Kraft Fruit & Veg Salad Dressings - Garlic Parmesan with Roasted Cauliflower and Fire Roasted Tomato with Basil

My mom recently went on a shopping spree and came back with two of these interesting dressings: Garlic Parmesan with Roasted Cauliflower and Fire Roasted Tomato with Basil.

There are also two other flavours that I will review once I try them:  Berry Balsamic and Roasted Yellow Pepper with Garlic and Lime

These dressings contain no artificial flavors and colors and are each between 25-30 calories per serving.  They are low fat and low salt.  The Kraft Fruit & Veg dressings are also made with real fruits & vegetables.

Now, I'm a HUGE salad fan so I take any chance I have to try new dressings.

The  Garlic Parmesan with Roasted Cauliflower was VERY garlicky. I love garlic so this didn't bother me (in fact I LOVED it!), but if you're not a big garlic fan then you might not like this dressing. I thought that the Parmesan flavour balanced really well with the garlic. 

You couldn't really taste the cauliflower, but it did make this dressing very, very thick straight out of the bottle. For me, the texture took some time to get used to since it's almost more of a paste than a dressing, but once I did this dressing was delicious! The thickness of this dressing made it really good for dipping veggies and the garlic and Parmesan make it an excellent companion to mashed potatoes (which consequently, it comes with a mashed potato recipe on the side of the bottle!).

The Fire Roasted Tomato with Basil is great with salads. It does have a tangier flavour and is a bit sharper than other tomato and basil dressings that I've had, but overall it is enjoyable. I like that it has more of a vinegar base as opposed to the others that I've had that were predominantly oil based. This dressing is also a bit spicy, which was a surprise since a lot of the other similar dressings have been almost bordering on bland. This is a refreshing dressing that would be perfect for a summer barbecue (if summer ever makes an appearance!).

Overall, I would purchase these two dressings again. Since these two dressings were so good, I can't wait to try the other two flavours!

Sally Hansen Salon Effects

The other day I just couldn't get may nail polish to dry so I decided to stop by my local drug store and pick up the Sally Hansen Salon Effects Real Nail Polish Strips in Laced Up (shown above). At my local Shoppers Drug Mart, these bad boys will set you back about $10.99 (Canadian) plus tax, although when they're on sale you can probably save a dollar.

The product is described as follows:

Sally knows nails are the best accessory. Now, Sally makes it easy to get a salon effect any time, any place. It wears like nail polish because it IS nail polish. No dry time, so you’re ready to go.

The kit comes with 16 nail strips (varying sizes), a small file, a buffer, a cuticle pusher, and instructions.

The instructions are pretty simple and have 2 steps (Prep and Application).

To prep your nails it is recommended that you start with clean, dry nails. Use the wooden stick provided to push back cuticles, shape free edge of nail with the hot pink side of the file, smooth the surface of the nail with the white side of the file, and lastly use a final swipe of nail polish remover to make sure nails are clean.

The application instructions are:

1. Select - Choose the best strip for each nail
2. Peel - Remove the clear protective plastic cover and peel the nail polish strip from the backing paper
3. Break - choose the side of the strip that best fits the shape of your cuticle. Break the silver tab away from the strip
4. Apply - Place the strip against the cuticle line. (Press the strip to your nail. Gently stretch the strip over the nail. Firmly smooth over entire nail)
5. Shape - Smooth excess over nail edges, forming a crease around the edge of the nail. Gently file away excess from nail edge.
6. Repeat for remaining nails

Application of these strips was pretty easy. They went on fairly painlessly. The hardest part that I found was finding the individual strips that fit each nail. Some strips were way too big (too big = harder to trim down with the wooden stick), while others didn't cover my whole nail and left a little sliver on the side or near the cuticle uncovered (which I easily remedied with some black nail polish as filler - the Laced Up pattern is pretty forgiving to touch ups). Now, I'm a stickler and hate missing a spot on my nail even with regular nail polish so if you're not so OCD about your nails then it's really not a deal breaker and you don't really need to do touch ups.

Although the instructions mention stretching these strips to fit your nail, I found that you have to be very careful about stretching these strips and wouldn't recommend it unless you absolutely have to. It is very, very easy to stretch them too much (even pulling lightly) and overstretching will leave you with an ugly clear spot in the pattern.   

The one thing that I do love about these strips is that they are already dry so I don't have to wait and pray that they dry and do not smudge. They also come in a range of pretty cool designs and if you don't want to spend the time or money to visit a nail salon for designed nails then these strips are pretty easy to use. 

These strips do come in solid colours too, but personally I would just stick with the patterned ones since it would be cheaper just to buy a bottle of polish if you wanted a solid colour.

The only real downside that I find with these strips is that they are pretty expensive for a one shot deal and on my nails they only last about a week.

I would buy these strips again, but not on a continual basis because of the price. These are going to be my once in a while treat to myself.