Strawberry and Goat's Cheese Spinach Salad

This salad is our go-to meal for eating out at a friend's house.  When someone invites us over to dinner, we offer to make them something at their place.  This salad works as a starter or main (after all, when we have it, it's our whole dinner!) and with a few tweaks, it is quite palatable to non-keto people as well.  'The acceptable face of keto' we call it.  Also, it is easy to put together in an unfamiliar kitchen with ingredients that are pretty easy to find.

Ingredients:

40 g baby spinach

25 g avocado

30 g strawberries

100 g Eroski goat's cheese

28 g olive oil

7 g red wine vinegar

2 drops stevia

Note on goat's cheese:  Make sure your goat's cheese is <0.1g per 100.  Besides Eroski's home brand, Capricorn goat's cheese (UK) is good (although you can't find the values on the outside of the package, trust me), and Trader Joe's (US) also carried some.

Cut the avocado, strawberries, and goat's cheese into thin slices and toss over your bed of baby spinach.

For the dressing, combine the olive oil, vinegar, and stevia and pour over your salad.  Adjust the olive oil as needed if you use a cheese with different values.

fat:  63.1 g, protein:  22.7 g, carb:  3 g

ratio:  2.5:1

Variations:

Toasted pecans are another lovely addition to this salad, and allow you to cut out a bit more olive oil or cheese.  Make sure you adjust down your carbs elsewhere, such as by going down to 35 g of spinach.

Blue cheese also works well on this salad if you can't find an appropriate goat's cheese (like in south Texas).  It's too strong for my tastes, but Tristan likes it even better!  Alternatively, we've even used brie on this salad in a pinch, which is much milder.

Bacon!  I tried it on a strawberry salad in Austin and became a believer, so if you need a bit more protein in your diet, sprinkle some on.  Like the pecans, most bacon has carbs, so adjust your spinach (or other carb) down a bit to compensate.

Coconut Fruit Pops

Tristan is meant to have a snack or dessert every day, so it's good to have something easy around.  Frozen treats are also good since its getting quite hot these days!  Pictured here are two flavors of coconut fruit pops, lime and raspberry.  I use frozen raspberries, again for convenience, and the nutritional values are based on those printed on my frozen raspberry bag from Carrefour.


Ingredients:

Coconut Lime Pops

60 g coconut cream (blue dragon)

18 g lime juice

2 g coconut oil

4 drops liquid stevia

Raspberry Coconut Pops

60 g coconut cream (blue dragon)

24 g frozen raspberries

3 drops liquid stevia

In the case of the lime pops, the ingredients only need to be stirred together and poured in popsicle containers which can hold at least 80 mL of liquid.  Be warned, these pops are very lime-y so decrease the lime juice if you don't enjoy sour sweets.

fat:  13.5 g, protein:  2.1 g, carbs:  2.5 g

ratio:  2.9:1

For the raspberry pops, combine ingredients in a blender and pour.  It's better to use slightly bigger pops if you can find them.  The consistency is quite like a very thick smoothie or milkshake, so another alternative way of serving would be as a frozen drink.

fat:  11.8 g, protein:  2.3 g, carbs:  2.5 g

ratio: 2.5:1

Variations:  I've also made a strawberry version, and I'm sure lemon or blackberry would work too (or combinations?) depending on what fruits you like!