Salad

Last night, with a little help from Trader Joe’s, Joel and I had a picnic dinner with a view.

Can you see the needle off in the distance? Made for a great Wednesday night.

So here we are, 30 salads later. Joel and I were just starting to get tired of salads as this final week began, so we decided to revisit several of our favorites from the month in these last few days. This week started, though, with the holiday weekend …

Sunday, May 27

I was in charge of meal planning for my family’s camping trip over the three day weekend, and for the record, I planned it out so that we had one salad for each of the two days we were there. My best intentions were rearranged, so instead, we had two salads on Sunday. It works. The first, at lunch, had iceberg lettuce, carrots, tomato, avocado, yellow mini peppers, goat cheese, and a medley of smoked salmons. I had Italian dressing on mine, which somewhat redeemed the flavorlessness of the iceberg lettuce (sorry, dad).

The second was a Caesar salad at dinner, eaten with steaks and baked potatoes.

Monday, May 28

Monday night saw another taco salad – one of Joel’s favorites, and easy to make even after being on the road for three hours. Romaine, taco meat, tomatoes, peppers, guacamole, tons of cheese. In this case, guacamole worked as dressing.

Tuesday, May 29

Cobb salad combines all of Joel’s favorite salad toppings in one bowl – hard boiled egg, chicken, bacon, avocado, and olives. I had tomatoes on mine (he somehow doesn’t like them.) Sorry for the repeat picture, but I ate it from the exact same bowl and with the exact same dressing.

Wednesday, May 30

A repeat of one of my favorite salads from the month – the Italian chop salad we ate on May 2. Red leaf lettuce, green and black olives, peppers (raw this time), tomatoes, salami and cubed mozzarella. I dressed mine with apple cider vinegar and olive oil.

Thursday, May 31

The final day of our salad challenge, and our lettuce supply had dwindled to almost nothing. Neither of us is planning to eat a salad for the next few days, so not wanting to buy more lettuce, we made small side salads and amped them up with toppings. Carrots, tomatoes, olives and sunflower seeds on mine, with honey mustard dressing. In the background, some sauteed peppers and a chicken sausage.

And there you have it! For you statistical types, here’s the final breakdown:
Salads eaten: 30
Days missed: 3
Number of main course salads: 16
Number of side salads: 14
Most eaten salad: Caesar (5 times)
My favorite: Salad Nicoise
Joel’s favorite: cobb salad or fruit salad

To see all the salads from this month, check out:

• Salads from the week, May 1-5
• Salads from the week, May 6-12
• Salads from the week, May 13-19
• Salads from the week, May 20-25

Popping in a day early with this week’s round-up of salads …

Sunday, May 20

Fruit salad. You may have noticed (or maybe not) that I tend not to eat much fruit. There’s a reason for this – I seem to have some random intolerances for certain fruits, most notably dates and bananas. Alongside some mashed potatoes and a ham steak here, I made a salad from a few of the fruits that I tolerate wonderfully – strawberries, blueberries, pineapple.

Monday, May 21

I had a repeat of the fruit salad above, but instead of boring you with a repeat picture, here’s the fruit salad Joel enjoyed both days – to a can of fruit cocktail he added apple, banana, orange, strawberries, blueberries, and whipped cream.

Tuesday, May 22

Caprese salad. I can’t believe it took me three weeks into the salad challenge to make this one, because I love it so. Layers of tomatoes, mozzarella cheese and basil, which I coated with basil olive oil, salt and pepper.

Wednesday, May 23

For breakfast, I assembled this open faced sandwich with leftover caprese salad fixins. Basil and mozzarella between toast and a poached egg, with tomatoes on top. Now, if you decide to make this sandwich (and I highly recommend it), note that it is an eat-with-fork-and-knife kind of sandwich, not an eat-with-your-hands-while-driving-to-work kind of sandwich, especially if our egg yolk is runny and your dress is black. Luckily, Joel was willing to bring a clean sweater to me at work. He’s the best.

And for dinner, I made a green salad from this recipe. Joel was happy because it had more fruit, I was happy because the dressing is tahini based.

Thursday, May 24

What I like to call “fridge salad,” meaning everything I could find in the fridge which could be chopped up and tossed into a salad. The greens were mixed greens and romaine, with chicken breast, bacon, goat cheese, sweet mini pepper, carrots, tomatoes, and olives. I dressed mine with oil and vinegar.

Friday, May 25

We had dinner at BJ’s, where I had the Santa Fe salad. The salad was quite tasty, but let me be honest – I was just there for the gluten-free pizookie dessert

And now we’re down to the final six days of salad. I’ll be off the grid for the long weekend, but I’ll be back on Tuesday to let you know what I’ve been up to, and I’ll post the final round up of salads next Friday!

Also from this month:

• Salads from the week, May 1-5
• Salads from the week, May 6-12
• Salads from the week, May 13-19

Here’s another week’s worth of salads.

Once again, I failed to eat one on Sunday, so starting with …

Monday, May 14

The box of random salads that, sadly, glutened me. There was a ginger carrot slaw with green and purple cabbage, arugula salad that was supposed to have pine nuts and tomatoes but somehow the spoonful I took had neither, and some mixed greens that I topped with shredded carrots and zucchini and some peas. That’s peppered turkey on top.

Tuesday, May 15

Didn’t want to tax my recuperating digestive system with raw veggies, so I made this potato salad with boiled yukon gold potatoes and steamed green beans. It was dressed with lemon juice, lemon stevia, whole grain mustard, and olive oil.

Wednesday, May 16
No picture, but I ate leftover potato salad, a Caesar salad, and the last of my hot dogs. Imagine this plate crossed with this plate.

Thursday, May 17

I somehow forgot to eat lunch that day, so I was starving and picked up a prepared salad from Trader Joe’s on the way home. (They seem to have several gluten-free options, but I always get the same one. I’m predictable that way.) This one had spinach, tomatoes, shredded mozzarella, a boiled egg, and tons of bacon. The dressing was lemon poppyseed.

Friday, May 18

We made cobb salads with baked chicken, bacon, black olives, avocado, hard boiled eggs, and I had tomatoes on mine (but Joel doesn’t like them). Mine was dressed with honey mustard vinaigrette, Joel’s with ranch.

Saturday, May 19

Another Caesar salad, this one with a steak dinner. Also had roasted potatoes and asparagus.

Also from this month:

• Salads from the week, May 1-5
• Salads from the week, May 6-12