Spicy Stir-Fried Broccoli Stems Recipe

This recipe is for everyone who likes to nibble the broccoli stems when they’re cutting up the broccoli!

Broccoli stems are one of those under-appreciated vegetable parts that don’t get much respect, yet when I’m cutting up stalks of broccoli, they’re my favorite part to nibble on.  After I realized how much I liked them, a few years ago I started to save the stems in the vegetable crisper.  I’ve mostly used my broccoli stem bounty in salads, but this idea for cooking the stems with a spicy sauce is something I came up with when I had a whole pound of stems saved up.  I cooked them in a wok, but a large frying pan will work, and if you’ve never eaten the broccoli stems, this recipe just might turn you into a fan.
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Baby Kale Greek Salad Recipe

All the flavors of Greek salad, plus baby kale!

Yes, the infatuation with Earthbound Farm Organic Baby Kales  is still going strong around here, and last week my local Fresh Market store had the baby kale mix on sale, so there’s been a lot of baby kale on the menu.  Of course that’s perfectly fine with me since I love this baby kale, especially for salads.  Not only is the flavor milder, the baby kale mix such a nice combination of flavors and shapes.  I like the crunch that kale gives to this version of Greek salad and I loved the way all these flavors worked together.
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Recipe for Heart of Palm Salad with Tomato, Avocado, and Lime (with or without Cilantro)

I’ve been infatuated with this Heart of Palm Salad with Tomato, Avocado, Cilantro, and Lime.

I love combining beloved ingredients in slightly different ways, and this Heart of Palm Salad with Tomato, Avocado, Cilantro, and Lime was the happy result when I arranged a marriage between my favorite Vegan Heart of Palm and Avocado Salad and Colorful Tomato Salad with Hearts of Palm.  This offspring salad had all the good qualities of the parents, plus some new qualities of its own!
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Recipe for Whole Wheat Orzo Salad with Kale, Chickpeas, Lemon, and Feta

A delicious healthful salad with whole wheat orzo, kale, chickpeas, lemon, and Feta.  You could use brown rice or quinoa for a gluten-free version of this tasty salad.

A few years ago I discovered 100% Whole Wheat Orzo Pasta, and I’ve used it to make a few tasty pasta salads since then.  If you’re not familiar with it, orzo is a type of pasta that’s shaped like large grains of rice, and if you don’t want to bother finding the whole wheat orzo or for a gluten-free version of this salad, cooked brown rice would make a fine substitute.  Of course it won’t surprise anyone that I took a fantastic-sounding salad with spinach and switched out the spinach for kale.  I used regular curly kale so we trimmed it and wilted the kale for a minute, but if you had Earthbound Farm Ready-to-use Organic Mixed Baby Kales you could just give the kale a few rough chops and throw it in the salad.  We also added some cumin into the dressing for this salad, which gave it a bit of a Mediterranean flavor.  No matter what version of this salad you end up with, we thought this delightful combination of flavors was a perfect meatless meal.
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Recipe for Raw Baby Kale Salad with Apples, Sunflower Seeds, and Lemon-Dijon Vinaigrette

Raw Baby Kale Salad with Apples, Sunflower Seeds, and Lemon-Dijon Vinaigrette!

There’s no doubt about it, I’m seriously smitten with the Earthbound Farm Baby Kale Mix that suddenly appeared at the Fresh Market store by my house.  I’ve been buying it every time I see it at the store (and so is everyone else apparently, because about half the time they don’t have any.)  Making a salad with the raw baby kale was a snap and I loved this combination with raw baby kale, apples tossed in a lemon-Dijon vinaigrette, and crispy sunflower seeds adding a little crunch.  The dressing for this is slightly sweet, so maybe this would be a good one to try out on family members who are on the fence about raw kale.
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