Pepper Salad

Jim's parents were with us over the Thanksgiving holiday and his dad showed me this delicious salad!

It is so simple to make this vibrant dish.

Simply chop up the following:
1 red bell pepper
1 orange bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper

Then toss in a bunch of watercress and a 14 ounce can of rinsed black beans.

The dressing is a combination of olive oil and balsamic vinegar to taste. I always say to start with small additions of the vinegar as to not over power the food. Then add more as desired.

Adding in quinoa is a great way to turn this salad into a meal!

Thank you for stopping by! I hope you are having a wonderful holiday season thus far. ~Val

Delicious Food

I wanted to share a few recipes I have tried lately and loved!

Crunchy Cashew Thai Quinoa Salad with Ginger Peanut Dressing

Recipe here.  

I'm obsessed with this salad! It is like candy! It will likely be a staple in the fridge this summer.

I used peanuts since they are only a fraction of the cost of cashews. This one here doesn't look like the one on the website because I used green cabbage and forgot to buy a red bell pepper! It was still amazing. I love heat in most dishes and added finely diced Habanero pepper. It is a dish that you can play around with in terms of ingredients.

Avocado Feta Salsa

Recipe here.

I eat this as a salad. It is also great mixed with greens. The first time I made it, I found it a bit vinegary for my taste buds so the next time I made it I used 1 tablespoon less of vinegar and added another tablespoon of olive oil. It is not as flavorful after being refrigerated so eating it fresh is the way to go!

Arugula Pesto + Farro Pilaf

Recipe here.

This is quite the dish that can be changed with different veggies. I love the arugula pesto! There were no pumpkin seed in the store when I went to make this but sunflower seeds were a great substitute. Since gluten is not my friend, I used quinoa instead of farro.

Instant Frozen Yogurt

This looks like baby food but it is delicious mango frozen yogurt! 

I made this by chopping up a large, fresh mango and freezing it in the morning. By the end of the day it was ready. I put it in the food processor with approximately 1 cup of plain yogurt and a heaping tablespoon of brown sugar. It whipped to perfection! 

I can across this idea in a magazine. The original recipe says to combined 4.5 cups of frozen mango (or a 16 ouce bag), 1.5 cups of plain Greek yogurt and 1/3 cup of confectioner's sugar or brown sugar (that sounds like too much sugar considering how sweet the fruit is). 

Next time we will try it with Greek yogurt which would make it even creamier and play around with other fruits. 

I did try this with frozen orange wedges but had an issue with the texture (it came out soupy and pulpy). However, we froze the leftovers which turned into perfect Italian ice! I just love when mistakes have a happy ending. Now I know how we can make a delicious icy treat in the future.

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you feel inspired to make something in the kitchen! ~Val

This Week's Blog Post

Tiffany Inspired Bracelet

My youngest niece is having a Tiffany and spa themed birthday party! So I am working on Tiffany inspired bracelets that all the guests will receive at the party.

This chain is perfect for kids. It looks heavy but it actually made of super lightweight aluminum and is quite strong!

Portable Air Conditioner

This photo of Emmett shows how hot it has been in my house! The poor thing could not even find energy to put his limps on his pedestal. He was looking at me as if to say “can’t you do something about this?”.

This was the best $300 I have ever spent!!! After accepting that this summer is not going to improve in terms of heat and humidity I broke down and bought a portable air conditioner! I have been living without which was survivable up to this season!

I opted for portable so that I can spot cool rooms by simply rolling this unit from room to room as needed. I can use the oven again!  It has an obnoxious tube that exhausts out the window!

It was not as simple to install in the window as anticipated but Jim figured out a way to make it work easily. If I was by myself trying to set up the window situation there would have been a number of curse words coming from my mouth!

Carter Fields

CarterFields is a little gem I initially read about in the local newspaper. Located on the North Andover/Boxford town line in MA it is 85 acres of conservation land.

After a short hike through overgrown, bug filled woods, the path brings you to an open swampy area of nesting trees! The pictures are taken from really far away, hence the grainy results.

There is an estimate of 70 pairs of great blue herons that nest here each May and June. Unfortunately we did not have binoculars to get a good look at the birds but we could make out their profiles! After cropping the photos, we can see them much better.

Mango, Avocado and Arugula Salad

I came across this salad via Pinterest. Pairing mango with avocado is something that never crossed my mind before. This recipe is delicious if you love the ingredients.

Its dressing is a honey Dijon which is really simple to whip up. Considering the price of macadamia nuts along with their incredibly high calorie content, I substituted with cashews. This is a great summer salad! Recipe here.

Garden Update

Pretty pink lilies!

Pretty pink gladiolas! It is neat how the buds open from the bottom up.

Pretty pink hibiscus! I love these enormous floppy flowers!

The hydrangeas are blooming!

Thank you for stopping by! Have a wonderful week! ~Val