Eat the Rainbow!

 While salads can be awesome, variety is the spice of life. Eating vegetables is so important for good health. They're packed with vitamins and minerals, not to mention fiber. And of course eating a wide variety of different vegetables gives you more flavour and helps prevent boredom.

These rolls are so versatile- you can swap out veggies for the ones you like, change the protein, change the sauce you use... I have some ideas and I think this base idea will be fun to play with!

Rice Paper Spring Rolls:

10 rice paper wraps
30 shrimp, cooked, peeled, and deveined

2 green onions, chopped

1/2 sweet bell pepper, diced (go for red or yellow for colour contrast!)

1/2 red onion, diced

3/4 cup Boston lettuce, chopped

1/2 cup red cabbage, shredded

1/2 cup matchstick carrots

2 tbsp fresh basil, finely shredded

1 tbsp hoisin sauce

3 tbsp rice wine vinegar

2 tsp minced ginger

Mix together the hoisin sauce, rice wine vinegar, and minced ginger in a small sauce bowl, and refrigerate until ready to use.

Make sure you have a clean cutting board or plate to build your wraps on! Fill a large bowl with warm water, and before you build each wrap, dip the dry rice paper wrap into the water entirely to moisten it- it takes about five seconds for it to start to soften but it will be finished by the time you're done adding toppings. Lay the wrap on your work station. Slightly to the right of middle, make a vertical line of three shrimp down the middle of the wrap. Add your basil, and a little bit of each of your toppings- fill it out with the lettuce last. Fold up the bottom of the wrap until it reaches the bottom of the toppings. Then take the right side of the wrap and pull it entirely over the toppings and tuck it in. Finish rolling up the wrap tightly, and fold the top part in so it's sealed. This will take some practice but by the time you're done rolling ten, I'm sure you'll be much improved!

Take out your sauce for dipping, and enjoy! These are so versatile- you can have them as a snack, or have a few more and they become a meal! You can easily make them vegan and of course depending on the sauce you use, they can be gluten free as well.

One spring roll has 55 calories, 0.5g fat, 8g carbs, and 4g of protein- not to mention how filling you'll find them with all the fresh veggies!

I've also tried them with sweet chili Thai sauce and rice wine vinegar and that's also good- 1 tbsp sweet chili sauce to 3 tbsp vinegar mixed well. Sweet chili sauce has about the same caloric value as hoisin sauce so it shouldn't change the nutritional information much.

Enjoy!