Red, Green, and Gold

I guess that's a creative enough title for a dinner recipe?

Tonight I literally had 10 minutes to grab dinner ingredients from the store.  Ten minutes until I had to be home and caring for the kids because Maurice has to be at work by 5:00, and it was 4:51, and I was stressing.  No time to tap into my hankerings or cravings; I had to come up with a healthy idea, pay for it, and be home within ten minutes.

So I headed for the produce aisle with some kind of salad on my mind.  I really wasn't in the mood for salad; I wanted something warm and hearty.  That's when it struck me: baked pears topped with blue cheese is one of my favorite devour-able items, ever.  Once the wheels were turning, here is what I came up with:

Baked yams with honey, cinnamon, and brown sugar, tossed greens with homemade apricot/raspberry dressing, and baked apples and pears topped with blue cheese crumbles.  Recipes are as follows:

Baked Yams
6 medium-sized yams
honey
cinnamon
brown sugar

Bake yams in 400* oven for an hour to an hour, ten minutes.  Cut open and pour on about a tsp of honey (I used local honey).  Sprinkle with cinnamon and brown sugar.  Simple!

Berry/Apricot Dressing
1 cup red wine, reduced
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 lb. raspberries
1/2 lb. blackberries
4 apricots, peeled and quartered
Pepper to taste

Blend all ingredients in a blender or juicer until consistency is thin enough to drizzle. (I hate the word "drizzle".)  Pour over mix of spinach and romaine lettuce, toss.  You can also top this salad with toasted walnuts or almonds.  I used almonds tonight only because I burned the walnuts when I tried to toast them.  :-/

Baked apples/pears
4 apples, thick sliced
4 pears, thick sliced
Bleu cheese crumbles

Bake in 400* oven for half an hour or until tender but not mushy.  Remove and top with bleu cheese crumbles.