Category: tomato salad

10 Quick Facts About Tomatoes

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Tomatoes are fruits and have been grown in various parts of the world for many years.

The following are 10 quick facts about tomatoes you should know:

1. The most common varieties are red in colour when ripe. This colouration is due to the presence of a compound called Lycopene which has been shown to help in fighting cancerous cells.

2. Tomatoes can be eaten raw or cooked. They can be used in making soups, sauces, fresh tomato juice, tomato paste, or mixed with other vegetables to make salads and sandwiches.

3. Raw tomatoes can be used to make face masks. They help in smoothing the skin and making it glow reducing dullness.

4. Tomatoes are rich in Vitamins A & C, calcium, potassium, magnesium and phosphorous.

5. The leaves of tomato plants are toxic and not edible.

6. Tomatoes have acidic properties which help in treating blackheads and clearing pimples.

7. Tomatoes are heart friendly because they do not contain harmful cholesterol and have low amounts of sodium. This helps reduce the likelihood of cardiovascular diseases.

8. The more a tomato ripens, the more the amount of Vitamin C increases. Those picked from the tomato tree when ripe have higher amounts of the vitamin than those picked while yellow and allowed to ripen slowly.

9. Tomatoes are rich in chromium which aids in regulating blood sugar levels among diabetic patients. It also helps in regulating high blood pressure.

10. Tomatoes help in improving eyesight and strengthening bones.

Vegetable salad

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During the Christmas period, our family came together although most of them turned up on the eve of Christmas due to public transport problems. many of us do not own personal cars and so just like the rest of the Kenyan public, we hard to bear with the hiked prices on public service vehicles. A number opted to travel on the eve and day of Christmas but that wasn’t such a good idea because it was at that time that prices were thrice the usual cost.
On the festive  day, cooking, which is usually a big part of such events started late. One of my cousins we were to cook with traveled that day. We started with the chapattis, which are cooked in almost every household during celebrations, then rice and later the stews.
Instead of preparing the all-too-common Kachumbari (salad consisting of tomatoes, onions and salt) I offered to prepare this salad. I had been forced to look for some of the items some two days earlier because there was a scarcity in the market . I had picked the lettuce from a supermarket only found in the district headquarters town, and due to the hot weather had to make sure it was very well preserved.
These are the few items I used:
–          – Lettuce                                       – Tomatoes                                  – Onions
–          – Salt                                             – Oil                                             – Avocado (tiny pieces)
–          – Green/red Bell pepper                -Grated carrot
I chopped and mixed all of them in a big bowl. The avocado and tomatoes were very fresh because I got them straight from the garden. Oh, I also ate so many mangoes daily since they were available at no cost and I could eat as much as I wanted. 
The older generation more than loved it. Of course most of my cousins knew how to prepare the salad, only that they don’t do it a lot due to what they refer to as ‘a lot of work’