Salad: Green and Red with Fat Free Raspberry Vinaigrette

A quick summer salad I made to satisfy the crunchy craving I had all day long.

Green Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette 

• 2 hearts of Romaine Lettuce, chopped
• 1 bell peppers, thinly sliced in rounds
• 2 pickling cucumbers, thinly sliced
• 2 kiwi fruit, skinned and sliced

Fat Free Raspberry Vinaigrette

• 8-10 oz raspberries, fresh or frozen
• 3 tbs raw honey [or to taste]

~Blend in a high speed blender.
~Pour over salad and enjoy.

Absolutely delicious!  Satisfy your summer crunch!

Raw Chocolate Hemp Milk-Vegan Recipe

Delicious food was on my radar today. I craved CARBS and to satisfy them I whipped up a glass of Raw Chocolate Hemp Milk... but that's in a moment. Before I get there, I will tell you all about my lunch... just because I want to ;).

My knight-in-shining-armor picked me up for lunch and I had overall only 30 minutes to whip something up. It had to be something very quick and easy, and totally vegan, of course. Green Salad was a must, since I have been craving greens lately. But what else? Luckily I had a couple of huge potatoes, peeled and ready to go. So, while I chopped greens, I fired up the stove and got potatoes to cooking.

Green Salad
It was super simple: green leafy lettuce, 4 stems of celery, chopped, 1C of chopped parsley.

For dressing I combined 2T balsamic vinegar, 2T extra virgin olive oil and 3T sesame seeds.

Toss everything together and voila--salad served. If you so desire you can add your favorite spice [I added Kirkland Organic Mix], and a tad of salt.

Potatoes
While my 2 extra large potatoes [chopped] where boiling with a tad of Himalayan salt, I sauteed 1/2 chopped onion in 2-3T extra virgin olive oil.

When potatoes were done, I had mine one-and-only mash them up in a little bit of boiling water [I did not strain potatoes completely], then we poured sauteed onions over potatoes and our lunch was ready!

Simple and simply delicious!

Now I am going to get to that Raw Chocolate Hemp Milk I mentioned.

When I got home from work I was craving carbs and could not seem to find a way to satisfy myself. After cleaning the kitchen a brilliant idea hit my taste buds. As much as I wanted to stay away from bread today, I was craving a slice of home-made toasted bread with a dash of salt on it and something creamy and sweet to contrast it. So... Raw Chocolate Hemp Milk was born.

Raw Chocolate Hemp Milk

Ingredients

• 1/3C raw whole hemp seeds
• 1 1/4C warm water [you can use cold water if you wish]
• 2 tsp raw honey
• dash of salt to balance out the sweetness
• 1 heaping tsp raw cacao

Place all ingredients into a high speed blender and blend for 45-60 sec. If you wish you can strain hemp milk through a nut bag or a piece of cheese cloth, but I did not mind having everything left in my milk--after a minute in the Vita-Mix the seeds get pretty disintegrated and only added to the richness of the milk.

I had not one, but TWO servings of this deliciousness! Maybe one too many, but at least my craving was satisfied.

I toasted my home-made wheat bread on a heated skillet, having spread a tad of olive oil on both sides and salted it with Himalayan Salt. All I can say is YUM!

Hope you can satisfy your cravings with some awesome vegan food as well, when they come, so there is no sense of guilt, as you would have it after a pint of Ben and Jerry's ;).

Have a good night!

This recipe is linked to in

GLUTEN FREE--DAYS 8-10 [loads of recipes]

I started this post on Friday, day 8 of my Gluten Free adventure, when I received a call that 3 of my nephews are in town and I had to get out very quickly to pick them up. You can only imagine that there was little time left to blog when I got back home with 3 teenagers. On top of everything else one of them just celebrated his b-day, so we had to make sure to celebrate again.

The day after we remodeled and I had a photo shoot, leaving me with no time to blog. Yesterday was equally crazy. So, with all this said, let me dive into day 8-10 of my Gluten Free living, as I started it on Friday, November 13th.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I am going to start off by making up for cell phone pictures I had to take while on vacation. So, here is the image of Raw Salsa with corn chips:

Green Salad
and Roasted Potatoes all from day 1 of our vacation.

Today, after getting home early from our vacation, I plunged straight into the kitchen--there was nothing to eat and we still had a long day ahead of us. Instead of coming back to the kitchen several times, I decided to make enough for the whole day today and some for tomorrow, since we will be working on the house. So, I made Rice & Potato soup, Raw Alfredo Zucchini Noodles, Baked Potatoes and a super delicious Spinach Salad with Creamy Dressing. And I actually jotted down a recipe for the dressing, which can be used both as a dressing and Alfredo Sauce.

So, here is to Gluten Free Friday!

Rice and Potato Soup
[Makes 6.5 quarts of soup—reduce ingredients proportions if you are not planning to feed 4 people for 2 days with is, as I did ;)]

Ingredients
• 6 quarts filtered water
• 1.5 cups rice
• 3 extra large potatoes, peeled and sliced
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 large bell pepper, chopped
• 2 large carrots, chopped
• ¼ cup or less olive oil
• Sea or Himalayan salt to taste
• Favorite seasoning, to taste
• Choice of your greens: 1cup cilantro, 1-2 cups parsley or any other kind of greens, chopped
• Chopped dill to garnish

Preparation
• Pour water into a large pot and place on HI on the stove
• Add rice and potatoes and salt, bringing to boil
• Reduce heat to Medium or any point where the ingredients can still be cooking (my cookware allows me to reduce it to LOW)
• While rice and potatoes are cooking, heat a skillet with oil, adding in onion, bell pepper, carrots and seasoning
• Sauté on Medium heat for up to 5 minutes
• When potatoes and rice have cooked through (takes 20-25 minutes), add sautéed vegetables and continue cooking for another 10-15 minutes
• Add chopped greens, leaving them in hot soup for a couple of minutes to wilt
• Serve hot, garnishing with dill, if you like

Raw Zucchini Pasta with Alfredo Sauce

Ingredients
• 3 medium-large zucchinis, cut by a spiral slicer, see details here
• Sea or Himalayan salt to taste
• Alfredo Sauce (recipe below)

Preparation
• After making zucchini noodles, combine them with Cashew Alfredo sauce
• Serve immediately or refrigerate

Spinach Salad with Creamy Dressing

Ingredients
• 1 head romaine lettuce, chopped
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 bell pepper, sliced
• ¼ onion, thinly sliced
• 1 cup cilantro, chopped
• Anything else you might want to add [I had some left over quinoa veggie spirals, so I mixed them in]
• ½-3/4 cup Alfredo/Creamy Dressing [recipe below]

Preparation
• Toss all ingredients together
• Add dressing, toss again
• Serve immediately or refrigerate

Now for my new invention: Cashew Creamy Dressing/Alfredo Sauce. You can use it on non-wheat, gluten free pasta of your choice and salads alike. However, I would not suggest it for those of you who might have cashew allergies.

Cashew Creamy Dressing/Alfredo Sauce
Ingredients
• 1 cup cashews
• 1 cup water
• Sea or Himalayan salt to taste
• 2 medium size cloves of garlic
• 1-2 tbs fresh lemon juice
• 1 tbs favorite seasoning [I use Kirkland’s organic mix]

Preparation
• Soak cashews in water for at least an hour, up to two hours
• Place ALL ingredients, including soaking water, into a high speed blender (I use Vita-Mix 5200)
• Blend until smooth (I start with a low speed and increase it to the highest setting)
• Pour over your salad or noodles
• Refrigerate leftovers and use as needed

With all these recipes I hope I have earned your forgiveness for not posting for 3 days :). Have a great Gluten Free Monday!