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Reinstating Healthy Friday 
Cook's notes: On Fridays Ever Ready will explore recipes that will give you some healthy choices/options for the new year that include vegan, gluten free and low carbs dishes. Perhaps some of recipes will even win over the meat and potatoes guys and non-veggie eaters in your household. 
Healthy Fridays will also be following some of the new food trends of 2017. Looking ahead I do know its all about the coconut.  And I now have a half gallon of coconut milk to use up.
The past two years Brussels sprouts recipes have been very popular from baked, roasted, sauteed, fried and now I discovered at Trader Joes shaved Brussels Sprouts.  

Gosh the possibilities are endless using them in dishes. You can actually eat them without sauteing or roasting them. They basically function just like cabbage in a slaw once they are shredded. No problem if not near a store that sells this product as I was able to thinly slice sprouts with a very sharp chef like knife. 
The following salad is naturally vegan, gluten-free  and wonderfully light and delicious. Salad recipe serves four can easily be doubled but also double the dressing. 
Brussels Sprouts, Cranberry and Quinoa Salad

Salad Ingredients:

• 1 cup uncooked quinoa
• 1/2 lb. Brussels sprouts. rinsed ends trimmed, then halved lengthwise and thinly sliced crosswise or 1/2 package shaved Brussels sprouts
• 1 cup dried cranberries
• 1/3 -1/2 cup toasted chopped pecans

Dressing Ingredients:

• 2 TB. each lemon juice and orange juice
• 2 TB. olive oil or Lemon Olive Oil 
• 1 TB. lemon zest
• 1 tsp. honey
• 3/4 tsp. each parsley flakes and chives

Salad Directions:

• Follow directions on quinoa package but substitute vegetable broth for the water. Toss warmed cooked quinoa with shaved Brussels sprouts and cranberries. Drizzle in dressing and garnish with toasted pecans.

Dressing Directions:

• Add in a blender, juices, olive oil, spices , honey and zest.  Mix well. 
  

Mandarin Pomegranate Spinach Salad

Cook's notes: Brighten up your winter meal with this healthy side. A light easy homemade poppy seed dressing is drizzled over the top. Recipe serves four. Dressing from 
cookingclassy.com
Salad Ingredients:

• one small bag of baby spinach, ends trimmed
• 4-5 Halos ( clementines) peeled and segmented or  can of Mandarin oranges, drained  
• 3/4 cup toasted almonds
• 2 avocados, peeled and diced
• 1 cup Pom Poms ( Pomegranate arils)

Poppy-seed Dressings Ingredients: 

• 2 TB. white wine vinegar
• 1- 1/2 TB. sugar
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup light mayonnaise (tested with Hellman's light)
• 1- 1/2 TB. honey
• 1 TB. poppy seeds
• 1 TB. milk, if needed

Salad Directions:

• Mix well and drizzle dressing over the salad

Dressing Directions:

• In a small mixing bowl whisk together vinegar, sugar and salt until sugar and salt have dissolved. 
• Add mayonnaise, honey and poppy seeds and whisk until combined. Mix in milk to thin if desired. Store in refrigerator several hours for flavors to meld. 

Poetry is the opening and closing of a door,
leaving those who look through
to guess about what is seen during the moment.
by Carl Sandburg

folklorist, novelist, historian, storyteller

Carl Sandburg was the champion of the American spirit. He wrote about famous Americans who had done great things and not so famous Americans whose achievements were on a smaller scale. Years before he first published his poems, he traveled all over the Unites States, collecting folk songs, more than 300 in all. Eventually these songs were published in "The American Songbag" in 1927. Sandburg spent his life capturing the American spirit in his writing and folk songs. He is well known for his poetry in free verse which often focused on the American worker, a six volume biography of Abraham Lincoln which took 30 years to write and three collections of stories for children called Rootabaga stories.
He was the recipient of three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his book Lincoln:The War Years and two for his poetry.

Epiphany is celebrated on January 6, and celebrates the Magi’s visit to the Christ Child.

It is celebrated with a King Cake which is a cinnamon-roll like cake with sugary icing using traditional Mardi Gras colored sprinkles on the outside. The baby figurine is seen in the middle of the roll.