My New Favourite Dip

In all our married years I don't recall ever buying dip from the store.  Since TR can't do most store dairy products it's just one of those things that stays at the store.  But it hasn't ever really been wanted that much anyway.  After all there are salad dressings (like creamy cucumber) that you can use to dip vegetables, and flavoured chips don't really need dip.  Since we've changed our diet we very very very rarely will eat flavoured chips.  We stick to the regular non-msg chips.  Actually it's more than just msg that we're staying away from in flavoured chips - they also come with a whole schwackload of other nasty additives.  So we decided that we'd just stick to the regular if we were going to have chips.  After a while of just regular though it's easy to begin missing other flavours that we're used to. 
A few weeks ago I started making some dip with some Epicure spices for my kids.  They love dipping their vegetables in dip and since we don't even do store salad dressing anymore I decided that I'd just have to make some for them.  I really love the combination of mayonnaise, yogurt and spices.  For veggies I've been using the Italian Dressing.  The one thing I've learned though is I can't just mix some and serve it - it needs time to sit, preferably several hours. 
When I was a child I used to like the "dill" dip from the store the most, so the other day I decided to give it a try.  This time I just did mostly yogurt with some mayo (next time I'm trying all yogurt so it'll be even healthier) and some frozen dill blended together.  TR was pretty skeptical because of the yogurt (which he doesn't like) but he loved the dip.  It didn't taste at all like yogurt.  In fact it tasted very much like the store stuff I remember.  Creamy dill. Yum!
* On a sidenote the yogurt I used was partially drained so it was thicker. I just use a tea towel held over a bowl with an elastic hairband and allow the yogurt to drip until it's thick. Usually several hours. And our yogurt is homemade so he can eat it :)

Now that I've discovered this I can't wait to try other flavours!  Like cheddar (with Epicure's mac and cheese), garlic and green onion, chili, bbq (Epicure's bbq spice), the possibilities are endless!! 

Trying something new

Lately I've been borrowing books from the library on "Raw foods".  It is amazing to me that some people actually eat only raw foods -but it is fascinating at the same time.  I'm pretty sure I could only ever do it for a very short time for several reasons - one of the biggest being that I can't raise my own raw food diet in my garden.  They eat a lot of nuts and seeds which I can't grow, get locally or cheaply.  (if I were to eat nuts on a regular basis they would have to be raw nuts that I could soak.  If you google it there is a lot of information on why you  need to soak nuts and seeds.) I also can't get organic fruits and veggies year round.  Anyway, that really is neither here nor there.  The point is I like the idea of eating more raw foods in our diet and the "raw food" people have some really great ideas for food besides just veggie sticks and salad. 

I've also just ordered a bunch of recipe books on "gluten free" recipes.  As soon as I can get the appropriate foods in our house we will be going gluten free for a while.  Chloe has had digestive problems for a long time.  Really weak bladder muscles that are made worse by constipation.  I recently read a blog where the child had these same symptoms and was found to be sensitive to wheat and eggs.  I've wondered for a while if Chloe might not have a hard time digesting wheat but was told that it would give her diarrhea and not constipation.  So anyway, going gluten free might not be easy but it is certainly not going to hurt us so I thought we'd give it a try.  Wouldn't it be easier if we just took her in and got tested first you ask? 

Trust me.  It's easier to change our diet than to get her tested :)