Green Leafy Side Salad

For Wednesday, I tried a departure from the salad-only meal, combining a McDonald's side salad with a Quarter Pounder. I was hungry at lunch for more than a salad, and we had a family cookout planned for dinner; the side salad was my best option.

I was actualy quite impressed with the simple side salad from McDonald's. It had a variety of greens in the mix, more than I've seen in any other salad thus far. They provided a tasty mix of flavors and textures. I had to pass on the tomatoes. I plan to try some other varieties, but I was not ready during this meal. Also, I tried some ranch dressing on this salad. As I expected, I'm not crazy about it; the taste was okay when it got well-mixed with the other tastes, but I was rather unhappy to find dollops of ranch here and there!

Perhaps the most important lesson of this meal was the fact that my tummy can be satisfied by a burger and small salad. I do not need the fries to be full. I often tire of fries due to the frequency with which we eat fast food. The salad substitution gives me a good alternative and may even become my regular side. I know - still not incredibly healthy when eaten with a quarter pound of beef. But certainly a dietary improvement!

McDonald's Side Salad w/ Ranch Dressing: A surprising A-

Green Leafy Salad w/ Fruit & Nuts

I'm learning that the hardest part of this deal is not eating the salads - I may actually be on my way to enjoying the green! - but making time to post the pictures and reviews in a timely fashion. I am intent on catching up by the end of the week.

The salad reviewed here was eaten for lunch on Tuesday during a meeting of the Tifton Alzheimer's Memory Walk. My paternal grandmother has been stricken with the disease and is currently in the moderate-to-late stages. My parents are her primary caregivers and are very devoted, visiting her at least once almost every day at her home in a local assisted living facility. I am proud to serve on this fundraising committee seeking to end this horrible affliction.

For lunch during the meeting, I tried Wendy's new Apple Pecan Chicken Salad, suggested by friend Melissa Simms. I found a lot of good flavors in the salad but had trouble getting a sense of the whole because the apple and pecan pieces were so big they pretty much had to be eaten individually. Still, the pecans were very tasty - fresher than I expected - and added a cruncht texture. The appples were good. I did not enjoy the small purple-red berries in the salad (Sorry! I don't know what they are). I am also not crazy about the bleu cheese crumbles because of their bitter taste. I am not a fan of bitter.

Overall, I enjoyed the salad and may try it again. Still, it is not one of my favorites due to a dislike of some ingredients and the fac that some of the pieces are too big to enjoy as part of the salad.

Wendy's Apple Pecan Chicken Salad - Grade: B

Green Leafy Snacks

Life being what it is, sometimes there's only time for one good meal in a day. On Sunday, my toddler son took a nap practically from noon to 3:30, putting lunch very late in the afternoon. On Monday, yard work with my father-in-law also pushed the midday meal well into the afternoon. And for me to eat a salad for the ONLY meal of the day? That really is asking a lot.

Still, a deal's a deal. So I turned to salad for a late-night snack each day. And I found a way to make each salad a bit unique from what I've tried before. Here's the results:

On Sunday, I added a dash of black pepper to my salad and realized why people choose to do such a thing. I've always thought it odd to put pepper on vegetables, but it actually brought out some new flavors, especially in the green peppers. Oh, BTW, I have decided that I really like green peppers. Even though I wasn't hungry enough to eat all of even the small salad I made for Sunday night, I made a point of picking out the peppers. I am amazing myself at how tasty I find some of these green things that I have avoided for more than thirty-five years!

On Monday, I was able to add cucumber, another vegetable I have avoided with a passion. Though there were none available at our farmers' market over the weekend, I did get a chance to pick one up while grocery shopping late Monday afternoon. So my salad snack on Monday night consisted of lettuce, carrots, turnips, onion, green pepper and cucumber. Oh, and black pepper again. I've got to say, I'm not thrilled by cucumbers. They don't taste bad, mind you, but I really got very little flavor at all. If anyone has suggestions on making cucumbers more tasty, I'm open to trying it.

Still haven't given tomatoes another try. I know they are a central ingredient to most any garden salad, and one of the few items that give color variance. I just don't know if my taste buds will embrace the tomato flavor. I do intend to try another variety soon and will, of course, report my findings.

Thus far, I have avoided the use of salad dressings on most of my salads, but I plan to try at least all of the major dressing groups as well over the next weeks and months. Please send any unique salad dressing recipes, as well as your favorite green salad mixes, to my email: CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net. I'll hope to hear from you soon!

Farmer's Market Fresh

We finally made it to the Downtown Tifton Farmer's Marketon Saturday. Got some fresh onions, green peppers and tomatoes to put on the green, leafy salad stuff. We also bought some yellow squash and Georgia peaches for good measure. I was amazed to note that our total bill was about $1300!! That alone may be a good reason to start eating healthy on an ongoing basis!

Due to the growing season in south Georgia, we had to go with a bag salad for the lettuce - also included shredded carrots and radishes. You can see all of the ingrediants put together for my daily salad in one of the pics above.

Much to my surprise, the onions and peppers were quite good! The onions are a sweet variety, the seller told us, and added a nice flavor. The peppers gave a nice kick and a bit of a crunch. I even liked the carrots and radishes, though they were not exactly fresh.

I'm still not sure about tomatoes, though. These tomatoes (Early Girl variety, if we heard correctly) were better than the grape tomatoes on the fast food salad, but I still wasn't crazy about them. I gave it three bites and will try again over time. So far, not expecting to embrace tomatoes beyond this challenge.

My wife is certainly happy that I am eating - even beginning to enjoy - salads. She's been trying to get me into salads for 12 years of marraige, and hopefully we can get our toddler son into healthy eating through the good example of both of his parents.

Well, that's about it. I'm actually looking forward to future visits to the farmers' market - definitely not a statement that would have sprung from my mouth as little as two weeks ago! :)

Good night, and happy eating!!

Green Leafy Leftovers

Today was leftover Grilled Chicken Ceasar Salad from Zaxby's. Those Zaxby's salads are big! I must say that I'm looking forward to getting to the Downtown Tifton Farmer's Market tomorrow for some fresh veggies. Please send your recipes on in to CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net so I know what to buy.

I gave a full review of the Zaxby's ceasar in yesterday's post, but I can add a few observations about the leftovers. No surprises here, probably. Primarily, everything was just not as crispy. This fact was especially apparent in the Texas toast bread pieces, which had the texture of croutons yesterday byt were more like soggy toast today. The lettuce was likewise less crispy. The grilled chicken, now cold, had lost its great grilled flavor. To Zaxby's credit, my wife (who has always regularly eaten salads) says that it's rare to even have chicken left on a salad during the second day.

Tomorrow to the farmer's market! Check back Saturday night for a report on my first venture into a fresh, homemade salad.

CASA Greg Seeks Counsel

Please watch the video to help me decide how many days I will be eating salad. The deal I had made with my friends fell apart, just a bit, when part of the Chase Community Giving application crashed during the final-hours surge of voting. Details are in the video. As are options for setting my salad-eating course! Please watch and cast your vote in the comments below!!

Green Leafy Salad - Day 2

Today's salad is also of the fast food variety - the Grilled Chicken Ceasar Zalad from Zaxby's. I'm looking forward to taking in the Downtown Tifton Farmer's Market on Saturday to get fresh veggies and begin making salads. Until then, looks like fast food will do.

The Zaxby's Grilled Chicken Ceasar Salad is a good basic salad with grilled chicken. It consists of lettuce, grilled chicken, bacon, melted cheese (Swiss, I think), croutons and a tangy Ceasar dressing.

The chicken is flavorful - kind of a mesquite grilled flavor. The bacon was actually a surprise. It was hiding under the chicken and lettuce at first. At first, I didn't know that I would like bacon with lettuce. I know - bacon bits are standard and have always been a part of my greenless salad. Still, I was surprised that crispy fried bacon provided a nice flavor in a forkful of green, leafy salad.

The melted cheese adds a nice softer texture to a crisp, mostly crunchy salad. The croutongs are actually small cubes of the usual Zaxby's Texas toast, cooked to a greater degree of dryness than the buttered toast that comes with most of their meals. It worked out pretty well.

The Ceasar dressing from Zaxby's was slighty tangy and added another nice layer of flavor to the salad.

At least 363 salad days to go. I would sure love to have some more fresh salad recipes coming into my inbox at CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net. Should be a fun day at the Tifton Farmer's Market on Saturday!

See you tomorrow with another salad review!

Green Leafy Salad - Day 1

Our Coastal Plain CASA supporters answered the challenge, and I'm now eating a salad a day for some time to come. We do have a small problem - the Chase Community Giving application got overrun with voters in the final hours, and the board that showed number of friends who voted - well, it crashed. I know it was close to 365 and probably went a bit over, so we have some time to work with. We'll just have to find an equitable solution before a full year is up. :)

In the meantime, today was Day 1. It was a busy court date, with staff and volunteers in attendance to advocate for fifteen foster children, so I had to grab a quick fast food salad for lunch. Today was the new Spicy Chicken Ceasar from Wendy's, pictured with this post. I found the chicken, of course, to be quite good. ;)

In all seriousness, the greens were fresh and they made for a nice blend of flavors with the spicy chicken - rather spicy, actually - and the cheese. I was less than impressed with the sliced cheese used in the salad, but it had a decent flavor. It's going to take me a while to like tomatoes - if I ever do. My wife tells me that fast food tomatoes are usually not great, so maybe when I can get to the farmer's market for fresh produce ...

Well, that's about it. I'm still hoping to get some salad recipes at my email address - CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net. Just one so far. I'm looking forward to trying a great variety of salads and need you to send some my way! I promise to try every one for as long as the challenge lasts - how ever many days that turns out to be!

CASA Greg Goes Green

Guess I'll be eating green salads for a while - at least 355 days worth, with a few hours of voting left for my Fb friends to add to the total. May as well start sending in the salad recipes! Send them to CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net. I'll try every one until the days run out!

Looking forward to chowing down on some leafy green goodness (I guess) beginning Wednesday!!

Hey, I need one day to celebrate with a plate of cottage cheese!

Here's the video that started me down this road.

CASA Greg Goes Green (Maybe)

Well, I've posted a video to Facebook and will soon add it to YouTube. If Coastal Plain CASA gets enough votes in the quest for 20K in Chase Community Giving, I'll be looking for lots of green, leafy salads to eat. Moving on from Greg's Greenless Salad of cottage cheese, ham cubes, bacon bits and egg crumbles. Get your recipes ready!! In fact, go ahead and send them to CasaGregGoesGreen@bellsouth.net. I am confident we can all break the 1500 vote barrier.

And please vote for Coastal Plain CASA, and the foster children we serve, by Monday, July 12. Link to vote is http://bit.ly/cpcasa-chasegiving on Facebook!