It Feels Like Spring, So Let's Make Salad!

Ok, I realize that most of you are still in the peak of winter with plummeting temperatures and snow. But we live in the Sonoran Desert and our winters are usually beautiful. These last two months have been quite cold for us and I have been making hot stews and soups alot to keep us warm (we do not have heat in our house, so temps in the 40s at night is really chilly for us inside the house).

But yesterday felt like spring with a gorgeous 78 degrees and, of course, sunshine! We only see clouds a few days each year, so our weather is pretty monotonous:-).

Now that some of you want to beat me with a stick, I will share my recipe for this delicious pasta salad I threw together. I started with some whole grain penne pasta, cooked and drained. I left it to cool while I chopped what I had in the frig: carrots, celery tops (I used to throw them away), onion, tomatoes, cucumber, baby spinach, and broccoli. To this I added about 1/3 of a piece of turkey ham (very frugal meat - about 3 meals for $2.00), chopped into cubes. When the pasta was cool, I tossed it all together with some balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt, pepper and topped with some Parmesan cheese.

Everybody loved it! And my hubby took the leftover (not much) for his lunch at work today. Since most of the produce I got from our community food bank, the whole meal probably cost me about $2.00! That fits my frugal budget, how about yours?