HAPPY ADVENT

Our Turkey:

Last Saturday’s Pizza (Summer Squash, Goat Cheese, Onions and Toasted Walnuts)

Sunday’s Turkey Chimichanga:

We’re giving ourselves another easy week because Bill, who probably needs to be in a sanatorium somewhere in the Alps, has a chest congestion that resembles the traffic on the LA Freeways at rush hour.  It is a relief that it stops him from talking so much, but we want him to get better. 

As for cooking, he cannot touch anything without sterilizing his hands in scalding water every other minute, and he’s too weak to cut onions or carrots.

But we do have a suggestion for those days when you are too tired, or busy, or, like Bill, too sick to cook.  You can still put tasty food on a plate, and we did that with an old standard, the salad-trio served at lunch counters and club rooms in the last century. 

Basically, we’re talking ice cream scoops of egg salad, tuna salad, and chicken salad (or substitute shrimp salad or cottage cheese for any one of them) arranged on a plate of lettuce.  Oh sure, you can add some garnishes, toast points, pickles, whatever.  But the basic idea is to give people these three tasty mounds of salad to dig into at their discretion.  It was a favorite lunch in Bill’s long-career of travel, and on Monday it was a perfect way to put a satisfying meal on the plate without sending Psycho-Chef back to bed, wheezing and groaning.

Note:  You know how to make all of those salads, right?  With tuna,* we like to add celery and red onion, with egg salad, celery, scallions and parsley, and with chicken salad, toasted pecans or cashews, raisins, scallions and a light dressing of mayo, chutney (Major Grey’s) curry powder, salt and pepper.  Buy a tub of arugula, make a bed of it on a plate and portion out the salads – or just one or two of them, and enjoy.

*Please buy the tuna packed in oil, not water.  There are minimal calories from the oil (once you drain the tuna) and a grand improvement in texture and overall taste.