Baldur

Here's an old favorite dressing of mine. Baldur has always loved Russian Dressing my version it's quite a bit spicier than the traditional.
Feel free to add other herbs, I have even pummeled caraway and dill seeds in my mortar and added them.
This needs at least a day in the refrigerator for the many flavors to 'meld'.

Chernobyl Dressing

In a bowl whisk together
1 cup reduced fat Mayonaisse
3 tablespoons ketchup
1 heaping tablespoon horseradish (or more)
1 tablespoon pickle relish
2 tablespoons vodka
2 tablespoons vinegar (use cider or white vinegar)
1 tablespoon minced chives (dried is fine)
1 tablespoon finely minced parsley (dried is fine)
1 teaspoon dried English mustard powder
2 teaspoons dried hot red pepper flakes (or more)
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
several dashes (to taste) Tabasco Sauce

Cover tightly and keep it refrigerated until needed

marius

Oh Baldur - that sounds YUMMY! Will definitely try it!

Meanwhile, this is one of my favorite meals any time of year. A piano teacher served this when I went for dinner some forty years ago. She served it along with a cup of tomato soup and I've not found a better combination. Crusty bread also goes well with this.

Weight Watcher's Shrimp Salad

Ingredients:
1 can medium sized shrimp
(I use fresh because the canned shrimp can break up when you toss this salad, and fresh is yum.)
1 can blue lake cut green beans
1 garlic clove (or more if you like)
1 tbsp. cooking oil
1-2 cubes of bouillon (beef or veg)
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup sliced green onions (use green parts too)
1/4 cup vinegar
2-3 cups shredded lettuce (I slice thinly instead of shred)
2/3rds cup of white rice (or use brown but just adapt cooking times and liquid)

Directions:
Open the beans and save the bean juice in a large measuring cup.
Put the shrimp (cooked if you bought it fresh) and beans in a shallow pan with the vinegar. Set in refrig for 20-60 minutes, turning every now and then.
Get everything ready to chop/slice, then let it sit while you start the rice.
Add water to the bean juice until you get 1 and 1/3 cups of liquid.
Pour that in a small rice pan. To that liquid, add the garlic clove, (minced or however you like it), the bouillon cubes and the veg. oil. Bring to a boil and pour in the rice. Let boil with lid off for about 5 minutes. Then put the lid on and turn temp to low for another 20-25 minutes. (Different timing for brown rice but I don't know what.)
While the rice is cooking fix the lettuce, celery and green onions. Put them in a large salad bowl.
After shrimp/beans have marinated, drain the vinegar and add to lettuce mix.
When rice is finished, fluff it for a second and toss it hot onto everything in the salad bowl.
Toss and serve immediately. Use light soy sauce as "dressing."

I like this cold the next day too, or even re-heated. And, fun to eat with chop sticks if one is in the mood. Not sure if this is really a low-cal meal, but I eat it like it is ... meaning I eat a lot when I make this.

marius

And, if this salad sounds appealing to Baldur, he will leave out the shrimp and add something. I want to know if he uses this and tweaks it. Sometimes I've added water chestnuts and they work okay.

Your pillows sound wonderful. I have a friend who does unusual needlework and there are promises of lessons, but she travels a great deal so I'm waiting. Tried knitting and one has to think way too hard. My friend swears needlepoint does not require the same kind of attention. Hope so. : )

Baldur

If you are following a preprinted design needlepoint is almost mindless.
Since Baldur feels he must tweak designs it becomes complicated

Your recipe does sound interesting, I could remove the shrimp.
Robert would absolutely not eat it, that is guaranteed, far too many vegetables.
The lettuce must wilt a little from the hot rice, but that is not a problem.
This sounds like it would work with the faux chicken cubes I can find in the market now.

marius

Ah ... marius needs a preprinted design for sure! Maybe complications can come later. (tee hee, they often do.)

Have made the shrimp salad with chicken and I liked it but ... missed the pretty pink color of the shrimp on the greens. Isn't that silly! And, yes, the lettuce wilts and that seemed odd first time I made it, but not when I ate it.

marius

Spouse actually prefers the shrimp salad with bits of sausage. It works fine, but again ... not pretty pink color.

marius has puzzle-head and must off to bed.

Goodnight Baldur, goodnight all.

Qsilv

'salad combinations' seems to have shifted a bit toward dressings here, so I'll mention a trick that gets puzzled happy mmmmmmm's. This is actually the sauce for Chinese crispy shrimp with glazed walnuts, but those are served on a bed of shredded lettuce and I've always missed that lettuce when restaurants leave it out... plus having a bit of it slurp over onto broccoli and pea pods and such was delightful... so it finally dawned on me that it could work just fine as a salad dressing on its own.

4 parts mayo, 1 part condensed milk (not evaporated), 1 part honey

That's the basic sauce... tinkering is fun tho not at all necessary... perhaps a tiny splash of lemon, sherry, sesame seeds... I've added cognac and it was fabulous.

Dragon

Back to the skin tag thing, does Baldur know there is actually a product you can get over the counter to remove these? I can't for the life of me remember the name but it's can with some sort of freezing liquid in it. You put a thing that kind of looks like a q-tip on the nozzle then press the trigger until the applicator on the end starts dripping, the liquid will now get very cold and you can freeze these skin tags off with it. They have a similar one for warts too.

Dragon

I have no particular special salad recipe to add, but when I'm making a salad I like to put in some green grapes (halved) and maybe some roasted pine nuts. I do quite like walnuts in salad too but my sweetie doesn't care for them so I'll often crack up a bunch of almonds (I use a hammer for this- it's fun). Sometimes we'll throw in some dried cranberries if we have them too. I find a nice balsamic vinigrette goes with almost any salad, but it seems everyone already agrees with me on that one.

Qsilv

cranberries! oooh yes! in fact, any kind of berries in salad make a sort of piquant surprise for the tongue

a wonderful salad I had recently involved spinach with thinly sliced strawberries and finely crumbled gorgonzola

matthew

Salad... What is a salad??? Is that one of them healthy thingamabobs...

Qsilv

Nooooo, matthew... (solemn headshake).... it's one of those secret sensuous things... with tender bits... sweet-tart... (nodding knowingly... slowww wink)

Dragon

matthew, it's that green stuff that you push to the side of your plate to make more room for meat and potatoes.

marius

matthew, your comment makes me think of email from the other day. Oriental doctor prescribes diet of vegetables: beef, pork, chicken, alcohol. These are all vegetables because they "are made with vegetables!"

marius woke to a strange site today. Looking out from kitchen window with sleep fog still in the brain, I'm wondering why the back yard looks strange. Finally it dawns on the old bean ... there is barely any snow. You can see green and brown grass. Lots of it! Oh what a lovely vision! Must take the cats out to get their grass salad while it's fresh!

Dragon

Had to let Baldur know, this evening my fella said "Ooo, when are we going to make that Braised Beef in Beer again?" I always like to know when one of my recipes goes over well, so I thought Baldur might appreciate that.

Baldur

Qsilv that is perhaps the oddest dressing recipe I've seen; now I want to try it. No doubt it would be wonderful on fruit too.


Baldur had salad with French dressing again tonight, oh when will this curse be lifted?
Actually despite my hating French dressing the salads have been quite good.
Tonight it was iceberg lettuce, cucumber, faux tuna salad, a sliced hard cooked egg and partially steamed carrots.
I had sliced a carrot into coins and steamed them it until barely half done, then cooled them in ice water.
They actually weren't bad with the evil salad dressing, and I wasn't in the mood for raw carrot this evening.
There are perhaps only two more meals worth of dressing left in that bottle.
Hurrah!

AuntieB

Poor baby,
Auntie B had a very simple meal tonight out on my rooftop deck while comfortably ensconced in my hot tub.
Diego marinated skewers of large shrimp in a mixture of coconut cream (Coco Lopez brand) and lime juice before grilling them, he served them over jasmine rice in a large bowl shaped sea shell, sprinkled liberally with toasted coconut.
On the side were chunks of perfectly ripe mango and papaya, a few perfect huge strawberries and some sliced banana.
I was expecting a mojito but was surprised when instead he brought over a large frozen drink made with vanilla ice cream, bananas broiled with brown sugar and rum.
It tasted like Bananas Foster but looked like a smoothie.
Afterwards we are going to brush up on pur Argentine Tango in my Florida room. Diego moved the rattan furniture out of the way this morning.

AuntieB

For those of you not familiar with the Argentine Tango, here is a video of one being done on 'Dancing with the Stars'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS2Os79KRdQ

Baldur

Auntie B you must proofread more carefully

pur - r + o = our

marius

Baldur, have you never "accidentally" spilled something you don't like? It's quick and easy. And cleaning up the mess is nothing but joy. If that is not a viable option, I think blue cheese helps French dressing, also a bit of water, oil, vinegar and perhaps a few herbs mixed in to dilute it. Good luck. ; )