Chiffonade of Mixed Lettuces

Printable Recipe

Cutting lettuce into delicate strips for this chiffonade salad creates an elegant design worthy of the footed trifle dish, if you happen to have one. Any straight sided bowl will do, of course - it's the colorful mix of lettuce and veg that makes it pretty. Two different dressings make it unexpectedly good.

So, let's start by putting together the interior dressing, drizzled on about half way through the layering. Use 1/3 c good flavored olive oil and 1-1/2  TBS fresh lemon juice with 1/2 tsp Honey Mustard. No substitutes.

This is a dressing of few ingredients which must each taste delicious individually. Bottled lemon juice or hot dog mustard or cheap oil will RUIN it.

I know, I'm strict about ingredients. Add a pinch of salt and pepper and shake it, baby.

 A Lettuce Note:
Any mix of colorful lettuces will do, some red, some light green, some dark. I happened upon this 4 pack at my grocery that was ideal. For a crunchier and brighter addition, I also bought romaine.

A Chiffonade Note:
Remove any damaged outer leaves and simply cut the entire head crossways into thin ribbons. Keep the various colors separate. I washed and dried everything one bunch at a time after cutting.

Even though these had already been spun in the salad spinner, I wrapped them in an absorbent towel to dry further. Residual water will only thin out the dressing.


Layer all the heads of the softer lettuce first, red and then green. Clip a handful of fresh dill evenly over the top with kitchen shears.











For extra flavor and color, thin slice a red onion, red pepper, green bell pepper, and several radishes.
Line the edges of the bowl with first one layer of vegetables slices and then another until all are used, scattering a mixture in the center of the bowl.  Drizzle the dressing over all evenly.




Top this layer with all the strips of romaine and add several generous spoonfuls of Miracle Whip Light.

Smooth it out with the back of the spoon.

The trick is in not lifting the spoon, just pressing it down and turning the bowl with the other hand.

Now clean up the edges of that bowl and serve proudly. Delicious and beautiful too.

THE SHOPPING LIST
4 colorful lettuces
1 romaine lettuce
Honey Mustard
Olive Oil
1 Lemon
Miracle Whip Lite
1 Small Red Onion
1 Red Bell Pepper
1 Green Bell Pepper
3-4 Radishes
1 bunch of Dill

TSFL note - one cup of this salad counts as one vegetable serving and one to two healthy fat servings.
Summer has given way to Fall Fest at the Food Network website where you'll find my foodie blogs along with other great food lovin' bloggers, offering up our best ideas all the way through the holidays! Each week we'll be blogging together with the FN Dish to produce fabulous ways to enjoy your produce!  This week, it's Mixed Lettuce, next week come on back for perfect ways with Pumpkins. Check out these other delicious ideas:
Jeanette's Healthy Living: Quinoa and Black Lentil Salad With Mixed Salad Greens
Cooking With Books: "Chopped" Salads
Haute Apple Pie: Roasted Butternut Squash Salad With Warm Bacon Dressing
Dishin & Dishes: Beet Salad With Garlic Vinaigrette
Thursday Night Dinner: Mixed Lettuce, Caramelized Onion and Goat Cheese Pita Pizza
And Love It Too: Rainbow Salad
Made By Michelle: Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato Sandwiches
Feed Me Phoebe: Hearts of Romaine With Beets, Pistachios and Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette
HGTV Gardens: Garden-to-Table: Mixed Lettuce
Virtually Homemade: Mixed Fall Greens With Dijon Chive Vinaigrette
Devour: Lettuce (Hold the Salad)
Daily*Dishin: Almond Chutney Chicken Lettuce Wraps
FN Dish: Top 12 Lettuce Wraps

Spinach Leaf Roll Ups

Printed Recipe

Here's a quick little colorful bite perfect for a last-minute appetizer platter or just to have as a snack that will leave you satisfied and feeling virtuous for making healthy choices. And these couldn't be simpler to make, especially if you start with a bag of prewashed spinach.

Find the darkest sweet red pepper in the produce bin and cut into 1/4" strips about the width of your spinach leaves. I looked for baby spinach leaves because they're flatter than the full size crinkly spinach and easier for this recipe. Simply choose the largest flattest leaves from the bag and pinch off the stems. Line them up, assembly line style, and spread with a thin layer of Laughing Cow Creamy Swiss Lite. This is easiest if the cheese is at room temp. You'll need about one triangle of Laughing Cow for every half dozen or so leaves.
Position a matchstick of the red pepper at the base of each leaf and roll up tightly. The cheese is just sticky enough to hold them together for serving (and definitely long enough to pop them straight into your mouth). Voila! I just made you eat spinach and love it.
THE SHOPPING LIST
1 cup spinach leaves
3 Wedges Laughing Cow Creamy Swiss Lite
1/2 Red Bell Pepper

**Count this as one vegetable serving and 3 condiment servings if you are following the Take Shape for Life program and eat all on the above list.**

Summer has given way to Fall Fest at the Food Network website where you'll find my foodie blogs along with other great food lovin' bloggers, offering up our best ideas all the way through the holidays! Each week we'll be blogging together with the FN Dish to produce fabulous ways to enjoy your produce!  This week, it's Spinach, next week come on back for tasty ways with Turnips. Check out these other delicious ideas: 

Jeanette's Healthy Living: Skinny Hot Spinach Dip
Feed Me Phoebe: October Evening Lentil Soup With Spinach
And Love It Too: Grain-Free Spinach Pie
Cooking With Elise: Baby Spinach Salad With Cranberries, Spiced Pecans and a Maple Vinaigrette
Virtually Homemade: Three Onion Dip With Spinach
HGTV Gardens: Garden-to-Table: Spinach
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Whole-Wheat Pasta With Spicy Spinach and Peanut Butter Pesto
Thursday Night Dinner: Spinach Ice Cream
Cooking Channel: Fresh Spinach in Indian Recipes
Daily*Dishin: Spinach-Sausage Saute With Pan-Fried Gnocchi
Bacon and Souffle: Baby Spinach Pizza With Sopressata and Sriracha
FN Dish: Stuff It With Spinach

Summer Squash Ribbons with Feta and Pine Nuts

(Printable Recipe)

Yellow squash in ribbons this thin is so tender you'll swear it's been cooked, but no - it's fresh and ready in minutes for a cool salad or easy side.  All you need is a sprinkling of seasonings and it's dressed to serve, without a drop of dressing to fatten it up.

Here's what you'll need: Several Yellow Squash, the smaller the better; small green onions (scallions), a few sprigs of basil, feta, pine nuts.

Trim the ends from each squash. Using a vegetable peeler (or mandolin set to the very thinnest setting) shave strips of squash, disposing of the first and last piece which will just be skin. If the squash is very seedy, toss it. Little seeds won't matter, but any slices that are mostly seed aren't worth keeping. And this is why we pick through the squash for the tiniest ones in the first place!

Stack up several basil leaves and thinly slice them into little green ribbons. Here I've used sweet basil most easily found in the grocery in pots or in small plastic boxes in the area where fresh herbs are sold. If it's spring, keep an eye out for different types of potted basil from herb growers or flower stands. The flavors can vary from spicy to sweet to exotic and strong. You'll find which you like best.

These are a few of the basils I'm growing this year. The tiny leafed one in the middle is Greek Globe Basil, the sweetest basil I've ever tasted. The pretty, variegated basil on the left is not only beautiful to grow it has a fine mild flavor with a note of something spicy as well. And, of course, sweet basil on the right. Incidentally, if you grow your own, cut it and use it up before it blossoms, for it is worthless from the moment the first flowerbud appears. The entire plant turns to bitter licorice and is good for nothing but the compost heap.

Finally, toss your ribbons with salt and pepper and about a tablespoon each of the chopped basil, finely sliced scallions (I've used purple ones here that I found at the Farmer's Mkt), Crumbled Feta, and Pine Nuts.     As an alternate to the Feta, I have also used fresh Parmesan, grated on a rasp here from a left-over rind. A little of this goes a long way since it's so strong. In a good way!

Note for those on the Take Shape for Life Program - if you make this with 2 cups of squash, you'll have four 1/2 cup servings and the pine nuts, feta, and onion will equal about a serving of the allowable condiments for the day. Never heard of TSFL? My husband and I  lost 110 pounds (together!) in under 4 months and are health coaches who can help you do the same! You can click the link above to send me an email through TSFL. We feel the benefit every day of getting back to good health through this plan.

SUMMERFEST at the Food Network IS BACK!! Check out these other great blogs for squash ideas:

 

Jeanette's Healthy Living: Quick and Easy Sesame Summer Squash Stir-Fry
Cooking With Elise: Orange Summer Squash Bread
Feed Me Phoebe: Summer Squash and Cornmeal Cakes With Tarragon
Chez Us: Zucchini Pancakes With Minty Dill Crème Fraiche
And Love It, Too: Peter Pan Squash Spiced Oven Fries
Made By Michelle: Pattypan Squash and Tomato Frittata
Cooking Channel: Our  Top 5 Favorite Squash Recipes
Daily*Dishin: Summer Squash Confetti Salad
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Summer Squash Chips
Ingredients, Inc.: Summer Squash and Kale Sauté
Thursday Night Dinner: Summer Squash Medley
Sweet Life Bake: Zucchini Fried With Tequila-Spiked Avocado Dip
Dixie Chik Cooks: Fried Summer Squash Parmesan Sliders
Healthy Eats: Summer Squash Any Way You Slice It
FN Dish: Cheesy Summer Squash

Cucumber Jicama Salad

(Printable Recipe)

Cool cucumber and lightly sweet jicama make a perfect summery combo for this light slaw or salad. It's a crunchy and refreshing alternative to creamy cole slaw, with plenty of flavor from the upside-down vinaigrette that's more vinegar than oil and has just the right punch of red chili paste to spice it up. If this sounds like a mix that's all over the map, that's because it is - a little bit Asian, a little bit south of the border, and a dab of good old backyard garden.

While the summer cukes and Vidalia onions are in abundance I could eat this slaw every day. English cucumbers will certainly suffice in winter and purple onions will do (and add some nice color). Jicama adds the real crunch in this dish, and it's usually in my grocery all year round, looking like a fat round potato that has found its way into the Odd Vegetable bin. Most grocers stock these near similarly strange produce or root vegetables.

First of all, here's the quick and easy way to get into this tuber. Forget peeling it. Go for your largest sharpest knife and chop off four "sides" to get it into a boxy shape. Set it up on one of the flat sides and take off the top and bottom the same way so you're left with a nice square shape you can easily slice.

Keep what's left in the middle!

Now cut into thin slices.

Stack the slices into manageable piles and cut down through the whole stack for julienned sticks. If you're starting to think you'll just skip the cutting and get out your grater, do resist! The jicama might withstand it but grate that cucumber and you'll have cucumber water on your hands and little else. Great to splash on your face but not so good for our slaw, ah...we'll just call it a salad instead.

Finally, chop through the stacks one more time for inch or so length pieces.  And it's time to match the cucumber to the jicama.

Peel and halve from end to end, then again across the middle. If there are lots of seeds, just scrape them out with a spoon so that what is left is firm flesh only. Stand the pieces on end and slice into thin flats that can be julienned into strips as we did the jicama. Again, resist the temptation to grate like a regular slaw, although you could slice in little half moons if you think that's simpler, you'll just loose some of the crunch that makes this salad so refreshing.

Finally, the onion. Thinly slice and chop those strips into smaller sticks to match our other vegetables.
You'll see here a bit of chopped green onion (scallion) that I decided to add as a garnish  to the finished dish also, for good looks and a different onion flavor element.

So, to the finished measure: 1 cup each of cucumber and jicama with 1/4 cup onion. You'll probably have more than enough to double this recipe, but to this measure of vegetables pictured, use the following recipe of vinaigrette initially:


Whisk together 2 Tbs Rice Vinegar, 1 Tbs Olive Oil, 1 tsp each of Splenda and Red Chili Paste, and a pinch of salt. (Most every grocery stocks Rice Vinegar and Red Chili Paste with other Asian foods.)
Rice Vinegar is very different in flavor than plain white vinegar or wine vinegar, having a hint of natural sweetness without adding carbs or calories. 

Give it a taste before you pour: if
you like more heat - add a little more chili paste, more sweetness - an extra dash of Splenda, if tangy is what you like - another splash of the vinegar.

And now, the anointing of the salad: toss with only half the dressing for starters and then see how much you really need. I had plenty of extra vegetables and used all the dressing, but see what tastes best to you!

THE SHOPPING LIST
1 large cucumber
1 jicama
1 small Vidalia onion
(or purple onion)
1 Scallion, green top only
Rice Vinegar
Red Chili Paste
Olive Oil
Splenda

SummerFest at the Food Network website (FN Dish) is back! Once again, you'll find my foodie blogs on the Food Network along with other great food lovin' bloggers, offering up our best ideas for your Farmer's Market finds all summer long. Each week we'll be blogging together with the FN Dish to produce fabulous ways to enjoy your produce!  This week, it's cucumbers. Check out these delicious ideas:

What's Gaby Cooking: Cucumber, Herb and Pita Salad
Ingredients, Inc.: Easiest Cucumber Salad
Virtually Homemade: Cucumber Strawberry Cooler
From My Corner of Saratoga: Marinated Cucumber Salad
The Cultural Dish: Pasta With Roasted Shrimp and Cucumbers
Daily*Dishin: Southern Benedictine - Creamy Cucumber Spread
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Cucumber and Avocado Open-Face Sandwiches
And Love It, Too: Fermented Spicy Garlic-Dill Cukes and Zukes
FN Dish: No-Cook Cucumber Recipes
Cooking With Elise: Wedge Salad With Cucumber-Ranch Dressing
The Sensitive Epicure: Chinese Style Cucumbers

 

Cool Cukes: 7 Minute Summer in a Jar

The perfect mix of sweet, tangy, little bit fiery, and fresh. The stuff my Nanny (read: grandma) always had in the fridge in summer as soon as the cucumbers were ripe in her Tennessee garden. My version is sweeter than it is tangy and has a spicy little bite from hot peppers. I use it as a topper for salads, a side dish at almost every meal, and on sandwiches all summer..except maybe PB&Js. This week the Farmer's Market yielded golden cucumbers and new red onions which made the wonderfully colorful jar on the right. And within 24 hrs it had a lovely pink hue from those onions.

**I originally posted this recipe on my Daily*Dishin blog and it appeared in the Food Network Summerfest as well. I have altered the recipe to replace the sugar with Splenda and was so surprised at how good it tasted that I decided to include it here, especially since I am never without a jar in my fridge.**

I look for smallish cucumbers usually, but this long english cucumber (like the kind shrinkwrapped in the store) makes a really good choice because the seedy part is minimal and never mushy. The golden cukes turned out to be fairly green inside and quite seedy so I scooped that  part with a spoon.

I think these are best when cut very thin. A mandoline makes quick work of this step. I use my über cheap, ancient Ronco slicer-dicer gadget (set to #2, for anyone out there who is lucky enough to have one of these little baby dinosaurs lying around). Go ahead and layer cucumbers alternating with onions in the jar before pouring on the liquid.  Mix 1/4 cup Splenda and 1/4 cup water with 3/4 cup vinegar, good pinch of salt and pepper. I whisk this together but it really doesn't matter whether the sugar dissolves now or after you pour into the jar. It will all work out.

Ratio is 3 times as much vinegar as sugar.

Slowly pour the liquid until it is almost to the top. The cucumbers will release more juice and top it off within a few hours. For the yellow cukes I used Champagne vinegar. You can try various others, but plain white is the standby.

I add the peppers last because they're easiest to get into place after the liquid. Slip a butter knife into the jar to gently press back the vegetables and make room to slide the peppers in all around. I know they're beautiful, but don't get too carried away unless you like it HOT! Because it's still a little early for fresh red peppers I used these dried Ancho Chiles which turn bright red again in the jar.

I added one more flavor element to this jar. It's a garlic scape, the top part of the growing garlic that is chopped off early in the season. These keep for ages in the fridge and I still had some from weeks ago. They impart a nice mild garlic flavor and look kind of interesting in the jar and not snakey at all, hmm. Some fresh dill goes in last right on the top. I only had a little to add this week, but the more the merrier, if you have plenty. Give these a day to flavor up and have at 'em! They only get better and better as the days go by, not that you can expect them to last very long.

If you're following the Take Shape For Life program, you may find as I did that these are a great appetite suppressant for some reason. I often have a small dish (maybe 1/4 cup - so only half a veg serving) if dinner is running late or I'm hungry and in the midst of preparing a big meal.

 

THE SHOPPING LIST

4-6 small cucumbers
1 vidalia onion
fresh dill
Splenda
vinegar

2 Minute French Green Beans

When dinner is ready and you still need a green veg on the side, this is your dish!

I try to keep these fresh french green beans on hand all the time. They're quick, easy, and delicious with or without any extras. Most groceries stock them near the fresh bagged vegetables, often with the type that can be steamed in the bag. And that's exactly what you can do with these, we just usually need a serving or two instead of an entire bag.

Although these are labeled as "trimmed" (and I'm putting that in quotes because they're not), it's only the stem end that's trimmed and I like to get rid of the other end too. The easiest way to do this is to trim up a handful at a time with kitchen shears. And if you're not using kitchen shears, try a pair! get the type that come apart in the middle so you can throw them in the dishwasher. I have at least 4 pair in my kitchen because I use them constantly to cut up raw meats, trim vegetables, open bags, clip flower stems...you'll find endless uses for these.

A quick way to judge how to end up with a single 1/2 cup serving after they're cut is like this. That's about a 2-1/2" diameter handful.








And don't put down your shears yet! Cut through the whole handful of beans in one or two inch lengths for bite size pieces.

Now into the bowl, top it with stretch wrap and give it 2 minutes* in the wave. They'll be perfectly done, no need for water or anything else. OK, spritz with a bit of I Can't Believe it's Not Butter if you're not the vegetable purist!


*For 3-4 Servings they'll need about 4 minutes wave time.

Southern Yellow Squash

There's something wonderful that happens to plain old yellow squash when you give it a slow saute and a good bit of pepper. I've said before that every southern cook knows the secret of finely ground black pepper. Some of the best whole baked chicken I've ever eaten is simply cooked quite high with lots of pepper and salt, basted in its own juices. But that's another blogpost, another day...let us return to the squash at hand.

For two to three smallish squashes I use 1/2 a vidalia onion, sliced thinly, not diced. As for the squash, they need to be fairly thin too and I usually do mine with the Ronco slice-o-matic but feel free to wield a knife or pull out your own mandoline slicer.

When you have an array of lovely yellow disks like this, you're ready to start.

Use a non-stick skillet over low-med heat and hit it with a light spray of Pam or just a bit of olive oil. Go ahead and give it a good salt and peppering now since the salt will help the vegetables give up moisture promptly and keep them from sticking also. This little trick allows you to use minimal to zero cooking fats. Give it a stir every 5-6 minutes just to be sure and in about 15-20 minutes they should look like this:

If you've cut a thicker slice it may take up to 30 minutes for a nice finish. When they are done they should be nicely browned and melt-in-your-mouth tender!









**For the Take Shape for Life lean eaters out there, you can skip the olive oil completely if you're not having the leanest meat for dinner or don't have fat servings left for the day. The squash will still be delish!