Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Updates and Poppyseed Dressing

Started off my day right, with a 30 minute run.  Didn't stop ONCE.  (I know.  I can hardly believe it myself!)  After that I did Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred DVD.  Felt great to begin my day that way, and it's helped me to be more productive and organized too!  I love being organized, makes me feel so much better about things!  And I think I forgot to tell you that I ran in a 5K on Saturday.  In the rain of all things!  I had a goal time in mind, but I must have been setting myself up pretty high, because I didn't make it, by a long shot.  I was hoping to run it in 35 minutes.  Took me 39.  Oh well, it felt great doing it!  Running just may be my thing for awhile....

Summer is flying by.  Less than 2 weeks left before I head back to work.  I'm loving being home with the kids, although as the days and weeks wear on, they are trying my patience more and more.  Gee, once they go back to daycare then I just get to deal with other people's children all day long....I'd rather deal with my own!

Here's a few pics of the kiddos getting in some swim time in the backyard, followed by some pizza!




My baby girl turned 3 last week.  Holy cow!  I'm loving each stage she is growing through, and what a little lady she is becoming.  Here she is with a picture of the homemade cake (done by me and my sister!).  She had to have a butterfly theme, so everything was pink and butterflies!  Maybe I'll do a post with some of those pictures soon, so I can show off all of my hard work! 


I felt as if I had been in a rut with my food choices there for awhile.  Nothing sounded good and I was sick of the same old thing.  My mom makes this SUPER yummy salad with a homemade poppyseed dressing that I absolutely CAN'T get enough of, so I decided to treat myself one day.  It's definitely NOT healthy.  But man oh man is it good!!!!  There's something about the combination of the ingredients and dressing that just taste so delicious!

Here's the dish: 

Lettuce Cashew Salad
Romaine Lettuce
Shredded Swiss Cheese
Cashews
Bacon Bits

Poppyseed Dressing
1/4 cup vinegar
1/4 cup sugar (add more if you want/like it sweeter - the original recipe calls for 3/4 cup)
about 1 teaspoon mustard (I think I add more?)
1 teaspoon onion salt or powder
1 teaspoon poppyseeds
1 cup canola oil

Combine all ingredients except oil into a blender. Blend on low until mixed. With blender still going, slowly add oil in a steady stream until dressing becomes thick and creamy.

Pour desired amount over salad ingredients and mix just before serving. (Less is more!)
Now, I made this salad for my book club and we gobbled it up!  I saved the dressing that didn't get used and decided to try it on a different salad.  Here's what I came up with:
You are looking at spinach, strawberries, feta cheese, slivered almonds, and the same dressing mentioned above.  TO. DIE. FOR.  This was just as good as the other one!  And the salad ingredients are a bit better for you too!  I've had this two days in a row for lunch now and it is so very yummy.  I just wish I knew the proper calories and serving size.  It's hard to know when you make it homemade.  I suppose I could figure out how many tablespoons are in a cup, since that's how much oil was used in the recipe, and go from there.  (Does anyone REALLY know that off the top of their head?  I'll google it and figure it out).  I've used just a tablespoon of the dressing each time I've used it. 

Go ahead, give it a try.  YOU'LL LOVE IT, I just know it!

1 comment:

  1. The summer is far too short for teachers... Today is the official "summer is halfway over" day. Inservice starts on August 30th...

    Impressive on the 30 minutes of running and 5k! In my running program I will running 30 minutes Saturday... I am not optimistic but I hope I can do it!

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