Forest Feast Fashion: Floral Dress + Floral Rolls

I’ve got another Forest Feast Fashion pairing for you! Wouldn’t you love to nosh on some Floral Summer Rolls while wearing this lovely floral dress by Sonnet James? I would (ha!)

These rolls are one of my favorite things to eat. (So much in fact that my family has been known to make them for me on my birthday!) They are in my entertaining cookbook, The Forest Feast Gatherings. I can usually find the rice paper wraps at my local grocery store in the “international” aisle. As for edible flowers, I like to grow nasturtium seeds (they are really easy), but you can also find edible flowers at the farmers market and even at the grocery store. (I asked my local grocery store produce department to order them and they arrived next day!) If you can’t find any, you can always decorate the rolls inside with basil leaves, mint leaves, rings of red onion, carrot strips, red bell pepper slices or chopped purple cabbage.

TO MAKE THE ROLLS:

More instructions are on the image below but simply soak the rice paper rounds in water for a minute, lay out on a cutting board, then fill with thinly sliced salad ingredients in the middle of the round. Musts for me are lettuce (crunch!), avocado, red onion and fresh mint. But you can add anything that’s cut up small enough. Fold the ends in and roll up like a burrito!

I recently spent a weekend on a retreat with Whitney, the founder of the dress company Sonnet James. In honor of Mother's Day, I thought I'd share her inspiring story. She started her company on her own as a newly single mother with 2 very young boys.  After they'd go to bed at night, she read business books and taught herself to make patterns and sew. Later, she went door-to-door at factories in San Francisco until she found a place that could ethically produce the dresses for her. Her goal was to make play dresses for moms, and that's just what she does! She started with some Kickstarter money and then a blog post by Design Mom ignited initial orders, but after a recent appearance on Shark Tank, she now works with the investor Sara Blakely of Spanx (another super-inspiring biz-mom!) and her business is thriving. Can't wait to see what's next, Whitney...and I love my new dress, thank you for sending it to me.

Read more about Whitney here.

*Amazon Affiliate links are used in this post and if you purchase via these links, The Forest Feast will earn a small profit.

Yellow Dress + Yellow Salad!

It’s another edition of #forestfeastfashion where I pair one of my favorite dresses of the moment with a Forest Feast dish!

I just got this yellow floral dress (that’s made in America!) to wear to Alt Summit next week and thought it would be perfect paired with the Yellow Salad from my first cookbook.

It’s a long stretchy faux-wrap, and super comfortable, with big florals (like I love!)

It’s a long stretchy faux-wrap, and super comfortable, with big florals (like I love!)

YELLOW SALAD (from The Forest Feast cookbook)

Toss 1 yellow bell pepper (cubed), 1 can garbanzo beans, 1 c yellow cherry tomatoes (halved), 1 small raw golden beet (thinly sliced or diced), 1 sliced (lemon) cucumber, 1/2 c golden raisins, 1 T lemon zest, and raw kernels from 1 ear corn (about 1/2 c). Dress with a little olive oil , salt and a squeeze of lemon, or your favorite vinaigrette.

See some more dress/dish pairings here!

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Fashion Feast: Floral Summer Dresses + Salads

I'm starting a new series on this blog called FASHION FEAST! I love the idea of pairing seasonal clothing or accessories with "matching" seasonal dishes, so here goes! I saw these  food and fashion mash-ups on Bon Appetit years ago and have always wanted to do something similar.

If I could spend every day of summer in a floral dress, I probably would! So to kick things off, here's my list of 10 (affordable!) Summer Floral Dresses and Summer Salads to eat while wearing them:

>> Click on each dress pic to shop, and each salad pic for the recipe <<

Cheers to sun dresses and salads for the warm days ahead!