GSG Kale Salad! Mmmm!

Marilee emailed me and reminded me that I hadn't put up the Kale Salad recipe I did for Salad night. This recipe comes from the Green Smoothie Girl's Holiday Recipe Book. This is SO yummy!

Colorful Christmas Salad *
This salad presents well. It looks like Christmas, with vibrant greens and reds! Take this
to your next holiday party.
4 C kale and/or collards, cut into ribbons (LD's note: I just chop this up into little shreds w/my chef's knife)
1 C green cabbage, finely chopped
1 C red cabbage, finely chopped
2 lrg. tomatoes, chopped
1 C radishes, finely chopped or julienned
2 apples, shredded
1 large mango, finely chopped
seeds from ¾ of a pomegranate
2 avocados, diced
Note: To save time, I chop by hand only the kale, collards, mango, and avocado. The
cabbage, apples, and radishes I coarsely grate in my food processor. (LD's - this works great in the food processor)Mix all well. The Tangy Dill Dressing (below) is perfect for this salad.

Tangy Dill Dressing *
¼ C fresh lemon juice
¼ C fresh orange juice
½ C extra virgin olive oil
2 Tbsp. Bragg Liquid Aminos
¼ C apple cider vinegar
2 Tbsp. honey
2 garlic cloves
1 Tbsp. dried (or ¼ C fresh) dill weed
Blend all ingredients in a high-power blender.

More Salads

These recipes are from Lara . . .

Grapefruit Salad

greens
grapefruit
pecans - saute in a pan with a couple tablespoons of honey and coconut oil
top with honey vinaigrette dressing

Dressing - Honey Vinaigrette

This is my standard dressing that I eat on my greens every day.

Blend:
1 cup olive oil (you can substitute half of this with water if you want a lighter dressing)
1/2 cup raw apple cider vinegar (or any other type of vinegar, lime or lemon juice)
1/2 - 3/4 cup honey

Lemon Tahini Dressing

Blend:
1/4 - 1/2 cup water or raw olive oil (I usually use 1/2 cup water)
1/4 cup raw tahini
juice from one lemon
1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper (I usually use 1/2 tsp)
1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon Himalayan crystal salt (I usually use 1/2 ts

I think tahini is an acquired taste. You can also grind up your own sesame seeds instead of buying tahini.

Sunflower Seed Salad Dressing (Vegan Ranch)

We also use this like sour cream on veggie fajitas or dip our veggie pizza in it. If we're eating taco salad I mix in some salsa and it tastes just like the spicy ranch dressing from Costa Vida or Cafe Rio.

1 cup raw sunflower seeds (soaked in water for a couple hours and drained if you can but you don't need to soak them first)
1 cup water
4+ Tablespoons lemon juice
1 or 2 cloves of fresh garlic
3/4 teaspoon onion powder
3/4 teaspoon salt

Place ingredients in blender and blend until smooth.

Salads!! They're Here!

The Salad night was WONDERFUL! We had a great time with Trenton (the chef in training) demo vinaigrette and we ate yummy salads. Woot!

And I have been promising everyone that I would get the salad recipes posted. . . Sorry on that everyone.

So here is the Salad that Darci Brown sent in. I will post the Kale Salad and dressing tomorrow.

Citrus summer Salad

Baby Spinach
Romaine Lettuce
Purple Leaf Lettuce
Red Onion Sliced Thin
GrapeFruit Sectioned and Skinned
Orange Sectioned and Skinned
Sliced almonds or Walnuts
Strawberries Sliced
Fresh blueberries


Dressing

Juice of one Orange
Juice of one Lemon
Juices of one Lime
1/2 cup of canola oil
1 Tablespoon of Raw honey
1 tsp. salt
pepper to taste
1 tsp. minced garlic
1 Tablespoon of Cilantro

Pour over Salad and toss. Not too much dressing.

**The amounts of ingredients in this salad just depend on your likes of the ingredients.
Depending on the flavor of the fruit in the dressing I adjust the amounts of ingredients in the dressing
also. These amounts are approximate

Really Quick

First, I'm so sorry to all the people that have stopped me and asked me about my weight-loss and what I've been doing. Why? Because it usually turns into at least a 45 minute discussion and my mouth going a mile a minute and trying to expunge all the information I've crammed into my brain in the last 3 months. So I apologize if it's more than you want to know. I'm trying to learn to send people to the blog so that they can accept or reject and not worry about having to get a word in edgewise to tell me that they're not interested.

Before I get interrupted again. . . don't ask what I got interrupted for. . . I'm going to try and answer a couple of questions I've gotten lately.

#1 - Why Green Smoothies? Can't you just eat it in a salad.

Answer - Generally you will consume way more greens in a smoothie than in a salad. I figure that I'm putting in enough greens for 4 good sized salads. Then what do you put on top of that salad so that you can eat it? DRESSING - full of fat and oils.

Also, we don't chew our food as well as we should to aid in our digestive process. How many times have you tried to chew your food 32 times?? We won't go into my hubby's description of his attempt to do this. We really should spend more time at the table and not in dinner conversation, but chewing our food. I'll leave this discussion by saying, when it goes down our throat it should be the consistency of applesauce. So, after all of that, when you drink a green smoothie the Blender has done the hard part of digestion for you!! So it's easier for your stomach to break it down into the easiest digestible particles and the nutrition can get out into your bloodstream faster than if you were to eat 4 salads.

#2 - What do you eat through out the day?

Answer - Well, I'm still new to all this Raw food thing and YES it is a MAJOR Paradigm shift!! Let's just say that for anyone who was raised making bread, cookies, pies, cakes, casseroles, etc. . . . It is a BIG deal trying to wrap your mind about NOT cooking anything!

First I just drank lots of green smoothie, sometimes 2 quarts a day. Then BIG salads. With homemade dressings, or just olive oil and balsamic vinegar and a sprinkle of herbs. Celery, carrots, homemade guacamole on cucumber chips, or hummus.

Now I have a breakfast of Smush with my 4 year old in the morning. . . He's learning to like it and Hubby thinks it tastes great. I just have to tell you . . Yesterday we were eating our Smush and 4YO said he didn't want to call it smush anymore. So he named it Malea! and tomorrow he said we'll call it Peter.

We soak 1 TBS golden flax seeds in water (overnight or at least 1 hour)then rinse it. This is kinda difficult cuz it gets really slippery/slimy. But try
We dump this in the blender with:
1 apple cut into chunks
1 banana broken in chunks
1 tsp cinnamon.

Whirl it all together and pour into a bowl. Top with small apple chunks, chopped bananas or raisins.

This makes enough for a small bowl for Hudson and a portion for me, but Hubby could eat the whole thing himself.

Lunch is either a salad or just a piece of fruit or handful of nuts. Green smoothie if I haven't drank my full quart for the day.

Dinner more salad or a raw entree. We've tried raw spaghetti and marinara and a few other things, but mostly I make some sort of whole food recipe for the kids from Green Smoothie Girl, or the The Original Fast Food Book. But my poor kids are going dairy-free and meat-free for the most part. Oh, Hubby now loves Lentil Tacos. He wasn't too happy for them when he was still eating meat, but now he's LOVING them!

OK, so that didn't end up being too quick, but hope that helps.

Lauri!

What's really RAW?

Lara keeps asking me if I really mean I'm totally RAW. When you say you're RAW doesn't mean you have to be 100%. In my reading and research if you're eating 60% - 75% RAW and adding wholesome whole foods to that, then you're Raw. Yes, I've had a few days that I've eaten totally 100% Raw. Which I don't think is that hard. Drink a Green Smoothie for Breakfast and eat Salads for lunch and dinner. If my family weren't insisting on something else besides fruits and veggies, it would be easier for me to eat 100%. But I'll pop something in my mouth occasionally that isn't raw. My family generally wants something that's cooked for dinner and we always have a big salad. So I'll eat a bit of the whole foods cooked meal, but I try mainly to just eat a nice big salad for dinner. But the cool thing is that I'm not addicted to food anymore, so I don't obsess and eat TONS of something that isn't good for me. . . .