There are so many naturally gluten-free and healthy food options that it really doesn’t have to be that hard to eat wonderful and nourishing meals if you have celiac disease. And while I’m on the subject, I intensely dislike the word disease in connection with celiac.
Condition, circumstance, situation – there has to be a better word than disease. Can anyone come up with one? Something a little more uplifting and positive. If you were never exposed to gluten (ever), you would never end up with celiac disease (ever), so let’s call it something else. I think I’ll start calling it the “celiac phenomenon.” Or as my son’s girlfriend says, “that yak thing.” Give it some thought. We need a new name for this, something more optimistic.
Okay, back to taking charge of your gluten free lifestyle and making it a nourishing and savory one. Nourishing, savory, and gluten-free go together quite well. It does take some time and effort though.
No time? Yea, I know, it’s not easy, but once you get in the swing of things, it’s not that bad. And it’s actually a lot of fun, but you do have to do your share of of up-front work to stay off the nutritional slip and slide. Prepare things ahead so you don’t get stuck munching on less healthy choices out of desperation. Like a bag of potato chips or gluten-free, prepackaged cup cakes. You’ve heard this before, but just because it says gluten-free doesn’t mean it’s healthy.
This spinach salad takes very little time to prepare, is a nice change from typical dinner salads, and is packed with high-end nutrients. Add some wild rice on the side and you have a whole meal.
what you need
2 tablespoons water
1 and 1/2 tablespoons red-wine vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon agave honey (or any other honey)
2 teaspoons dijon mustard*
1/4th teaspoon ground black pepper
2 Bosc or Anjou pears (cut lengthwise into slices)
several cups of torn spinach (flat leaf or baby spinach works best)
1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion
1/4 cup pecans
what you do
•combine first six ingredients in a small bowl; stir well with a whisk
•place pear slices in the bowl with dressing; toss to coat and let sit in refrigerator for an hour or so (if you don’t have time to let the pears marinate, it doesn’t matter)
•put spinach in serving bowl (I like using a pie pan size dish, something not so deep)
•add pears and dressing
•add onion slices
•lightly toss to coat spinach
•sprinkle with pecans
* I like Annie’s Natural Dijon Mustard (gluten-free)
Yum!
the nutritional profile of spinach (it’s good stuff)
I’ll start with the over-the-top nutritional values provided by this Popeye-sustaining vegetable. First off, one cup of fresh spinach provides a whopping 1110% (no mistake, that’s thousand) of the daily value of vitamin K, 294% of vitamin A, 84% of manganese, 65% of folate and 35% of iron. It also has plenty of vitamin C, B2, calcium, potassium, B6, dietary fiber, protein and on and on. Even some omega 3 fatty acids. This is all packed into one cup of spinach, which is a measly 41 calories. Lots of bang for your buck!
In good health…
Melissa
