Orange twist on a Waldorf Salad

There seems to be a theme in my most recent blogs...I'm ridiculously busy, and yet I'm hungry, so let's mix something up! Oh, and it's most likely either snowing or raining LOL! For the last few weeks in the Pacific Northwest, we've been begging for rain. While the rest of our beautiful country is either in threat of a hurricane or flooding, we're surrounded by forest fires and air quality so bad that people are wearing masks to protect their lungs.

Well, enough of that fun...let's discuss one of my favorite 'desert' salads! This one is so fun to make and you can mix up all kinds of fruit, nuts, dried fruit...whatever! I made this particular blend for Christmas last year and it was a huge hit.

Today I was looking at our options for a desert and I am (again) on a pretty restrictive diet, so no flours of any kind. And it hit me! Waldorf Salad! I had just a few grapes left, one apple, about 2 cups of yogurt...it was perfect.

Anymore, we spray all our fruit and veggies with Thieves Fruit & Veggie Spray. I always have one behind the sink and I even take one on trips with me (for flights, it's under the limit...score!). One of these days I'm going to post a side by side of almonds that have been soaked in plain water versus the Thieves Fruit & Veggie Spray/Soak...it's astonishing and gross what could be going in your body.

I have tried just about every Greek yogurt out there and I always come back to Fage. It's just so good! I add the yogurt first and then the drops of orange vitality oil and mix it up...trust me, it will smell amazing!

I feel like every home needs an apple slicer. It's just so much easier! I slice it up and then dice into small pieces.

Speaking of cool kitchen tools, get one of these, too! I have no idea what it's called, and yet I use it all the time. I use it to slice up cherry tomatoes and grapes (the plate method or a knife work as well).

Here we go!

Orange twist on a Waldorf Salad:
2 cups Fage Greek yogurt (or your choice)
1/8 cup raisins
1/8 cup dried Wolfberries (get yours here: Dried Wolferries)
1/8 cup sliced almonds (walnuts are what they usually suggest...I like sliced almonds)  
3-5 drops Orange Vitality (get yours here: Orange Vitality)
About a cup (or more) of sliced grapes
1 diced apple

Mix it all together, let set in the fridge for about an hour and then ENJOY! 

What other twist will you put on this recipe?  

Snow Day Un-Fat Mints! (Get it....Thin Mints)

I love the snow. I love the snow. I love the snow..... Ok, does that make it go away now??  I really do love the snow, and normally it's not so bad. It's just that our town isn't quite built for snow and that makes it difficult to maintain a normal life right now. Also, disclaimer about what you're about to see. I'm pretty tired, and I think that most bloggers would attempt to recreate their post so that it looked perfect. This is real life, folks. This is really what happened in our kitchen today, and I'm not fixing it.

With that being said...these are still super duper delicious!!

We love mint. It's phenomenal. Yesterday, I started to see all these evil posts go up about Girl Scout Cookies and I'm supposed to be on a 2017 New Year, New Me, healthy eating thing. So clearly, I needed to find a way to make these myself.

First thing that happened was this. I was so excited to grab all the ingredients and get started, that I almost put coconut butter into the chocolate instead of coconut oil. Not really a huge deal...but, just shows how unobservant I am right now. Thankfully I caught this before the mistake was made! Just, not before I'd already taken the picture. haha!

Second thing that happened was this. I did not have powdered sugar. I do, however, have a coffee grinder. So, into the coffee grinder goes the sugar!! Blend that up, and voila! Powdered Sugar!

 I can tell you that using a squirrel spatula makes this much more enjoyable :)

Rolling out the dough was fun and I didn't have any issue with it sticking to my cutting board. (That's not sarcasm, I really didn't have trouble with this part!)

 Roll into that plastic wrap, and into the freezer you go!

Get that chocolate melted!! This part is fun for me. I love melting chocolate! And, I'm too lazy to do the whole bowl over a pot on the stove nonsense. That's too much work.

Third thing that happened was this.  Once the cookies are out of the oven, please don't do what we did. Don't try to start coating the cookies before they are completely cooled. Are they still good? Oh goodness, yes. Are they ugly? See for yourself...

To get the cookies to set up quickly and properly, place in the fridge or freezer. And then, eat them up!  Enjoy!!

Ingredients

Cookies:

• 1 cup (8 oz, or 2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3 drops of Peppermint Vitality Essential Oil
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• 1 ½ cups Gluten Free or All- Purpose flour  - this is best if you don’t overfill, too much flour makes the cookies much too crumbly…see those pictures above :)

Chocolate coating:

• 16 ounces semi-sweet baking chocolate chips
• 1 tsp coconut oil
• 4 drops of Peppermint Vitality Essential Oil

Instructions

(Your oven will need to be at 350F…don’t do it yet!)

1. In a stand mixer, mix the butter until light and fluffy.  Slowly add the powdered sugar,  mix until combined. While mixing on low, add in the salt, vanilla and cocoa powder. The batter will begin to get thick, this is good! Add the flour in slowly and continue mixing for about 1-2 minutes.
2. Remove from your mixer and place the dough onto a cutting board. Roll into a ball and then roll into a log until about 1-1.5 inches thick. Cover in plastic wrap and place int eh freezer for 15 minutes.
3. NOW Pre-heat your oven to 350F (mine takes about 15 minutes to warm up since it’s old…no need to waste all that heat).
4. Take the dough out of the freezer, unwrap, and slice to desired thickness. I made them about ¼ inch.
5. Fit as many cookies as you can on a Silipat or Parchment Sheet lined baking sheet since they won’t expand much at all. Whatever dough is not yet cut, wrap back up and place in the freezer until the next batch.  
6. Bake cookies for 10 minutes. Here is a tough part…remove from the oven and allow to cool COMPLETELY!! Not letting them cool will make them end up breaking apart.
7. Now to the peppermint coating! Put your chocolate chips and coconut oil in a glass container and microwave for 20-30 seconds at a time. Stir each time. Drop in your Peppermint Vitality Essential Oil and stir some more.
8. Make sure those cookies are cooled, then gently place in your glass bowl and turn the cookie around in the chocolate using a fork. Gently tap the fork handle against the glass to help shake excess chocolate off. Place the cookie on the parchment or Silipat and if you can, then place in the fridge to harden up much faster!  ***You'll want to store these in the fridge...plus, they taste delicious cold!! :)