Archive for the ‘Sides – Salads’ Category
Macaroni Salad I
Easy recipe that I learned from my parents, I have been making this now for years. I often make this to provide several days of lunches and even an evening meal or two. This can be a side dish or a light main dish. Links to the Shortcuts are listed in the Notes section.
Ingredients
- 500 grams elbow macaroni, (8 oz)
- 1 onion, diced
- 2-3 cans tuna, packed in oil or brine, drained, Shortcut
- 3-4 hard boiled eggs, peeled, chopped, Shortcut
- mayo, as needed
- ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Heat a pot of salted water to boiling, add the macaroni, cook until tender, drain well. Return the macaroni to the same pot, we are going to use the cooking pot as the mixing bowl now.
- To the macaroni, add the onion, tuna, and eggs. If using the Shortcut to prepare the tuna, use ½ cup cooked tuna for each can.
- Gently mix together to minimize tearing apart the eggs.
- Add the mayo, several spoons first and gently mix together. Keep adding mayo a spoon at a time until you get your desired consistency. Add some black pepper and give the salad another mix or two.
- Transfer salad to a serving bowl, cover, and place in the fridge to chill until serving. s a great side dish, lunch, or even as a light main meal.
Notes
Low cost per serving as this makes a lot of salad.
Shortcut: Tuna.
Mom's Potato Salad
This is a very easy recipe, one my Mom has been making for years, and I remember this since I was a child and asked her for the recipe probably 15 years ago. I made one addition to the recipe (bell peppers) thanks to a good friend in the US. This is what I say is a user friendly recipe, amounts are guessed, and you can add or remove items to your liking or what you have on hand.
Ingredients
- 6 potatoes, medium or large is ok
- 6 hard boiled eggs, chicken or duck, peeled
- 3-4 stalks imported celery, diced, or several bunches of Thai celery, chopped
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 red bell pepper, diced
- 1 yellow bell pepper, diced
- 1 jar green olives with pimento, drained and sliced, (354 g / 13 oz)
- 3-4 red radish, optional, sliced thin
- mayo
- prepared yellow mustard
- cracked black pepper
Instructions
- Peel and cube the potatoes, add to a large saucepan and cover with 1 inch of water. Bring to a boil and reduce to a simmer, cook until the potatoes are just fork tender. Drain and allow to cool.
- While the potatoes are cooking, dice the veggies and place in a large mixing bowl.
- Peel the eggs and chop into large pieces. Add to the bowl and mix everything.
- Potatoes should be done now, remove them from the water and allow to cool. Once the potatoes are cooled, add to the bowl and mix again.
- Now add about 3 good sized spoons of mayo and start to mix, add mayo to completely coat everything but not dripping with mayo either, once that is done, add a few tablespoons of mustard and mix that in, color should be a pale yellow, taste, and add more mustard if needed. Once the taste is good, sprinkle in cracked black pepper and mix again, check the taste. If the taste is good, put the salad in 1-2 containers, put on lids, and refrigerate for several hours before serving. This photo shows perfect consistency, after this, it is packed in a large plastic bowl to be refrigerated.
- I normally serve this as a side with Italian sausage or hamburgers.
Notes
Variant: 1. Inspired by my good friend, Stephen Connell, United States. An old Southern US trick is you fry up some bacon crisp, take out the bacon, then the bacon fat, while it is still hot, is drizzled over the boiled cubed potato's then add everything else including the bacon that you have crushed into bits. You do not want the potatoes swimming in the bacon fat, but enough to coat them and soak in.
Chicken Salad I
Easy to assemble dish that is healthy and nutritious. Very easy to tailor this recipe to what you have on hand at the time. This recipe will even provide chicken broth you can refrigerate for later use in another recipe.
Ingredients
- 10-12 chicken thighs, skin on, see note
- 3-4 eggs, hard boiled
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2-4 stalks celery, if using Thai celery, use several bunches, chopped
- 4-5 spring onions, chopped, green and white part
- 1 red bell pepper, chopped
- 1 yellow bell pepper, chopped
- mayo
- ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Boil the chicken thighs in a pot along with the eggs, remove the eggs about 2 minutes after the water starts to boil and place in cold water. Boil the chicken until cooked through then remove from the water and allow to cool. Skim any foam off the top of the water and you have chicken stock you can refrigerate.
- While the chicken and eggs are cooling, chop the onion, spring onions, celery including, and leaves, and the bell peppers. Place in a large bowl. This photo only shows onion, yellow bell pepper and eggs, see, make this with what you have on hand.
- When the chicken is cool enough to handle, remove the skin and bone and save for a snack for your dog, and simply shred the meat with your fingers and place into the bowl with the chopped veggies. This photo is the 5 chicken thighs I used for these photos.
- Peel the eggs, and chop and add to the bowl with the chicken and veggies. Thighs shredded, use your fingers, added to the bowl.
- Give the items in the bowl a good mixing, then start adding mayo, start with several large spoonfuls first, keep mixing and adding mayo until everything is coated well but not dripping with mayo. Sprinkle in some ground black pepper, another quick stir, then refrigerate for several hours. Serve as is, on crackers, or even a sandwich.
- Mixed and ready for the fridge.
Notes
Chicken thigh note: buy quarters, separate the thigh from the leg and freeze the legs for another meal.
Chicken runs about 58 Baht per kilo in a grocery store quarters, quarters also have larger thighs, so you may spend 140-160 baht on chicken, only half will be needed as you can freeze the legs for later use, so cost would be about 70-80 Baht. All other items should come in under 100 Baht. So for this meal, 180 baht, 200 Baht max, for 8 meals it is well under $1 per meal.
My own recipe.
