Salad Dressing of the Week: Green Goddess

This spring/summer I want to do a better job eating salads, and I'm hopeful that using homemade salad dressings will help make salad eating more appetizing.

 

I found a recipe here that looked close to a dressing my grandmother has made in the past from scratch. Yes, it's full of great calorie-laden stuff like mayonnaise and sour cream (which I replaced with plain lowfat yogurt), but it also contains great flavorings like tarragon vinegar and anchovies--which are my favorite salad dressing ingredient!

 

It also contains fresh herbs: parsley, chives, mint, and tarragon. This week I used what I had on hand, which was parsley, green onions, no mint, and dried tarragon. It still turned out beautifully and I have been enjoying it on salad every day this week, in small portions of course.

ETA: Here are some various ways I used Green Goddess dressing this week:

• I also served it to our relatives on salad as well as on top of fresh steamed asparagus.
• As a dip for cut fresh vegetables.
• Combined with chopped hardboiled eggs, it makes a tangy Egg Salad
• I also spread it on a tortilla as a sandwich spread, then added turkey, lettuce, spinach, carrots, and tomatoes for a tasty sandwich wrap.
• I didn't do this, but you could also use it for potato salad, either warm or chilled.

 This stuff is good. I will definitely be making it again!

 

You can find more ways to use herbs and spices as Lifeasmom.com.

Declutter Challenge March Update: Building Ebay Experience

I haven't forgotten that it's past time to report on my decluttering progress in March. After a busy month in February... blah blah blah. I toyed with the idea of listing some items on Craig's List, but ultimately I decided to focus on Ebay listings.

I followed the strategy I had worked out and it went well. Listing auctions with no reserve on Ebay makes me anxious, and many people prefer to avoid the fear of an item selling for a low price by raising the starting bid price or pricing the item as Buy it Now. I've observed that auctions with higher starting bid prices appear to attract fewer bidders. I could sell items using the Buy it Now feature, but I wasn't sure exactly how much my items would be worth in the end. One buyer actually contacted me about an auction, wondering if I would be willing to change it to a Buy it Now transaction. I'm glad I didn't because the item ended up selling for more than the buyer would have offered.

I also struggled with the mail rates. The cost to mail the larger items were easy to justify, but the cost to mail some of the smaller items across the country was exhorbitant. In some cases the flat rate envelopes and boxes worked well, but in other cases the value of the item I was trying to sell wasn't worth how much it would cost to safely ship it anywhere in the country. I ended up added additional shipping options on several transactions.

In the end, I sold 7 of the 11 items, resulting in $155.47 in sales after Ebay and Paypal commissions and fees, which I've finally figured out!* Several of the small items sold for only $.99, so I'm not always right about what items will be in demand. I didn't mind very much because I had great success on other transactions, and I still moved items that were no longer useful to my family out of my house and into a home where the item is needed.

I also sold an additional book through Half.com, making $5.59 after commissions and fees. I only have a small handful of books listed, but it's nice to every once in a while pop a book in the mail to someone who would like to own it.

That's all I sold! It was a smaller month, but still well ahead of my earning goal--I earned a total of $161.06.

As for my other decluttering projects, I could have made more progress. The pile for Goodwill that I made when decluttering the basement laundry room is still in the house, unfortunately. I did successfully recycle my worn, flaking, non-stick cookware. April is set to be a high export month due to the yard/consignment sale strategy.

*You might recall from last month that I wasn't sure what my Ebay fees were. After a bit of research, I figured out that my Ebay fees totaled $18.26, and were not paid before I posted my numbers for last month. Paypal must also be paid when you are a seller--I'm learning so much!--and their total fees were $8.60, but these fees were deducted from each transaction as they were processed. This all means that I overstated my Ebay earnings for February by $18.26, so I've deducted that amount from the loan payment that I'm sending for March. This is a bit complex to keep track of, yet another reason I am limiting my Ebay activity to 1 week per month! I don't know how accountants keep up with this stuff!

Menu Plan Monday: April 5th

Due to my unplanned vacation, I didn't even make a meal plan last week. We ate what was available and went out to dinner in a completely unplanned, casual way. It was fun but at the same time chaotic. It's time to return to reality as I have major project deadlines approaching!

• Monday: Creamy Enchilada Casserole sliding from, uh, TWO weeks ago... good thing the ingredients held up! with steamed broccoli and salad.
• Tuesday: Family Feast for Fourteen
• Wednesday: Leftovers (including Roast Lamb from Easter Dinner)
• Thursday: Potato 'Collard' Quiche (using up collard greens bought for another purpose), butternut squash soup, and salad
• Friday: Out for dinner
• Saturday: Baked Ziti from the freezer, bread, and salad
• Sunday: Leftovers
• Monday: this meal we hardly ever get around to eating: Spaghetti with Turkey Meatballs (from the freezer) and steamed green beans...  and also salad!

Soup of the Week: I will make Bone Soup once more in the next week or two, then retire most soup making until the fall.

Salad Dressing of the Week: Green Goddess Dressing (recipe to come).

This post is linked to orgjunkie.com's Menu Plan Monday, an inspiring collection of meal plans and recipes.

Make Your Own Salad Dressing

I like to think that I provide nutritious food for my family. We eat mainly whole grains, whether brown rice, whole wheat pasta, or whole grain breads/flours (with the exception for some baked treats that don't convert well to whole grain flours). We strive to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables each day, although the 'variety' factor is negligible for certain family members. We eat generally lean proteins, including beans and legumes, and include vegetarian and fish meals in our meal rotation.

The weaker areas in the menu plan appear to be our sugar intake (too high) and our salad intake (too low).

I have all sorts of salad excuses. I know I should make them, I know I should eat them, BUT:

• Washing the lettuce is time consuming.
• Chopping the vegetables is time consuming.
• EATING the salad is time consuming (although this may be the point: to slow down and fill up while avoiding the temptation to consume more higher-caloric portions of the meal).
• The salad dressings we have are unappetizing aka gross.

Am I the only person who has a shelf like this in the refrigerator?

These are the Ghosts of Salads Past: store-bought salad dressings purchased over the years in an attempt to find enjoyable yet nutritious options. You don't even want to know how old these dressing bottles are. Between my percieved lack of patience for salad preparation and lack of appetizing dressing options, I hardly ever bother to make a salad to go with a meal. Who would with such a pitiful selection of congealed preservatives waiting to be added on top?

I want to change this trend. If I prep 4-5 days worth of greens at a time, it will save time when I am trying to put dinner on the table. If I put a bit of salad on my children's plates each night, perhaps they will learn that vegetables don't have to be steam-cooked to be enjoyed. Lastly, if I have a delicious, preservative-free, home made dressing on hand to add to the salad, perhaps I will feel more motivated to eat it.

My grandmother eats a salad nearly every day, and she makes her own salad dressings on a regular basis. Since warm weather is approaching, I am planning to replace making my Soup of the Week with preparing a variety of her homemade salad dressings.

As for the sugar intake issue, stay tuned. First I have to deal with the influx of treats that arrived with The Bunny.

Family Feast For Fourteen

Well... maybe not fourteen specifically. A more accurate title for this post would be 'A Family Feast for Approximately Ten to Fifteen depending on who makes it,' but I thought the alliteration was more intriguing.

Anyway, this is last-minute planning for a casual gathering this Tuesday night. The meal needs to have vegetarian options and be reasonably kid-friendly as well as have easy final preparation steps.

I have to admit I was having Meal Planning Block coming up with this one... should I make Lasagna again? I think my in-laws like my lasagna, but maybe we should do something different this time.

Finally I followed the sage advice to look to what you already have on hand, and I recalled that I have a bunch of marinated chicken as well as a package of tofu to use up. We have the grill up and running as of yesterday, so I can grill chicken and serve it with the early spring standbys: roasted baby red potatoes and asparagus (I'll do something a bit different with the tofu if the vegetarians are able to attend). Add a salad with homemade dressing, an appetizer, a dessert, and a drink setup and dinner is done.

Whew, I thought that was going to be harder than it turned out to be! Now I am freed up to clean my filthy house that I didn't touch last week.

Fitness Goals Update for March

Goal for the Year: more than 150

Classes Attended in March: 14

Current 2010 Total as of March 31st: 39!

I'm technically on track to meet my goal, thinks look ominous when I look at the calendar and see our upcoming schedule--I need to get ahead sooner rather than later. I'm going to try to attend class 4 times a week this month to see if I can get a little ahead.

My Spring Break Vacation

I had a lot of fun on my Spring Break Vacation this past week. I wasn't expecting to be on vacation per se; we didn't have specific plans to take a trip or a break from routine life, but that is what happens apparently when you ask your kids what they would like to do (Answers: go to the toy store, go to the movie theatre, eat hamburgers and ice cream at every opportunity, and play!)

We toured exhibits...

Went bike riding...

Had Easter events with family...

and many other fun activities. We went out to eat quite a bit and disregarded stodgy old rules like 'Bedtime'. Unfortunately, none of our fun plans included things such as housework, preparing for the upcoming yard and consignment sales, or blogging. I'm feeling a little out of whack and VERY Behind Schedule. I need to get back on track!