Side Salad Dinner

Like summer tapas. 

The possibilities are endless, here are a few to get you started. 

Brussels Sprouts with Dried Cherries and Pistachios

Brussels Sprouts

Olive Oil

Balsamic Vinegar

Dried Cherries

Pistachios

Coat the Brussels sprouts  with olive oil and roast at 425 for 10 minutes. Toss with remaining ingredients.

 

Sesame Cucumber Salad

Cucumbers (thinly sliced

Sesame Seeds

Sesame Oil

Truffle Salt

Toss all ingredients 

 

Sweet Potato Quinoa Salad

Quinoa 
Sweet Potato
Chicken Broth
Cinnamon
Honey
Put desired amount of quinoa and chopped sweet potato in a pot add chicken broth until covered. Bring to boil and cook until quinoa is sprouted and sweet potato is soft. Drizzle with honey and cinnamon to taste. Serve hot.

 

If you have enough of them who needs a main dish?

Mini caprese salad

It is almost tomato season here. 

Yeah!!!

If you have had fresh from the garden tomatoes I don't need to say anymore. 

If you haven't, you should. 

Heirloom tomatoes are far superior, in my oh so humble opinion. 

If you don't know about heirloom tomatoes, you should do some research and try them out. Absolutely worth it. 

Here are a couple sites to get you started. 

This one.  

Or this one.  

 

I know they taste like candy on their own, but I can't very well put heirloom tomatoes down as a recipe.

Or can't I?

Heirloom Tomatoes

Heirloom Tomatoes

Eat them. 

Ok I can put it down as a recipe.  

But it sucks. 

So here is a ever so slightly more involved one.  

And much fancier sounding. 

Which can earn you points when bringing things places or cook for guests. 

Or discerning family members.

Mini Caprese Salad

Mini Heirloom Tomatoes

Fresh Mozzarella Cheese

Rosemary Olive Oil

High Quality Finishing Salt

Hot Sauce (optional) I use Trader Joe's brand sriracha sauce. So good on so many things.

Layer all ingredients into bite size piles. 

Enjoy!

Popeye Was Right =)

SPINACH ROCKS!!! I use spinach in everything! Salads, soups, eggs, chili, pancakes, smoothies, whatever I can cram the green stuff in without too much notice. 

After the family has had its fill with fresh spinach, I freeze the rest!  I have found this is the easiest way to use it daily.  If you chop it right out of the freezer, it can be as small as an herb in a few minutes. 

I think spinach has a mild enough flavor that most people don't even notice the extra added gem except for the color! The Irish would agree more green the better. =))

I am what I am, 
Bretta

Banana walnut salad

 I don't miss the speed of fast food, I miss the convenience.

We are remodeling our two bedroom house to give each of our three children their own room, or berth as we're referring to them so as to invoke a cozy, nautical image rather than focus on the all too obvious miniscule size each will be.

We also just adopted a new puppy.
I'll share some puppy recipes soon!!

Needless to say it's a bit hectic around our place.

And still my family expects to eat.
EVERY day.
Have I mentioned they've been on spring break for three weeks with all this going on?
Right, so, hectic. 

The ingredients not stowed in the basement during construction led to this meal:

Banana Walnut Salad

Lettuce
Sprouts
Bananas
Walnuts, Toasted
Grape seed oil and Cabernet vinegar

Served with crockpot chicken and margarita pizza.

Not bad considering the current stage of remodeling ~ new puppy chaos we are in right now!!

For the pizza I drizzled olive oil on a Trader Joe's whole wheat pizza crust, sliced mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil and baked at 550 until the cheese started to brown.

Simplest Cucumber Salad =)

This is a quick, easy way to get in some green stuff along with your next meal or snack! Simplest Cucumber Salad is a little spin off of caprese salad. Simple, yummy and quick....as I wish all meals could transpire. I sat down to eat this the other day after I let it sit on the counter for a few hours and boy was it delicious!! Eating room temperature vegetables can be so satisfying. We forget in our modern world that our veggies used to come right out of the garden. I can honestly say that a warm tomato and cucumber in the peak of the summer, straight from ground is unbelievable.

Simplest Cucumber Salad Recipe

4 mini cucumbers sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil 
Salt and pepper to taste (truffle salt is my fav with this....www.artisansalt.com)

Does this really require explanation? Thinly slice cucumbers, drizzle with olive oil then salt and pepper to taste. Simple, easy and tasty!!

Here are some fun facts about cucumbers:

Worlds Healthiest Foods Website: Cucumbers

I love how they crunch, 

Bretta

bretta.vemma.com

Ground Nut Soup and Salad

Occasionally I feel the need to realign my diet. 

I know the foods that work best for me. 

More so I know the foods that don't work well for me. 

Namely white flour, white sugar, alcohol.

You know, all the good stuff :(

A few years ago, a year after my second child was born I started an eating regime with my mom called the Perricone Promise. 

Dr. Perricone is a dermatologist who came up with an eating plan for a younger appearance which had the side effect (on us at least) weight loss. It is a 28 day program and we committed to doing it together. He also wrote The Perricone Weight-Loss Diet book which I don't like as well but I enjoy some of the recipes.

It has become my go to eating re-align-er.  

Yes, I should eat by it's guidelines all the time. I feel better, I look better, and I keep my weight in check.

The reality is that I like having a beer with my husband and a pizza night now and again.

And slowly the now and again becomes all the time and my jeans get tight. 

The wonderful thing about having this is that I always know I can go back to it and that it works for me. I believe in balance but when you swing too far one way the pendulum must swing the other way for a while so you can get back to a happy center. 

Strawberry Salad

3 cups Baby Spinach
5 Strawberries, chopped
3 mini Cucumbers
1 Tablespoons Sesame Seeds 
2 Tablespoons Nutritional Yeast
3 Tablespoons Balsamic Vinaigrette (Make your own, it's olive oil and vinegar, add salt, garlic, and mustard if you want to get fancy but for goodness sake don't spend money on products that give you a bunch of stuff you don't want.)

 

 African Groundnut Soup
adapted from The Perricone Weight-Loss Diet which adapted the recipe from Stop the Clock cooking.

Olive Oil
1 red onion, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
1/2 cup celery, chopped
6 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1 Tablespoon curry powder
2 Tablespoons fresh ginger, pealed and minced
1 jar of tomato sauce (preferably one you canned after the harvest last year ;)
1 bay leaf (my family is still arguing the effect of the bay leaf but I throw in anyway, sorry Uncle Ted.)
4 cups chicken broth (you know, from last night's whole crock pot chicken dinner)
3 tablespoons almond butter 
1 1/2 cooked soy beans (edamame works as well)
1 lb. cooked chicken
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1/2 pound spinach (or kale, chard, or other dark leafy green)
Salt and Pepper and hot sauce to taste

• Saute onion, pepper, celery in olive oil for about 5 minutes.
• Stir in garlic, ginger, curry powder.
• Add tomato sauce and bay leaf and cook about 3 minutes.
• Add broth, bring to boil, reduce to low, whisk in almond butter until blended.
• Add beans and chicken and cook until heated through.
• Stir in cilantro and spinach.
• Season with salt, pepper and hot sauce if desired. 

Kids - Treats and Lunch

I have been labeled as many thing in my mommying style. A hippie, uber healthy, overly particular. 

I am clearing the slate right now: it's not true. 

None of it. 

Do you know what the kids are eating in this picture? 

Root Beer Floats.

With Ice Cream.

And Root Beer.

I am not the food Nazi that some people believe me to be. 

That being said; I have my limits and my lines. 

The kids chose, of their own free will I might add, to trade the candy they received for Valentine's day in for a treat that mommy approved of. 

It's organic ice cream and all natural root beer. The alternative was corn syrup solids, every color dye and number you can think of and other ingredients that I can't write right now because I have no idea what they were. 

I'm not anti occasional treat, but chemicals and non food items I'd prefer not enter these growing bodies. 

And here is a lunch idea that is a big hit around here.

Turkey Rolls and Salad 

Slices of roasted turkey

Please be careful when buying lunch meat; it, for the most part it is gross. Really gross. And full of BAD things. Costco sells roasted sliced turkey breast that is just that no preservatives or additives. Yes, organic would be better, slicing your own would be amazing, but it's all a balance, yes?

Cheese Sticks

Spinach

Strawberries

Banana Chips

Pine Nuts

Balsamic Vinaigrette 

Wrap the turkey around the stick of cheese. 

Assemble the salad.

Cinnamon and Sugared Pecan Salad

 Call me transparent, but the better and treaty-er it sounds the higher my kids' enthusiasm is in eating it. 

1 head Romain

2 handfuls Spinach

1 cup blueberries

1/4 red onions diced

1/4 cup feta crumbled

1/2 cup cinnamon and sugar almonds 

(brown raw pecans in pan with a bit coconut oil, toss in jar with cinnamon and sugar to taste, keep around to sprinkle on salads)

1/2 cucumber chopped

(slice other part of cucumbers for water glasses at the table to make it a fancy meal, according to my offspring)

Dressing:

1 cup olive oil

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

1 clove garlic

salt and pepper to taste

Keep a large dressing made up and dress salads to taste.  

Put it all together. 

 

Tuna and Avocado Salad with White Beans

If this recipe sounds eerily familiar, it is because it is a knock-off of Erins Avocado Salad. I got so addicted to her salmon salad that I began to ponder my role in the decline of the Pacific Northwest wild salmon population.  And also, wild salmon is expensive (so, so worth every penny, however, but sometimes you have to remind yourself there are other fish in the sea).

1 can albacore tuna
1 avocado, peeled and diced
1 can of white beans, rinsed and drained (I took a strong liking to Great Northern beans for this, but garbanzos are great also, as are other white beans)
10-12 kalamata olives, pitted and chopped
1/2 red onion, coarsely chopped
1/4 cup feta cheese (I also use Romano cheese often, either is delicious or go cheese-free if you prefer)
Lemon juice to taste
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients and sprinkle with lemon juice and salt and pepper.

There are endless variations to this. Sometimes I chop some Bibb lettuce leaves and toss them in, or sliced fresh basil if I have it. Chopped pecans are yummy in it. My husband has requested cucumbers be added but  sadly he has been overruled every time as I don't like them! And of course, sub salmon for tuna for the Cadillac version.

Avocado Salad

Or as I like to think of it; the pregnant girl manna.

A few years ago I make this salad and bring it to the beach to share.

Jessica, quite pregnant at the time oohs and ahhs over it and tells me it meets all her crazy pregnancy needs.

I’m happy to have provided a good lunch and all is well.

Until the next summer, when I am in her former state and she returns the favor.

It is only then than I truly understand what she was trying to say.

This salad was like food to a starving Ethiopian kid. (I guess that dates me.... my father would have said Chinese kid.. I don't know what the starving kid de jour is but let me tell you send him some of this salad and everyone will be good.)

Bottom line, I cried in gratitude.

Seriously.

3 Avocados, chopped in 1 inch cubes

10 Cherry Tomatoes, halved or quartered depending on size

1 can of garbanzo beans

1/2 red onion diced

1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped

1 can of salmon

Mix it all together and serve over lettuce, in lettuce as a wrap, or with flax chips or flax crackers.