Showing posts with label salad. Show all posts
Showing posts with label salad. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Blue Cheese & Apple Salad Recipe


They arrive slowly, one thought, followed by another. Followed by a grumble. I start wandering the house. Opening the fridge first, then the freezer. The fridge again. The cabinets. The fridge again. A glass of water.


I have a confession to make.

I'm a late evening snacker. Not a midnight snacker, but about an 8 or 9pm snacker.

I just get the munchies at that time of night. In a serious way.

Take right now, for instance.

Sometimes the glass of water cures me. More often than not, I still want something. We eat a lot of popcorn in our house, sometimes plain, sometimes with flavors like Cheesy BBQ or Cool Ranch. But that wasn't going to suffice this time.

I turned to an old favorite, my blue cheese and apple salad. This is so good. It's so easy too!


Blue Cheese & Apple Salad
1 apple
6-8 basil leaves
blue cheese crumbles
balsamic vinegar

Core the apple and chop roughly. Divide between two bowls. Sprinkle blue cheese crumbles over the top and drizzle with balsamic vinegar. Garnish with basil leaves.

You can substitute pears for the apples, or feta for the blue cheese.

Enjoy.



Miz Helen’s Country Cottage

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Grandma's Sweet and Tangy Tomato Dressing

Tomatoes.

Are.

The.

Best.

Period!

I'm incredibly jealous of all of you who have been sharing lovely tomato recipes. From your bushels of tomatoes that grow so lovely in your yards. I really really miss going to the Farmers' Market in Colorado Springs and coming home with 25# of tomatoes.

Tomatoes and Alaska are not the best of friends... unless a greenhouse is involved.

With all of the recent tomato bounty posts that have been flying around BlogLand, I did what any jealous self-starting cook would do -- pulled myself up by my bootstraps and made the trip to Costco. Typically my tomato adventures start at Costco. Oh! How I love Costco.

Proudly walking in my front door with a few small containers of tomatoes, the wheels started turning.
 
My grandmother's tomato dressing is simply amazing. Sweet and tangy, with absolutely no nutritional value whatsoever, it's the best thing that happened to tomatoes ever. It's so easy to make too. To call it a tomato dressing is a bit of a misnomer, since there are no tomatoes in the sauce; rather, it's what you put on tomatoes to enjoy!
 
I've also found that it's quite stunning on baked breaded chicken. Stunning.
 
Eating the dressing on tomatoes is really the best part though. Really. It will make your taste buds sing.

And your tomatoes will disappear.

A bowlful of  delicious dressing with some gorgeous
yellow heirloom tomatoes. MMMMM.


Grandma's Sweet & Tangy Tomato Dressing
 
4 teaspoons French's prepared mustard (the yellow stuff)
4 Tablespoons sugar
2 Tablespoons white vinegar
2/3 cup vegetable oil
dash of salt
dash of paprika
 
Mix sugar, salt, paprika and mustard in blender. Add vinegar. Turn on blender. Add oil slowly, one tip of the measuring cup at a time (about 10 small blips of the cup). Beat until mixture is thickened to your preference.
 
Serve immediately or refrigerate and serve.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Pete's Creamy Coleslaw

One night, early this summer, I was at my parents' house for dinner. Mom had made some amazing coleslaw, and I just HAD to get the recipe so I could make it for myself. I'm in love with this dish in so many different ways, I can't begin to describe the light flavor, the sweet and tangy twist of the pineapple, and the overall amazing-osity of the slaw.


Mom told me this came from a long-held time-honored tradition of cooking in the household - The Jack Daniels Old Time Barbeque Cookbook by Vince Staten. This book has been the source of many a delightful dinner and even more requests for recipes from family and friends. I am but one in a long line of people who've fallen in love with the recipes in this book.

Pete’s Creamy Coleslaw
modified from the Jack Daniels Old Time Barbeque Cookbook

Dressing
5 oz can evaporated milk
¼ c apple-cider vinegar
2 T sugar
1 t salt
¼ t celery seed
¼ t pepper
½ c mayonnaise
Mix all together (fits in a 1 cup measuring cup and use a wire whisk) and pour over
the following in a big enough bowl to stir everything up.

Salad
4 c shredded cabbage ( I usually use 1 large head of cabbage for this amt of
dressing)
1 medium carrot shredded / grated
1 rib celery diced
1 can of crushed pineapple, drained.



I typically mix the dressing in a separate large bowl.

Then, using my most favorite-est kitchen tool, the food processor, I cut the other large ingredients into small chunks and feed through the cheese grater function to get little shreds of cabbage, carrots, and celery.

Mix dressing and salad together and serve.

Mom's advice: "This is very good right away, and even better if it has several hours in the
refrigerator prior to eating.
"

Mine doesn't always make it to the fridge first...

Proudly sharing this with



Miz Helen’s Country Cottage

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Sweet 'n Tangy Kiwi Dressing & Alaska Salad -- Friday Potluck Recipe Hop #47

One of the only things in the fridge when I returned home was a container filled with kiwi fruit. After pawning some of the kiwis off on various grateful friends, I was still left with 8-10 kiwis. I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to do something with them.

I love kiwis... the fruit, the birds and the people. However, outside of eating them plain, which I had already burned out on, I had no idea what to do with them.

So I did what any sensible lady would do when faced with such a dire dilemma, I turned to Google.

I found a lovely blog That British Woman, which has lots of fun posts.

Back to the matter at hand though -- kiwi fruit! She has a post titled 50 + 1 Recipes for Kiwi Fruit, a round up of some of her favorite kiwi recipes from which I was able to draw wonderful inspiration.


Taking inspiration from recipe number 33, and the contents of my fabulous CSA box, I created an amazing, mainly Alaska-grown salad. The salad didn't feature my mystery veggie, which turned out to be kohlrabi, because I had no idea what to do about it; you can read about my adventures with kohlrabi another day.

However, complete with Alaska red and green leaf lettuce, tomatoes, zucchini, broccoli, carrots, and non-Alaska grown baby bellas, 1/2 apple, and bleu cheese, this spectacular salad goes perfectly with the new kiwi fruit dressing.

Delicious.

Sweet 'n Tangy Kiwi Salad Dressing
as seen here

3 Kiwifruit, peeled and chopped
1 tbsp Grated Fresh Root Ginger
5 tbsp Olive Oil
The juice of 1 Lime
Salt and Black Pepper

Puree all ingredients in a food processor, then add to your salad.

*Note: the original recipe calls for 2 Kiwi and 1 teaspoon of ginger; however the dressing tasted too olive oil-y for me. Adding an third kiwi and the additional ginger made a fantastic flavor, though the dressing was a little thick. This is a keeper.

Enjoy!

In addition to Friday Potluck, I'm pleased to be linking this up to

And now, on to Friday Potluck!

I love all of the recipes that you've been bringing by, and can't wait for this week's edition!

grab the code!



Just a few quick and easy rules for joining the party:

1. Link directly to your recipe (not your main blog).
2. Only one recipe per blog each week.
3. Be sure, in the linked blog post, to link back here to Friday Potluck @ EKat's Kitchen using the button above or text.
4. Have fun, do some visiting and enjoy!

Thanks!

Monday, October 25, 2010

Buffalo Chicken Bite Salad

My father's aunt and grandmother ran a roadhouse in Montana. The story (as I remember it) goes that they cooked for 20 people at a time, and that this legacy followed them throughout their lives.


I wonder if it's genetic?


I always seem to overdo it on the quantities. This past weekend at our "going away" party, I managed to limit myself to a single dish - Buffalo Chicken Bites. Here's the original Buffalo Chicken Bites recipe. 
As I mention in yesterday's post, I made three flavors: Frank's Buffalo Sauce, Teriyaki, and Barbecue, shown above still marinating in the ziploc bags.


As always, whenever we have a party, I overcook. So, though I limited myself to one dish, we made a TON of chicken bites. 


Needless to say, we have leftovers. Not HAD leftovers, HAVE, as in, we still have them. 


Both last night, and tonight for dinner we're having Buffalo Chicken Bite Salad (some with bbq, some with buffalo, some with teriyaki). It's delicious, it's easy, it gets rid of leftovers, and it uses bleu cheese. This girl loves bleu cheese.




Buffalo Chicken Bite Salad for Two


10-12 Buffalo Chicken Bites (recipe here)
1 heart of romaine lettuce, rinsed.
2 tablespoons Bleu Cheese, divided


Tear the lettuce into small pieces and divide between two bowls. Top each bowl with half of the chicken bites and follow with bleu cheese.

Eat and enjoy!



This post is linked to the following blogs, with pleasure.


And, though I'm not convinced that it fits completely within the mission of Hearth and Soul, I so love participating in this blog hop, so I'm joining with this recipe. (It is very good, and it's all homemade, so I'm hoping it's not too far off the mission!)
hearthandsoulgirlichef

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Caesar Salad with Curry-Rubbed Chicken

Simple though it may be, I really love making this as a light meal with some good protein in any number of situations. Be it when I'm tired, when it's hot out, or when we're perchance in need of groceries AND motivation to go to the store.

We took a beautiful drive today through the Colorado mountains and on a little dirt road through Phantom Canyon - CO Hwy 67. I'll post photos of that tomorrow in another post, as they really deserve a write up all of their own! We were exhausted afterward and K went in for a nap. With little motivation for anything more than leftover Chang's Spicy Chicken from lunch yesterday, I took some chicken from the freezer and started thawing.

While K napped, I added some curry powder, cumin, garlic salt, and coriander to the chicken, rubbed it in and left the chicken to marinate. After K woke up and put the chicken on the grill, I made the dressing and prepped the salads. Yum!!! Next time, I might make a yogurt marinade with the curry and let the chicken marinate overnight to really allow the flavors to marry, but yum. I love this anyway.

Caesar Salad with Curry-Rubbed Chicken
(Printable Recipe)
1 chicken breast
1 large heart of romaine

Dressing
2 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup fresh grated parmesan cheese
fresh-squeezed juice of 1/2 lemon
ground pepper
garlic salt to taste

Curry Rub
1 tsp curry powder
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp garlic salt
(coats one chicken breast - for additional chicken pieces, adjust the recipe accordingly)

Mix the rub, then rub into chicken breast. Let marinate for 1 hour in fridge before grilling.

Start mixing the dressing and whisk together well at the bottom of your salad bowl until they form a paste. Add additional of any ingredients to taste.

Chop up rinsed hearts of romaine and mix in with the dressing.


Dish up into two bowls. Top with additional parmesan cheese, fresh ground pepper and the sliced chicken. Serve!

Serves 2.

This is my father's recipe for Ceasar dressing, and I absolutely love it!

I'm linking this to Souper Sunday at Kahakai Kitchen. Be sure to check out Deb's blog every Sunday to see the other entries.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Cucumber Tomato Salad

Long time, no talk. I know. I've had a good reason though. Lots of really good reasons, actually.
Reason # 1: The great tomato canning of 2010. After we made the three recipes there, we went on to purchase more tomatoes and do even more canning. We have more tomato soup than we know what to do with!

Reason #2: I was completely out of energy! After the great canning experiment, lots and lots of leftovers, an extremely short work week, and preparing to go out of town, I was worn out.

Reason #3: We went out of town for a family wedding. Klark was the best man; and though he wasn't thrilled about the color guava, he wore it quite well. My gorgeous hubby. Congratulations to Kory and Nixi.

Reason #4: We were in Wisconsin and eating lots of wonderful fried food to include large cheeseburgers, fish fry fish, cheese curds and more. And it was so good, and so not healthy most of the time.

Reason #5: We weren't cooking, and didn't bring computers!!!

Fast forward to last night. 7:30. Just home with two apathetic cats and a very excited dog. Very tired and very hungry.



Cucumber Tomato Salad was the easiest, healthiest, fastest, and therefore best decision.
(Printable Recipe)
2 tomatoes
1 cucumber
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp balsamic vinagrette
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp red wine

Whisk together the liquid ingredients and stir in diced tomatoes and cucumber. Voila! Dinner. Really tasty and fresh... and oh! so easy.


We also cooked some pasta, which I took for lunch today and used leftover salad as a sauce.

I highly recommend for those nights when time is short, hunger is high, and veggies sound good.

It doesn't have the same ooey gooey delicious flavor of a cheese curd, but I think, in technical terms, it's about 600,000 times healthier for you and your arteries.

I promise to get back to cooking soon, with more tasty recipes to pass along to you and to try.

This post is being linked to Foodie Friday on Designs by Gollum and

 
Inspiration Friday at Southern in my Heart

as well as my very own

Friday Potluck

Fabulous Food Friday!

ShareThis

Related Posts with Thumbnails