Lunch, you know that meal that you scramble to get together before running out the door at 8am? Or you have simply given up getting it together and now resort to something like Subway. This is the meal that a lot of people neglect. They go with the same old sandwich, or cheese and crackers, or in my case... shove a few pieces of fruit in my backpack and that would be my lunch. But with very small amount of effort and a few essentials from your pantry, you can make some really really good lunches.
The idea of having a post on 5 days of lunches came from a comment that a friend made while we were studying. I pulled out my sandwich, you can smell the peanut butter, then she asked "what is that red thing in your sandwich?". It was apple slices. She then went on saying that she is so tired of the lunches that she packs and it's just so much easier to buy something on campus or just suck it up and eat the same old boring thing again. So came this idea: 5 days worth of lunches with pantry materials.
To be honest, I'm kind of a hippocrate. I enjoyed myself very thoroughly this past week while I was eating delectable lunches. Now, the chances are very high that I will return to my same old stare at my fridge to see what I can bring, then leave the house with a frozen muffin and some pieces of fruit.
Enough of the blabbering, let's get to the main ingredient. Literally.
These are simple ingredients, easily substituted. Things you SHOULD have in your pantry, or easy essentials to get from the store.
Spinach
Lemon
Peanut Butter--> can be other nut butters as well
Olive oil (or any type of vegetable oil)
Tuna--> for my vegetarian friends: chickpeas. I know you have cans of that stuff.
Bread
Quinoa--> or any type of pasta, depending on what you're doing with it
Garlic
With the quinoa, you can cook up a batch of it and leave it in the fridge for the week. And when you're mixing up things with quinoa, it is so versatile, you can practically add anything.
Now I made a spinach pesto, another kind of spinach pesto. No nuts, no cheese. Just spinach, garlic and lemon.
Spinch Pesto
2 cups spinach (packed)
1/4 olive oil
2 cloves garlic
juice and zest of 1/2 lemon
1/2 tsp salt
pepper to taste
Put all the ingredients in a blender. Tip: don't add all the spinach at once, otherwise it's too dry to blend. Let it blend up and puree with some of the liquid first then go on and add the rest.
Makes 1/2- 3/4 cup.
Day 1- Quinoa with Spinach pesto
Quinoa
Spinach pesto
Add spinach pesto to quinoa to your taste-liking. I also added some strawberries and walnuts. Feel free to throw in anything from your kitchen!
Day 2- Peanut Buttered-Tuna Sandwich
Tuna
Peanut butter
Spinach
Bread
1. Melt 1 1/2 tbsp of peanut butter in the microwave
2. Mix the peanut butter with 1/4 cup of tuna
I also added some curry powder, ground ginger and pepper to the mix.
Now put the sandwich together!
Day 3- PB and Pesto Sandwich
Peanut butter
Pesto
Bread
Simple enough. Spread each on a slice of bread. Put them together. Voila! You have yourself a gourmet peanut butter sandwich. I know it sounds like an odd mixture but trust me, it was really tasty. Added to my version of this was apple slices!
Day 4- Tuna and Spinach Quinoa Salad
Tuna
Spinach
Quinoa
1. Chop your spinach into thinner slices
2. Mix the ingredients together.
I also added the spinach pesto to this since I had tons of it left still. Then I also added dried cranberries and later on some kiwi as well. Throw in whatever you like! Let your creativity flow!
Day 5- GRAND FINALE- Tuna-Quinoa-Pesto on Peanut Buttered Bread
When I say throw everything together, I mean throw everything together.
Tuna
Quinoa
Spinach pesto
Peanut butter
Spinach
Bread
1. Mix together some tuna, quinoa and pesto. Make sure it binds together well. More tuna, less quinoa.
2. Spread peanut butter on your bread.
3. Lay on those beautiful spinach leaves
4. Put the tuna mixture on top
5. Lay on the other slice of bread
There you have it. 5 days of innovative lunches. You can say they're borderline gourmet, or gourmet. Pesto makes everything gourmet, or so I'd like to think. Surely, there're so many other variety of things you can do with those simple ingredients. Experiment with it a little. Have fun with it. And I guarantee you will look forward to eating lunch again.
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