I always prepare my lunch for days that I go to my school the night before, since waking up at 6AM only allows me an hour to get ready for the day before commuting for 35 minutes. I originally planned on defrosting some of my leftover bulgur chili that I froze last week for today's lunch. But when I opened my fridge, I noticed all of the fresh produce I had in there that I did not want to waste. This feeling was brought on by the fact that I recently had to throw out an entire cantaloupe that fell victim to mold.
Using the cherry tomatoes, arugula, and goat cheese I bought for last night's dinner, along with some berries that I bought to mix in with my yogurt that I eat for breakfast at my school, I came up with one hell of a good-looking salad. (I'll post a picture on here when I have it for lunch later). I even threw in some sliced mushrooms that I found in my fridge from last week, too. My dressing of choice is Walden Farm's no-calorie raspberry vinaigrette. My hope is that this combination will result in a sweet-salty salad of perfect proportions.
To me, the trick in creating the perfect salad is making sure that it is the correct size portion-wise. Portion-distortion is a huge problem in our society, and my family and friends are no exception to this. I don't eat out at restaurants as often as I used to, but I've developed a habit of ordering from the appetizer menu instead of the entree menu (not only are the portions smaller, but it's cheaper). The thing is, we don't need to eat more to feel full. In a recent study I saw on the news, people reported feeling full when eating a smaller portion than they were used to. It's all a matter of how our brain perceives what's on our plate.
In making this salad, I used the following measurements:
1 cup arugula leaves
1/4 cup cherry tomatoes
1/4 cup sliced baby bella mushrooms
1 tbsp blueberries
1 tbsp goat cheese crumbles
2 medium strawberies
I originally planned on using 1/2 cup of cherry tomatoes, but I realized that I didn't need that many as I started slicing them.
So I'm curious: how do you like to make use of leftover ingredients?
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for me, it depends on what the leftovers are. i'll use leftover hotdog rolls for garlic bread and leftover taco shells for an enchillada casserole, but i'll use leftover vegetables in a soup or stir-fry. sometimes, i'll just keep leftovers from meals in the fridge and on a friday night when i don't feel like cooking, i'll take them all out and have a buffet.
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