"Tannenbaum" (Rosemary-lime) Dressing/Sauce

Apparently we can't have a Christmas tree of any kind (even plastic), as Dave's feelings of pines is tainted from his roommate experience of a bug-infested tree a few years ago. They smell so nice though, see how happy it made us girls!

I don't know about you but I could use more time this month (still two more people to shop for and haven't gotten the cards written yet). So during the busy-holiday (and other crunch times) I think the most useful recipes are sauces, because you can just try them on anything after their original recipe.  Like this dressing recipe from Food.com I tried at my folk's place after I saw they had a giant bag of limes from Costco with the green beans as originally meant.

Side-tangent, but speaking of Costco, on trip last week, at the Mission Valley location, I noticed they started carrying Rudi's gluten free bread in the fridge/freezer section. I don't think it is dairy free, and like Udi's, they use sunflower/safflower oil which won't work when I start the detox. But gf bread that you can eat without toasting is like a Christmas miracle. Also in the fridge section I spied some gluten-free, dairy free pre-made cookie dough! (it did have soy).

 A week after coming back from my visit with mom and pop, my co-worker had filled the basket near her cube with limes.  Recipe re-cycle time! Instead of basil, I ended up using about 1/4 cup of the rinsed leaves from fresh Christmas-tree like rosemary (did you know you can take an unused sprig and stick it in a pot of dirt to grow your own herb? Thank you old roomie, Jeff.) I guess that is a close as I can get to having a tree this year.

 

2 tablespoons lime juice  (about 1-2 limes, roll them on counter before cutting for easier juicing)
2 tablespoons honey
1 1/2 teaspoons vegetable oil
3 garlic cloves, crushed 
1/4 cup (or to taste) of fresh rosemary leaves
1 dash salt and pepper

Put all ingredients in a blender. Spoon over anything that needs some zip! See my examples of use below.

• Try it as a taco sauce. Worked great on a white fish.
• Make a bean (I tested chickpea) and roasted celery salad.
• Tossed with chickpeas, quinoa and steamed escarole (looks like lettuce but bitter when raw, pictured above)
• Works fine as a salad dressing too! Complemented the smoked salmon, dried cranberries, beans and toasted squash seeds (yes, sometimes I save my winter squash seeds for consuming)

 Have you ever tried fruit cake and is it as bad as it seems to be?