What's for dinner, darling?

Salad/stir fry for the day? What should I cook today?

The eternal question. Ideally something new, something I have not made in a while. The key to make salads interesting is to keep changing most of the ingredients everyday.

As I was going through the motions of deciding on what to cook( this is harder than the actual cooking) I remembered a Sanjeev Kapoor, ' Egg and Lettuce' salad recipe. As a meal accompaniment that would have worked fine but a main meal salad would need to have more "body" and so more ingredients( you cannot possibly have more than one egg per person in your salad). But the combination sounded appetising and I decided to use that as the base and add more ingredients. Some veggies( beans and carrots are always stocked in my refrigerator), some boiled pasta(a handful, should not overpower the veggies, veggies add volume to the salad without adding too many calories) and some sausages( for that wee bit of indulgence).

Now for the dressing. Did not want to use mayonnaise or the olive oil and lime juice combo( think new, think different has to be the mantra). So decided to make a cooked tomato sauce dressing with garlic, fresh basil and Tobasco. In all the combination that I quite hurriedly put together seemed to look good and worked well.

My Thursday Salad

(In the absence of a better name I have decided to name the salads by the day of the week)

Ingredients

Boiled Pasta: About 1 cup

Beans: 4/5 beans cut into two inch long pieces and blanched

Eggs: 2/3 boiled and cut into quartets

Carrots: 1, cut them two inch long pieces( had not initially planned on the carrots but they seemed to contrast so well with the rest of the ingredients, just could not miss out on the photo opportunity- sis would be proud of me)

Tomatoes: 2/3, blanched and pureed

Olive oil: 2 tsp

Oregano seasoning: 1 tsp

Basil leaves: 4/5

Lettuce: 4/5 leaves

Garlic: 4/5 cloves, sliced into thin slivers

Sugar: 1 tsp

Sausage: 2/3 cut into roundels

Tobasco sauce: 1 tsp

Method

For the dressing:Heat some olive oil, saute the garlic. Add the tomato puree, basil leaves, sugar, Tabasco, oregano. Simmer for a few minutes to thicken the sauce. Remove from the stove.

Add the boiled pasta, beans and carrots to the tomato sauce. Mix well.

Layer a dish with some lettuce leaves. Add the pasta with vegetables layer. Top with the sausage, boiled eggs and some shredded lettuce. Serve.

I am learning to think beyond the regular garden salad and making some amazing discoveries in the process.

Bon Apetit and Happy Cooking!

P.S: I did not get to sample any of it. I ate the leftover Thai Green Curry but then I am not complaining.