Dukan Diet

I confess I don't like everything about the holidays (The sweets!  The overspending!)  But one thing I do love about this time of year is the way many of us are inspired to do things to help others.  Yes, I know some people donate for tax purposes.  But whatever motivates it, when people give to help those who are less fortunate, it's all good. 

Sadly, one in seven people in America face hunger, and many Americans rely on food banks to have enough food for their families.  And milk is one of the least donated items to food banks; in fact families who receive food from food banks get less than one gallon of milk per year.  

I'm grateful to my friend Heidi at FoodieCrush who told me recently about Santas Milk Drive, a milk donation program sponsored by The Great American Milk Drive to encourage donating milk during the holidays. If you visit the website and donate money for milk between now and December 31, every gallon of milk you finance will be matched by Feeding America.  (I just made a donation; you enter your state to be sure the milk you donate goes to food banks in your area.)  Please help by making a donation to Santa's Milk Drive if you can.

Every month has it's own most-eaten foods, but in March I'm thinking about cabbage and St. Patrick's Day food!

St. Patrick's Day is only a week away, and if you like the idea of cooking corned beef to celebrate on March 17, there's a great collection of Slow Cooker Corned Beef From Food Bloggers at my slow cooker site, including the delicious-looking Slow Cooker Corned Beef with Horseradish-Mustard Sauce (pictured above) from my friend Lydia.

My late father was partly Irish, and towards the end of his life I used to enjoy making an Irish-American dinner every year for St. Patrick's Day.  I say Irish-American, because for the most part the foods Americans eat on St. Patrick's Day aren't really Irish, did you know that?  But my dad certainly didn't care if the food was authentic, and he loved the corned beef dinners I'd make for him every year.

Not all my siblings love corned beef and other Irish-American foods the way my dad did, but this year it just so happens I'm going to have visiting family members in town on March 17, so I'm going to have a St. Patrick's dinner.  Of course I'll make my Corned Beef with Veggies and Horseradish Sauce, something I made every year for dad.
Now here are a few more Irish American Foods I'm thinking about this week . . .