Something Different: One-Dish Meal: Pasta Ham Salad

It's dark leafy greens, the fine mesh strainer, and pasta ham salad served with Italian orange cream.

Featured nutrient-rich food: Dark Leafy Greens
Preliminary research indicates that dark leafy greens support the immune system and may ward off certain types of cancer.

These greens are also rich in folic acid, a nutrient critical to fight anemia, prevent some birth defects, help eyes and bone health.

Avocado Salad with Lime Dressing

Tropical flavors of mango and citrus complement black beans in this colorful salad loaded with Vitamin E and easy-to-create Culinary Artistry Appeal.

Good Source of Vitamin E
One of the 13 essential vitamins needed for the body to function. You can find Vitamin E in Avocado, Dark green vegetables (spinach, broccoli, asparagus, turnip greens), Margarine (made from safflower, corn, and sunflower oil), Oils (safflower, corn, and sunflower), Papaya and mango, Seeds and nuts, Wheat germ and wheat germ oil.

Friday Side Dish: Easy Apple Salad with Lemon-Poppy Seed Dressing

The apple tree is a deciduous tree in the rose family best known for its sweet, pomaceous fruit, Apples are often eaten raw, but can also be found in many prepared foods (especially desserts) and drinks. Many beneficial health effects are thought to result from eating apples.

The proverb "An apple a day keeps the doctor away", addressing the health effects of the fruit, dates from 19th century Wales.

Apples are often eaten raw. The whole fruit including the skin is suitable for human consumption. Apples can be canned or juiced. They are milled or pressed to produce apple juice, which may be drunk unfiltered (called apple cider in North America), or filtered.

Make It Monday: Edamame Corn Salad with Oregano Vinaigrette

It's Make-It-Monday. This recipe from McCormick features oregano, a perennial herb, sometimes called wild marjoram,. Its close relative, O. majorana, is known as sweet marjoram.

Oregano is an important culinary herb, used for the flavor of its leaves, which can be more flavorful when dried than fresh. It has an aromatic, warm and slightly bitter taste, which can vary in intensity. Do you know what foods spices go with?

Mom's Strawberry Jello Salad

This is one of the family favorites. I made it when the children were young. They still love it today now that they have children of their own. I mean who doesn't love strawberries?

Other than the gorgeous look of the finished strawberry jello salad, it is just the right color for Christmas. Made in layers, the glass baking dish that I serve it in highlights the festive and picturesque appeal of this yummy salad.

Turkey Salad with Red Grapes

This turkey salad with red grapes makes a great salad with an entree or mix for a sandwich. This recipe gets lots of extra flavor from the sliced grapes and a little lemon juice.

For added crunch and protein, add coarsely chopped pecans and enjoy on lettuce for lunch or use it in a hearty sandwich.

Dancing Tastebud Orange Salad

Here is a fresh green salad made with oranges and an out-of-this world orange dressing. It is one of the yummiest salads made with a super easy salad dressing.

I am not kidding: You will want to serve this green salad with oranges and cherries over and over again.

I call it the "Dancing Tastebud Orange Salad" because every bite makes your eyes smile and your tastebuds dance. Olay!

Superfoods Loaded with Antioxidants Good for the Budget

It's Meatless Monday and another day to choose superfoods. Tasty foods such as spinach, strawberries, blueberries, and walnuts are superfoods loaded with antioxidants, and antioxidants are happy food for a body and the budget, too.

Spinach, strawberries, blueberries, and walnuts are called Superfoods because they are loaded with vitamins and antioxidants. Here's the superfoods salad recipe:

Three Bean Salad

Green beans, also known as string bean, snap bean and ejotes (Mexico) are unripe fruit -- but most people consider and use green beans as a vegetable. Green bean is tasty and has a fleshy flavor. The pod is mildly sweet.

Green beans very popular. They can be purchased fresh, canned and frozen. They're cooked steamed, boiled, stir-fried as well as baked in casseroles.

Leafy Butter Lettuce Salad with Pistachios

Butter lettuce is a variety of butterhead lettuce, known for its smooth, loosely bunched, tender leaves with has a slightly sweet, buttery flavor. It is fat free, cholesterol and sodium free, and an outstanding source of Vitamin A, C and folate.

Wonderfully delicious pistachio nuts have been revered as the symbol of wellness and robust health since ancient times. The nuts are enriched with many health-benefiting nutrients that are essential for optimum health.

Pistachio nuts are dry fruits originating in the mountain ranges of West-Asian region. They're a member of the cashew family. Nuts grow on a small tree believed to be originally from Central Asia and the Middle East. The trees are planted in orchards and take approximately seven to ten years to reach peak.

How to Make 7-Up Jello Salad

Here's how to make 7-up jello salad for your Christmas table.  This recipe is one of two jello dishes that my kids love and yummed it up at the Christmas dinner table when they were young. I stopped making it for some reason.  Not sure why?  But it's a recipe full of memories.  You don't even feel like it's jello. It's so good.  Jello is not just for kids.  You can even make it with sugar-free J-E-L-L-O.

Mom's Potato Salad Kids Love to Eat

Hola potato lovers. As the countdown to this year's Mother's Day tick tocks behind us, I think every mother reminisces about her children. I was remembering my three little ones when they were in elementary school. 

I pictured them sitting around the kitchen table, spoon in hand waiting to eat. The beanie weenies were ready to serve next to a big pile of Mom's potato salad that I homemade. I don't remember even being able to buy pre-made potato salad in those days, but that may just be me not remembering. Hmmm. Anyway.

Green Onion Salad with Chili-Lime Dressing

The green onion, often referred to as, scallion, has hollow green leaves similar to an onion. It's small onion with long leaves. It's harvested for it's milder taste. It can be added to a recipe or enjoyed raw. Green onions are often part of a salad, soups and salsas.

In Mexico and the Southwest United States, a type of scallion called cebollitas are often sprinkled with salt, grilled whole and added to cheese and rice recipes.

Fennel Salad with Oranges Olives

Fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) is a flowering plant species in the celery family. It is a highly aromatic and flavorful herb with both culinary and medicinal uses. It tastes similar to anise (although fennel seeds are smaller).

The bulb, foliage and seeds of the fennel plant are widely used in many of the culinary traditions of the world. For cooking, green seeds are optimal.

The leaves are delicately flavored and similar in shape to those of dill. The bulb is a crisp vegetable that can be sautéed, stewed, braised, grilled, or eaten raw. Young tender leaves are used for garnishes, as a salad, to add flavor to salads, to flavor sauces to be served with puddings, and also in soups and fish sauce.

Fresh Fruit Salad

Here's a sweet fresh fruit salad recipe for your holiday meal. Most home cooks, nutritional experts and top chefs know that eating fresh fruits and green vegetables provide excellent nutrition. Meals rich in fruits and vegetables provide essential vitamins, minerals, fibers and other necessary substances.

Nutritionists agree that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables is a good source of vitamins like vitamin A, vitamin C and other nutrients like potassium and dietary fiber.

Vitamin A which is found in many vegetables and fruits especially carrots is believed to improve eye sight and vision.

Romaine Lettuce Salad with Roasted Walnuts and Blue Cheese

Romaine lettuce has sturdy leaves with firm ribs down their centers. Unlike most lettuces, it is tolerant of heat. The common name in North America is "romaine", while elsewhere it is known as "cos lettuce," because it's believed to have been introduced from the Greek Island of Cos.

Romaine is a dark leafy green rich with antioxidants believed to help prevent cancer. It has a gentle, but slightly bitter taste. it as an excellent source of vitamin A (notably through its concentration of the pro-vitamin A carotenoid, beta-carotene), vitamin K, folate, and molybdenum, as well as dietary fiber. With its folic acid, vitamin C, beta-carotene, potassium, and fiber content, romaine lettuce can significantly contribute to a heart-healthy diet.

Friday Side Dish: Savory Potato Salad

The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial nightshade Solanum tuberosum L. The word "potato" may refer either to the plant itself or the edible tuber.

The potato was first domesticated in the region of modern-day southern Peru and extreme northwestern Bolivia between 8000 and 5000 BC. It has since spread around the world and become a staple crop in many countries.

Friday Side Dish: Classic Macaroni Salad with Real Mayonnaise

Macaroni is a variety of dry pasta, originating from Italy, made with durum wheat. Macaroni usually does not contain eggs and is normally cut in short, hollow shapes. It may be straight or curved, in which case it is frequently called elbow macaroni.

Pasta comes in hundreds of different shapes, sizes, textures, and flavors, but the Italian, or Western, style prevails as the favorite in most countries.

Friday Side Dish: Cabbage Salad

Cabbage is a vegetable that belongs to the same family that includes broccoli, kale, cauliflower and brussels sprouts. Cabbage is one of the oldest vegetable plants and is believed to be originated in Asia and the Mediterranean.

Friday Side Dish: Garlic Tomato Pasta Salad

Pasta is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine, with the first reference dating to 1154 in Sicily. Pasta is a noodle made from an unleavened dough of a durum wheat flour mixed with water and formed into sheets or various shapes, then cooked and served in any number of dishes. It can be made with flour from other cereals or grains, and eggs may be used instead of water.