Tag Archives: vinaigrette

What’s a Cruet?

Our new cruet

Our new $8 cruet

If you’re trying to lose weight or keep from getting fat, salads are helpful. I recommend them in my Advanced Mediterranean Diet, Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet, Paleobetic Diet, and Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet.

My favorite salad dressings are vinaigrettes. They can be as simple as olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. The problem with most commercial vinaigrettes is the label says “_____ Vinaigrette with olive oil,” but the first listed ingredient is soybean oil (or some other industrial seed oil) and olive oil is somewhere down the line. My current favorite commercial salad dressing has water as the first ingredient!

Get around that by making your own. Here’s a recipe and a salad to try it on. Also, if you’re watching your carb consumption, the commercial dressings  may sneak in more than you want. Again, avoid that by making your own.

Cruet label

Cruet label

You can make a vinaigrette in a jar with a lid. Add the ingredients then shake to create an emulsion. Or do it in a bowl with a whisk. My wife found us a cruet at the supermarket that I was hoping would allow mixing, storing, and pouring all from the same attractive container. Unfortunately, it leaks when I shake it.

Steve Parker, M.D.

Recipe: Sunny’s Super Salad

diabetic diet, Paleobetic diet, diabetes,

You won’t be able to eat this in one sitting if you’re small or sedentary

This huge salad is a full meal. It fills a 10-inch plate (25 cm). Since it contains five vegetables, you should feel virtuous eating it. Who says the paleo diet’s all about meat?

Ingredients:

8 oz (230 g) raw chicken breast tenderloin (it cooks down to 5 oz)

1/4 cup (60 ml) canned mandarin orange wedges (6-7 wedges) (if you can only find these packed in syrup or light syrup, add 3 g to the digestible carb count below)

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) lemon pepper seasoning

4 oz (110 g) hearts of romaine lettuce

1 oz (30 g) baby spinach

2.5 oz (1/4 cucumber or 70 g) cucumber, peeled and sliced into discs

2 oz (60 g) California avocado, peeled and seeded, cut into wedges (1/2 of standard-sized avocado)

3 oz (85 g) fresh tomato (a typical roma or small tomato)

1 oz (30 g) walnuts

6 tbsp (90 ml) extra virgin olive oil

2 tbsp (30 ml) vinegar (we used balsamic)

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) salt

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) fresh ground black pepper

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) crushed dried rosemary

diabetic diet, Paleobetic diet, low-carb, seasoning

Like Deborah on “Everybody Loves Raymond,” my wife often makes lemon chicken

Instructions:

First cook the chicken breast over medium heat in a skillet. If you think the meat will stick to the pan, add a smidgen (1/2 tsp or 2.5 ml) of olive oil to the pan. Don’t overcook or the meat will get tough. It’ll take five or 10 minutes.

While that’s cooking, prepare your vinaigrette. In a jar with a lid, place the olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, and rosemary, then shake vigorously for 20 seconds. Not 21 or you’ll ruin it. You’re done.

If you use a commercial vinaigrette instead, use one that has no more than 2 g of carbohydrate per 2 tbsp. You may have trouble finding that since so many of the commercial guys add sugar.

Place the lettuce and spinach on a plate then add the cucumber, avocado, tomato, cooked chicken, walnuts, and mandarin orange wedges on top. Drizzle two or three tbsp of the vinaigrette over it (nutritional analysis assumes three). Enjoy.

Servings: 1

(Actually, you’ll have enough vinaigrette left over for one or two more salads or vegetable servings. Save it in the refrigerator.)

Nutritional Analysis:

57 % fat

12 % carbohydrate

31 % protein

710 calories

25 g carbohydrate

10 g fiber

15 g digestible carb

990 mg sodium

1,570 mg potassium

Prominent features: Rich in protein, vitamin A, B6, C, copper, iron, manganese, magnesium, pantothenic acid, selenium, and phosphorus.

low-carb diet, diabetic diet, Paleobetic diet, balsamic vinaigrette,

I like this and use it. The lower left corner says “with EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL.” In order, the listed ingredients are water, balsamic vinegar, soybean oil and extra virgin olive oil, sugar….  2 tbsp has 3 grams of carb. Which oil would you guess predominates? BTW, balsamic has the most carbs of all the vinegars.

Recipe: Turkey Tomato Bowl + Macadamia Nuts

paleobetic diet, low-carb

This Turkey Tomato Bowl fits criteria for the Paleobetic Diet

This is what I did with some of our leftover Thanksgiving turkey. If you don’t have leftover turkey, I bet leftover chicken or steak would be  fine substitutes. Heck, I’m tempted to try it with salmon or canned tuna or chicken. In addition to the flavor, what I like about this meal is that it’s crazy quick.

Ingredients:

6 oz (170 g) cooked turkey chunks, light meat (or 8 oz (225 g) if you’re starting raw and planning to cook it)

5 oz (140 g) raw tomato (2 small roma tomatoes, for example), cut into chunks

2 tbsp (30 ml) balsamic vinaigrette

black pepper to taste

1 oz (30 g) roasted macadamia nuts

paleobetic diet, low-carb, diabetes, diabetic diet, paleo diet

These roma tomatoes were amazingly flavorful for late Fall in the northern hemisphere. Before cooking, my wife injected the bird with olive oil, massaged periodically over 30 minutes, then popped it in the oven.

Instructions:

Toss the turkey and tomato chunks in a bowl, splash on the vinaigrette, then microwave for 60-80 seconds. Pepper as desired. Drink the leftover juice right out of the bowl. Enjoy with macadamia nuts for dessert and you’ve got a full meal.

Discussion:

paleobetic diet, low-carb, diabetes, diabetic diet

Grok wouldn’t have access to this

I was lazy when I made this so I just used a commercial salad dressing rather than making my own vinaigrette. Wish-Bone Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing “with extra virgin olive oil.” Here are the top ingredients, in order: water, balsamic vinegar, soybean oil and extra virgin olive oil (sic), sugar, salt, spices, etc. So the oil could have been soybean oil (from a legume—the horror!!!) with one drop of EVOO for all I know. Olive oil is a rich source of monounsaturated fatty acid, so you might be able to calculate how much EVOO was in the dressing if I tell you there were five grams of fat per two tbsp (30 ml) serving, of which 1.5 grams were monounsaturated. That serving also has three grams of carbohydrate (all sugar) and only 60 calories. Right there on the bottle is says gluten-free and “no high fructose corn syrup.” I bet it had HFCS in it three years ago and there would be no mention of the trendy “gluten-free.”

I don’t know any home cooks who add water to vinaigrettes. They are essentially oil and vinegar (in a ratio of 3:1) and spices. The ones I make have quite a bit more than 60 calories per two tbsp (30 ml); more like 220 cals. All of the oils you would use have about 120 calories per tbsp all from fat. If you make this recipe with home-made vinaigrette, add 150 calories to the nutritional analysis below. It won’t affect the carb count.

Note that of the common vinegars, balsamic has the most carbohydrates—some vinegars have zero. If you use typical amounts of balsamic vinaigrette, you shouldn’t need to worry about the carbohydrates unless perhaps you’re on a strict ketogenic diet and limited to 20-30 grams of carb daily.

Servings: 1

Nutritional Analysis:

58% fat

7% carbohydrate

35% protein

620 calories

11.5 g carbohydrate

3.7 g fiber

8 g digestible carbohydrate

743 mg sodium

877 mg potassium

Prominent features: High in protein, vitamin B6, iron, manganese, niacin, phosphorus, selenium, and zinc.

paleobetic diet, low-carb, diabetic diet, paleo diet

Bonus pic! A new horse at the Parker Compound. He’s an old-style Morgan.

Hamburger and Avocado Salad

Hamburger-Avocado Salad with tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, salt/pepper, and olive oil vinaigrette

This was an OK dinner.  My wife didn’t care for it, which may explain why don’t see anything similar on typical restaurant menus.  You see salads with chicken, salmon, or steak strips, usually.  Hamburger’s just not an ideal pairing with the other flavors, I guess. I dressed it with the left-over olive oil vinaigrette I made yesterday.

-Steve

Sunny’s Super Salad

Sunny’s Super Salad

My wife whipped this up for a quick lunch.   The salad has several types of lettuce, walnuts, mandarin oranges, avocado, cucumber, and tomato, topped with pan-fried skinless chicken strips.

I made the vinaigrette with extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and salt/pepper in about two minutes.  My oil to vinegar ratio was 3:1.  My wife wants less vinegar next time.

Sprinkle on Weber Roasted Garlic and Herb Seasoning  for extra zing, if desired.  I may add this to my next batch of vinaigrette.

—Steve