Shrek Shake

How much kale did your kids eat today?

Mine ate this much -- about 2 cups.

I took this glass of kale, filled it halfway up with skim milk, and blended it.  When the greens and milk were completely smooth, I added about half a cup of frozen raspberries and the sections of one clementine, and then blended it all again.  The result was a light green, Shrek-colored shake that was a cool, sweet, vitamin-filled treat that both of my kids could LOVE.

They have both filled up on "Shrek shakes" before / during dinner for the last several nights in a row...and I couldn't be happier.

Simple Salad

The simple salad I made with my first CSA delivery turned out to be so fresh and delicious that I had to make it again.  This time I didn't even bother with the carrots.  It was just crisp lettuce, white vinegar, chipotle-infused olive oil, and black pepper.

I served it with a few crustless spinach mini quiches and a clementine.  Heaven. On. Earth.

The best thing about "spring" food is how easy it is to prepare!  No more hours in the kitchen hacking away at butternut squash and then oiling it, roasting it, cooling it, scooping it, etc.  Lettuce just gets washed and put on a plate!  I never appreciated that before, but now I do!

Kale, Clementine, and Almond Salad

There's no magic to this recipe: Just put chopped kale, clementine sections, and raw almonds in a bowl.  No dressing needed!

Simple veggies, fruit, and nut salads are such easy, healthy go-to snacks or sides for me when I'm trying to lose weight.

Sweet Potato and Strawberry Smoothie

Yup, I'm on a smoothie kick!

The in-season veggie plus out-of-season frozen fruit combo is just STELLAR.  I really enjoy it as an "after school snack" when I get home from work.  And it does double-duty as a drink for my toddler to go with her dinner.

This time I used a fresh sweet potato, a fresh clementine, and frozen strawberries. 

A sweet potato?!  Yup! 

I actually used half of a raw sweet potato, cutting it into chunks and putting it straight into the blender.  I added sections of one clementine and topped it off with about a cup of frozen strawberries.  I covered everything with milk and then blended it up.

It came out light, frothy, and sweet!  The sweet potato was a nice stand-in texture-wise for the usual smoothie ingredients of yogurt or a banana (I don't care for bananas).  

This won high marks from my toddler, who didn't want to give up the straw from her "strawberry milk" until she had licked off every drop!

Cinnamon-Clementine Cranberry Sauce

The folks at Whole Foods are just SO GOOD at marketing to me.

As I gear up for Thanksgiving dinner, I’ve had cranberries on the brain. 

And, voila, just inside the entrance to the Annapolis Whole Foods, I found a huge tub of fresh cranberries floating in water, ready for me to scoop out and “harvest” from the bog. 

Such fun. 

As if I needed further convincing, the cranberries on offer were from Pemberton, New Jersey.  That’s within a half day’s drive from Annapolis (and therefore pretty local), and also about a ten minute’s drive from where I used to live in New Jersey.

I found a lovely recipe from The Gracious Pantry for Clean Eating Cranberry Sauce, and that was my plan:

About 3.5 cups of fresh cranberries

½ cup honey

1 cinnamon stick

Zest of one large orange

Cup of water

Throw everything in a pot and let it cook for 30 minutes.

Awesome.

Except I didn’t have an orange; I only had clementines.  And my grater was in the dishwasher, so I couldn’t make zest.

Instead, I peeled a large clementine and threw the segments in the pot with everything else just to see what would happen.

It turned out great!

It made a cranberry sauce that had the perfect consistency, even if it was a little tart. 

Make that VERY tart. 

VERY, VERY TART. 

I loved it, but I think I’ll serve it at Thanksgiving with a small note of warning.  This is not cranberry sauce for the faint of heart.    

Having successfully added my Clementine to my cranberry sauce, I was feeling like a very accomplished, enterprising cook. 

Until I saw this recipe on the Whole Foods blog this morning. 

Apparently, I am not the first person to come up with cinnamon-clementine cranberry sauce.  However, my version avoids 3/4 cup of refined sugar, which would, admittedly, probably take away from the extreme tarness if I added it. 

But where's the fun in that?

UPDATE: I remembered at the last minute that I was supposed to bring a side dish for a pot-luck Thanksgiving lunch at the office.  I grabbed my cranberry sauce out of the fridge and ran.  Given the tartness, I was a little concerned.  But I said nothing and watched in amazement as my co-workers piled it high on their turkey, spread it on their bread, and even ate it by itself with a spoon.  There is no greater compliment than when someone looks up from his food approvingly and says, "Who brought the cranberry sauce?!"  As it turns out, the tartness is just perfect when paired with the other sweet and savory dishes served at Thanksgiving!