A Life in Food
Chicken fajita for lunch? Don’t mind if I do! Tired of sandwiches or sad-looking lunches? These chicken fajita lunch bowls will have you looking forward to your lunch hour again. They are also LOW CARB (I’m here to help a girl out). A bit of light chopping and grilling makes this meal feel like you had lunch at your favorite Tex-Mex place, but with half the calorie count.
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Meal prep can be the difference between staying on track with healthy eating choices or going off the rails and finding yourself ordering a Mc whatever through a speaker in the drive-through. Dedicating a few extra minutes on weekends to set up your meals for the week is time well spent. Whether it be lunches, dinners or both – planning ahead is essential.
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This post is sponsored by Idaho®Potatoes. All opinions are my own.
Potatoes. Everyone loves them and they are available year round. However, I’m sure you get stuck in the same potato rut like I do. You need new ideas! Well, this one is our new “Go-To”. It has tons of veggies, it’s healthy, it’s gluten-free and if you leave the egg off, it’s vegan.
We all have a piece of that or a hunk of this in the fridge just waiting to get used up in something , right? Here is the perfect way to use up a few of those ingredients that are hanging out patiently awaiting their destiny.
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It’s the unofficial start to summer and you know what that means: dining alfresco! Whether it be picnics, backyard BBQ’s or lunch hours outside on a bench while soaking up a little sunshine, this grain salad with it’s rainbow of colors has you covered.
It’s the perfect time of year to enjoy nature’s bounty of fresh vegetables. If you are trying to eat a little cleaner and healthier, grain salads are for you! The satisfying chewiness of whole grains, the crunch of fresh veggies, the freshness of herbs and the zing of red wine vinegar make this salad a home run.
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Making your own vinaigrette is so easy, you’ll wonder why you haven’t been doing it for years. It takes a few ingredients and five minutes to get “better than store bought” salad dressing at a fraction of the cost.
The three most dreaded words in my vocabulary “Bathing Suit Season”. It’s not that I have an issue wearing one, I hate shopping for them. Come on, Girls out there… Please tell me you have my back. It could nearly be classified as torture. I have to psych myself up for the task, give myself a little pep talk and promise myself a reward if I get it accomplished in record time.
When life gives you lemons, make a vinaigrette ~ Me.
The point is, we are eating A LOT of salads these days. We always eat salad, but lately we are eating enough greens for a small village. We have a few favorites, like this Butternut Arugula Salad, but I like to change it up fairly often. One of the best ways to do that is with the dressing. Last year, we were at a family reunion and I was lucky enough to score 2 lbs of raw honey from a cousin who has bees. That honey is incredible and makes the best vinaigrettes! Making your own vinaigrette at home takes about 5 minutes and one of the advantages in doing it yourself is total control over the ingredients. You know exactly what is in there. No red dye #5, no high-fructose corn syrup, no need for a PhD to decipher ingredients! Just squeeze a few lemons, add in a little honey, blitz it & stir in whole grain mustard. Easy Peasy, Lemony Squeezy.
This vinaigrette is good for more than just salad, I use it in a summer pasta salad (post coming soon) and it’s a great marinade for chicken! This recipe makes about 3 cups of dressing and it will keep in an airtight container in the fridge for 5 – 7 days. Five minutes of work for a vinaigrette you can use all week! That’s a pretty good deal.
Spicy arugula, creamy butternut squash and white beans drizzled with maple vinaigrette. This is the perfect fall salad.
A few months ago, we were in Vancouver for our honeymoon. Whenever we tell people that we spent our honeymoon in Vancouver, it goes one of two ways: If they’ve never been, they automatically ask “Why Vancouver?” and for those that have been, it’s usually a smile and a sigh. They get it. There’s a reason I had to tell you a bit of backstory… I planned for MONTHS for this trip. Every single detail, including activities and eating. Ok, it was mostly eating… One of the “must do” activities was biking the perimeter of Stanley Park. The weather did not cooperate with us and it rained almost every single day of our trip.
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Thai chicken salad with spicy chili lime dressing is my go-to summer dinner. The vinaigrette keeps me coming back for more and because it’s so light, I don’t feel the least bit guilty. This salad is a great alternative to it’s heavy, mayo-laden cousins.
In my continuing effort to avoid turning my kitchen into the sweltering fires of hell, I decided that this time I would cheat a little. Just a little, and it’s for the greater good. The heat index is hovering in the triple digits while beads of sweat are pooling at the nape of my neck. The least entertaining thought at this moment is “let’s fire up the oven”.
Store-bought roast chicken: In the winter months, this would be considered sacrilege… but in the blistering heat of summer, it is sweet salvation!
As if buying the chicken wasn’t enough, the food processor is going to do the majority of the work! Yep, this might be the perfect summer recipe. The amount of work involved barely even registers. If you don’t own a food processor it isn’t the end of the world, just a bit of chopping & grating.
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Homemade vinaigrettes are one of the easiest things to make. If you are not confident in the kitchen, this is a great place to start getting your feet wet. A handful of ingredients and 5 minutes is all it takes to make something delicious.
Now that Spring is in full swing and the Farmer’s Markets are replete with the good stuff, it’s time to start putting those veggies back into the rotation.
Some people tend to look at salads as the obligatory precursor to the main event. Granted, if someone serves you a bowl of pre-cut lettuce and gloppy dressing, it is barely even that. However, with a little creativity and a blender you can make something that is beautiful, delicious, good for you and even those that tend to resist eating “rabbit food” may even get on board.
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A very good childhood friend of mine sent me some salted caramels over the holidays and I have been rationing them out on a daily basis. Needless to say, when I see commercials for all of the various weight-loss companies it makes me cringe a bit knowing I’m a few bites away from needing an intervention.
Therefore, I’ve taken it upon myself to get back into the swing of things. Like everyone else, I get a bit out of control during the holidays and then, when all of the over-eating makes me feel like Jabba the Hutt, the pendulum swings back the other way and I get myself back in line.
As you well know from previous posts, I have no shortage of mason jars in various shapes & sizes cluttering my cabinets and there is a reason for this, besides canning. They are useful for many different things, quick salad dressing being one of them.
It honestly couldn’t be easier… pour everything in & shake it up. The best part of making your own salad dressing aside from it being much less expensive, is that you know exactly what’s in it. There are no dyes, no high-fructose corn syrup, no ingredients that require a Ph.D. in Chemistry to pronounce.
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