Caveman Dinner: Monday, 8/9/10

Caveman Dinner tonight (all ingredients organic): Nothing fancy, left over BBQ Chicken (see earlier posts on FB, or wait for the recipe next time I make it).  I have to use up some homemade Caveman Mayo (one egg, 1/4 tsp mustard powder and 1 tbs lemon juice in the blender on the slowest speed, as I slowly add in one cup of sunflower oil), and some cilantro, so I'm going to make one of my favorite salad dressings and serve a side salad.


There's a store here called Gelson's, and they have this salad dressing on their salad bar that I love, simply called Cilantro Dressing.  Well, I have yet to find an organic salad dressing in a store that doesn't contain salt, or vinegar, or both!  Remember, just because it's organic, doesn't mean it's good for you or is Caveman Approved.  The cavemen would not have salt, except maybe in trace amounts IF they lived by an ocean.  Most did not however.  Most organic products try to hide the salt amount by claiming they are only using organic sea salt.  Well, the nasty little lie there is sea salt does exactly the same damage to your body as salt salt.  They break down the exact same way.  "But you need salt to survive, douche-wad!"  Yes, well, there's no need to get nasty.  The Caveman Diet theory is all the food you eat has enough salt for you to live without adding extra.  And they wouldn't have vinegar, or anything fermented for that matter (unfortunately, this means no alcohol, but if you have kids, I wouldn't recommend quitting drinking).


So my goal is to recreate the taste of that yummy dressing without using any of the bad ingredients.  We'll replace the flavor giving salt with other herbs and spices, and combined with the absolute freshness of the ingredients, it'll be as much or more flavor than the original from a bottle.  It'll certainly taste fresher and healthier.


The first two ingredients are no brainers, cilantro and mayonaise.  Now let me remind you, I'm no chef or cook, so chopping cilantro doesn't give me the jollies.  But I bought a cheap ass food processor and chop away.  Normally I replace vinegar with lemon juice, but since to me cilantro has a Mexican flavor to it, let's use lime juice instead.  They seem to go well together in both Mexican and Thai dishes.


Normally I use fresh ingredients, but with salad dressings, I like to go to the spice rack instead.  Add some garlic powder, onion powder, oregano, black pepper, and cumin to give that nice Mexican flavor to it.  If you like it spicy (like I do), throw some fresh jalapeno into the food processor when chopping the cilantro!  I don't usually measure stuff, just add ingredients by personal tastes.  Feel free to substitute, that's how I get most of my recipes.  I'll toss the dressing with some romaine lettuce, red onion, cherry tomatoes, shredded carrot, avocado, and anything else in my fridge that I need to get rid of before my next trip to Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and the local farmer's market (more on shopping in a future blog).


This dressing is delicious, but what I'm starting to salivate for is the leftover BBQ sauce I'm going to dip the chicken in, made mostly with fresh plums, ginger, garlic and my homemade Caveman Ketchup (read the next blog for the ketchup recipe).  It's outrageous, no added salt or added sugar, and completely healthy!  Could you ever imagine losing weight while eating BBQ sauce?  Well, I'm doing it!!!  Caveman like!!  Caveman like cilantro dressing, and BBQ sauce!!  Ugga-bugga!!!!


P.S. - For dessert I almost always eat fresh fruit.  This week I bought grapes, strawberries, plums, peaches, and nectarines at the local farmers market for $2 a pound, fresh, delicious, and in season, nature's perfect dessert!


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