Guacamole Salad Dressing & Healthy Vegan Friday

Happy Friday! This is my last full week of summer vacation before I start my fall class next week. I’m taking Nutritional Epidemiology for my masters program and I’m excited because I think being competent in analyzing research is going to be important for whatever aspect of vegan nutrition I end up working on in my career. That being said, I think this class is going to be a beast and I’m slightly dreading it.

Even though I just got back from Florida, I decided to take advantage of my last week of freedom and traveled south to the San Diego area on Wednesday to catch up with three friends from high school. At the last minute, we decided to do a potluck lunch so I brought a giant green salad with mainly stuff I picked up a local market on my way. I made an avocado-based dressing before leaving the house with these ingredients (plus two lemons):

I heard about this no-salt salsa from Trader Joe’s at Dr. Fuhrman’s Getaway and this was my first time using it. The ingredient label is pretty good although there is a tiny bit of sugar and none of the items are organic. Still, in a pinch, I think this is a great product. All I did was combine the avocados, chopped shallot and juice of two lemons (I would have preferred limes but I didn’t have them):

I then just poured in about a cup of the salsa and used a fork to mash it all together:

If I had had any cilantro in the house, I would have added that, too.

Here’s the printable recipe:

As mentioned, I picked up the rest of the salad fixins’ at the store including the lettuce, bell peppers, cucumber, beans and cherry tomatoes:

I also purchased a bag of organic red grapes for dessert. Once I got to my friend’s house, it was pandemonium with four women and three kids. I was glad my dressing was already prepared so all I had to do for the salad was chop the veggies and throw everything in a big bowl:

One of my friends made baked kale, too:

After lunch, we headed to the pool to cool off. I loved swimming with this little guy:

Remember when this little cutie came to my house in May and I made Sweet Cherry Ice Cream for his parents, Alan and me? He’s now sitting up by himself and getting so chubby!

When I got home later that day, I was pretty tired so I again raided the fridge for a quick dinner. I am overjoyed that Trader Joe’s now sells an organic mix of kale, spinach and chard:

I think it’s funny that they list the kale as “baby kales”:

Since the mix is pre-washed (thank you for that), all I did was steam the greens in a pot with the steamer insert:

I had some previously baked sweet potatoes so I served the potato with the greens and a tiny bit of low-sodium tamari:

One of the suggestions I learned at Dr. Fuhrman’s Getaway was to have steamed greens every night with dinner, assuming lunch consisted of raw salad and veggies. I’m trying to take this advice. I was going to list some more tips I learned in this post, but I think I’ll save those for next week.

Before I go, today is another Healthy Vegan Friday! These were the top-3 most clicked-up posts from last week:

1. How I Lost 56 Pounds With the Green Smoothie Diet from Katherine @ Green Thickies 
2. Creamy Avocado Chickpea Pasta from Sarina @ Earth Given 
3. Cherry Ripe Bites from NutriDude

Wow, what great entries. My fellow blog party hostesses Gabby and Shelby are also featuring the entries from this week so please do check out their sites.

Want to participate in this weekly healthy recipe blog party? Check out the details here and then click the link below to submit yours.

Have a great weekend and I’ll see you back here on Monday!

Tagged as: avocados, guacamole, lemon juice, salsa, shallot

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