Best-Ever Strawberry Spinach Salad with Poppyseed Dressing

March 19, 2015 by Christine Skari

It turns out that California has decided to completely skip out the “winter” part of the year and here on the coast of Santa Barbara, we have had almost nothing but sunshine and 70 degree weather. This translates to me wanting to post aalllll the warmer-weather food (fruit! salad! light & scrumptious combos!), but I’ve held back since I didn’t want to tempt all my readers who are still battling snow and cold with ginormous produce-filled photos like THIS.

*proceeds to swoon*

I know I’ve been a bit bad about posting this last week, but I promise I have good reason. I’m just ending the last of my finals (just have my genetics one at 8 am on tomorrow morning!) and then I’m FREEE! My lecture schedule for next quarter is insane in the best possible way, and I only have class on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Someone please pinch me 😯 . I have big plans on amping up my blogging, photography, and overall quality of recipes and posts on the blog during that time, so please bear with me as I give everything I have to this last final.

So on to the food! The credit for this recipe goes to my close friend and housemate, Darinne, who has adapted this dish from the one here mama gave to her when she left for college. Her mom used to make this salad for her when she was growing up and it was the ONLY salad she would eat. Darinne is a bit of a picky eater (we call her an alien because she doesn’t like chocolate 😯 ), so her mom wanted to make sure she had an emergency recipe to help her get her greens in. And let me tell ya, this is the perfect healthy and nutrient-packed recipe!

Just think: vibrant and fresh spinach that just screams goodness, plumb and ripe strawberries, toasted almonds for that perfect crunch, and an amazing poppyseed dressing that is full of flavor. My mouth and heart are happy.

Simple & Healthy Chicken Sweet Potato Bake

March 12, 2015 by Christine Skari

As you might have gotten from my blog posts (or lack of posts…), I’ve been pretty busy lately. Between the constant bombardment of exams and essays that make up the fast-paced quarter system, setting up my tiny (but growing!) photography business, keeping up with Apple of My Eye, training for a half marathon, and trying to give myself time to spend with Kyle and my friends, I don’t have much spare time to get all that much cooking done outside of what I do for the blog. It’s funny because I think most people have this idea in their heads that I cook extravagant meals 24/7, which is absolutely the opposite of what I normally do. When I’m not cooking/baking for the blog, I usually stick to my favorite tried-and-true recipes like my Mom’s beef soup, Obachan’s lasagna, simple pasta dishes, takeout (oops), and deliciously simple chicken bakes like this!

I think I tend to gravitate to easier and fast recipes since I’m just so dang busy and want at least one aspect of my life to be simple. After a long day, there’s nothing I’d rather NOT do than stand up in the kitchen slaving away when I could be reclining on the couch with Netflix. Bonus points if the recipe makes a humongous amount of leftovers that I can eat for a week straight and is healthy for ya! I eat takeout more than I care to admit, so meals that I can make in bulk and refrigerate/freeze really help me stick to a healthy balance since I’m much less tempted to get fried rice or a cheeseburger when I can just grab something yummy, throw it in the microwave, and relax over a good meal.

This is the perfect fix for a busy college student like myself, and though it just involves cutting up a bunch of ingredients and baking them together, I thought I’d share it on the blog since it is pretty reflective of how I normally eat.

Question of the Day: What’s one easy recipe that you find yourself making on repeat?

15-Minute Healthy Asian Beef Bowl

February 20, 2015 by Christine Skari

Who’s ready for the easiest, yet most mouthwatering dish ever? Mee me me.

This is the kind of recipe that saves ya. After a long day (blog work on my photography site, three classes, a 5 mile run, studying, and styling/photographing/editing 4 (!) recipes), there is nothing better than being able to relax at home with a dinner that is done in a flash. This asian beef bowl takes a total of 15 minutes (if you don’t count the rice andddd I’m totally not against the microwavable kind) and the sweet and salty flavors will have you absolutely swooning. As Kyle just told me when I asked him to describe the recipe, it’s “inhalation-worthy”. There were a couple of times when we were scarfing down our dinner that Kyle had to make himself sit back and slooooowwww down because he had to remind himself to breathe in-between bites. If that doesn’t indicate a succesfully delicious recipe, I don’t know what does!

I’m keeping this post short and sweet because I am bone-tired and still need to do a bit of sponsored work and studying for my biochem class. The clock currently says 10:55 p.m, so I’m hoping to be in bed by 1 so I can wake up around 7 and get to my genetics class. Oh! And did I mention that tomorrow, Kyle and I are heading back to our hometown because…. HIS FAMILY IS GETTING A PUPPY. A tiny, squirmy black lab that I’m gonna love on so hard. Eeeeeep.!!!

Mom’s Simple Prosciutto & Beet Arugula Salad

February 11, 2015 by Christine Skari

Oh hi there, you gorgeous salad.

I forgive you for making me scratch my head in frustration over what to name you for the entire time I was writing/editing this post. It’s hard to name something that has so many note-worthy ingredients that I want to keep in the recipe title, yet I also want to underline how simple and easy this salad is to make. I don’t know about you, but whenever I see big and shmancy foreign words like prosciutto and arugula in a recipe, I tend to shrug my shoulders like ehhhhh and head to the freezer to pull out a microwavable meal. I finally settled with my Mom’s Simple Prosciutto & Beet Arugula Salad, but that doesn’t include the yummy balsamic dressing, sweet tomatoes, and feta cheese.

Arghhhhh… the struggles of being a food blogger…

I guess true love (liiiikee the one this salad and I have <3) involves your heart strings being pulled a bit 😉 .

So let’s chat a bit about this salad!

The stars of the show include plump juicy beets, salty prosciutto, peppery arugula, and a stupidly easy dressing. And when I say stupidly easy, I mean it. When I asked my mom to make this recipe for the blog (hi mom!) and to measure how she makes her dressing so I could give you guys accurate proportions, she gave me a skeptical stare. My mom is the kind of cook who never measures anything, so the thought of pulling out the measuring spoons to get a ratio had her rolling her eyes. It involves just two ingredients (olive oil and balsamic vinegar) and, if you’re my mom, you just pour both on until it “feels right”.

This is the salad that has my steak-and-potato-loving dad asking for it exclusively for dinner. That’s a big deal folk! The man grew up on a rural potato farm in the Norwegian countryside, so his tastebuds have come a long way. I don’t want to give you the impression that he knows how to cook (he has yet to master the microwave and could burn water), but he can appreciate a great combination of flavors and texture that makes this healthy salad a winner!

While we love having some prosciutto in this recipe, if you’re vegetarian or aren’t a big fan of it, feel free to leave it out! Serve with some crusty baguette and wine and you’re in for a goooood night!

Healthy Weeknight Spaghetti Bolognese

January 22, 2015 by Christine Skari

Nothing screams comfort to me more than an enormous, steamy-hot bowl of pasta. There’s something about pasta noodles that make it the perfect flavor vessel and man, is it carrying the most perfect cargo in this recipe! I’m talkin’ a super rich (but actually lightened up!) tomato sauce that’s chock full of lean ground beef, onions, bell peppers, and mushrooms and all tied together with that perfect savory touch of garlic salt and a gorgeous sprinkling of parmesan.

Let’s have some #realtalk here: it would be blasphemy to leave out all that beautiful parm <3.

This is one of those meals that Kyle and I on a regular basis. We’re both pretty busy (he’s an engineering major), but his schedule is more intense this term than mine, so I do most of the cooking. It’s kinda funny, but when I’m not working on recipes for the blog, I tend to gravitate to time-tested and super easy meals that I can whip up quickly. This definitely fits that bill! I made this on Wednesday night and paired it with steamed veggies and some whole wheat baguette bread.

It was the definition of healthy comfort food and I only decided to photograph it at the last minute since I figured it would be a pretty good representation of the type of meals I eat. I like a balance of indulgent, yet healthy recipes that make me feel happy and content and have ingredients that do good things for my body. Huzzah!

So this. Done in 30 minutes and, if you’re like Kyle and I, it will serve you up at least 4-5 hefty portions. Kyle eats a lot and we still have a serving in the fridge! If you’re a lighter eater or serve this with veggies/a side, it will easily last you 6 meals and you are set for a few days. Perfect for people who don’t want to slave away in the kitchen all day and are big fans of yummy pasta-tomato-y-goodness.

*raises hand*

Happy eating!