Scape to paradise

Today I'm talkin' rawsta. Why? Because summer squash is here, and it's my duty to share the tastiness. Above: Finished garlic scape pesto rawsta. See below for the details! 

So, do you remember that recipe I gave for garlic scape pesto? Well, this week we received a yellow summer squash in our CSA. And, I found this to be the perfect opportunity to make a raw pasta, or as I like to call it, rawsta!

Who doesn't love pesto in the summer? I ended up using this recipe instead (only, I don't do roasted nuts and used soaked and dehydrated pine nuts instead). I found it to be just a little bit easier. And if you've been following my blog, you know that I like easy. I mean, why be hard? Hard is too, well… hard. I want to make your life easy. It's too short to be hard.

Pesto is finished. Now it's time to spiralize this squash! (Sorry about the bad pic. Sun going down = high contrast shots = pesto not looking as good as it tastes!)

One gadget that I cannot live without is a spiralizer. If you do not have a spiralizer, get one today. I mean stop reading this blog right now and run to target or Williams-Sonoma or Amazon.com and get yourself one. I have a Ben Riner  but any will do, really. They have much cheaper ones now. It's the healthiest and cheapest kitchen gadget you can possibly get yourself this summer. You will never know how you lived without it. And it will help keep that yellow polka dot bikini looking oh so hot on your booty.

My Ben Riner spiralizer. Simply put squash in and turn. It magically becomes rawsta!

Spiralized squash. Yummy & nutritious noodles to top with anything under the sun! This is a big dinner plate. One squash made that many noodles. 

Save the ends of your squash that the spiralizer couldn't spiralize. Put them in your "spare parts" bucket (I use a pyrex and fill it through the week, then juice with fruit and lemon) in the fridge for juice, or cut them into a salad this week. 

Once the squash is spiralized, top with just a dollup of the pesto (a little goes a LONG way with pesto, folks). And now it's time to dig in.

Summer squash noodles. Delicate & delicious and almost no calories. 

So there's not much easier than this dish. You just spiralize your squash, blend up some pesto in the vitamix or blender, combine them, and eat. Pretty easy. You don't even have to turn the stove on and heat up your house up this July. Winner winner chicken-less dinner!

Oooh, and it's so pretty. And so are you. No really. You're beautiful. Now feed those beautiful cells some really healthy food.

Mangia mangia,
Steph

I'm cheap: CSA part quatre

I beat the hell out of my liver and kidneys with alcohol for too many years. Sure, it was super fun doing it. But now I'm in my upper 30's, and it's taken its toll on me. My liver might be detoxing until I die. And as a good friend says, "If you're not detoxing, you're toxing." ... or something like that. So, I eat salad every day ... several times a day. There's such variety in salad. It's oh so pretty too. I dig pretty things.

But I don't really dig kohlrabi. So, I hit up google to find a recipe that might work with a few of the goodies I got this week in our CSA. I came across this little gem.

KOHLRABI, BEET SUMMER SALAD
I took one pound of raw beets, kohlrabi & carrots (from the grocer), and shredded them. I added the zest and juice of one lemon, 1TBSP olive oil, 1TBSP raw honey and gave it a quick stir. This became the perfect salad for a day like today: 88 and humid! It made a generous amount, which will feed a few meals through the week. And it's just how I like it. Simple. Quick and easy!
(and pretty too!)

And this is without a filter. Nature's colors!

For dinner, I went with my staple kale salad. I'm not usually a fan of fruit in my salad. If you follow the laws of proper food combining, it's kind of a "no no". But, I feel I digest it just fine. And this salad is totally dessert. TOTALLY. Not to mention kale holds up super well to dressing. So, you can create this and store in fridge for a few days. I usually have 2-4 salads in my fridge that I can pull out and munch on. Keeps me from raiding my husband's snack cupboard!

Everyday kale salad.

EVERYDAY KALE SALAD: Simple and amazing
Shredded kale
Chopped onion
Apple chunks
Hemp seeds

Top with my fave dressing: Tangy honey vinagrette
3/4 cup olive oil (I actually do an olive/sesame oil blend)
1/4 (plus a splash more) apple cider vinegar (raw with mother)
2 TBSP water
2 TBSP honey
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper (I don't usually use pepper in this, but it's an option)

Before I bore you to pieces, I'm going to wrap up my CSA week recipes.

Sauteed beet greens with garlic.

But I left out the beet greens (leaves). Darn! Okay, use these however you would use spinach. My favorite way (not raw, but I do love a cooked veggie once in awhile!) is to tear them and saute with fresh chopped garlic, sea salt and olive or coconut oil. I seriously think it's one of my favorite foods ever. I sometimes add in some tarragon for an "OMG, die!" moment.

Garlic scapes!

Oh. Scapes!!! How can I forget. Garlic has a stem while growing, and it's not only edible, it's delicious! I look forward to scape season just so I can make batches of Garlic Scape Pesto and freeze it. Our last CSA season gave me so much pesto, I ate it until the following season.

One last thing. Stay tuned to see how you can use all the little parts of the veggies you cut off and toss (i.e. beet or carrot "skins", flimsy celery stalks, cabbage center stalk, etc.). Listen, I compost. But very little goes in there once I'm done with a plant. I told you I'm cheap. I'm frugal. And I've had countless people ask me how I can eat so healthy on such a small paycheck. So, I'm really happy to finally be able to have a forum to share this with all of you. My secrets are out! I wish I could fit them all in one post! But it would take me a year to write, and then you'd have nothing to look forward to tomorrow.

Peace in, friends. Be well.