Food Friday - Super Salads

from Kris B.

I am a huge fan of salad and I'm not particular about what kind of salad I eat.  The only thing here is that I am not a fan a most salad dressings.  Even when I'm not watching my calories, I don't eat dressing on my salads.  So the problem for me, as I am looking for ways to trim those unnecessary calories, is not adjusting to eating "dry" salad, but frather inding a dressing that I will enjoy when the salad must have a dressing.  And let's face it, chicken salad is not salad unless it has dressing.

This is a simple chicken salad, given its flavor by tarragon and chives and its crunch from toasted almonds.  The dressing is a mixture of low-fat plain yogurt and light sour cream.  Aside from cooking the chicken, it takes no time to prepare; but, it is best if allowed to sit in the fridge for 12-24 hours to give ample time for all of the flavors to meld together.

INGREDIENTS
3 small chicken breast halves
3 ribs of celery, diced
1 bunch of chives, finely chopped
2 TBS fresh tarragon, finely chopped
1/2 Cup low-fat plain yogurt
1/4 Cup light sour cream
1/4 Cup toasted almonds
Salt Ground black pepper
Salad greens

Coat a skillet with non-stick cooking spray.  At medium high heat, cook the chicken, 4-6 minutes on each side until there is no pink and the juices run clear.  Remove from heat and allow the chicken to rest for ten minutes.  Once cooled, cut into bite-sized pieces.

Combine the yogurt, sour cream, celery, tarragon, and chives in a medium bowl,  Once it has cooled, add the chicken.  Mix.

Cover and refrigerate for at least an hour or up to 24 hours. (The longer it is refrigerated, the better the salad will be.)

Just before serving, add desired amounts of salt and pepper and the almonds, reserving a few for garnishing, if desired.  Serve on a bed of your favorite salad greens.

Makes 4 servings.

Nutrition information: per serving; 177 calories; 5g fat; 8g carbohydrates; 25g protein; 3g fiber; 182mg sodium



from Tracey G

Another funny opposite between Kris and I, is my love for salad dressing. I was one who only ate salad so I could have dressing! After all, it would look kind of crazy me eating salad dressing from a spoon! I was never a fan of creamy dressings (other than for potato salad, macaroni salad chicken salad etc), ranch was a dip for me, not something that went on my salad and so forth. I preferred, and actually still do, a vinaigrette-style dressing. My first ever salad dressing was plain vinegar and olive oil. I remember once, as a little girl, my mom had run out of olive oil - it was a staple in our household and at the time and where we live, you couldn't get it here. So we used to bring it back up north with us from visits downstate in the Detroit area - same with feta, but that's another story, lol. So what did she do? She substituted VEGETABLE oil in its place. I remember I almost spit out my bite of salad (I actually may have!) - it was awful! Like taking a drink of your iced tea and discovering it's Coke or vice versa, it was just wrong. She never ever did that again.

But anyway, I do love a good vinaigrette, and I think one of my all time favorites is a raspberry vinaigrette which I use on this salad. It is a "lite" version, and it's one of my particular favorites. I use this one even when I'm not eating mindfully because I just love the taste of it - it's Ken's Steak House Lite Raspberry Walnut Vinaigrette. It's the best one I've run across that reminds me of the very first one I tried in a restaurant. The rest of the salad I pulled from various things I love in salads. I had this idea to just pull them altogether and tie them up with my favorite dressing, and I was very happy with the results!! It was actually yummy enough that dressing may not have even been needed as all the flavors mixed together to be just right on their own.

The ingredients are approximate and you can, once again, add or subtract whatever you like!

Red, White and Blue Salad

serves 6

8 cups spring mix salad greens

2 cups halved fresh strawberries

1 cup blueberries

1/2 small red onion, thinly sliced

1/3 cup raspberry vinaigrette

1/2 cup crumbled feta

Combine greens, onion, and berries in a large bowl; drizzle with vinaigrette and toss to combine. Sprinkle with cheese and serve immediately.

Food Friday - Pass the Salad, Please!

fromKris B.

I don’t have many memories of family Thanksgiving meals and the ones that I do have, are not particularly good ones.  First of all, my mother was one of those who dragged out all of the china for the Thanksgiving meal, no matter who was or was not coming to eat, and then made me dress up for dinner.  Needless to say, particularly as a teenager, this “tradition” made me less than happy.  All that, topped with the fact that I really didn’t care for traditional Thanksgiving food, made the fourth Thursday in November a most miserable day all the way around for me.  I have never cared for roasted turkey; it has never tasted good to me.  That is not a commentary on my mom’s preparation of the holiday turkey, but rather on roasted turkey itself.  It doesn't matter who prepares it, I just don’t like it.  My mom always served Brussels sprouts and cole slaw as side dishes with the turkey, neither of which I liked as a kid.  And, the sweet potatoes were always the candied kind which were and still are way too sweet for me.  Basically, I ate mashed potatoes and dressing as my Thanksgiving meal.  My carbohydrate addiction started young!  Lol. 

I am happy to report that I have evolved a bit as an adult.  I still don't care for roasted turkey, but  I do like smoked turkey.  Thankfully, I have a husband who will now smoke our Thanksgiving turkey.  I also have discovered that I love both Brussels sprouts, preferably roasted with garlic, and cole slaw.  Once I changed my attitude about cole slaw, I tried to find my mom’s recipe.  She had many cookbooks and lots of recipes written on many scraps of paper, but I was never able to find her cole slaw recipe.  All I can remember is that it had lots of sugar and mayonnaise in it.  This most certainly was not enough information to go about trying to replicate it.  So, I was left to search for and try recipes on my own.  Fortunately, because I never actually ate my mom’s cole slaw, I was not up against some expectation that the recipe had to taste just like mom’s.  It just had to taste good to me now.  After a few failed attempts and some others that were so-so, I have finally settled on what I think is the perfect cole slaw recipe.  It is from Ginny Callan’s cookbook, Beyond the Moon Cookbook.  She calls the recipe  “Zesty Cabbage Salad.”  Whatever its name, it is pretty darn good!  I like this recipe a lot because it gets its sweetness not from the cup or more of sugar that I know my mom’s recipe used, but from the natural sweetness in carrots and red bell peppers as well as a tiny bit of honey.

INGREDIENTS

6 cups sated shredded green cabbage

2 cups grated carrots

6 scallions, sliced

1/2 cup minced fresh parsley

1/2 cup currants

3/4 cup chopped fresh red bell pepper

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1/4 cup mayonnaise

1/4 cup sour cream

1 TBS hot dijon or horseradish mustard

2 TBS fresh lemon juice

1 TBS vinegar

1 tsp honey

1/2/ tsp salt

Toss the cabbage, carrots, scallions, parsley, and currants together in a large bowl.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the ingredients for the dressing - yogurt, mayonaise, sour cream, mustard, lemon juice, vinegar, honey and salt.

Pour the dressing over the salad.  Toss well. Serve immediately or refrigerate until ready to serve.

by TraceyG

When I was a kid we used to go on little getaways - my mom, dad and myself. My dad loved doing that, we'd stay at a Holiday Inn, make sure they had a Holidome or at the very least an indoor pool for me to play in during our stay. If it had an in-house restaurant it was even better!! :-) I wish I could remember how old I was, I want to say I was in the 8-10 range, and we were over on the west side of the state, on a mini break at the Holiday Inn in Traverse City, when, mom discovered this salad. It was on the salad bar in the in-house restaurant, and she fell in love with it. And what I remember from that point on was her mad search for the recipe, lol. Once she found it, it became a staple for her to make around special occasions and potlucks etc. I remember her making it for Thanksgiving quite a few times, but back then I was not a fan of it. I now, as an adult, love this salad - I make it whenever I want it, it's so easy, and so yummy, that, for me it's an anytime-I-want-not-just-for-a-special-occasion salad, lol. And it's pretty too :-)

I've made it with all the vegetable ingredients and I've made it without some of them too - as long as I have carrots and the dressing, I'm a happy girl, lol. So, feel free to make it even if you don't have all the vegetables! Honestly, I can't remember the last time I used celery - not that I don't have it on hand, I just don't care for it in the salad, lol.

Copper Penny Salad

2 lbs cooked carrots (cut in rounds)

1 small green pepper, chopped

½ c diced celery

1 medium onion, sliced

1 can tomato soup

1/2 c vegetable oil

1 cup sugar

¾ c vinegar

Combine soup, oil, sugar and vinegar in a medium saucepan, bring to a boil, stir while cooking to dissolve sugar. Pour over vegetable mixture. Refrigerate 24 hrs.