Phil, Linda, and Sara,

The recipes are making me hungry. They don't make gooseberry pie around here in Indiana but we had a gooseberry bush where I grew up in northern Wisconsin. Actually, because of the harsh climate in northern Wisconsin, not much grew in gardens. The summers are very short. I remember we had some small wild strawberries growing in the yard. We had several apple trees and some rhubarb plants. I don't remember having much of a garden.

Where we live right now, our yard is very shady, so even tomatoes don't ripen very fast. I put some in planters on my back deck one year, but something took a bite out of each tomato, so I had to throw them away. We have deep woods right behind our house. We have deer in abundance, raccoons, possums, and squirrels galore. It is a great lot for animals and birds, but not flowers or vegetables.

DonnaZ

Hi Sara,

I don't use my Bread Machine very much, however I did try a Whole Wheat Bread just the other day to go with Donna's Chicken Salad, that's really easy to make and delicious. The recipe's over at Donna's Let's Share Recipes >> Chicken Salad.

You just touched on two of my favorite foods, Turnips and Asparagus. Matter of fact, I've always said that asparagus and celery are the two perfect diet foods, because you will burn more calories chewing them up and consuming them, than they have in them. I love asparagus any way you can fix it, and as for Turnips, steamed with a little oil and honey, and I'm in heaven. I always cut up a few of the turnips in with my Greens when I cook them. Makes them so much more flavorful.

If I can find my recipe, I have a Perfect Vegetable Broth, where I combine Turnips, Carrots, Celery, etc., that I've been meaning to make up a batch of for awhile now. Will try to find it and then I'll share it, it's the best I've ever tasted, even if I do say so myself.

I'm going to have to go now and get some rest I'm afraid, because I've been over at the hospital for about 13 hours straight today.

Talk to all of you tomorrow.

Have A Blessed Evening,

Phil

Phil, my best wishes to you. I was afraid something was going on. Please do be okay. Take care of yourself friend.

We love you.

Sara

Hi Sara, Linda & Donna,

First of all I want to apologize for being away so long. I appreciate all of you for dropping by to visit and I definitely apreciate your Comments. and Recipe Ideas.

Let's see if we can get back in the swing of things and try to eat Healthy at the same time...

Garlic Shrimp Salad

Enjoy this delicious shrimp salad as part of your Healthiest Way of Eating. It makes a great light meal on its own, or you can serve it as a side salad to a larger meal. Rich in health-promoting nutrients you will receive 60% of the Daily Value (DV) for vitamin C, 56% DV for protein, 53% DV for vitamin K, and 44% DV for folate and much more. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

• 4 medium cloves garlic, pressed
• 1 lb medium-sized cooked shrimp, best bought still frozen
• 1 bunch asparagus, cut into 1-inch pieces, discarding bottom fourth
• 3 TBS vegetable broth
• 1 fresh tomato, diced into 1/2-inch pieces
• 3 TBS chopped fresh parsley (or 3 tsp dried parsley if fresh not available)
• small head of romaine lettuce, chopped
• *optional 2 oz crumbled goat cheese
• salt and fresh cracked black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Press garlic and let sit for at least 5 minutes to bring out its hidden health benefits.
2. Make sure shrimp is completely thawed and patted dry with a paper towel, or it will dilute the flavor of the salad.
3. Add broth to medium skillet and after it has heated up, Healthy Sauté asparagus for 5 minutes.
4. Whisk together lemon, oil, mustard, honey, garlic, salt and pepper. Toss shrimp, asparagus, parsley, and tomato with dressing and herbs. Allow shrimp salad to marinate for at least 15 minutes.
5. Discard outer leaves of lettuce head, rinse, dry, and chop. Serve shrimp mixture on bed of lettuce and top with crumbled goat cheese, if desired.

Serves 4

Healthy Cooking Tips:

Buying shrimp that is still frozen will ensure that it will be as fresh as possible. Because all shrimp comes frozen in stores once they have thawed they lose their freshness very quickly. This recipe was created to be very quick and easy, so we added already cooked shrimp to the ingredient list. If you have the time, obviously it would have better flavor if the shrimp was raw and you cooked it yourself. It is very important either way to make sure the shrimp is patted dry. Otherwise it will dilute the flavor of your salad. Also, if you plan ahead, this salad will taste even better if it marinates for a couple of hours. It's easiest to cut the bunch of asparagus at the same time. Just line up ends, cut off the bottom fourth (which is fibrous) and cut rest into 1-inch pieces.

Have A Great Week,

Phil