Lemon Basil Dressing - homemade

Lemon Basil Dressing
recipe by Steve Binder

makes 2 cups
2 oz container of basil leaves with small stems* finely chopped
½ cup honey
1/8 cup apple cider vinegar
2-4 garlic cloves, crushed
1- 2 the juice of 1-2 lemons
¼ teaspoon salt
1½ c light olive oil (mild)

A local restaurant had the most wonderful lemon basil dressing and we always tried to bring home extra.  We would order extra with our meal but they rarely let us buy some to take home.  That would have been extra extra dressing and I guess that wasn't allowed.  

Enough was enough. We had to have that dressing.  My husband decided he was going to create a dressing that was as good or better than theirs and we would always be able to have it in the house! 

Since I no longer can trust premade dressings, this is made without any unnecessary preservatives, additives, MSG, nothing.  All real pure ingredients - as close as we could reasonably get. 

*I can usually find 4 oz containers of basil at our local Lucky's Market.  I take all the leaves off the big stems and leave the little stems with the leaves.  I whirl it up in the Cuisinart and divide it in half.  I usually get about 2½ ounces of chopped basil this way, so just over 1 ounce of basil per batch once it's all cleaned and chopped.

I put the 1+ ounce of whirled basil back in the Cuisinart.  Add in the lemon juice, minced garlic, honey, cider vinegar, and salt. Blend it all together and leave it running while slowly pouring in the olive oil.  The oil should emulsify the entire batch and it shouldn't separate for many days.  

The emulsifying process is new to me, so I'm not sure how long it will stay together.   But when I just whisked everything together, it stayed together long enough to pour onto my salads.  I like to put the dressing into a nice glass bottle (recycling at it's best - I use glass milk bottles or the Silly Cow hot chocolate mix jars.) I store the dressing in the fridge and when I want to use it, I let the contents warm up a bit and shake it real good to mix everything up again. If it's needed immediately I do a quick zap in the microwave.  

This is what the Lemon Basil dressing looks like when it's been just whisked together, no Cuisinart magic, and allowed to sit for a few minutes.  Just shake and pour to use.  

The photo at the top of the page shows the gifts that I'm giving to friends.  It's about 1 cup of Lemon Basil Dressing, in the Silly Cow jars.  They look so lovely, even though I can't for the life of my get the wording off of the jars.  I've tried a razor blade, nail polish remover, hot soapy water, the dishwasher - everything I can think of.  Sooo, the advertising is still on the bottles. That's the way it goes.  

I use the Lemon Basil dressing on so many things other than salad - steamed veggies, fried calamari, fish, chicken, a drizzle on sandwiches, etc.  It really is that good and versatile.



Lemon Basil Dressing
recipe by Steve Binder

makes 2 cups
2 oz container of basil leaves with small stems* finely chopped
½ cup honey
1/8 cup apple cider vinegar
2-4 garlic cloves, crushed
1- 2 the juice of 1-2 lemons
¼ teaspoon salt
1½ c light olive oil (mild)


Prepare all of the ingredients, chop the basil in the Cuisinart, add the honey, vinegar, crushed garlic, juice of lemon(s) and salt.  Pulse until all is incorporated.  Then take the little lid off the top of the Cuisinart and slowly pour in the oil. When incorporated, stop the machine and taste test.  This is where you can add more lemon or salt if needed.  I use small lemons as they are easier to juice, so I usually need two of them. When taste testing is done, pour into desired container for storage in fridge. 

DIY Postcard Swap

Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash

DIY Post Card Swap is something I found through Studio iHanna just this year and just a few days ago.  The time to sign up has passed and the postcards should have been mailed out by now, but she has two of these swaps each year, so if you're interested, please get on her email list or follow her blog or Instagram. Those that used the special hashtag when posting #diypostcardswap can be used to see what postcards have been made and sent out. 

Sadly, my postcards did not get mailed out by the deadline, but they will be by Monday.  I hate being late!  I hate it!

I had such a great time creating my cards.  I made just slightly bigger versions of my Index Card A Day project this summer. I was delighted to pull out my ephemera (paper) and collect even more bits and pieces the few days I was creating the cards.  Steve, who usually rolls his eyes at me saving things that should be trash, helped collect a few things.  He does love to see the childlike excitement that comes over me!

Here is one of the first postcards I did for the swap.  My love of security envelopes is well known, but not for those that receive the card!  I created mountains with the envelopes and then used the stickers that I had just recently received from an Etsy shop, Lissovacraft, and the green stripes were from the packaging that she used.  I absolutely love her work and will someday get a handmade poster with her paper plants and flowers, but for now, I have stickers. 

I used a few Jacksonville magazines for this card and a magazine that we received from Amazon for kids toys.  The purple pinata was from that Amazon book.  It was too funny to not use.  There was a special section in the other magazine about doughnuts and cookies, so that worked real well with the pinata.

My birthday was last month and I hated to just bury the card that I received in a pile in my room so I recycled quite a bit of it into this post card.  The Sunset block near the bottom is from a wetnap that was given to someone at a restaurant.  I loved the retro look to it.  This particular one happened to go through the washer - so it's extra distressed. 

I created 10 postcards, so I hope you keep with me to see the remaining 7 in upcoming blog posts.  I promise it will be soon. 

Have a great day!
Kristin

Taco Seasoning - homemade

Would you like a great Taco seasoning mix that's pretty easy to put together and makes ground beef (or turkey or chicken for that matter) taste out of this world?  This homemade taco seasoning mix uses all real ingredients, no fillers, just real 100% spices and herbs.  If you want 100% real ingredients, make sure you read the labels on your spices to make sure. 

Some really great things have come about because of my quest to get artificial chemicals and ingredients out of my life.  Now I rarely if ever used store bought spice packets for my hamburger, so having an envelope of taco mix on hand was foreign to me.  When I made taco meat before this, I'd add in some chili powder and salt and that's about it.  I didn't feel the need to add more to it, but honestly, it was seriously bland.

When I married Steve, he regularly used seasonings to amp up the flavor for his taco meat.  It was only natural for him to want more flavor for his taco meat than just chili powder and salt.  He did occasionally use the taco seasoning envelopes, but was always concerned about the high salt content. We enjoy cooking together so finding something we both liked was important.

It wasn't until visiting my sister in Michigan one year that I saw her recipe for a homemade taco mix, that I realized we could make our own mix.  I took a picture of it and shared it with Steve.  He reminded me that he had a homemade mix, too, but hadn't made it in awhile.  Here I had thought that a homemade mix was an "ah ha" moment!  WOW!  We can do this at home! 

Clearly, at this point I wasn't much of a cook!

As it turned out, we liked Alison's taco mix very much and have been using it ever since.  Definitely a hit!

There are a lot of ingredients, but this mix is so good it's worth it to keep all of these spices in stock.  It's not overwhelmingly salty or sweet or peppery or hot.  For me, it's just right.   I do have to admit though, I do not use the full amount of black pepper as in the recipe, but that's because I am not a pepper person.  But I will give the recipe as written and not my wimpy version.

A few years ago Steve and I created a cookbook for our families and in it we included this taco seasoning recipe.   One version is nearly equivalent to a single package of a store bought taco mix envelope and the other is the recipe x4 (times 4), so that you can have some on hand whenever you wanted it. 

The photos are of the x4. I took these photos in my kitchen just a few days ago.  Who knew it would turn out to be so gorgeous.  I put the chili powder in the dish first, so all that you can see is just the little red top right in the middle. 

Taco Seasoning
(equivalent to one envelope of store bought)

1 T chili powder
¼ t garlic powder
¼ t onion powder
¼ t dried oregano
½ t paprika
1½ t ground cumin
1 t sea salt
1 t black pepper



Taco Seasoning  x4

4 T chili powder
1 t garlic powder
1 t onion powder
1 t dried oregano
2 t paprika
2 T ground cumin
4 t sea salt
4 t black pepper

(2 Tablespoons of homemade taco seasoning = one store bought 1.25oz packet.)


*Most of the spices I use come from Penzey's Spices in Wisconsin.  We had a local brick and mortar store up until recently.  I am seriously bummed they closed but the rent just got too high for them to stay. They have an awesome online website and I can just order from there, or when traveling I look for a store.  I have no affiliation with Penzey's, I've just been buying from them for a few decades and believe they are the best. 


Thanks for stopping by.  Have a great day!
Kristin