Swiss chard + cherries + pistachios + avocado dressing = delicious. 
Who knew that adding some cherries to a salad could be so darn tasty? I sure didn’t. Continue reading
salad
5 Ways To Make Salads More Interesting
It’s hot and lately, my go-to meal has been some form of a salad. I posted a quinoa salad recipe on Friday and I have a Swiss chard salad coming your way this week that I can’t stop making.
But let’s face it, not everyone loves salads.
Continue reading
DIY Wednesday: Basil Salad Dressing
Friends
, I’m ready to admit something.
I’m kind of having a love affair with basil. I know, I know. It’s just a summer fling, but I can’t get enough of the stuff. It smells so good, looks so pretty, and tastes phenomenal. Even better, it makes any food I put in my mouth taste phenomenal.
I got into the fresh basil game a little late this summer because for most of the summer we were gone every weekend and I couldn’t get to the farmer’s market and I was not going to pay over $3 for the tiny little packages at the store. But this past month we have made it to the market and one stand there sells fresh herbs of all kind and I can get a whole bunch of basil for $2. Naturally I load up on it and come home and make all the basil things.
Besides the obvious pesto (which I have like 3 jars of right now) I have been making basil and lemon oil, and this dressing. I have swooned about this dressing a few times over on Instagram so I thought that I would share it with you guys.
I’ve talked about making your own salad dressing before and I think it’s the best money and health saving switch you can make. Making your own salad dressing is SO simple and you get to control the ingredients. Store bought dressing is full of preservatives and you’re paying a lot of money to ingest those things.
So why not make your own? This literally comes together in the touch of a blender button and BAM, you have a delicious, basil-filled dressing ready to go on salad, over vegetables, or straight into your mouth with a straw. Which I’ve never done…
Basil Salad Dressing
- 1 cup loosely packed, whole basil leaves
- 2 tsp roasted garlic or 2 cloves fresh garlic
- 2 tbsp tahini
- 1/3 cup full-fat coconut milk (you could also use almond milk)
- juice of half a lime
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- Ready for this? Put everything into a blender and blend until smooth. Taste and adjust seasoning. Store it in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week…. if it lasts that long.
I love one step recipes almost as much as I love basil. See how easy it is to make dressing? You can even switch up the herbs you do and use parsley, dill, or cilantro. Whatever your little heart desires! 
The Last Summer Pasta Salad
Summer
is having its last hurrah. Half of this week has been ridiculously hot and humid. I’m talking two showers-a-day hot and humid. But that humidity finally broke a few days ago and now you can feel a touch of fall in the air.
While I absolutely love fall, I’m not quite ready to give up my summer just yet. My farmer’s market still has plenty of end of the summer vegetables like corn and tomatoes and there are still a few 80 degree days in the forecast. Warm days like that beg for a meal that doesn’t require you to turn on the oven. 
I came up with this pasta salad last Sunday when even thinking about turning on the oven made me sweat, and I was already sweating buckets. This meal comes together fast and tastes amazing served up cold. It also packs in a lot of vegetables and herbs and can be customized to whatever produce you have lying around.
So if you’re like me and aren’t ready to say goodbye to summer, whip up this salad and enjoy these last few days.
The Last Summer Pasta Salad with Herb Sauce
- 2 cups cooked pasta, I used brown rice rotini
- 1 cup cooked quinoa
- 2 ears of corn, kernels removed (you can also use frozen kernels, thawed)
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes, sliced in half
- 1 cup bell peppers, I used a mix of yellow, green, and red
- 1 cup zucchini, diced
- 1/2 cup onion, diced
- 3-4 cloves garlic minced
Herb Sauce
- 1 small bunch of basil leaves, about 1/2 cup tightly packed
- 1 small bunch of cilantro
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1/3 cup full-fat coconut milk
- juice of half a lime
- salt and pepper to taste
- Combine all sauce ingredients in a blender and set aside.
- Heat a little olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Saute the onions until softened and then add in the peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, and corn. Cook until the edges are slightly brown. Add in the garlic at the very end and saute for one more minute.
- Remove the vegetables from heat and let them cool. In a large bowl combine the pasta and quinoa and the cooled vegetables. Mix everything well.
- Pour the herb sauce over everything and stir to combine so everything is coated. Taste and adjust the seasonings. You can serve it right away or put it in the fridge to cool completely.
Tomato Cucumber Salad and Old Favorites
Does anyone else watch TV shows that they have seen a million times? I do. All the time. While I love watching new shows and finding new things to love, a part of me loves the comfort of an old favorite. If you know anything about me, you can probably guess which show I always turn to.
Friends
I own all of the episodes on DVD (even though they are now on Netflix, I still watch the DVD version because there are scenes that are cut out on the Netflix versions) and I will routinely watch them over and over. I can pretty much quote whole episodes, recognize obscure lines, and know what each scene looks like. If Marta Kaufmann and David Crane called me up and told me they needed someone to recreate every single episode on their own, I would be perfect for the job.
Why do I continue to watch Friends over and over and over again? It’s a security blanket. When I’m feeling blue, I know one of Chandler’s jokes can cheer me up. When I’m under the weather, there is no better medicine than Phoebe’s ditzy yet surprisingly poignant logic. I see myself in some of Monica’s obsessive tendencies, Joey gives me encouragement that even if I’m not great at something if I keep at it I can achieve some kind of greatness, and who doesn’t love the on again off again relationship between Rachel and Ross?
It also connects me to the people I love. My mom, sister, and my friend Ashley are all just as big a fans as I am when it comes to Friends. I can randomly text them lines from the show and they know exactly what episode I’m watching. I often relate my life to certain scenarios and they know exactly what I mean. So to make a long story short, Friends is awesome and I’ll never stop watching.
This simple salad is almost as awesome as Friends. It’s the perfect summer side dish because it takes 2 minutes to put together, doesn’t require a stove or oven, and uses in season vegetables. You probably already have most of the ingredients, so whip up a big batch to eat all weekend long because the longer this salad marinates, the better it gets!
Tomato Cucumber Salad- based on this recipe from Rachel Ray
- 2 large cucumbers, peeled and sliced
- 16 oz cherry tomatoes, cut in half or quartered
- 3/4 cup red onion, diced
- 1/4 cup white wine vinegar
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 2 tsp oregano
- 2 tsp basil
- salt and pepper to taste
- Wash, peel, and cut the cucumbers and place into a large bowl. Wash and cut the tomatoes and add those in along with the red onion. Mix everything so it’s well combined
- Pour in the vinegar and olive oil and stir once again. Finally, add in all the seasonings. Mix everything really well.
- Cover and place in the fridge and if possible allow it to marinate overnight. Once it has marinated, taste and adjust any seasonings.
Also, if you’re looking for a delicious and healthy treat to cool off during this hot weekend you should check out my post on Girl.ish this week. I made a PB & J milkshake that tastes like it should be so bad for you but it’s not! Go try it and let me know what you think!
Have a great weekend everyone!
Life Healthfully Lived 