Although it doesn’t feel like spring today, I thought I’d post a wonderful spring salad recipe that has gotten me excited for warmer weather.

This recipe is from one of my favourite cooks, Danielle Walker.  Her website, Against All Grain has grain free recipes that are as delicious as the photos suggest.  She is featured on our Resource Page as a go to website for detoxing and eating grain free.

Here is her recipe for Tangled Thai Salad.  It’s a wonderful way to recreate how we think about using vegetables.  This recipe needs a spiralizer to create long, lovely noodles from cucumbers, carrots, beets and whatever other vegetables you would want.  Hope you enjoy and that spring comes soon enough to help us enjoy more delicious salads like this one.

Roasted Veggies are easy, delicious and a convenient way of getting more vegetables into your diet.  These are great on their own cold or hot or could be blended with water/milk for soup.  If you’re needing a change in your menu, consider this to help with healthy eating this fall.

These took less than 10 minutes of prep time, 40 minutes of baking and were a hit.

Ingredients:

2 lbs of organic carrots from the market or grocery store

3-4 huge cloves of garlic, minced

2 inches of ginger root, grated

a few tablespoons of avocado oil

Assemble on a tray and roast for 40+ minutes at 375F.

Beets are in season and offer an abundance of healthy nutrients.  They contain magnesium, calcium, iron, phosphorus and folic acid.  What makes them most exciting is the detoxification support that comes from the phytonutrients, betalains.  This is the pigment that gives beets, swiss chard and rhubarb its colour but also gives your body antioxidant, and anti-inflammatory support as well.

One way I like to prep this food is cooking the full beets (peel and all) with a bit of Sea Salt and water to cover completely, until soft, generally about 60 minutes.

Once cooked, I drain the water (nice to keep to drink) and rinse in cold water.  I then use my hands to peel the skins.

Add balsamic vinegar, olive oil, sesame oil, salt and cloves of garlic to your taste.  It’s important to add the dressing when the beets are hot so the flavour seeps in completely.  Add parsley/basil, walnuts and if you love blue cheese that’s a fun addition too.

Eat warm or cool, but enjoy this wonderful vegetable this fall season.