Summer fresh pasta salad with apple cider vinaigrette + is ACV the fountain of youth?

Hey Steemians!

Do If you have a hectic schedule and want to meal prep or have a large group to feed at a pot luck dinner or summer bbq, it can be an overwhelming amount of time spent in the kitchen. Given my food allergies and my allergen being in everything means long hours in the kitchen too at times. With summer right around the corner, I enjoy quick refreshing dishes that take minimal effort. This is a perfect dish to maximize your time... Pasta salad!! Does healthy have to mean no carbs or anything fun? NO, I believe balance and natural ingredients and a chemical free diet is key to good health and leaves a little room to cheat with those unhealthy goodies we all enjoy.

I'm sure many have heard of the health benefits of apple cider vinegar which I will elaborate below the recipe but it can be difficult to incorporate in a diet. Like many of my recipes, you can customize this one into your preference with loads of veggies or just a little bit to make it look good. In my pasta salad, I like to have half pasta and half fresh veggies with a little meat and cheese but feel free to freestyle this one to your liking. For my pasta salad, I chose to go with pizza style and used dry cured pepperoni and mozzarella cheese to make it fun. If that's not your thing, feel free to use other meats like ham, turkey or chicken, once again, add as little or as much as your heart desires. The dressing recipe below will be enough for one 375 g box of uncooked pasta.

HOME MADE ITALIAN DRESSING

• 3/4 cup apple cider vinegar
• 1 & 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 tbs lightly dried basil
• 1 tbs sugar, dried oregano, thyme
• 2 tbs Ground Parmesan
• 1 & 1/2 tbs ground mustard
• 1 tsp onion & garlic powder, celery salt

SALAD

• 1 -375g box of uncooked tri-color fusili
• cherry tomatoes
• spinach
• mushrooms
• red onion (diced) or green onion
• celery
• mozzarella cheese
• additional ground parmesan
• dry cured pepperoni
• red pepper

These ingredients are just a guideline, add, remove or customize to your own taste. If you are doing this for meal prep for the week, it will last longer and be fresher if you store the cooked pasta and the dressing separately , all you have to do daily is cut and mix your veggies etc as you are ready to eat.

INSTRUCTIONS

• Cook the full box of pasta as instructed on the box. Once cooked, strain and run under cold water, dump back into the pot and refrigerate for a few hours until cold.

• Whisk all the dressing ingredients and allow to sit and absorb for about half hour.

• Cut all your additional ingredients to desired size and add to the pasta, Give your dressing a quick stir to freshen it up and mix in to the salad. Salt and pepper to taste and top with the desired amount of parmesan. Easy peasy ready to eat or to take away on your day trip or potluck and bbq.

Apple cider vinegar is filled with healthy goodies. Because of it's fermentation process, it is full of healthy bacteria and enzymes that aid in digestion and maintain good digestive health. With the north-american diet full of herbicides, pesticides and chemicals used in food processing, our healthy gut bacteria diversity has been reduced and needs to be replenished, what better way than doing it naturally. Good bacteria helps control bad bacteria, ACV is know to also destroy the bad actors.

It is suggested to help regulate high blood sugar and reduce cholesterol also helping in wight loss and losing belly fat. Olive oil is also know to help with this. I'm not an expert but I do have my advanced biology and get a brief education on how the body breaks down and use certain food. The body needs a reasonable amount of fat as energy to function and will take what it needs first and discard the lesser quality excess. In other words, if you eat a reasonable amount of vegetable based healthy fats loaded with amino acids, it will help flush the bad unhealthy fats instead of storing them.

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/6-proven-health-benefits-of-apple-cider-vinegar#section3

AVC is believed to be anti fungal and can be used externally as well as internally. It is suggested to help with things like foot fungus or to regulating mild acne prone skin or help balance skin tone and oil production, even help minimize pores. Most of these external claims have inconclusive or very little research so use with care and experiment. Like any other woman, I am always on the quest for eternal youth (I know, I know...is it even possible?) and I try all these weird natural remedies just in case, why would I treat this any different!

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/323721.php

To do a proper experiment, the less variables the better so I continued my regular beloved French skin care regiment and implemented ACV into my routine.

THE EXPERIMENT

Like any day, I continued to use my usual daily face wash and after I made a diluted AVC solution Using 1 part vinegar and 2 parts water (you don't need much). After washing my face, I used the ACV/water solution and rinsed my face in it watching not to get any in my eyes (ouch, that burns) and allowed it to dry. Now I have extremely sensitive skin so I didn't want to leave it on and risk chemical burns (it is strong enough to cause such if used undiluted). Once dried, I washed it thoroughly with warm water until all the residue was washed off.

MY RESULTS

Along with sensitive skin, I also have combination skin meaning oily in the T zone (chin, nose and forehead) and dry everywhere else. Honestly, it is hard to find adequate one size fits all products to care for mixed skin. I do not have acne but I get the odd annoying pimple and on the first day of trying this, I had a big red rager on my forehead, perfect timing I guess. To add to the list of imperfections, I have a few annoying patches of psoriasis caused by my auto-immune disorder that get really itchy and flaky especially in the winter months. After one use, my skin appeared red and had me slightly concerned but after half an hour it was all gone and left a even toned glowing skin like I have never seen before, no more dry patches, no more oily patches and my skin looked perfect and not oily in the T zone, it even appeared to have minimized the appearance of pores. It felt a little tight but nothing a good moisturizer wont fix, it is part of my routine anyway.

The next day, my skin looked even better and my few psoriasis patches were no longer visible or itchy (and it has not come back yet). That big red raging pimple was also reduced to next to nothing and barely visible days ahead of what it normally should (thank goodness!) Age spots & mild freckles and dark circle(raccoon eyes) were less visible. I no longer have combination skin and it's pretty even on all of my face and the once dry skin areas are no longer itchy or dry. The few wrinkles I had were also visibly diminished along with my light laugh lines reduced the the dimples of my youth. WOW! After only one use. For the first time ever, I was pleased with the results of the simple home skin remedy and decided to continue the regiment twice a week in order to not overwhelm my sensitive skin. It has now been a month and my skin continues to be better and better with each use.

THE CONCLUSION

I will continue to use this diluted solution as I see only positive results and no negative impact on my skin after a month of twice weekly usage, it's a good test period. This may not be a good idea for everybody as we all react differently. If you decide to try this, proceed with caution and if you start to see negative effects, stop immediately to avoid skin damage. If you suffer from severe acne, consult your dermatologist before using. Do not use if you have open wounds. The type that works best is the natural ACV with the "mother"(the one with the weird floaties at the bottom). Some are bothered by the smell, believe me, my face smelled like a salad for the rest of the night but I wasn't bothered, all I suggest, don't use before going anywhere and best to use at the end of the day because of the smell, it will be gone by morning.

Disclaimer: This is only personal results and not an accredited study, use at your own risk.