Pasta Salad with Homemade Italian Dressing

For a potluck, I made pasta salad. I was thinking about just adding bottled dressing to some pasta and vegetables but decided against it. Bottled dressings are load with sodium so I thought it would better to make my own Italian dressing. I found a recipe for zesty Italian dressing on GrouponRecipe. However, I made some changes since I did not have some of the ingredients---I used garlic powder instead of garlic salt, I used Italian seasoning in place of oregano, thyme, dried basil, and I omitted the celery salt. Below you can find the recipe for the pasta salad and homemade Italian dressing. I made two batches of the homemade dressing separately but of course you can just double the recipe. Overall, I like the dressing and pasta salad. It was good, light, and not salty. Also, I receive positive from my friends at the potluck. Therefore, this recipe is a keeper for me.

Food Pictures

I found some pictures of food on my cellphone so I wanted to share them with you. Below are the pictures and below the pictures are brief descriptions.

Oatmeal with Dried Longan

A great way to start your day is by having a bowl of oatmeal. Oatmeal is excellent source of fiber, vitamin E, zinc, selenium, copper, iron, manganese, and magnesium. Foods high fiber keep you fuller for a longer period and can also help lower bad cholesterol levels; therefore, I highly recommend the consumption of high fiber foods to improve health. To make the oatmeal tastier, I added Dried Longan and some brown sugar. Dried Longan provides a number of health benefits as it have been said to improve concentration and memory, stomachache, insomnia, and amnesia. It is also a good source of fiber and iron. Try eating oatmeal with Dried Longan and tell me what you think. You can find the simple recipe below.

Bread Base Pizza

Sometimes for a snack or for lunch, I would make something that can be classified as a downgraded version of a pizza. I would use whole wheat bread slices as the base, ketchup as the tomato sauce, and top them with various ingredients. Then I would bake them in a 350 degrees Fahrenheit preheated oven for about 10 minutes to melt the cheese and toast the edges of the bread. One time, I topped the slices with shredded mozzarella cheese, basil leaves, sliced cherry tomatoes, diced red peppers, and grated Parmesan cheese. During another occasion, I used onions, sliced cherry tomatoes, chopped onions, shredded mozzarella cheese, grated Parmesan cheese, ground black pepper, garlic powder, and Italian seasoning to top the bread. I think these are fun to make. You should give them a try especially when you have an urge for pizza. 

Fresh Salsa

Homemade salsa and tortilla chips are great refreshing healthy snacks during a hot day. Besides eating salsa with tortilla chips, you can use it to top your tacos, add it to your salad, or eat it alone. In this salsa recipe, I used tomatoes, onions, cilantro, red pepper, salt, lime juice, oil, and pepper. I really do encourage everyone to try adding cilantro into your salsa. It makes a difference and adds a fresh taste. If you like the sweet taste of bell peppers like I do, you can also add some green bell peppers. I wanted to add green pepper but I only had red peppers. Without further adieu, below is the recipe. I hope you enjoy!!! If you have any questions or comments, please post it on the comment post. Thanks.

Simple California Rolls

I wanted some sushi so I made some simple California rolls. I used Kirby cucumbers so for each roll I putted two slices of cucumbers to make it long enough for the roll. I used imitation crabsticks but you can also use imitation crabmeat. Imitation crabsticks can be easily found at Asian supermarkets. They are easy to use and cheaper than imitation crabmeat sold in American supermarkets or at least where I live. Below is the detailed recipe. I had my sushi with pickled ginger.

Frozen Mango and Orange Treat

As I mentioned in one of my earlier blog postings, it is hot in Philadelphia. To cool off, I made mango and orange popsicles with a molding that I bought from the dollar store (I love dollar stores). The recipe for the popsicles can be found at seasaltwithfood.com. I have also typed out the recipe below. Give it a try. The popsicles are delicious and would make excellent treats for kids. It is a better alternative to sugary popsicles made up of only artificial flavorings and dyes.

My Failed Margherita Pizza

So I didn’t have pizza dough or yeast so I tried to make the dough with a recipe from COOKS.COM that uses baking power. Well, it didn’t turn out that great. I think I baked the dough too long so it became too hard especially around the edges. The texture was not right, but it did have a pizza crust taste. I have to try this recipe again when I have time. It received good reviews and I feel like there is a high chance I can be successful at making this dough, too.

For the topping, I used a recipe from Food.com. The topping was okay, but next time when I make it I am going to use garlic powder instead of garlic cloves. I thought the taste was too strong for me. 

Chewy Oatmeal, Cranberry, and Dark Chocolate Cookies

I wanted to make cookies as a gift for my friend’s graduation. Since I had oatmeal, dried cranberries, and a lindt chocolate bar, I decided to make oatmeal, cranberry, and chocolate cookies. But I would need a recipe that would not require butter because I didn’t have any butter in the house. Luckily, I was able to come across a recipe for oatmeal cookies on Allrecipes.com that used oil instead of butter. I made some adjustments to the original recipe such as eliminating coconut flakes, reducing the sugar, and putting in cinnamon, dried cranberries, and chocolate. To add a little celebratory touch to it, I decorated the cookies with congratulatory words made of icing that hardens. The recipe for the icing can be found at Food.com. The icing in the original recipe was used to accompany gingerbread cookies; however, I didn’t try the gingerbread cookie recipe.

The cookies turned out really well. They were chewy and not too sweet---I really enjoyed them. More importantly, my friend as well as her family members loved it. You guys should give this recipe a try. It is easy, delicious, and don’t have as much calories as oatmeal cookies made from butter. Next time when I bake, I will try to substitute butter with oil to see if it works as well as it did in this recipe. Also, I might consider using this recipe as a base for other cookies. I will let you know how it turns out.