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Amber shares a few of her favorite salads today, yum! -Anne-Marie

Ever since the Crazy Sexy Cleanse I have been loving salads for lunch and dinner, too! And while I have gone back to drinking the occasional glass of wine and chocolate is back in my life – I have continued on with eating many fresh green salads.

I thought I would share a few of my favorites along with some tips for packing your salad to eat later that have worked well for me over the last few months.

Starting from the upper right and going clockwise:

1. Curly green leaf lettuce, lightly toasted almonds, baked beets and dried tart cherries. For a dressing I used a store bought Miso Ginger dressing.

2. Spinach, bean sprouts (see how I make my own) dried sweet cherries and pistachios. Lemon juice and Olive oil for a dressing.

3. Lettuce greens topped with shredded carrots, marinated artichokes, cooked lentils, toasted pine nuts and more bean sprouts. I like to have a balsamic vinaigrette with this one.

4. And my newest creation based on this recipe from my local Co-Op grocery store. It has Rainbow Chard greens, shredded carrots, toasted Pepitos (pumpkin seeds) and the most amazing dressing made from garlic Jalapeno (just a little), fresh herbs, and some oil.

When bringing my salad creations to work for lunch I like to separate out many of the ingredients to make sure it stays crispy and delicious and not soggy or wilted. Crunchy things, like nuts or croutons, are brought in a separate container that doesn’t go into the fridge. I also bring my dressing in a separate container and just drizzle a little on as I eat – I think I use less this way, but I could be wrong.

What are some of your favorite salad toppings? 

Today, Amber in marketing shares a favorite recipe and technique – enjoy!

While doing the Crazy Sexy Adventure Cleanse, I had a great time re-discovering my love of making salads. Which involved finding good stuff to put in my salad, like bean sprouts!

Making your own sprouts at home is so easy and doesn’t take any special equipment (although there are really cool sprouting rigs you can buy) and you can sprout all sorts of seeds, beans, nuts and grains. Eating sprouts is an incredibly nutritious way to get Vitamin A, Vitamin C and B-Complex as well as protein.

Today I’ll show you how I sprouted mung beans that I bought in the bulk section at my grocery store. Or course, you can buy special sprouting seeds and beans, but you can find so much at your local store to get you started.

To sprout you will need:

• Quart Size Canning Jar
• Ring to fit the jar
• Cheese Cloth
• Beans or Seeds

Instructions

ONE: Rinse the beans and discard any that look weird or discolored.

TWO: Place about 1/4 cup of beans in the jar and fill with water. Place a double square of cheese cloth over the top of the jar and use the ring to secure it on. Allow the beans to soak for about 1 day. Smaller beans and seeds don’t need as long.

THREE: Pour out the water through the cheesecloth and rinse the beans just by filling the jar through the cheese cloth and draining out the water. Rinse a few times and be sure to get as much water out as you can. You don’t want the beans sitting in a puddle, which can lead to mold and rot.

FOUR: Rinse 2-4 times a day until you get sprouts. It usually takes about 8 days for me to get good mung bean sprouts.

FIVE: This step is optional. You may want to remove the skins or hulls of your sprouts. The easiest way is to put the sprouts in a big bowl of water and skim off the skins that float to the top. I find this gets most of the skins and doesn’t take too much time.

SIX: Eat them up! Here’s one of my favorite salads. It has marinated artichokes, grated carrot, lentils, and sprouts on top of fresh, crispy lettuce.

Guest post by Amber from Bramble Berry

I am a smoothie fanatic. I love them and have one nearly everyday! And I love when I find a new combination that just hits the spot. This one was suggested to me by a dear friend and I  just had to try it. Conveniently, I had some homemade almond milk on hand (Learn to make your own here). Please keep in mind I don’t measure anything when I make these – so the amounts are approximate.

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Guest post by Amber from Bramble Berry

Last year Anne-Marie discovered the joys of making milk from Almonds and I thought it sounded easy and fun and really wanted to try it. Of course, it took me nearly a year to do it – but now I can’t wait to make another batch! I just use it like I would regular milk; in my tea, smoothies and cereal (Captain Crunch and almond milk? Heaven!).

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