Mexican Salad Dressing! Easiest ever in the history of Mexico.

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As a follow up to my Mexican Food Fan post, here is a salad dressing for you! This has to be tthe easiest Mexican salad dressing ever in the history of Mexico!:) Here are the TWO things you need to make this “couldn’t be easier” home made dressing!

Yes, seriously. That’s it.  Of course, home-made plain yogurt (Google it, cause I’m not there yet) and home-made salsa are best, but if you don’t have time for that, use an organic (or natural, no chemicals/hormones added) store-bought version of each of these. I do half and half to make my dressing, but use the ratio you prefer.  You could use sour cream if you don’t have plain yogurt.

Since we’re all trying to eat more vegetables (aka “salads”), this is one more way to give you some variety in the salads area (and encourage you to keep eating greens!). We like our Mexican Salad (sans shell) with seasoned grass-fed beef, raw milk white cheddar, plenty of veg including fresh cilantro, and this dressing. If you must have the shell, use organic corn chips or break an organic taco shell instead. The chips are smaller, and likely fewer ingredients than the giant taco salad shells I’ve seen. Let me know if you try this with other ingredients too. Ole!

Encouraging Health,

Organic Eater

10 Ways to know if you’re a true Mexican Food Fan!

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Happy Cinco de Mayo! My family is criz-azy about Mexican food. The Hubs’ nickname is “Taco”, if that tells you anything. When we started eating super healthy, I had to find a way to make Mexican as healthy as possible, cause there was NO WAY we could give that up! Fortunately, I succeeded at the healthy versions (whew!) that are actually even MORE tasty than the old way. Thank God. We are not exaggerating when we say we are truly Mexican Food fans, but as far as we know, there is no Mexican blood running through our veins, surprisingly. Here are a few ways we know we are authentic fans. Take the test for yourself.

If you have one of these sitting in your breakfast or dining room all year long, you’re a true Mexican food fan. No, we don’t wait until Cinco de Mayo. He’s out all year.

If you own a copy of something similar to this, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If you stock this, or similar items, in your pantry at all times, because you wouldn’t be caught dead without salsa, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If you have at least 2 varieties of this stocked at all times, because crunchy every night would get boring, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If you know what these are, you are a true Mexican Food fan:

If you listen to Mexican Music on Pandora several nights a week, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If “let’s do something different” means using this instead, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If you can identify all the ingredients in the pictures below, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

If you enjoy taking family photos like this, you’re a true Mexican Food fan: (we also made magnets)

And lastly, if you subscribe to this magazine, you’re a true Mexican Food fan:

So, did you pass the test? Didn’t think so. Happy Cinco de Mayo anyway!

Encouraging Health (and fun!),
Organic Eater
PS: there is a great Mexican recipe for OMG, Organic Mexican Goodness on my blog that you should try AND Vanessa at HealthyLivingHowTo.com has an entire post of several Mexican recipes on her blog too! Everything I’ve ever tried of hers has been great! Enjoy!

Recipe: Ranch Dip

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Somebody asked me for a homemade Ranch Dressing, and I needed one myself, so here we go! And I LOVE the way this one lets you mix the spices before hand, and add them to the dairy base when you’re ready for it! Easy! Enjoy the link. Lisa’s blog is fantastic, and she is a fellow Charlotte blogger! 80k like her facebook page. Wow, that has some great potential for impacting the ‘Real-Food World’ for good! Recipe: Ranch Flavored Dip « 100 Days of Real Food.

PS: use organic or grass-fed, or hormone free sour cream (it will be labeled “hormone free” on the container if it is). I am going to try it with organic plain whole fat yogurt (Greek if I can find it), since we use plain yogurt in place of sour cream most of the time. Once you put the food under it, it tastes almost exactly the same anyway, so why not get the probiotics by using yogurt?! Let me know if you like this, and I’ll do the same!

Encouraging Health,

Organic Eater

Year One of “The Good Life”

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This week marks the one year anniversary of life change for me and my family. I have been “into” organic for many years, but April 29 is the day the contest started that changed my life (I believe) forever! I am so grateful to God for all the ways He is giving me the tools and blessings to do “the natural”, while He takes care of the “supernatural”. And note that I said “do”, knowing I have a part in this. This lifestyle requires choices and discipline and some sacrifice. God blesses me with untold blessings, that far outweigh any sacrifice I am making, but the two work in synergy to create change. Every breath I take comes from Him, so I want to take this time to be grateful for my good life. Very good life. If you want to read a long list of specific ways my physical body has positively responded to removing grains and sugars and only eating “real food”, here is the link. But I want this post to be more about how I’ve changed on the inside, and how my family has changed. The good stuff.

This was taken after our first 5k! What a special memory and huge accomplishment for us! Thank you, Susan (behind hubs), for all your training!

There seems to be a new girl in here who is quite happy to cook up these amazingly healthful meals, from scratch, almost every day of the week. I am blessed to live in a house with a functioning kitchen, and be able to buy the food we eat. I don’t take any of it for granted. Amazingly, we rarely want to go out to eat anymore.  And I’m not a great cook, people. This is new (and still learning) territory for me! I’m embarrassed to tell you I’ve had to watch a You Tube video this past year on how to boil an egg properly. For real. And that’s part of what I mean by God giving me “tools” like YouTube and other foodie’s blogs, some caring people, my iPhone, computer and internet! I have had to learn so much! And there have been sacrifices: cable tv and home phone to name only a couple.   But I look back with great joy over how I’ve changed and how these changes have affected my family.

We didn’t have sickness this past year. Maybe a sniffle or cough during flu season, for a day or two. The hubs made it through his company’s “busy season” in November and December without missing a day, when everyone (in close contact) around him was getting sick. My kids are trying new foods they’ve never eaten before, and I am shocked at what I’m learning about them. For example, I never knew they love asparagus! My kids (and hubs) are proud of their “weird” lunches at school (and work), and they’re very aware of how differently our family eats. My kids probably know more about grass-fed beef and hormone filled milk than most adults do. They’ve “bought in” to this lifestyle and really do believe me when I say “it’s good for you”. They’re seeing results like feeling great, no more belly aches, clear skin, etc., just like their mom. We’re all much more conscious of what we’re putting in our bodies and how it makes us feel. It’s been an “awakening” of sorts. I’m shocked we didn’t make the connection before. The kids have responded well to the change. The challenge has been on the other end: teaching them how to show grace, and when to “backoff”, so as not to sound judgemental about other’s choices. (I may want to re-think telling them, “we don’t eat crap like that anymore”. They tend to repeat it.) And of course that fine balancing act of knowing how to handle all of this with extended family who may see things differently. That’s always a fun one.

The hubs is thrilled with his cooking-like-a-maniac wife, of course. Being the Eater he is, this new life suits him just fine. He has seen results similar to mine, so the “sacrifice” is worth it for him too. He’s behind me 100% in this, so that makes it much easier for me to keep going, and it’s another thing I’m thankful for! Our only real challenge in doing this now is the budget, because I want more appliances, gadgets, and expensive specialty food items! In fact, I’d like a whole new kitchen, thank you! I’m still learning contentment (remember that whole “journey” thing I wrote about?). This last year has brought tremendous change for us. More than I ever thought could happen, actually. And we weren’t obese, nor did we have major health problems or food allergies before we started. We were just a “normal” American family. And that’s the part that’s strange to me. I thought we were doing pretty well. I had no idea all those things were symptoms that something was wrong with me, us,  and could be changed with our diet (and a few adjustments). I had no idea how much better things could be.

These last couple months seem to have plateaued for my weight loss, so I need to decide if I want to turn it up a notch to lose more, or keep happily doing this and maintaining where I’m at just fine. We shall see. I like where we’re going. I see all areas of my life improving along with my physical self. I am happy to know I can still do a lot of changing at 44. I am encouraged that my “best days are ahead”. I know they are. I am filled with more purpose than ever before, ready to tackle what God has next for me. I can feel Him preparing me for what He has prepared for me. All of this physical, mental, and spiritual change has been supported by some very special people who I want to thank here. My Pastor, Steven Furtick, for creating the contest and more importantly for teaching us every week how to implement change in every area of our lives; Buck Buhler for implementing the contest; Dr. Tony Hyser for taking good care of me and my family and showing us the way to true health, and Susan Black for training me in how to run (which gave me the confidence to even enter the contest). God’s been good to me, and I’ve made changes to improve my health, so I’m thankful for my “good, good life”.

I encourage you to just take that first step, whatever it is for you. Let me know what you’re doing to change, or what’s holding you back from doing it. Writing it out may be the first step towards your good life.

Encouraging Health,

Dana, the Organic Eater

I promised in an earlier post that I would show you an “in process” picture. Here’s One Year ago, and April 2012 (I’m still not ready to call it the “after” picture)

Chia Salad Dressing and more reasons to love Ch-ch-ch-Chia (and a nutrition update 12/1/12)

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I have a recipe for you that uses Chia seeds. Yes, the same seeds that many of us grew up hearing about on that awesome commercial “Ch-ch-ch Chia!” Now you can be like me, and every time you hear about Chia Seeds you can have that li’l diddy in your head! Please watch it on YouTube if you have no idea what I’m talking about.

And drumroll please:  I created this myself, no link to another blog. I didn’t even Google a recipe for inspiration, I just started creating! You may be impressed now. Go ahead.

Of course, you can add chia seeds to almost anything: salads, smoothies, homemade breads and snack bars. Even adding them to a glass of water is great (but gets slimey fast). Just about er’body needs a lil more chia in their life (for their Omega 3s!), and we’re all eating lots more fresh local green salads now that greens are coming in, right??!! So, here’s a sweet Chia Seed Dressing that is like any poppyseed dressing you’ve had before, except this one is home made, so you know what’s in it, and that’s always good to know what you’re eating.

Chia Seed Dressing:

Add about equal parts oil and vinegar, add a dash of coconut milk (to make it white), a sweetener (start small and keep adding), and some chia seeds. That’s it. I’m not even giving measurements, because it depends on how much you want to make, and some prefer it more vinegary, while others like it more oily. Other milks would probably work too, that’s just what I had on hand.

ingredients in my Chia Dressing

I used grapeseed oil because it has a light flavor. Almond oil may be another good one. Olive oil would need to be mild in flavor, in my opinion, to work well. I used raw local honey to sweeten it, but I may try stevia or coconut sugar next time. I added too much to my batch, so start with a small amount and add more if needed. I used rice vinegar, but apple cider vinegar may work too. Experiment and let me know your results!  If you have made a poppyseed or chia seed dressing like this before, leave a link below in the comments. I’d love to read another recipe.

Voila! My finished product:

Homemade Chia Seed Dressing from OrganicEater

and yes, this was taken AFTER I used it on our salad. I didn’t make that small of a batch:)

And here’s the awesome strawberry salad I made for this dressing:

Isn’t she lovely? Mixed organic local greens, raw almonds, organic local strawberries, goat cheese, and my Chia Seed Dressing. It was delightful. The kind of salad that makes you wish you had girlfriends over, who could enjoy it with you, because the hubs just doesn’t appreciate a good strawberry salad the way girlfriends would! Oh, he ate it, but without the same elation that I had.

So, now for more info on the amazing Chia Seed. The Crunchy Betty blog had a terrific post on the benefits of chia seeds this week, and she included some recipes and a face wash with chia seeds. If you’re hungry for more, click on her link below for more ch-ch-ch-chia Chia Lookin’ Swell, Baby | Crunchy Betty.

UPDATE 12/1/12: because I like to educate myself and my readers on ALL sides of the nutritional story, I am including this link to why Butter Believer isn’t crazy about overloading on chia seeds (and flax too). The main problem being, there are better sources for the health benefits of chia seeds, and our bodies have trouble converting the chia seed’s ALA Omega 3s into EPA and DHA (usable form). So, study and decide for yourself. 

It’s good to be back. I have so much in this ol brain, but not enough hours in the day to blog! If you want to keep up with me daily, I’m usually hanging out on Instagram most days. Maybe I’ll see ya there.

B-b-b-bye for now!

Encouraging Health,

Organic Eater