The Nourishing Gourmet

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Green Salad Series: Add Some Interest (and More Nutrition!)

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In part three of my Green Salad Series, we will be going over some simple (and even obvious) ways to add interest to your green salad. In part one we talked about our salad greens and in part two I shared how to make a simple dressing.

Recently, I noticed that my husband didn’t seem very interested in our green salads. I would always end up eating the leftovers. But once I started adding in some other vegetables and herbs for interest, he started enjoying our salads so much more. It really makes a difference for presentation, and taste appeal. You also get the benefit of all that added nutrition. This really works well for us (For more works for me wednesday tips, go here)

Adding Vegetables

While there are even many more options than I am giving here, this is a good starting point. One type of vegetable can be added to a salad in many forms. For example, a carrot can be grated, chopped or made into ribbons, which I will be explaining below. Varying how you prepare you vegetables does add interest and variety. But making vegetables ribbons is one of my variates right now.

Making Vegetables Ribbons


To make these pretty carrot “ribbons”, wash and peel your carrot. Then, putting your carrot flat on the cutting board, take your peeler, and run it top to bottom creating a “ribbon”. Continue to do this until you are about half way down the carrot, then turn around and do the same on the other side. As long as your peeler is sharp, you should be able to use most of the carrot.

You can actually do the same thing with asparagus (my mother in-law was the one who first showed me this). This is also very pretty and adds a nice crunch and taste to your salad.

Another thing that is very tasty, if you can get our hands on them at the farmer’s market, are these young, sweet onions. I don’t usually like raw onions, but these are wonderful. I just thinly slice and add to my salad.
Another classic salad addition is cucumber. They are more in season right now, so they are really good. If you leave the peel on, make sure it’s not bitter. Otherwise, peel them before slicing.
And you can see in my picture on the top of this page, I also had some thinly sliced red and yellow peppers prepared as well. These are a favorite of mine as well. As long as you don’t get the green ones, they are sweet, crunchy, and very flavorful. Sometimes I thinly slice them, other times, I cut them into small pieces. One last, and one of the most favorite additions, is avocado. They add healthy fat and nutrients and a wonderful taste to your salads. It also makes it more filling.

One last way to add a lot of flavor (and, again, nutrition) is to add fresh herbs to your salad.

(Fresh thyme from my garden)
“Fresh herbs add extra phenols to salads, and phenols protect your cells against oxidative damage, which, over time, can lead to cancer, heart disease and more. In one study, sage, rosemary, thyme and marjoram added the most antioxidant power to a salad. In fact, fresh marjoram leaves more than doubled a salad’s antioxidant value, while adding a slightly sweet, minty flavor. Although your body’s native antioxidants (catalase, glutathione and SOD) are your top cellular protectors, herbs and spices seem to help mightily.”
http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2008/05/four_herbs_for_highpowered_sal.html

I like basil and thyme especially. Just rinse, tear into smaller pieces and toss with the greens. Another, very refreshing herb to add is cilantro. Obviously, if you do this, don’t add herbs to your salad dressing!

I can guarantee that doing some or all of these steps will liven up your salad, and make it more of a main dish event! Tomorrow, I will be sharing some of my favorite protein additions, so stay tuned for that!

How about you? What are your favorite vegetable or herb additions to your salad?

Green Salad Series: Dress Those Greens!

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Part two, of my Green Salad Series!

Now that you have picked up a dark green head of lettuce (sighing blissfully whenever you think of all of those nutrients packed inside those leafs), and washed and dried it. It’s time for the next very important step, picking out your dressing.

I am a huge advocate of making your own dressing. It takes less than 5 minutes to make a simple one, it’s 100 times better for you than even most of the “healthy” versions bought at the store, and it’s often much cheaper as well. I often will make a large batch and keep it in my refrigerator. So it takes about 5 minutes to make a week’s worth of salad dressings! It works for me! At the end of this post I will give directions for making a simple, but delicious vinaigrette. But let’s focus on our ingredients, which will ensure the success of our dressing.

Olive Oil

For dressings, my oil of choice is olive oil.

“Olive oil contains 75 percent oleic acid, the stable monounsaturated fat, along with 13 percent saturated fat, 10 percent omega 6 linoleic acid, and 2 percent omega 3 linolenic acid. The high percentage of oleic acid makes olive oil ideal for salads and for cooking at moderate temperatures. Extra virgin olive oil is also rich in antioxidants. It should be cloudy, indicating that it has not been filtered, and have a golden yellow color, indicating that it is made from fully ripened olives. Olive oil has withstood the test of time;it’s the safest vegetable oil you can use…”Sally Fallon, Nourishing Traditions, pg19

Along with her tips for picking out a good olive oil, I add the following.

*Look for an olive oil that is in a dark glass bottle. This helps preserve olive oil’s properties and prevent it from becoming rancid

*Remember to look for the words, cold-pressed, and extra virgin olive oil. You want to avoid chemically treated olive oil (which is where we get “light” olive oil).

*Also remember that different olive oils will taste differently. You may find you prefer some brands over others.

* I keep a price list of organic olive oils, so I know when there is a good deal. Make sure you check how much it costs per ounce, not bottle.

Vinegar

What come next? Our vinegar. This is where we really branch out into all different directions!

Balsamic

A favorite for many people is balsamic vinegar. It has a rich, sweetly mellow taste. I haven’t found a favorite organic brand yet, but Trader Joes had a 20 year aged balsamic vinegar that was very good.

Kimberley’s Vinegar

I have recently fallen in love with this brand of organic vinegars. I had no idea that vinegar could be sooo flavorful! They also are organic. What’s so different about this vinegar? They use a good old fashioned method to making it. I found this description on their website.

“We personally select only premium wines from California’s top vineyards, using fully ripe grapes that are intense and fruity.

Kimberley Wine Vinegars are made with the ancient French Orleans method, taking a minimum of six months to age to perfection. This slow, careful, barrel fermentation produces an exceptional vinegar and superior flavor and quality. (Most bulk-produced vinegars are made in as little as three days and are often diluted with water.)

To start, we partially fill small oaks casks with wine. Then each cask receives select bacterial that slowly converts, or ferments the wine into vinegar. Ventilation holes in each cask allow normal air currents to carry off fermentation by-products, avoiding the bitterness found in some vinegars.

We do not add any chemicals to our vinegars at any time.”

And let me tell you, you can really tell a difference in taste. I love it. I have tried their Cabernet Sauvigon, which is like a red wine vinegar. It is very full flavored. I think we have gone through several of these already. I have also tried their champagne vinegar, which is a lighter, sweeter vinegar. It is also very good. I can’t wait to try their balsamic as well. I may have just found a good organic balsamic at last! You can buy them at Whole Foods and other markets.

So there are just a few options for you to start with. I will highlight other vinegars as time goes on, but these are some great ones to start with. If you can’t find particular brands, don’t worry. Get what looks good and go from there. And, as always, I would love to hear from you what your favorite olive oil and vinegar brands are.

So now that we have discussed our oil and vinegar, it’s time for our recipe!

Simple Vinaigrette
This recipe is simple, but classy. It uses what many consider the perfect ratio of oil to vinegar. If you pick out flavorful olive oil and vinegar it’s hard to go wrong! Some, especially those used to sugar laden dressings, may want to add a bit of sweetener to tame the tang. A dash of stevia, or a spoonful of honey, agave, or rapadura, all work. I often make it as simple as this, but sometimes I will add some Dijon mustard, and/or some fresh or dried herbs.

1/3 cup of vinegar
2/3 cup of olive oil
1/2-1 teaspoon of salt
1 garlic clove, minced

Combine in a glass jar, whisk or shake to combine well, and toss with salad greens right before serving.

Another favorite dressing of ours uses apple cider vinegar. Check out Our Everyday Salad Dressing as well.

This post is part of Kitchen Tip Tuesday, and Works for me Wednesday!

Part Two: Losing Weight Eating Nourishing Food :

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Green Salad Series

In part one, I talked about keeping your blood sugar levels even, and making coconut your new best friend. (I wanted to clarify, after receiving a few comments and an email, that I wasn’t trying to advocate that most of us had to go on a low-carb extreme diet to lose weight. Most of us just eat an extreme amount of carbohydrates without even realizing it! So cutting back will help many of us lose weight.)

Today, I would like to give just a few more tips and resources. So here we go…..

Eat Your Vegetables

Roasted Asparagus

We all know we should, but we don’t always get enough. In other countries, such as Italy, they eat high amounts of vegetables. This may be part of the reason why they are so healthy, and weigh so much less, despite not having a “perfect” diet. We should follow their good example, and really learn to enjoy vegetables. Once you start eating vegetables in higher amounts, you will literally crave them, if you don’t get them. They provide not only important fiber and nutrients, but they feel you up with fewer calories.

On that same note, when I went on The Body Ecology Diet, to help clear up some digestive issues (caused by back to back antibiotic use), not only did I have to food combine, and eat high amounts of cultured food, but I was supposed to eat 80 percent vegetables. I don’t think I was always successful in that, but I did certainly eat a lot of vegetables. Despite that fact that I felt like I was eating (vegetables) all day long, I still managed to lose weight. In fact, I lost too much weight, though I have since regained it successfully (that’s a good thing!). But all to say, eating a lot of vegetables and not eating as many carbohydrates certainly made me lose weight!

Watch Out for Nuts and Olive Oil

I know, I know. I said that fat doesn’t make you fat. That was only a half truth, perhaps. This is another point I gleaned from Eat Fat, Lose Fat. Olive oil and nuts may be great for your health, but they do tend to fatten you up. So, if you are trying to lose weight you should limit them. Mary Enig (the co-author of both Nourishing Traditions and Eat Fat, Lose Fat), suggests that you melt one cup of coconut oil over low heat, and add to one cup of olive oil and one cup of sesame oil (keep at room temperature). This is a healthy oil to use, the coconut oil stays liquid, and you won’t have to worry so much about the weight gain caused by olive oil.

Now, I should note that there are some studies done on certain nuts that show that they could be helpful in losing weight (I recently saw one for almonds). So, you can research it yourself. I am sure that some nuts are more fattening than others. Overall, just remember moderation.

Don’t Think “Eat Less”, Think “Eat More”

The tendency we have when trying to lose weight, is to think about all of the things we need to eat less of. Instead of thinking of all of the no-no’s, concentrate on all of the wonderful food that you should be eating more of, like coconut, beautiful salads, meat dishes, and creamy vegetable soups. Think less processed food, more whole grains. Think less carbohydrate foods, but more metabolism friendly coconut meals. Keep a positive view point!

Make Your own Broth and Soups

Chicken Noodle Soup with Turkey “Sausage”

Making your own very delicious chicken and beef broths is a gourmet, nutrient rich choice. By using that broth to make soups, it will give you satisfying meals that keep you thinner. And don’t be afraid to add some cream or coconut milk to your soup. It will help you absorb your nutrients, and keep you fuller for longer (oh, and it makes it taste better too!)

Stay Hydrated and Drink Tea

Thai Rooibos Iced Tea

I find that I will sometimes eat something when I am really just thirsty. Staying hydrated helps solve that problem. We want to eat when we are hungry, not when we are thirsty! Sometimes I am just in the mood for a “treat”, but not really hungry. Often, making myself a cup of my favorite herbal tea, with a dab of honey and a bit of cream or coconut milk fills that desire completely. Sometimes I will also add a bit of coconut oil as well (though that gets my metabolism going so much that I usually have to have a snack soon after!).

And the Obvious

Don’t overeat. It’s not only bad for your weight, but also for your health. Eating just until satisfied will leave you feeling less “weighed down” in more than one way! Also really avoid going on extreme diets. They are very hard on your body, health and metabolism. Choose instead to nourish your way to a proper weight.

If you follow practical steps to lose weight, but still don’t find it helping, you may need to consider going to a nautropath or qualified doctor to make sure that you don’t have any medical reasons that are causing you to hold on to weight. For example, low thyroid function will make you hold on to weight and I am sure that there are other medical reasons as well.

Helpful Resources:

Eat Fat, Lose Fat-Sally Fallon and Mary Enig not only give wonderful information on health and weight issues, but also provide wonderful recipes and menu plans for weight loss. Half of these recipes are coconut based, a big boon for those of us trying to add coconut into our diets.

The Body Ecology Diet-I definitely lost weight on this diet and also lost my sugar cravings as well. I do think that it helped my health, but found it to restrictive for long term use (this might have been because I was nursing at the time). There are some things that I don’t agree with, and many things I question, but I have gleaned a lot of wonderful advice and information from this book. It could prove very helpful to people trying to lose weight.

Weston A. Price Foundation– If you do a word search for “weight loss” on this site, you will find many wonderful resources, including book reviews on different diet books from a ‘nourishing” view. This would be quite helpful to those trying to sort through different diet books.
I found this article helpful in dealing with the “how many carbs” to eat question. This article gives helpful links to other articles on the site.