Fruit and Spinach Salad

Some of you may notice the change in the title of my blog and I’d like to explain.

When I first began blogging back in the summer of ’09, I originally planned to do a health and fitness blog. The name for that blog was simply “Living Well”. I then made the move to WordPress and decided to broaden the definition of my blog. This quickly changed after I realized that I really love to blog about living a healthier lifestyle. I enjoy posting recipes that I think are delicious and healthy and I like recommending workouts for those looking for a healthier way of living. These are all reasons why I decided to go back to my original blog name.I’d also like to encourage anyone who has healthy recipes of their own that would like to share them with me.

With that being said, my dear friend Brianna Swisher recently turned me on to a salad that is by far the best I’ve ever had. She and I had a little ritual dinner and a movie night a week or so ago and we decided to have a fruit and spinach salad. We headed  to the store, gathered the ingredients, and returned home to make a sensational meal. I’d like to share the recipe, if you could really even call it that, but with a twist.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 1/2 cups of mandarin oranges
• 10-15 medium-sized strawberries, sliced
• 1 bag of baby spinach leaves
• 1/2 cup of almonds, toasted
• 1 1/2 cups of blueberries
• raspberry vinaigrette dressing

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat the oven to 400-450 degrees.
2. Rinse all ingredients, except almonds. Layer spinach and fruit in a large serving bowl.
3. Place almonds, chopped or whole, on to a baking sheet and place in oven for 5-7 minutes, or until slightly browned.
4. Allow almonds to cool. Add dressing to salad and top with cooled almonds.
5. Serve and enjoy!

When Brianna and I originally did this salad, we added goat cheese and green peppers, which gave it a great flavor. We also used dry rice noodles for the topper, which gave a great crunch. If you don’t like any of these fruits, substitute any of your favorites and feel free to use any kind of dressing. Just keep in mind that vinaigrettes are usually the lowest in fat and calorie, so steer clear of any “creamy” dressings. These fatty dressings will also mask the flavor of the fruits. Eat this salad and I swear you’ll almost forget about the snowstorm heading our way!