Tag Archives: lunch

Beet & Walnut Salad

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This combination of beets, oil & vinegarette and toasted walnuts is delicious! Great as an appetizer, side or salad. 🙂

Blog beetwalnutsalad2 Blog beetwalnutsalad1

Ingredients

  • 3 pounds beets
  • 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
  • 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
  • dash of salt and pepper
  • 1/4 cup olive or walnut oil
  • 1/2 cup walnuts
  • 3/4 bunch green onions, sliced
  • 1/4 red onion, sliced into thin half-moons (optional)

Directions

  • Steam or boil beets until fork tender, it will really depend on their size, but about 20-40 minutes. Cut off root and stem ends and slip off skins under cool, running water while beets are still warm (easiest way to do this is to sort of ‘massage’ the beets and the skin will come right off). Cool beets.
  • Whisk together vinegar, mustard, salt, pepper and oil until dressing is blended.
  • Cut cooled, peeled beets into 1-inch wedges and toss with dressing.
  • To toast walnuts, preheat oven to 350° F. Spread nuts on a cookie sheet and toast for about 4 to 5 minutes. Let cool. Roughly chop toasted walnuts.
  • Add walnuts, green onions and red onions to dressed beats; toss to combine.

Super mom tip: Beets can be cooked days in advance and stored in the fridge. Just keep them unpeeled until you are ready to use.

Thanks PCC deli and recipes! :)

dit-elle-Esther

Chicken soup for the..

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Everything! A hot steaming bowl of chicken soup served for lunch or dinner is especially nice on icy damp January days like we’ve been having around here. Also great for sore throats, a perfect simple protein/veggie meal for little tummies, and the ultimate comfort food. This paleo friendly recipe is extremely easy to throw together, although there is some ‘de-boning’ work involved in the prep, but makes a large batch (for freezing/reheating, yay!).

Blog chickensoup2

Ingredients

  • One whole fresh chicken (usually found bagged in the refrigerated mean section of store)
  • 2 + 3 carrots, divided
  • 2+ 3 celery stalks, divided
  • 5 cloves garlic
  • 1 onion, quartered
  • Fresh ginger (optional)
  • Bay leaves
  • Salt/pepper to taste

Directions

  • Rinse chicken and put the entire bird in a pot
  • Fill with water, so it just covers chicken
  • Add a couple of roughly chopped carrots and celery stalks, garlic cloves, onion also roughly chopped, ginger and bay leaves
  • Bring to boil and let simmer for an hour or so
  • Remove chicken from pot (but save broth!) and let cool
  • Save all the broth, but discard veggies, bay leaves, ginger and anything else you don’t want in broth
  • Note that carrots/celery/onions/garlic get mushy after an hour cooking, so you will add new ones later. Mom tip: Carrots tend to be perfect for mashing into baby food though! 🙂
  • Once chicken is cooled, pick all the meat off the bones
  • Put broth back on heat and throw in sliced carrots and chopped celery
  • Bring to a simmer, add the now de-boned chicken back to soup
  • Season with salt & pepper and serve hot!

dit-elle-Esther

Salmon, potato and spinach soup

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I’ve been making a lot of soups recently – especially since we are having this unusual cold spell with temps in the teens at night and barely above 32 in the day! Brrr…! Hot soup to the rescue – easy, yummy and quick!

Blog salmonspinachsoup

 

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1 leek (white and pale-green parts only) — halved, rinsed and thinly sliced (or 1 onion, chopped)
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 4-8 small red or gold potatoes, scrubbed and halved (some paleo purists don’t eat white potatoes, so cauliflower would be a great substitute)
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • 5 cups vegetable or chicken stock
  • 1 1/2 pounds salmon fillet — skinned, boned and cut into 1-inch cubes
  • 1/2 cup half-and-half (or coconut milk for paleo)
  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill  (I used 1 tsp dry)
  • 5 ounces baby spinach

Directions

  • Melt butter in a heavy sauce pot over medium heat.
  • Add leek and garlic, stirring occasionally, until leek is soft, about 5 minutes.
  • Stir in potatoes and cauliflower; season with salt and pepper.
  • Pour in stock and bring to a boil.
  • Reduce heat to a simmer and cook until vegetables are fork tender, 7 to 9 minutes.
  • Add salmon and simmer until just cooked through, 3 to 5 minutes.
  • Stir in half-and-half, dill and spinach and briefly cook until spinach wilts and soup is heated through.

You can make this paleo by substituting coconut milk for the dairy.

dit-elle-Esther

Carmelized Onion Tart

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This is a delicious onion tart. Not quite paleo with the dairy, but great for breakfast, lunch or dinner!

Blog oniontart1 Blog oniontart2

Ingredients

  • 3 onions
  • 2 Tbsp butter
  • 5 eggs
  • 1/2 cup heavy cream, half’n’half, milk or plain Greek yogurt
  • 1 cup Swiss or cheddar cheese, shredded

Directions

  • Melt butter in large frying pan
  • Thinly slice onions by running them through the food processor on the slicer blade (takes <60 seconds)
  • Saute onions in butter for 30 mins on medium heat, stirring once in a while, until onions are translucent, soft, and started to brown and caramelize
  • If they have not started to brown, turn up heat and caramelize them a bit, stirring so as not to let them burn
  • While onions are cooking, whisk eggs and milk or yogurt
  • Cover glass pie pan with cooking spray, add onions, cheese, and pour egg/milk mixture evenly over it
  • Bake for 30 minutes on 350* or until golden brown around edges, bubbly and hot
  • Serve warm, great paired with soup and salad!

dit-elle-Esther

Cream of Mushroom Soup with Chestnuts

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I’ve been so busy making pumpkin dishes, I almost forgot that it is also MUSHROOM season! Yay, love, especially in soup! I’m not that adventurous when it comes to mushrooms in general. I’m mostly familiar with white mushrooms, the kind that come fresh in a package, or those canned button mushrooms. But mushrooms are clearly in season as the local grocery store has been featuring large bins and while I really have no idea what to do with them, I mustered up some courage, picked (well bagged) a pound of mushrooms and made some soup. The chestnuts add some texture in this soft, blended and flavorful soup. It was delish!Blog mushroomsoup1

Ingredients

  • 1 lbs or so of fresh mushrooms
  • 3 Tbsp minced shallots or onion
  • 1 garlic clove, minced
  • 2.5 cups chicken or vegetable broth
  • 2.5 cups water
  • 1/2 cup heavy cream or coconut milk (for paleo version)
  • 1 cup chestnuts (bottled or canned, liquid removed)
  • Springs of thyme
  • 2 or more slices applewood-smoked bacon, cooked and crumbled
  • 3 Tbsp sour cream
  • Olive oil
  • Dusting of pepper and salt to taste

Ingredients

  • SautĂ© mushrooms with a little olive oil for ~15 minutes or until soft
  • Add shallots, sautĂ© for 1 minute
  • Remove 1/2 cup mushroom mixture and set aside
  • Add broth, water, chestnuts and thyme to pan and bring to a boil
  • Reduce heat and simmer for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally
  • Remove from heat and discard thyme
  • Use a hand blender/inversion blender until soup is liquefied
  • Stir in cream, sour cream, reserved mushroom mixture, salt and pepper to taste
  • Garnish individual bowls with crumbled bacon

Super mom tip: Mushroom or chicken broth + sliced white mushrooms or a can of mushrooms + milk/cream/coconut milk + whatever garnish you have on hand = toss together heat and serve. That’s the 5 minute version! 🙂

Blog mushroomsoup2dit-elle-Esther

Curry Cashew Chicken Salad

1 Reply

So yummy! A great variation to basic chicken salad.currychixsalad2

Ingredients

  • 2 cups cooked and diced chicken
  • 3 stalks celery
  • Handful of frozen peas (optional)
  • Handful of cashews, chopped (toasted, optional)
  • Handful of raisins, chopped dates and/or grapes

Dressing

  • 1/2 cup mayo
  • Juice from 1/2 lemon
  • 1 tsp curry powder
  • 1 garlic clove, crushed

Directions

  • Toss salad ingredients in a large bowl
  • Whisk dressing ingredients in a separate bowl
  • Toss salad with dressing
  • Serve warm or chilledcurrychixsalad1dit-elle-Esther

Carrot Soup with Avocado, Lime and Cilantro

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It’s a damp October evening in Seattle. Get your cozy on with this hot soup that is so bright and cheery you will forget about the rain!

Fresh ginger, lime, cilantro, coconut milk and carrots.. create a delicious fusion of flavors! I won’t say this is super easy as there are some steps to prepare this soup, but it’s worth the effort!Blog Carrot Soup-1 Blog Carrot Soup-3

Serves 4

Ingredients

  • 1/2 onion, chopped
  • 1 Tbsp ginger, finely chopped
  • 2 lbs carrots
  • 1 lime, divided – grated (for zest) and squeezed for the garnish
  • 2 Tbsp butter
  • salt, pepper
  • 1 quart vegetable or chicken stock
  • 1 avocado
  • Cilantro
  • 1/2 cup coconut milk or heavy cream

Preparation

  • Melt butter in large pot
  • Chop the onion and the ginger into small pieces and grate the lime zest, and add to pot
  • SautĂ© the onion, ginger and lime zest in a pan with the butter
  • Add the carrots and some pepper and then sautĂ© for another 2 minutes
  • Add the broth and bring to boil. Simmer for 20 minutes
  • Puree the soup with a hand blender and add the cream

Garnish

  • Cut the avocado into pieces, chop the cilantro add some lime juice, salt and pepper and toss together lightly. Set aside.
  • Serve soup w/2-3 spoons of avocado mixture in each bowlBlog Carrot Soup-2

Paleo tip: use coconut milk, not cream, that’s it!

Super mom tip: Use a 2lb bag of peeled baby carrots – who has time for peeling or scrubbing carrot skins anyway? If you are peeling them, consider that there are good nutrients in carrot skins and just scrub them with a vegetable brush to clean.