dressing

When spring rolls around, you find so many delicious produce items popping up at your local farmers market.

With spring just around the corner, it’s time to think about shifting your diet in the direction of lighter foods.

When you’re trying to eat healthy, one of the smartest things you can do is meal plan.  Part of meal planning includes choosing dishes that can use the same ingredients so you don’t end up wasting food or having just a little bit of one thing left over.

These four recipes do just that: they take a basic ingredient and lay out three easy weeknight meal recipes—plus a lunch—based off that ingredient.  This means fewer items to buy at the grocery store (which means a quicker trip) and also less food wasted.

Spring is always an exciting time of year, especially for the local food eater.

Okay, so you just spent approximately $3 on a salad dressing at the grocery store. The problem? It's loaded with way too many unnecessary ingredients. Have you ever read the label on most salad dressings? They put everything from sugar (yes, you heard that right) to Calcium Disodium EDTA in it (to "protect freshness"). No thanks. I'm good. Instead, I like to make my own salad dressings at home. Here are eight DIY salad dressings that are actually healthy for you and require no unnatural sweeteners.

Nothing beats a nice summer BBQ with fresh, seasonal foods and good company. Even when you're not at a BBQ or special occasion, you can still bring in the bounty of summer with these four recipes. All of them incorporate in-season produce. I highly recommend going to the local farmers market and picking up the ingredients for these recipes from there, as it will enhance your dishes greatly.

The hemp plant has been cultivated for approximately 12,000 years and is one of man’s earliest crops. The benefits of the seeds have been known for about 3000 years, where it has been used medicinally and is a dietary mainstay in China. Hemp seeds are a compete protein containing all twenty amino acids.

Try this great Caesar dressing alternative! With avocados replacing the mayonnaise, and nutritional yeast replacing the parmesan for added nutrition and flavor.

Ingredients:
1 ripe avocado, pitted (about 1/2 cup mashed)
5 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1/2 to 3/4 cup water
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

Directions: