Love me up with YOUR VOTES!!

Did you know that in addition to wowing you here with my personal exploits, I also run a salt free/low sodium recipe site coincidentally called The Daily Dish??  You didn’t?!  Well – SURPRISE!  This enchanting personal blog you’re reading is actually an outgrowth of that OTHER Daily Dish, a project I’ve been undertaking Oooh.. the past four years. For FREE. Mm-hmm.  Here’s my lastest recipe.

Somehow my salt free recipe site (That OTHER Daily Dish) manages to be the most well hidden treasure of the culinary world.  And frankly, I’m tired of it.  WELL. No more!  Last month I got an email from my friend Tracy, encouraging me to enter a grant contest being held by Mom Central Consulting.

Snazzy logo, huh?!  Ayuh.  Their website explains the premise behind the program:

The Mom Blogosphere is brimming with talented, smart, passionate and ambitious women. We feel so grateful and want to do our part in helping take Moms’ personal brands to the next level …whether graphic or technical help, a site redesign or self-publishing a book… we want to pitch in to provide the support.

SHA-ZAM!!!!!!  Okay, last time I checked I was a blogger AND A MOM.  Yehaw!  In a nutshell, the grant contest will award five bloggers $2000 each.  This money can be used to improve and promote each of the winning websites. In the case of The Daily Dish, I would FINALLY be able to upgrade the site, giving it the royal “spa treatment” it so deserves, as well as self-publishing a cookbook of (you guessed it) 365 original recipes.  A salt free Daily Dish! from The Daily Dish! 🙂

Yesterday The Daily Dish cleared the first of three hurdles towards winning a grant.  My application was accepted! The next hurdle? Open voting by the public.  THIS IS WHERE YOU ALL COME IN BIG TIME.  Open voting begins today, March 1st, and runs through April 15th. One vote per person per day, through the next month and a half.  That’s a lot of votes.  But I for one know you’re all up to the challenge.  To (poorly) paraphrase Walt Whitman:

YOU ARE LARGE.  YOU CONTAIN MULTITUDES. and you know people.

Please, if you value my website, if you love this blog or JUST WANT TO BE NICE! take a moment to click the link below. Your vote today, tomorrow, and everyday through April 15th will make me SO VERY HAPPY I CAN BARELY CONTAIN MYSELF JUST THINKING ABOUT IT!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!

OPEN VOTING BEGINS TODAY! and RUNS THROUGH APRIL 15TH
(one vote per person per day)

CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR THE DAILY DISH!

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!! SERIOUSLY!! I MEAN IT!!!!!

Fore River Sanctuary Samosas with Mango Dipping Sauce

I don’t typically cross-post across my two blogs, preferring to compartmentalize my life (hah) but I’ve been so busy recreating this recipe I didn’t get round to writing anything else.  So indulge me.

Portland Trails is holding a “Trail Gourmet” Recipe Contest and I won’t beat around the bush.  I’d like to win.  I thought long & hard about which of my recipes to enter, and while walking the Fore River Sanctuary this week it came to me.  SAMOSAS.  I’d created a fantastic low sodium recipe for samosas four years ago, shortly after launching The Daily Dish.  While a little time intensive to make, these samosas freeze beautifully and would showcase one of Maine’s premier agricultural crops: Potatoes!  Samosas are perfect hiking fare.  Small and portable, yet hearty and filling.  They’re a healthy meal in an incredible, edible wrapper.  And they’re DELICIOUS – especially with the tangy subtle sweetness of the mango dipping sauce, which is easily toted in any lightweight lidded container. Double dipping a MUST!  So if you’re craving something extraordinary the next time you head out on the trail, look no further than Fore River Sanctuary Samosas with Mango Dipping Sauce.  Gourmet vegetarian snacks that pack a healthy, meal-like punch – NO SILVERWARE NECESSARY!

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Catching up.

Many, MANY thanks for all the well wishes.  I am finally feeling normal again, thank GOD.  This episode was particularly bad.  Normally the dizziness lasts about a week, this time it was more like 10-11 days.  Being me (read DAMN STUBBORN) I basically try to do everything I normally would.  Which – being home most of the time – is usually o-kay.  I can rest between laundry, kids, pets, chores, etc.  When the spins get overwhelming, I lay down.  But Thanksgiving on spin cycle…?  What a trip.  I spent the day in the kitchen, of course.  WELL – It was that or… what?  Try finding a low sodium holiday meal anywhere on a NORMAL day, let alone one when everything is closed.  SO I PERSEVERED.  Being (as I mentioned) stubborn as hell – as well as halfway insane, it didn’t much matter how sh*tty I felt.  I was going to conquer Thanksgiving or die trying.  The results were divine.  I tried several new recipes this year, including a low sodium cornbread stuffing, baked squash & apples, and whipped sweet potatoes.  Which, if I get my act together, I’ll post on my other DAILY DISH.  Stop laughing.

SO. Before the pity fest, I’d been discussing our latest home improvement project.  Re-tiling the upstairs bath.   Here’s the before shot.

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