'What's in the Fridge' Salad

We all know the feeling: it's 5pm, partners working late, Miss 3 wants carrots for tea, and says she has a sore ear: 'come sit with me Mummy', and tea is not going to cook itself. There's a little bit of this and a little bit of that in the fridge, but it's looking like adding up to a whole lot of nothing much. Arise the fridge Salad: a clever little combination of a few simple found-in-the-fridge ingredients, combined in a flash, and on the table in no time.

I combined half a finely chopped onion, a peeled and julienned carrot (you can grate - just be sure to squeeze out the excess juice), 4 boiled shelled and chopped eggs, a few sliced cherry tomatoes, and about 1 cup of cooked pasta of any shape or description.

Lets be honest here: we all love mayo! 
 
Combine 1 generous tablespoon of mayonnaise with a glugg of olive oil and some roughly chopped parsley.
I would have added a crushed clove of garlic, but mother hubbard the cupboard was bare on that front.






Gently stir the whole lot together and serve it with whatever protein you have available. In our house tonight it was chicken. It could just as well be as simple as some crispy fried bacon added into the salad.

 

 I sprinkled some chicken breast pieces with smoked garlic salt and pepper, seared the outside in the grill pan on the stove top first and then threw them into the oven at 200deg. C.

It should be all but cooked by the time the salad is ready.
A meat thermometer is a great piece of equipment to have: the chicken should reach 75deg.C measured in the thickest part. Overcook it and it will be like eating a white facecloth.




All done and dinner's on the table. Just enough time for bathtime, Miss 3 is off to bed, and there is time left over for me!