Tag Archives: ketchup

Thousand Island Dressing

30 Apr

This is another of the recipes related to my Foodbuzz’s 24,24,24 April event – A Very Veggie Experiment…  where I fixed dinner to my finicky friend Mariví and her 4 oldest kids – Ignacio, Diego, Kamila and Daniel.  The littlest one, Sergio, who’s just 3 months old, was spared of our experiment this time… 

I knew giving a side salad as part of dinner to Mariví’s kids was going to be the most difficult one to “sell”.  They are just not used to eating salad. But I had to give it a try…  I remember reading in the book Deceptively Delicious that even when you “sneak in” vegetables and other goodies into kid’s meals, it is important for them to learn that eating salads is key to good nutrition. 

I used organic romaine lettuce and organic cucumbers.  I bought mini cherry tomatoes and told them these were tomatoes specially made for kids.

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I made them a Thousand Island Dressing to go along with the salad.  That used to be the only dressing I liked when I was a kid, so I figured they might prefer that to any vinaigrette I could make.  I started with a Mayo Ketchup base and added some sweet pickles.

 

 thousand-island-dressing

THOUSAND ISLAND DRESSING

½ cup eggless mayonnaise
¼ cup ketchup
4-5 sweet pickles or sweet pickle relish
About ¼ tsp Garlic Salt

 

  1. In a small bowl whisk together the mayonnaise, ketchup and garlic salt.  Add the pickle relish and if using larger slices of pickles, just chop them up as small as you can.
  2. Serve on top of your favorite salad… iceberg lettuce seems to work very well with this creamy dressing.

 

Some of the kids tried the tomatoes only but they were not impressed.  I can’t believe it because in my household, a sliced tomato was considered enough salad for a typical weekday meal when I was growing up.

It was so sad to see all the salads left almost intact…  I was the only one who really ate the salad.  Everyone else, including the mom, left salad on their plates. 

This was the real challenge… but I will not give up.  I will make them eat salad if it’s the last thing I do for that family…

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A new twist on MayoKetchup – Wichi’s Version

4 Jan

My brother-in-law made a huge batch of sorullitos de maiz for New Year’s… I had the chance to have some and they were awesome.  But I noticed he made his MayoKetchup different from mine…

Here’s his version – super tasty, really nice twist on the traditional recipe.

 mayo-ketchup-part-21

MAYOKETCHUP – WICHI’S VERSION

¼ cup egg-free mayonnaise, like Vegenaise
2 tbs ketchup
1tsp yellow mustard, I am sure you can substitute with Dijon or even grain mustard
A dash of crushed garlic – Wichi mashes his garlic in a “pilón”, but you can use the one in a jar
A pinch of salt

 

  1. Mix everything together in a small bowl. 

Serve with a nice side of sorullitos de maiz.

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Creamy Tamari Dressing

13 May

In keeping with the international flavor of these last posts, I want to share with you a salad dressing that uses up any leftover tamari or soy sauce you use to marinate – in my case, it was tofu.

I am a firm believer in not wasting.  So, if the recipe calls for ¼ cup of something and that would leave a tiny bit left in the jar… dump it all in.  You should not either save a tiny bit that probably is not enough for something else in the future, nor throw it in the garbage either.  So when I marinated some tofu pieces the other day and was left with about a good 1-2 tbs of tamari left on the little dish, I decided to use it to make a dressing.

Many people come to me asking me for simple salad dressed ideas… salad dressings is even one of the offerings I have in my try-out culinary business, believe it or not.  People want something healthier than the bottled, preservatives filled options in the market these days.  But apparently, they are stumped when it comes to mixing it up.

Hey, oil and vinegar with some salt and pepper is the ultimate dressing…  mixing ip different kinds of oils and vinegars will give you different results.  But what if you’re into creamy dressings?  The solution is Mayonnaise.  Veggie Mayonnaise in our case.   Pay attention kids, because this will happen really quick…

 

 

CREAMY TAMARI DRESSING

¼ cup Veggie Mayo
A good squirt of ketchup
1-2 tbs tamari sauce
A squirt of honey
1 tbs lemon juice
A pinch of garlic salt or garlic powder

 

  1. Mix everything up in a small bowl and spoon it over your favorite salad.

 

My salad was a simple lettuce, tomato and cucumber salad. The dressing is creamy and a bit salty and tangy.  Great partner for any stir fry or Asian rice dish.

 

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Nuggets with MayoKetchup

8 Jan

Mayo what?????

People who are not from Puerto Rico usually ask me that question when I mention the Puerto Rican concoction MayoKetchup.  It’s exactly what it sounds like… a mixture of mayonnaise and ketchup. 

Who invented it?  I don’t know.  I do know that some guy registered the name and the mixture, bottles it and sells it in supermarkets.  But why pay someone to mix something you already have in your fridge or cupboard?  I’ll show you how.

 mayoketchup1.jpg

MayoKetchup

Egg-less mayonnaise
Ketchup
Garlic Salt to taste
  1. In a bowl, mix 1 part ketchup to 1 1/2 parts mayonnaise… the thing is to have a bit more mayo than ketchup. 
  2. Sprinkle and mix in some garlic salt to give an added dimension of flavor to the sauce. 

Use this to dip your favorite snacks…  I used it today to dunk some veggie “chicken” nuggets.  This is my version of fast food at home.  I also use it to dunk corn sorullitos, potato chips, and even as a base for a Thousand Island dressing.

nuggets-3.jpg

 I hope you like it as much as I do.

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