After a long week of work and school, I have random pieces of this and that in my fridge - nothing large enough to make a sizable dish on its own. I took everything out of the vegetable bins - pitched a couple unidentifiable
slimers found
in tiny tupperware and baggies - and surveyed the fresh bits and pieces waiting for inspiration.
Earlier this morning I sat beside a nice couple at my son's basketball game. They were having a conversation about preparing healthy meals for the next 30 days. I couldn't help myself and joined in their conversation. Before too long I was sharing a recipe and they were telling me about preparing a delicious kale salad. With a few stalks of kale on the counter in front of me, my mind was made up - chopped vegetable salad for lunch!
Chopped Vegetable Salad
A couple stalks of
curly kale (I had intended to sauté or make chips with them, but we ended up giving the guinea pigs half the bunch during the week),
1/2 a bunch of parsley (I love tabouli, so all of that went in), 1/8 of a small head of
red cabbage, 1/4
orange bell pepper, 1 "vine-ripened"
tomato, 1 tablespoon of
sweet onion,
beets, 1/2 a medium
zucchini, and a lime that really needed to be used. I minced the onion and parsley, chopped everything else (excluding the lime) fairly small and tossed everything together in a large bowl. I had small amounts of 2
vinaigrettes - just basic vinaigrettes - one made with balsamic vinegar and one with apple cider vinegar and fresh thyme. Together they made a terrific dressing for the chopped salad.
Those bits and pieces made A LOT - too much for lunch - I used about 1/3 of the chopped vegetables for the salad. What to do with the rest was easy…save it.
Save your bits and pieces - advice from my own mama. When I was growing up my mother always kept a Cool Whip container (the Cool Whip had long since been eaten) in the freezer. Every time we had a spoonful of vegetables leftover from dinner - usually too small for a decent portion, Mom would throw them in the Cool Whip Container and place it back in the freezer. When the container became full, it was time to work her magic - homemade vegetable soup; sometimes homemade beef vegetable soup.
That soup - either kind - was delicious and I can remember how proud I was for wanting more vegetable soup - how healthy I was! As I grew, my preferences changed and I can remember crushing crackers in the soup at times and very often during my teens dumping loads of cheddar cheese on top; my mom's homemade croutons were also a delicious addition.
The Cool Whip-vegetable soup tradition continues in my home, minus the Cool Whip container. Currently I'm using a 2-quart plastic tub you can purchase at the grocery store beside the resealable bags. I put tiny vegetable leftovers in there, the last splash of stock, a dab of tomato sauce, the liquid left after steaming vegetables, etc.
1/3 of the chopped salad (minus the dressing) went in the soup container
The last 1/3 went into a container in the fridge - I'll probably sauté it and use it in an omelet tomorrow morning.
My vegetable bins are clean and ready for a new supply this weekend, my soup container is almost full, lunch was spectacular and I'm looking forward to that omelet. Not bad for the bottom of the vegetable bin!
