Salad in a Jar–this is absolutely FANTASTIC!!!!!

Last week I told you about my FoodSaver not working and my eBay purchase of another one.  It arrived yesterday, brand new with tape and cardboard still intact, so of course I fired it up immediately and it worked perfectly.

So this morning I got up, assembled my ingredients and I was off to the races. 

I used two heads of iceberg lettuce that I washed, chopped and spun dry in the salad spinner.  They don’t recommend you use baby bibb or spring greens, they’re too tender and don’t last as well,  romaine and iceberg work best.  Then I used the slicing blade of the salad shooter to quickly shred all of the other veggies.

Then I gave it all a quick toss to combine all the ingredients in the mixing bowl, which by the way is the greatest, cheapest thing ever.  This huge stainless bowl came from a local restaurant supply house, cost less than $10 and I use it so much, it’s awesome!

I started using a funnel to fill the jars, quickly realized that it was a pain, it was easier to just position the jar over the salad bowl and scoop the greens with a measuring cup.  Hubby doesn’t like green peppers, so I only added them to some of the jars and I didn’t add soft ingredients like cucumbers, tomatoes, or mushrooms as I’ve read that they don’t hold well.  I also used a regular stainless knife to chop my lettuce, even though I have a plastic lettuce knife, there is “supposedly” no need to use it as the lettuce doesn’t turn brown and I’m not a fan of tearing it because I like a finer texture and it’s hard to achieve when tearing it.

Then I wiped off the tops of the jars to make sure they were dry so that the seal would hold and I was ready to vacuum seal them.  It was really fast, really easy, it only took twenty seconds per jar to seal.  And no, there is nothing running down the front of the FoodSaver, it’s just shadows from the jars ;o)

And how long did this take?  From the time I started assembling my ingredients until I put them in the fridge, thirty-five minutes start to finish and I have enough salad to last me for seven days.  And this was the first try, I’m thinking next time it won’t take as long as today because I’ll know what I’m doing.  One mess per week and enough salad to last for days, works for me…

Red Silicone Whisk, this is a REALLY good thing…

I just bought this silicone whisk at either Marshall’s or T. J. Maxx a few weeks ago, both of our stores had a big display of them.

Oh my, what a difference a flexible whisk makes, it gets into all the nooks and crannies of your bowl, it’s just amazing.

You can find them online, too – HERE IS ONE SITE if you don’t want to trudge through the stores looking for them.  They’re a little more spendy online, I only paid like $5.99 for mine.  But check around, they are all over the place.  Super little gadget!!!

What I’m using for Moisturizer…

In my twenties I was a Merle Norman girl.  I bought all of their products,  and  they looked amazing on my young skin.  Then came Clinique and I jumped on that bandwagon.  For years I used their moisturizer, toner, makeup base, shadow, blush, even their cologne.  All the way through my thirties and forties I was a Clinique girl.  Then came my fifties, and I’m realizing that moisture is moisture, so I started using drugstore moisturizer instead of the pricey department store stuff.  Now I still have brand loyalty to certain products, I’m a huge MAC fan, but that’s a whole other blog.

Anyway, the drugstore stuff worked great for me, I can’t even remember which brands I bought, but they were inexpensive.  Then I turned sixty and discovered the little pots of Aldi’s moisturizer, which was awesome and only cost a few dollars and ranked right up there with department store brands in consumer tests.

And now that I’m almost sixty two, what am I using?  Well, I must confess, I ran out of my Aldi’s brand a few months ago, and I had a bottle of Johnson’s Baby Lotion sitting on my makeup table, because I adore the scent and I like slathering it on at bedtime because it smells so good.  So I put it on my face, and guess what, it worked as well as a makeup primer as any of the other stuff I’ve ever used. It’s gentle, non-irritating, what more do I want.  And it’s $5.00 for a gigantic pump bottle.

So now I’m using baby lotion as a moisturizer.  Do you think I’ve come full circle?  Hey, it works, it’s cheap, and at my age, regardless of what I slather on, it’s not going to turn back time.  Just push down on the pump and you’re good to go.  Nothing to unscrew or squeeze, it’s fast, no mess, and at this stage of my life I appreciate anything that’s easy to use.

I wonder what I’ll be using in my seventies? I have no idea, I may be using Udder Cream or Bag Balm, but if I have enough brain cells left to still blog, I’m sure I’ll be telling you about it.

Hope you’re all having a great Monday!

~ jan

Note:  After I posted this I started thinking, and I imagine a lot of you are saying, well this won’t work for me because I use moisturizers that have built in wrinkle-reducing ingredients.  I’ve had prescriptions for .025 strength Retin A since I was in my 30’s, and been diligent about using it all these years, so I don’t need additional ingredients in a moisturizer.

Random thoughts on a Sunday afternoon

I was going through my blog archives, and it’s really shocking how many years I’ve been doing this, and all the really stupid things I’ve said.  My poor family…

This week I heard from a nice lady named Holly who has been reading me for quite some time now, it was so nice to get her email, because blogging is such a solitary thing, I just type out whats on my mind and hit send, having no idea of who is going to read what I say.

My friend, Diane, told me this past week that she enjoys the blogs about my childhood.  She can relate to those posts, because her early years were similar to mine.  Feedback is good, it’s nice when people let me know their thoughts, heaven knows I give all of you way to many of mine. ;o)

I suppose that my blogs will remain in cyberspace for years to come, and I wonder what Abby will think about her grammie when she’s grown and reads some of these entries.  I seldom filter anything, I just start typing and whatever thought pops in my head ends up on here.  Maybe I should be a bit more selective, but nah, by the time Abby is old enough to read all of this, she will have long figured out that I’m her wackadoo grandmother.

So I’ll just keep on keepin’ on, spinning my wheels, going nowhere.  But perhaps occasionally I will give you a smile, or some good information.   That’s my purpose, that’s what keeps me doing this…