  

I made the recipe, but found that it was still too "dry" for my taste.  I kept adding pesto a tablespoon at a time and ended up adding between 1/3-1/2 cup of pesto.  I ate it with gluten free rice crackers and cucumber slices, but this would be delicious on top of a salad.  It was really good, and I would definitely eat it again.

Pesto Tuna Salad

2 cans drained tuna

1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed

1/4 cup chopped parsley

1/4 cup diced red onion

1/4 cup diced red peppers

1/3 - 1/2 cup spinach pesto

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

Salt and fresh ground pepper 

Mix all ingredients together. Can be chilled.  

Before adding the pesto

 

  

These Are My Confessions

I have some confessions to make.  No, not these kind of confessions...but I do feel really guilty like I've been cheating on myself and my health...

Ever since our last trip to Tahoe, I haven't been 100% following my diet, and eating foods that I shouldn't be.  Not at every meal, not all the time.  Just little bits here and there. I have successfully added some foods back into my diet, but some things, like wheat, dairy and spicy foods, just don't agree with me.   

Like the time I had a cupcake sized cheesecake...

Or the time Dave and I split the nachos at Freebirds...

I didn't feel terrible each time after I ate one of these things, so I guessed that I would be ok if I was having these things occasionally, as long as they weren't part of my everyday diet.  

Over the past few days, I've noticed my energy levels were down.  My joints were hurting.  My pants were tighter.  I was stuffy.  I was PMSing badly.  Colds and flus are going around the office now that school is back in session and I was sure that I just had a touch of whatever everyone else had on top of just being a bloated, emotional woman.  

Last week was our anniversary and we took a little getaway back to Tahoe.  This time we rented a vacation house.  It was adorable and bits of it reminded me of my grandparent's house in Washington. 

The morning was nice and chilly, so Dave got us Starbucks (yay soy milk Pumpkin Spice Latte) while I cooked us a healthy breakfast of sweet potatoes, eggs, and pastured bacon.  We needed a hearty breakfast so we could go hiking later that morning.  

We drove over to Heavenly so we could do the last hiking of the season.  The calendar says it's fall, but the weather and the trees just aren't cooperating just yet.  I did find one tree that had changed colors, but it was right next to a perfectly green tree.  

I realized I forgot my hat and we stopped off at the ski shop to find one.  Isn't it so cute?  

I looked inside the hat, and noticed it had a saying inside.  I read it and just hung my head and sighed deeply.  Another random sign from the universe...a gentle reminder that I need to be pursuing what I love...and I'm not where I'm supposed to be.  

Yes, I already have makeup sweat on it.  Ugh!

We got on the Gondola and stopped off at the lookout point.  The weather was beautiful and there was a slight breeze.  Perfect for hiking. 

The sun hiding behind the fluffy clouds. 

Our traditional "hold-the-camera-out-in-front-of-you-and -take -our -own-picture" picture

Last trip, we hiked up the California side of the mountain, so this time we decided to hike up the Nevada side.  It was getting pretty warm outside, and I was having difficulty adjusting to the altitude.  My joints were hurting and I just wanted to give up a couple minutes after we started.  

               

The views overlooking Carson Valley were amazing.  I love hiking because you get to see some of the most beautiful places that you would never get to see otherwise.  

We kept on going up the trail and it was a struggle.  I was breathing hard, I was hurting, and I was exhausted.  This was so different from how I felt at our last hike up here.  Sure, it was hard, but I felt great, had great energy, and just loved it!

I was so mad at myself.  I had been doing so good.  I started feeling better, so I got too bold and felt like I could go back to eating things I normally did.  I was still being generally healthy, but I was eating small quantities of wheat and dairy and other foods here and there and it was slowly slipping me back into an unhealthy state.  

Dave was so sweet and kept asking if I was ok, if we needed to rest, or if we needed to turn around.  I was near tears.  How could I do this to myself?  I was doing so well and in a few weeks, I'm almost back were I started?  

One thing that may or may not be a good quality about me is that I'm pretty stubborn.  Today, my stubbornness was a good thing because I wouldn't give up.  I wouldn't stop.  I couldn't give up and admit defeat.  I kept on going.  

I took a picture at the end of the trail just to prove I finished.  I was tired.  I was sore.  It hurt to breathe. But I finished.  It wasn't a long hike, but it was a steep hike and the elevation kills me since where I live is practically sea level.  

After I sat down for a bit and caught my breath and drank some water, I  felt a little better and promised myself to not let this happen again.  I need to get my focus back and not be such a baby on missing out on food.  I need to not cheat on my health.  

I saw this sign on the way back, and it made me happy!  

We were hungry after our hike and instead of stopping somewhere and getting some junk food, we headed over to Sprouts and had a healthy light lunch and some fresh juice.  Fresh juice instantly makes me feel better.  As soon as I start drinking it, I feel refreshed and nourished.  

Sprouts is a cool little hippie vegetarian cafe that serves amazing, healthy food.  I wish there was a place like that where I live.  

I busted up laughing when I saw this on the wall at Sprouts.  

The next day, at the suggestion from a Heavenly employee, we headed over to the Visitor's Center to see the salmon spawning at Taylor Creek.  

It was another picture perfect day.  I was a little relieved that this ended up to be more of a walk than a hike.

There was some really interesting educational signs all along our walk talking about the Tahoe area and the wildlife.  It was sad to learn that after these fish spawn, they die.  

We kept seeing signs warning us about bears in the area, but sadly we didn't have the privilege of seeing any fishing bears.  

We made it to Taylor Creek to see the salmon.  The water was so clear and all you could see were hundreds of red salmon trying to swim upstream.  

After our little walk, we stopped at the Beacon, a cute little bar and restaurant on the lake.  I was good and avoided ordering anything I shouldn't eat.  They had amazing Rum Runners, and I think everyone should go drink them by the dozens (responsibly, of course!)

Later that night we went back to Heavenly village and had dinner.  Once again, I ate appropriately.  After dinner, we sat outside by the fireplaces and had an after dinner drink.   

We came home, refreshed, and I came home with a new perspective. I am attempting to participate in the October Unprocessed Challenge.  For me, it's much more than just a challenge to eat better, it's a necessity to feel better.  I already eat a healthy diet, I just need to remember that a night out, a vacation, or a fun event is no excuse to stray away from healing my body and feeling better.  

Cucumber Tomato Salad

My garden is still overflowing with cucumbers.  We can't eat them, pickle them, or give them away fast enough.  Even if we ate cucumbers 3 meals a day, we would still have too many.  And yes, this is only from one plant!  Those things grow like weeds! 

When I was finishing up dinner the other night, I realized that I had forgotten to make a veggie to go with the meal.  I needed something fast so I decided to make a quick cucumber tomato salad.  It's so refreshing and tasty, it makes you forget you are actually eating something healthy!  

I like to start by washing and slicing up my cucumbers and tomatoes and putting them in a serving bowl.  I grind some fresh salt and pepper over the top.  Then I will drizzle over some oil and vinegar over the top.  In 5 minutes tops, I have a yummy vegetable to serve with my meal or as a stand alone snack.   

I have a slight addiction to gourmet spices, seasoning blends, olive oils, and vinegars.  I love that you can make the same basic dish and make it different every time based on a slight variation each time.   So even though I make this salad frequently, I always try to change it up to keep it from getting boring.  Sometimes I'll use rice vinegar and sesame oil.  Other times, I'll use olive oil and apple cider vinegar and toss in some fresh basil.  I've even added some sliced sweet red onions, mozzarella cheese, and olives to the mix.   

This time I used olive oil and a 20 year old aged pomegranate balsamic vinegar.  In place of salt, I used some Garlic Gold Sea Salt Nuggets.  Have you tried Garlic Gold before?  If you haven't you really should.  (No, they aren't paying me to say this...I just love this stuff).  I picked up some with a Groupon-like deal a while ago and I'm obsessed.  Little crunchy nuggets of garlic and sea salt.  This is not the garlic salt my mom used when I was little.  This stuff is awesome.  

I think that this was probably my favorite combination that I have put together so far.  Maybe we were really hungry, or it was really that good, but I was really disappointed when the bowl was empty.  

Cucumber Tomato Salad

1 cucumber

1 large tomato

1-2 tbl olive oil

1-2 tbl vinegar

salt and pepper

Wash cucumber, peel and seed if desired.  Slice.  Wash tomato and slice.  Place tomato and cucumber slices into a serving bowl.  Drizzle with oil and vinegar.  Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.   

This post was shared on Whole Food Fridays Week #11 and Creative Thursday Link Party #26

Taco Salad with Avocado Dressing

My friend Lauren came over for dinner after she got back from a short vacation.  She said she was needing to detox from all the fun and suggested we make a taco salad.  

My grandma and my mom make this super yummy taco salad that has a homemade avocado dressing  mixed in the salad.  I'm sure I loved the salad mostly because it had crushed up Fritos in the salad, but I did remember that the dressing was really yummy.  

I tracked down the recipe from my aunt and was so disappointed to find out that it had sour cream in it. Dairy does NOT do my body good anymore, so I decided to try to find another avocado dressing recipe.  None of the ones I found were even close to my grandma's recipe, so I ended up combing all the best parts of the dozens of recipes I read into my own, allergen-friendly, avocado dressing.  

I made the dressing in a mixing bowl with an immersion blender, but you could definitely make this in a blender, a magic bullet, or even a small food processor.  

Avocado Green Chili Dressing

1 Avocado, skin and pit removed

Juice of 1 Lime

3 tbl water

3 tbl olive oil

1 garlic clove (I used my fermented garlic)

Small handful of Cilantro (leaves...stems too if you're lazy)

1/2 of a 4oz can of diced green chilies

Salt and pepper to taste

1/4 tsp chili powder (opt)

Add all ingredients to a blender and process until smooth.  Cover and chill for about 30 minutes while you are preparing your salad.  

When we made our taco salads, we put in everything that we could find that would go in a taco salad.  Lettuce, tomatoes, taco meat, onions, olives, crushed up tortilla chips, roasted corn kernels, salsa, etc.  I also like to add black beans or kidney beans, but didn't have any at the time. Once again, this is one of those super flexible meals that will adapt to whatever you have on hand.  

This post was shared on Whole Food Fridays Week #11 and Creative Thursday Link Party #26

Grandma's Steak Marinade

I feel so lucky that I grew up with a mom and a Grandma that are very good cooks.  Aside from the red label soup casseroles, almost everything I grew up eating was from scratch, which I now realize is very rare.  When my friends were eating their Lunchables and Twinkies and McDonalds every day, we were eating sandwiches on homemade bread and desserts of homemade oatmeal cookies. 

Little did I realize that my mom was saving us from all the chemicals and preservatives that were starting to emerge into the American Diet during my childhood. Whether she did it because she wanted to feed us right, or we were simply to poor to buy all the prepared and fast foods, or a combination of both, I am really grateful that we got started out on right foot.  I didn't have to learn how to like healthy food as an adult, because I wasn't raised on a strict diet of Hot Pockets, Stouffer's Lasagna, and Hamburger Helper.

As a full-time commuting employee and a wife, I really struggle to find a balance between cooking healthy meals or relying on prepared foods and take out.  Many of the convenience foods that we find today are easily made at home in less than a few minutes.

We had the privilege of being able to buy a locally raised grass fed and finished cow at the beginning of this year.  It has really helped our food budget, as well as help us have a freezer full of healthy beef at a fraction of the grocery store price. 

I love to take a cheaper cut of steak and marinate it for a day or two and grill it to a nice medium rare.  Since I've had to be so careful about what I eat now, I was appalled at the ingredients in most steak marinades that we had been blindly buying.  They were full of HFCS, MSG, and all sorts of other ingredients that I cannot pronounce.  How can I expect to benefit from the health values of a grass fed steak when I'm slathering it with the very ingredients that I know are harming my body???

Then I remembered the steak marinade that I carefully copied from my mom's handwritten cookbook from my Grandma.  A simple steak marinade. No yucky ingredients, no MSG, no HFCS.

Don't you just love stained cookbook pages???

Because of my restrictions, I've made a slight change to grandma's recipe and I now use coconut amionos in place of the soy sauce.  I always let my steaks marinate 24-48 hours and marinate in a Ziploc so that the marinade is always covering the steak and there is no need to constantly flip the meat. Let your steak rest at room temperature about 30 minutes prior to grilling.

Enjoy!!!

A nice London Broil ready to grill

Shared on : Creative Thursday's