Pretty Little Apron

sour cream or plain greek yogurt

Ultimate Oven Fries with Sour Cream and Onion Dip

by

ovenfries There are a few secrets to the best oven fries. First, use butter! I only used two tablespoons for a whole batch of fries so a little goes a long way. Second, boil potatoes first, then bake. This will give you a really soft center and crunchy outside. Third, SEASON correctly. Potatoes don’t taste like anything so you need to season them nicely if you want them to turn out good. I do use a secret ingredient as well, and it is Bragg’s Sprinkle. It contains 23 seasonings and spices and it can turn anything into a delicious masterpiece in seconds! Here is the link to the seasoning. These fries would also make an awesome side a party topped with cheese and served with the dip in the middle of a tray!

If you don’t have the seasoning you can mix something similar up using a combination of equal parts rosemary, onion salt, garlic powder, thyme, basil, and parsley. Obviously those are only a few of the spices included in the seasoning but I feel those are the major flavors.


Toddler Lunch: Day 11 (and why Hidden Valley would prefer their ingredients stay hidden!)

by

toddler11 For lunch today my toddler had mostly leftovers from last night’s dinner. I made my 5 minute flounder recipe last night because my oldest son had a baseball game and it was one of those rush around evenings. I love that my kids are involved with sports but it can put a damper on eating a healthy meal together as a family. I knew I could quickly make the fish and throw in an extra piece for lunch today. When you are continually cooking healthy and unprocessed dinners, it can make other meals easier! I also served oven fries (from last night as well), carrots with homemade sour cream and onion dip, and a trail mix of coconut/chocolate popcorn (recipe coming soon!), almonds, and raisins.

I think the most important part of this meal is the dip. I use this in place of ranch dressing for the kids to dip veggies into. It is a better alternative to bottled ranch dressings because the truth it, most of the ingredients in bottled ranch are not ingredients anyone has sitting in their pantry. Here are the ingredients in Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing:


Soybean Oil, Water, Egg Yolk, Sugar, Salt, Cultured Nonfat Buttermilk, Natural Flavors (S0Y), Spices, Less Than 1% Of: Dried Garlic, Dried Onion, Vinegar, Phosphoric Acid, Xanthan Gum, Modified Food Starch, Monosodium Glutamate, Artificial Flavors, Disodium Phosphate, Sorbic Acid And Calcium Disodium EDTA As Preservatives, Disodium Inosinate And Disodium Guanylate.

If you have never looked at this ingredient list before it is a real eye opener at how much crap they can shove into one bottle. Here are the red flags:

  • First ingredient highly processed and refined soybean oil. Unhealthy, cheap, genetically modified.
  • Monosodium Glutamate: MSG, the chemical that excites your brain cells so much that your  brain tells you that you want more.
  • Artificial flavors: Unknown chemicals.
  • Calcium Disodium EDTA:  Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid are we in chemistry class now? Yeah, didn’t think so. Anything abbreviated on an ingredient list means you should be questioning why you are eating it.

The rest of the ingredients are flavor enhancers and thickeners because well, soybean oil doesn’t taste like anything and isn’t dairy-like. Essentially this is another example of using soybean oil as a main ingredient and then adding a ton of extra stuff to make it seem like something else. I guess Hidden Valley took a page out of the Campbell’s soup book!