Leftover Makeover (Spinach and Pasta Salad)

Alright I am dedicating this post to Ky and LB for their patience and dedication toward my blog. I apologize deeply for not posting as often as I usually have in the past, but the school year is finally coming to an end (well technically three weeks left!) and I have simply just been so busy! I have three more posts that I have been desperately needing to publish (plus this one) which I promise to have them all up by the end of this month. . . by the end of this week. With that said, here is a little something that I threw together about a week ago with a few leftovers found in my kitchen. As this recipe is very easy, simple, and can obviously be made with leftovers; I absolutely loved the fresh and pure taste each ingredient gave.

This is a cold pasta salad, yet it is not the typical pasta salad one would think of. (Because quite frankly I have never been a fan of cold pasta salad.) However this one is different because there is actually lettuce to the salad and is so simple yet delicious! Everything is cold and is covered with fresh parmesan cheese to combine each flavor together. It is also extremely easy, and if you are thinking right now of popping in a frozen meal or pouring a bowl of cereal, well think again because this recipe probably takes just as much or even less time and is not only healthier but tastes fresh and like real food.

Ingredients:

already cooked and prepared ziti pasta (leftover work) about 1/2 pound

one cup frozen peas

1/4 cup fresh grated Parmesan cheese

one sliced hard boiled egg

couple large handfuls baby spinach (about as much or more compared to ziti)

fresh herb and Parmesan dressing

LETS COOK!

defrost peas and add to salad bowl. toss with cold pasta, cheese, lettuce and egg. Before serving add dressing. Enjoy!

From The Garden (Herb and Springtime Salad)

Are you getting sick of all the salads I keep posting? Well I hope not, because my love for salads is far from dead. In fact, my salad exploration continues to grow as I find new ingredients to mix with a few green leaves to create a spectacular, exotic tasting salad. This is by far my best and favorite salad yet, because the flavors are an absolute juiced explosion. The corn and peppers make this salad bright, colorful, and extremely flavorful livening up any spring salad. On top of everything, I even added a few fresh herbs from my herb garden to add a slight texture and give the salad a hint of extra pizazz, which I believe, tops the dish off quite beautifully. (And might I add how excited I have been lately as I watch my garden continue to grow and grow and grow! It makes me so happy!)

Ingredients:
handful fresh spring mix lettuce
hadful fresh romaine lettuce coarsely chopped to bite size pieces
half cup cherry tomatoes halved
one fourth cup thinly sliced almonds
one third cup cold, cooked corn
half orange (or any color really) thinly sliced pepper (seeds not included...unless you would like)
few leaves Finley chopped parsley
handful leaves finely chopped chives
parmesan cheese, grated
a basil and herb dressing
LETS COOK!
in a salad bowl toss everything together and then add dressing right before serving. Serve, and enjoy! (UM WOW CAN YOU SAY EASY?!)

Spring Time is Here (Poached Egg Garden Salad)

 This is probably the easiest, fastest, simplest salads I have ever made. It is perfect for a quick fix dinner or lunch, beautiful enough to serve for guests, and fresh enough to be a wonderful salad idea for an enjoyed spring time picnic. The salad may appear extremely bland with the very few ingredients that are added, but sometimes clear and precise balances taste buds better than overdosing on jumbling mixtures of ideas. There is an egg to add protein which is poached yet "broken" to give the regular hard boiled egg a break, the almonds are all natural to save time from having to preheat and grease an oven, the lettuce consists of only two different types which keeps the hassle of handling multiple lettuces to a minimum, and the seasoning is purely simple with a light vinaigrette and freshly ground pepper bringing the salad together as whole. This salad may appear quite easy and one that possibly wouldn't classify under a chef's specialty, but that is because it is precisely that! This salad is quite easy and it is a recipe that absolutely anyone can achieve! So the short and simple recipe shall follow. . .

Ingredients:handful baby organic spring time lettuce
one stalk romaine lettuce
plain almonds
freshly ground pepper
basil and parmesan vinaigrette
one egg
LETS COOK! 
 add spring time lettuce to salad bowl and tear into bite size pieces the romaine lettuce and add to same bowl. Slice almonds and add to salad. In a small saucepan with inch thick high in water allow water to come to a boil. Crack egg into water and keep egg together as a whole and kind of slightly break the center yolk. But keep egg together! When thoroughly cooked through turn heat off. Pour vinaigrette into salad and toss. One placed on plate, add egg on top and garnish with pepper. Serve, and enjoy!

Mixed Everything Salad

I love salads. And it is as simple as that. I can not go for more than three days without craving fresh lettuce and simple ingredients that somehow all correspond with one another to create something so simple yet so delicious; a salad. Salads are so versatile for they can be a main dish or simply a side. They can become a picnic fave with bright fruits, or a mexican fiesta with tortillas and beans. Salads are formal beginnings or casual endings. I just love how salads can never be over rated for the varieties are endless that new creations of such are ordinary. So yes, I think I have made my self clear that salads are one of my favorite things to throw together as well as eat!

So as long as I can remember (or as long as I have been watching Food Network and discovered such thing as arugula), my mother and I have been on a quest for arugula everywhere and anywhere in our neighborhood. For months this hidden little treasure could not be found. . . until my mother entered a local grocer's and finally spotted Ms. Arugula! She may have been hard to find, but now that she was captured she was then brought back to the Brown household to be used in many ways. We first off started by mixing arugula up with other lettuces to create this absolutely amazing salad, and she then moved on to bigger positions in life such as the prime topping on a vegetarian pizza (which the posting will soon follow). Therefore, thanks to Arugula, this is probably one of my most prized salads that is for sure an award winner! (That is if it were ever to be entered in such contest. (I can see it now. . . the "Who Can Make Arugula Taste The Best Contest")Yes, sounds fabulous!)
Ingredients:
pinch of fresh ground pepper
1.5 cups organic baby spinach
1.5 cups organic arugula
1 cup hearts of romaine lettuce
.5 cup dried cranberries
2 hard boiled eggs sliced
4 tablespoons black organic beans
2 tablespoons crumbled feta cheese
basil herb dressing
LETS COOK!
In a salad bowl add all ingredients, mix together, serve and enjoy! (um..can you say salads are the easiest dinners to make?!. . . SO SIMPLE on a busy-running-around kind of night!)

Cheerful Lunches (Citrus Garden Salad)

Today I stayed home from school for unexplainable reasons, but that is far besides the point. The point is I was able to prepare a fabulous lunch for my most fabulous mother while she was away gaining another victory for her tennis team. She was delighted to see I have been somewhat productive on my day off as I folded the laundry, unloaded the dishwasher, ran a few errands, and now indulged in a little something for my self as well as her; in which I made a deelishis citrusy salad with these new extra citrus oranges that my mother had recently found at our grocery store.

It is very hard for me to explain these oranges, because they are not typical oranges. They are way better! Yesterday my mother came home from the local grocery store, and inside our go-green bags I was delighted to see loads and loads of colorful fruit. It made me smile at the fact she was thinking about me and made me smile even more to see she had bought oranges, life's happy little fruit. However, when I cut one open the other day, I noticed they looked more like grapefruits. But when I bit into one, it tasted quite like an orange but juicier, fresher, and all around better! Therefore, it was settled that I must add this fruit to my next salad to spruce up a typical garden salad. The salad was fresh, tangy, and looked so much happier, for it was now mixed with a sweetly sensational fruit.
Ingredients:
Mixed baby greens and baby spinach lettuce
One Orange (Or any citrus fruit)
1/4 cup sliced almonds
1/3 cup grated parmesan cheese
basil herb salad dressing
LETS COOK!
Place lettuce in a bowl and grate cheese over lettuce. Pour dressing and toss. Add salad to plates and sprinkle almonds on top. Place orange on top of salad, serve and enjoy! (How simple and easy was that?!)

Poached Egg Garden Salad

Many of you know that I have recently become a vegetarian, therefore I have begun reading and researching about vegetarian recipes through websites and magazines. I came to find that many recipes were quite intricate and required at least an entire circle around the clock in the kitchen. But some days there are not enough hours for me to fulfill what I hope to complete. And letting alone all the strenuous hours of homework and studying, I barley have time during the week to cook a gourmet meal. Therefore I realized salads are easy, quick, and extremely simple to make in a short amount of time, but I was getting tired of the same ol' same ol' house salad with tomatoes and boiled eggs. So I decided to add a bit of a twist to my new and improved favorite salad, known as the Poached Egg Garden Salad.

The reason I absolutely love and adore this salad is because well... the egg is poached!! When my mother first made a poached egg one morning for breakfast, I fell in love right away. The fact that the egg is half boiling yet still gooey and oozy in the middle, fascinates me and still puts me in awe! I never would of thought of adding this soft egg on top of a salad, but when I read about it from a cook book and then saw it on the Food Network station the next day, I knew it must be a success...and indeed it was. The soft, yellow insides of the egg ooze out ever so gently and blend with the salad dressing to create a whole new dressing of its own. This salad is refreshing, mouth watering, and just so good! (I also think it is so wonderfully amazing because who knew someone could put together such a decedent looking dinner in under ten minutes?!)

Ingredients:

1/4 bag of baby spinach
handful of small carrots
fresh parmesan cheese
light, oily caesar dressing
one egg
LETS COOK!

Tear off all stems of spinach and clean spinach before putting into bowl. In a small frying pan, boil about a quarter full of water. Once boiling, slowly add egg to water and bring to a simmer. With a slotted spoon, gently fold the whites of the egg over the top to keep the egg as a whole. Leave alone for a few minutes white thinly and coarsely slicing the carrots and slicing thin, thin slice of cheese. Add too lettuce and toss with dressing. After about 6 or so minutes (will know when egg is ready when the yellow middle has turned a translucent white) add the egg on top of the salad, serve, and enjoy!

A New Twist (Pear and Pecan Salad)

What good is a cook book when the price triumphs over taste and thinking while one stares at a recipe, is it really worth twenty dollars? That is why I love the Half Price Book Store so much. The price is the last thing I have to worry about when wandering from aisle to aisle scanning all the gently used and greatly loved books. The store has been so lovingly good to me in the past years from accompanying pleasurable summer novels for me to read while lounging around the beaches of Mexico, to saving my life with Spark notes for school projects in English, and now leaving extra change in my pocket to buy my first vegetarian cook book. Yes, that is right, I have pledged to PETA, and have happily become a vegetarian. So good bye meat, and sorry to those meat lovers, but this will no longer be a blog of meat. And for those meat lovers, well, it was very nice to meat you. (Hah, Blake, I had to add a pun! It only made sense!...Or since I am talking about saving money, it only made cents!)

I absolutely loved this salad, because the textures melted so well together. The pear was perfectly ripe and sweetened the red tipped lettuce, while the toasted pecans added a huge crunch to every bite. The softness of the pear almost smashed into the salad and the crunch of the pecans caused them to crumble on top. Because of this, a perfect salad was created. Thank you Nicola Graimes for this splendid combo! Note to reader: As this recipe did come from a cook book, I did change it up quite a bit and I saved more or less the idea of blending the two main ingredients together in the salad.
Ingredients:
1 cup shelled pecan nuts, halved

2 ripe pears

about half or so red tipped lettuce
caesar dressing that is more on the oily side

LETS COOK!

At 350 degrees fahrenheit, toast pecans on baking sheet that is lightly covered with olive oil. Make sure they do not burn. Cut the pears into even and thin slices, leaving the skin intact and discarding the cores. Wash the salad leaves and spin dry as well as patting down to with towel to further drying. Pour dressing and nuts over lettuce and toss. Serve with pecans on top, and enjoy!

Baby Mixed Greens Salad

Okay, this may sound strange, unbelievable, and even unfathomable, but I have never liked a salad until this past summer. You are probably thinking how have I lived and gone a whole seventeen plus years with out eating a single green leaf! Well, some how I managed to live, and I did survive. I first found my love of salad when I went with my mother and sister to La Madeline's for lunch one Sunday afternoon. They had both ordered a caesar salad, and it was just unbelievably beautiful! I couldn't resist and I had to order one my self to give this "salad" thing a try. From that day on I fell in love and now I eat salad every chance I get with every meal possible. (If I could, I would probably be eating it with my breakfast!)

My all time favorite salads, hands down, are caesar salads with the perfectly delightful creamy textured and thick dressing, as well as any salad with baby spinach leaves and a thin, light vinaigrette. I decided to mix all my favorite ingredients into one big salad, and have a variety of textures as well as a variety of different green leaves. This salad borders between a warm side dish and a crunchy full on entree. The warm, hard boiled egg wilts the spinach just enough to melt them around the chopped almonds and crumbled feta cheese. It is absolutely delicious if you are a salad lover, and your taste buds will be begging for that next bite. . .
Ingredients: (all will depend on the size of salad being made)
baby green leaf lettuce
baby spinach (make sure to have more of this than the other two)
baby Romain lettuce
1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese
2 hard boiled eggs
1/4 cup almonds
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 red onion
2 tablespoons orange juice with pulp
1 cup balsamic vinaigrette
LETS COOK!
boil eggs and peel shell off once boiled. clean all lettuce and leaves with water and pick off every stem from the baby spinach. (may take a while, but worth it in the end!) In a small bowl mix orange juice and vinaigrette together and set aside. In serving bowl, place lettuces inside. Roast almonds for a few minutes over medium-high heat in frying pan with olive oil until golden brown. Remove from heat and cut into halves, placing them on top of lettuce. Add the sliced hard boiled egg and crumbled feta cheese. Chop small pieces of the red onion, then add to salad. When ready to serve, pour vinaigrette over salad, toss, and enjoy! (simple as one, two, three!)

Turkey Day Fave (Cranberry-Almond Spinach Salad)

Webster's definition of Thanksgiving: the act of giving thanks and expressing gratitude through prayer. My definition of Thanksgiving: a day to indulge in lots and lots of good American food. Thanksgiving is a day that one can eat as much as they please without being judged, so why not enjoy the food we eat? That is why this year I decided to prepare a salad that was sure to make a second round around the table.

Thanksgiving is the start of fall cooking, therefore cranberries are all the rage in many of the side dishes; including spinach salads. It was a must to add cranberries for it's a popular favorite among many traditional Americans, as well are warm and toasty slivered almonds. This salad pairs between sweet-tang which comes from fresh, squeezed orange juices spritzed within the dressing and dried up cranberries sprinkled through out the baby spinach.

Ingredients:  (makes for large families)

2 packages fresh baby spinach

1 cup crumbled feta cheese

1/4 small red onion, thinly sliced

1 cup dried cranberries

1/2 cup roasted or toasted almonds

1 cup balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing

4 tablespoons orange juice

LETS COOK!

pick off every single stem from each leaf of the baby spinach (yes, this is very tedious). Place spinach in a serving bowl and add the cheese, onion, and cranberries. Thinly slice almonds and add to bowl as well.

In separate bowl combine balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing and orange juice. mix well together and pour over salad mixture when ready to serve.

Toss entire mixture together, and try to leave most of the cheeses, onion slices, almonds, and cranberries on top of spinach.

Serve and enjoy. (very simple, yet very good!)