Where I am, it is already growing warm. So warm that at 10AM I realized I was not going to want to be cooking dinner at 4PM tonight! Here is the quick and easy, cheap meal I threw together:
Dinner Salad
- 5 grilled chicken breasts cut in strips (could use left over steak, ground beef, whatever meat you have on hand)
- 10 hard-boiled eggs
- lettuce (note: you could also use any form of cooked pasta! I actually prefer the pasta, but my He-man is on a low-carb diet)
- tomatoes
- olives (any diced veggies either canned or fresh, as long as they’re ready to eat and the flavors meld)
- ranch salad dressing (works well with ANY salad dressing — Italian is a very common one, but you could also try Blue Cheese, Ceasar, etc.)
Dice everything up into bite size pieces, toss it in a bowl, and pull it out for the family when they’re ready to eat. This version is low in carbohydrates and high in protein. You can do so many different things with this recipe! If you have left over cheese, or other vegetables, throw it in. You’ll notice in the picture that I wound up leaving off the tomatoes and olives on this one. This was one of those nights where the family goes in a dozen different directions, so each person’s plate was customized to their tastes.
Mexican cheese blend + ground beef + salsa = taco salad — add some chips on the side, sour cream, etc.
Sliced steak + blue cheese + blue cheese dressing = steak salad
Tuna + curly pasta + Italian dressing = tuna pasta salad
My four year old ate 3 plates of this. I can remember my mother-in-law making something similar. When she did it, she’d use her fancy salad server that had compartments for each ingredient. We’d have an abundance of fresh fixings to choose from including artichoke hearts, asparagus, pickles, shrimp…oh, it just went on and on. You can dress this one up or simplify it down.
What other variations can you think of?
