Fennel - Tarragon dressing

For those of you who come across this blog or know me, I am on a journey to loose the weight and get healthier. So I am always on the search for new healthy recipes. Searching the internet cooking sites, FB, Twitter, cookbooks, magazines, you name it.

I came across a great salad dressing recipe recently while reading Rocco DiSpirito's "Now Eat This!" cookbook on page 55. He has a series of them and is coming out with an Now Eat This Italian this coming fall. Since I am currently on a #FindYourFit challenge to shed the weight in twelve weeks, I asked if Rocco (via Twitter) if I could share this recipe and he replied "please do"!

This recipe is low calorie, low fat, low sugars and yet high on flavor. The recipe indicates it is for four servings. Since I don't use as much, I estimate I would get eight servings of two to three tablespoons per serving. When I crunched the numbers for the calories, fat etc this is what I got for per serving with eight servings. It's better then any commercial dressing out there.

Serving size - about two and a half tablespoons
Calories: 32
Fat calories: .5
Total fat: .06g
Transfat: 0
Cholesterol: 0
Sodium: 157mg
Carbs: 4.5g
Fiber: 1g
Sugars: less then 1g
Protien: 2g

Ingredients:
1 small fennel bulb, cored and roughly chopped
8 garlic cloves
1/4 cup water
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1/2 cup Greek yogurt
1/4 cup fresh tarragon, whole leaves

1. To prepare the dressing, combine the fennel, garlic and water in a medium microwave-safe bowl, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and microwave on high until the vegetables are completely tender, about 8 minutes.

2. In a blender, combine the cooked fennel and garlic, any remaining juices, and the lemon juice. Puree the mixture until it is smooth. Let the puree cool slightly, still in the blender. Then add the mustard, yogurt, and tarragon, and puree until smooth. Season the dressing with salt and pepper to taste; chill in the refrigerator until ready to use.

Rocco's description of the recipe on the page is as follows:
"A great green salad has always been a staple on my restaurant menus and on my table at home. The combination of Dijon mustard, good-quality vinegar, and olive oil gives tender green leaves their raison d'etre. There is no olive oil in this dressing and it still tastes great.
I kept the Dijon mustard in the mix because it's very low in fat - and because few ingredients can pack a punch like Dijon mustard. Yogurt, lemon juice, and aromatics like tarragon and fennel round out the dressing. You'll never again eat a green dressed with artificial-tasting, gloppy, low-fat dressing."

In his book, Rocco also has recipes for ranch, blue cheese, russian dressings as well as mayo!
You can find his book here: Now Eat This!

More veg in that tuna salad sandwich

Earlier this month I watched a show on Food Network called "The Big Waste" which went on in some detail about the wasted food in the food industry. How even a blemish on an apple would be enough for a store to toss that into the garbage bin. It really made me a bit more concious about wasted food - especially vegetables. If you haven't seen the show its worth looking up.

So in an effort to loose weight, get healthier and also reduce wasted food, I have been juicing fruits and vegetables more. If a piece of fruit or veg is starting to look past its prime that I have on hand, I put it through for that day's juice now. Used to end up wholly in the compost bin otherwise. By this same logic, I realized that the pulp remains from my juicing was mainly going into the compost. Now in a state for easier composting at that. But some of it could still be usable. Like carrot, celery, onion, garlic, pepper, or some fruit pulp.

We started using the carrot and celery pulp for use in meatloaf, soups and tomatoe pasta sauce. As such, I have small containers in the fridge for the pulp from juicing. And today, came up with an additional use.

Usually, when I make tuna salad for sandwiches I will chop onion, celery and a little carrot. The carrot is usually still a bit hard unless really finely chopped. So this afternoon, wanting to make a quick lunch before heading to town, I opted for a tuna sandwich. I then realized that the carrot and celery pulp from my juicing would work nicely in the salad.

I took two three oz packs of tuna, two green onions chopped, at least an equal portion of carrot and celry pulp to the tuna, mesquite seasoning, granulated garlic, some seasoned salt and what remaining olive oil mayo was in the fridge - maybe two or three tablespoons. The resulting tuna salad was excellent flavor and texture. And I have at least enough tuna salad for two or more meals.

An added note: After setting in the fridge overnight, the tuna salad did not become watery.