All opinions are my own. This post may contain affiliate links. Read full Disclosure Policy.
The holiday season is almost here! I love the changing colors and the way the warm days turn to crisp evenings with vibrant sunsets. I love that Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year celebrations bring us closer to our family and friend as we share meals and make memories together. Our extended family also celebrates five birthdays and an anniversary between November and January, so we spend a lot of time with each other during this season.
Jewel-Osco recently invited its ambassador bloggers to the company’s headquarters and test kitchen for a “Welcome to the Holidays” cooking and decorating event. We spent a lot of time in the kitchen during this trip, cooking everything from prime rib to turkey to lamb. Throughout the event, we made all of the courses of a holiday meal: appetizers, salads, side dishes, and desserts. We even got to spend time creating our own flower arrangements to decorate our holiday tables!
We also learned lots of great tips for holiday entertaining with all sorts of things that can be found at your local Jewel-Osco. It really is a one-stop shop for all of your cooking and entertaining needs. Here are some of my favorite tips that I picked up at the event:
- Brighten your dinner table with fresh flowers without breaking the bank. If you haven’t visited the floral and gift department of your local Jewel store, you might be surprised at what you’ll find inside. Jewel-Osco stores carry debi lilly design TM fresh flowers, vases, and gift items. You’ll find pre-made bouquets, as well as cut flowers, greenery, and berry sprays.
- Compound butters are easy to make, and they add flavor to everything. Incredibly, I’d never made a compound butter before, but at Jewel-Osco’s culinary event, we had the opportunity to make our own custom butters. Simply take a stick of softened butter and add sweet or savory ingredients, then whip everything together. Add olive oil to make the butter easier to spread. We made bacon garlic Dijon butter, avocado lime butter — even rosemary maple butter. These taste wonderful when melted over roasted meats near the end of cooking! Or, spread them on warm breads for extra sweet or savory flavors.
- Crunched for time? Let Jewel-Osco bring the groceries to you! Did you know Jewel-Osco now offers grocery delivery? It’s already available in many parts of Chicagoland. At Jewel’s holiday event, we had the opportunity to try out the new delivery service. Surprisingly, I’d never ordered groceries online before. (I think everyone knows I really enjoy shopping in the store each week!) It was very easy to search for the items I wanted to buy online and add them to my virtual cart.
While Jewel’s new grocery delivery is newly launched and not available in my area yet, I sent a grocery order to my sister in Addison, who was thrilled with the entire process. Jewel’s grocery delivery trucks are divided into frozen, refrigerated, and standard sections so everything arrives at your door at the right temperature. It’s also worth noting that the delivery drivers do not accept tips. Visit shop.jewelosco.com to try Jewel-Osco’s grocery delivery, and use the code SEASONSEATINGS to get $25.00 off plus free delivery on your first online order of $100 or more.
As I touched on earlier, a large portion of our day at the event was spent cooking and baking in Jewel’s enormous test kitchen. It’s so much fun to be able to spend time in a fully-stocked kitchen, especially when the chefs in charge give you light guidance with a lot of latitude to create whatever you’d like! The bloggers in attendance had an enormous assortment of O Organics®, Signature Kitchens®, Open Nature®, and additional exclusive products to choose from.
I continue to be impressed by the quality of Jewel’s own brands, especially the organic products. At this event, we learned that O Organics is the largest USDA-certified organic brand in the entire country! I appreciate both the wide selection of organics available and Jewel’s commitment to providing organic products at a great value.
One of our group kitchen station assignments was to create a salad that would be perfect for a holiday spread. I was inspired by a basket filled with red and green apples on display in Jewel’s kitchen, and I began gathering ingredients that reminded me of fall: cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and walnuts. I chopped the apples and began working on a spiced maple dressing that evoked the scents and flavors of apple pie, with a dash of savory flavor too.
At the end of our cooking event, everyone in attendance enjoyed a feast where all of the dishes we made were served. This apple salad went so well with the roasted turkey and prime rib we had for dinner! Here’s the recipe I created:
Maple Walnut Apple Salad
- Three large or four medium Red Delicious apples
- Three large or four medium Granny Smith apples
- One 4-ounce bag O Organics Dried Cranberries
- 1 cup O Organics Seedless Raisins
- One 8-ounce bag Signature Kitchens Shelled Walnuts
Spiced Maple Dressing
- One cup O Organics 100% Pure Maple Syrup
- 2 TBSP O Organics Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 1 TBSP Signature Kitchens Dijon Mustard
- 2 TSP O Organics cinnamon
- 1 TSP O Organics nutmeg
- 1 TSP Signature Kitchens ground cloves
Wash and cut apples into bite-sized pieces. Discard cores and place apples in a bowl. Add cranberries, raisins, and walnuts and toss to mix.
In a separate bowl, mix maple syrup, olive oil, Dijon mustard, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. Pour dressing over apple mixture and thoroughly toss until apples are coated. You may serve immediately, or refrigerate overnight.
This salad is so quick and easy to make, and the colors of the apples and cranberries are so festive too! It looks wonderful on the dinner table, and all of the flavors and ingredients work so well together.
O Organics and Open Nature products are available in my area at my local Jewel-Osco. You can also find them at all of the Albertsons Companies family of stores, including Albertsons, Safeway, Acme Markets, Vons, Pavilions, Randalls, Tomb Thumb, Shaw’s, Star Market, United Express, United, and Carrs/Safeway. Visit JewelOsco.com to find the closest store location to you. You’ll also find more holiday meal ideas, tips and recipes on their site.
All opinions are my own. This post may contain affiliate links. Read full Disclosure Policy.
Melinda says
This salad looks delish! Can I ask what the mustard is for? It seems the only ingredient I am questioning what it adds to the dish? This looks like it would be great for a Christmas table.
Coupon Maven says
It adds the tiniest hint of savory to balance the sweetness of the apples and maple syrup. You don’t recognize it as “mustard” when you taste it at all — it just helps the depth of all of the flavors work together. My children especially -love- this salad!