Random Things In My Kitchen Slaw

Random Things In My Kitchen Slaw for lunch.

I'm not much of a cook & I'm certainly never going to be a food blogger--I leave that up to the likes of Well Fed Flat Broke's Emily Wight or Rebecca Coleman of Cooking by Laptop--but salads I can do.

I like chopping veggies plus since there's no cooking required I won't forget & leave a pot on the stove. I feel like there's more room for creativity with a salad too, since I don't have to worry about anything rising or thickening or caramelizing. I can just toss things from my fridge & cabinets into a bowl & voila! Lunch. 

Since reading "Eat to Live", I've really gotten into eating just a huge salad for lunch. It totally fills me up & I don't get hungry for hours afterward. I can consume a mass quantity of food without eating more than a few hundred calories. Plus eating a massive pile of kale or other greens is a great way to get important nutrients & fibre.

Here's my latest giant salad creation that I thought I'd share with you, since it turned out pretty well. I've named it Random Things In My Kitchen Slaw:

3-4 leaves kale, finely chopped
1 large carrot, grated
1/4 red cabbage, sliced into thin strips
1 apple
1/2 an avocado
A handful of cashews
A few dashes of apple cider vinegar
freshly ground pepper to taste
Hot sauce to taste (I used 3-4 good squirts of Sriracha)

Toss the first three ingredients in a large salad bowl. Throw the rest into your blender or food processor & whizz it up until it's smooth. Pour the dressing onto the salad & toss to coat.

This recipe made around 4 side salad sized portions. You could add some seeds or nuts on top to make it a little richer--sunflower, pumpkin, hemp, or even chia would be good.

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Get more greens into your toddler

Sprout is not what I'd call a picky eater, however he does have one sticking point: leaves. Spinach, kale, chard, collard greens, cabbage, lettuce: he won't eat them. Sadly, they're a great source of vitamins & minerals. I've tried chopping them & 'hiding' them in pasta. No dice, he picks them out. Then I tried mincing them, which had better success.

Lately, I've found great success adding kale into smoothies. He doesn't seem to mind the greenish tinge that they all have. It's also a great way to use up overripe bananas--just peel them, break them into two or three pieces & toss them in the freezer in a container.

The many ways to consume a smoothie/moisturizing mask

Here's my recipe:

• Two frozen bananas
• a handful of frozen kale
• a dash of vanilla
• a shake of cinnamon
• a few dollops of plain yogurt
• a tablespoon or two of hemp hearts (or chia seeds, flax seeds, etc)
• some other fruit--mango, strawberry, raspberry, blueberry--whatever you've got
• some milk or juice to thin as needed

Makes enough for one adult & one toddler to have big servings--about 750mL, usually.

I just add all of this in the blender (gradually, with liquids near the beginning, as my blender is a bit persnickety) & keep pushing the button until it's whizzed up into a smooth consistency. I sometimes make it quite thick & give Sprout a spoon--he thinks it's ice cream. Shhhh.. don't tell him it's not!

Obviously you can change this recipe completely--though I'd leave in the bananas, at least. I find the overripe bananas give it a lot of sweetness & a nice creamy body.

Another thing you could do with this is make popsicles. Or if you have an ice cream maker, you could try it in there. Anyone want to experiment with that one & let me know how it goes?

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