{"id":27272,"date":"2015-08-18T00:30:36","date_gmt":"2015-08-18T04:30:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/?p=27272"},"modified":"2015-08-18T00:47:49","modified_gmt":"2015-08-18T04:47:49","slug":"broccoli-salad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/2015\/08\/18\/broccoli-salad\/","title":{"rendered":"Broccoli Salad"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Summertime get-togethers&#8230;how many have you gone to or hosted this summer? \u00a0This past weekend we celebrated the 80th birthday of my dad, Jack McElroy&#8212;{4 great-grandchildren, 10 grandchildren, 4 daughters, 3 sons-in-law, our stepmom, and a few others who love him}. \u00a0Our family loves to pitch in and all contribute to the meal. \u00a0But this <strong>Broccoli-Craisin Salad <\/strong>always seems to be requested.<\/p>\n<p>Recently, I have tweaked the recipe to include (or NOT include) about half of the mayonnaise I originally have made this with and I &lt;shhhh! not everyone knows!&gt; substituted plain Greek yogurt. \u00a0It worked amazingly well&#8230;and lowered the calories\/fat grams by approximately 650 calories (yes, you read that correctly) and 80 grams of fat. \u00a0And added a significant hit (about 10-11 grams) of healthy protein. \u00a0And, honestly, you could even further reduce the mayo\/increase the yogurt because of all the flavor variations in this salad.<\/p>\n<p>This is a beautiful raw salad, a very <em>healthy but oh-so-yummy<\/em> addition to the array of delicious salads on the picnic\u00a0table.\u00a0 It has a slightly smoky (from the bacon), slightly sweet (from the Craisins and honey), slightly tart (from the vinegar), very mellow taste.\u00a0 I have had MANY supposed broccoli haters be prompted to try just one tiny taste\u2026only to find they enjoy it and come back for more!\u00a0 We enjoy this salad all year long!\u00a0 Hoping that your family enjoys it, too!<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\">Broccoli Salad<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/2012\/11\/19\/4178\/2012-08-17-18-58-38\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-4181\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-4181\" title=\"2012-08-17 18.58.38\" src=\"http:\/\/69.89.31.171\/~girlfrk8\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/2012-08-17-18-58-38.jpg?w=300\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/2012-08-17-18-58-38.jpg 960w, https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/2012-08-17-18-58-38-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">ingredients<\/span>:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>2 heads broccoli crowns, cut into tiny florets<br \/>\n1\/2 pkg Craisins (dried cranberries)<br \/>\n6 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled, optional<br \/>\n1\/2 red onion, very thinly sliced<br \/>\n1\/2 cup mayonnaise<br \/>\n1\/2\u00a0 cup plain Greek yogurt<br \/>\n3-4 tablespoons honey, warmed<br \/>\n3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar<br \/>\n1 cup roasted\/salted sunflower seeds<br \/>\nfreshly ground pepper<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">directions<\/span>:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>in a small bowl, stir together mayonnaise,\u00a0Greek yogurt, honey, and vinegar; set aside<\/li>\n<li>in a large bowl, combine first 4 ingredients. take liquid mixture and pour over broccoli mixture, tossing gently &lt;go ahead! \u00a0use your hands!&gt; to thoroughly coat and massage that \u00a0broccoli<\/li>\n<li>pour the dressed mixture into a large zip-top bag to go into the fridge. \u00a0every once in a while, give the bag a flip-over and a couple of squeezes to spread the yumminess all around<\/li>\n<li>when ready to go onto the table, pour the salad out into a serving bowl and top with sunflower seeds and a generous amount\u00a0of freshly ground pepper.<\/li>\n<li>easy-peasy!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>notes<\/strong><\/span>:<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; \u00a0definitely prepare this at least 4 hours beforehand&#8230;up to 24 hours or so<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; \u00a0 the biggest hint I can offer to you for this salad is to cut the broccoli florets as small as you possibly can. \u00a0consider this a &#8216;labor of love&#8217; and, oh, so worth it! \u00a0this will make it \u00a0MUCH more palatable to have little florets in your mouth as you munch on this salad rather than a big chunk of broccoli! \u00a0and the chopping can be done ahead of time, even a day or so, and simply stored in the fridge. \u00a0honestly, i have been known to sit in front of the television while doing it! \u00a0\ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\">\u2665 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u2665 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u2665 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u2665 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u2665<\/span><\/p>\n<p>God loves you!\u00a0\u00a0<span style=\"color: #008000;\">\u2665<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0(Please don\u2019t ever forget that!)<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #008000;\">\u2665\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>coleen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Summertime get-togethers&#8230;how many have you gone to or hosted this summer? \u00a0This past weekend we celebrated the 80th birthday of my dad, Jack McElroy&#8212;{4 great-grandchildren, 10 grandchildren, 4 daughters, 3 sons-in-law, our stepmom, and a few others who love him}. \u00a0Our family loves to pitch in and all contribute to the meal. \u00a0But this Broccoli-Craisin [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":4181,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[15],"tags":[3038,9288,235,1287,425,5322,483,9289],"class_list":["post-27272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-at-home-with-gch","tag-at-home-w-gch","tag-broccoli-craisin-salad","tag-coleen-hayden","tag-gch","tag-girlfriends-coffee-hour","tag-greek-yogurt","tag-healthy-but-oh-so-yummy","tag-reduced-fat-calories","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/2012-08-17-18-58-38.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p39pHp-75S","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27272"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27280,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27272\/revisions\/27280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/girlfriendscoffeehour.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}