Organic Produce – It Makes Thursdays Great!

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Cooking, farm fresh, fresh, fruit, health, Healthy Cooking, healthy eating, low-fat, non-fat, organic, organic produce, pesticides, produce, produce delivery, vegetables

  Why do I love Thursdays? Because when I get up every Thursday morning, I have a wonderful box waiting for me on my porch. That box is filled with beautiful organic produce. My husband and I recently became more aware of how many chemicals are on the produce we eat due to pesticides. We decided to try and eat organic produce as much as possible. Everything we want is not always available so we’re not eating strictly organic, but we figure any amount of organic produce has got to be better for us! What you see in the attached picture is what came in our produce delivery box today. We decided to go with a farm to door delivery service. All the produce is organic and is locally grown. I like it because were getting beautiful, seasonal vegetables and fruit as well as helping our local farmers stay in business. We’ve noticed the produce is near perfect and so fresh! It lasts much longer than what we buy in the grocery store. It hasn’t sat on grocery store shelves for any length of time or gotten caught up in a long shipping process. There are a number of these such services so you can look online for one in your area. We live in the San Francisco East Bay Area and use Doorstep Farmers. I’ve been very happy with the service. I particularly like that I can go to their website and customize my delivery. This way I make sure I’m going to get produce our family will actually use. Many of these services sell other organic kitchen staples as well, such as olive oil, honey, and eggs. Many of you may have access to local farmers markets and that is also a great resource for organic produce. Unfortunately for me, the only one we have is during daytime hours while I’m at work so the delivery service is a great option for our family. I hope you consider going organic with your produce. With every dollar we spend we have a voice to tell retailers what we the public want. The availability of organic produce has greatly improved and as we buy more retailers will continue to stock with more variety. Also, if you don’t have access to a farmers market go online and take a look at these online produce delivery services. You might find it works well for you too!

Fat Free Ingredients: Sour Cream and Shredded Cheddar Cheese

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Cooking, Food, health, Healthy Cooking, healthy eating, ingredients, low-fat, lowfat, non-fat, nonfat, weightloss

Fat free? Are you kidding me? I know the thought of fat-free ingredients or food brings to mind flavorless dishes, but I’m here to tell you there is a time and a place to use fat-free ingredients to make delicious foods! I have found certain non-fat and low-fat ingredients that work very well in contributing to wonderful dishes. Throughout my blog I hope to share some of these with you so you can begin to incorporate these into your cooking. 

#1 Fat Free Sour Cream

Other than vegetables, I think this ingredient has become my all time favorite fat free ingredient. This is one item that I have found I am willing to sacrifice the fat and I don’t notice a huge difference in the taste, but that could just be me. I challenge you to give it a try!

My family uses this ingredient in a variety of ways. We use it in our stroganoff dish, that we also use ground turkey in to keep it low-fat. I recently used this ingredient in my seven layer dip. I also used fat-free refried beans and a variety of fresh ingredients such as tomatoes, onions, guacamole, salsa, etc. I will tell you my secret ingredient is stirring taco seasoning mix into my fat-free sour cream before adding to my dip.

I think you’ll find this ingredient has a wide variety of uses from savory dishes to wonderful dips! And that brings me to my next ingredient…

#2 Fat Free Shredded Cheese

This ingredient also makes an appearance in my seven layer dip, but you may have guessed that already!

Now this ingredient is not quite as versatile as the sour cream. The food industry just has not perfected fat-free cheese yet. At times it can have a waxy texture to it, but I find it can work well when it’s mixed into a dish with several other components. You may also want to use it somewhat sparingly as in large quantities you will really experience that waxy texture. 

I often use it sprinkled on top of casseroles and in salads. Of course, it also works well as one of the layers in my seven layer dip.
I hope you’ll give these and some other fat-free or low-fat ingredients a try. They can really help lower the fat and calorie content of your dishes and help to keep them flavorful. Don’t be afraid to experiment and see what you like and what you don’t. What are some fat-free or low-fat ingredients that you enjoy using  in your dishes?