Take that Olive Garden!

This past weekend, when faced with hurricane Irene, my husband kindly requested that I make at least “3 days worth of salad” for us in preparation. At 40 weeks pregnant, all I could think about was stocking up on baked goods and making sure the ice cream doesn’t melt but my dear hubby wanted to make sure he got in his greens. Oh the irony! Even in my most unhealthy moments, I can count on my husband to keep me in check.

Three days of salad would be a good thing, I thought, as long as the ice cream doesn’t melt and I make a batch of banana bread before we can’t use the oven. 

So that’s what I did. I got to chopping and baking and before we knew it, we had a whole long weekend’s worth of goodies. I started with a ratatouille using all the veggies from the farmers market, then made an old-fashioned mac and cheese with whole grain pasta and broccoli, as well as a healthy banana blueberry bread.

And I made the salad. Using every veggie we had left, I chopped away until we had at least 3 days worth of greens!

Does anyone remember Olive Garden’s bottomless salad? I haven’t been there since I was a kid, but I do remember they had unlimited breadsticks and a bottomless salad. I thought that was pretty cool (although in retrospect it’s really more of a smart marketing ploy than anything-after all white bread drenched in butter and iceberg lettuce are pretty cheap to add onto a meal but makes you feel like you’re getting a good deal).

Anyways, this salad reminded me of  Olive Garden’s bottomless salad, except my version is filled with high density nutrients like spinach, strawberries, red cabbage and mushrooms. I left out the salad dressing and added it to each individual portion as we ate it, that way it keeps in the fridge for several days without getting soggy.

Why haven’t I done this before? It’s a super easy way to make sure we’re eating fresh greens and veggies. Chris was a happy hubby, and I was happy only to have to chop once, and have salad for days on end.

A win/win for everyone.

I’m going to do this more often. Take that Olive Garden!