Stay Connected

Friday, August 4, 2017

Cold Meal for a Hot Day



We are in the middle of a heat wave, here in Seattle. No A/C, just a couple of floor fans, and it is very warm in the house. Not wanting to heat the house when making dinner yesterday I took a suggestion from the comments a while back on using canned tuna. I made a macaroni-tuna salad. It was very tasty, refreshing, and used the odd bits of this and that without feeling like a "leftover" meal.

To one can of tuna I added 2 ounces of cheddar, diced, 1 boiled egg, chopped, about 10 ounces of dry macaroni, cooked, 3 green onions, some lettuce and kale, the last of the green olives, 5 large cherry tomatoes, mayonnaise and lots of sweet pickle relish. I didn't have enough leafy greens to make beds under the salad, so I just chopped the greens and added them to the macaroni. It worked well. I prepared the salad early in the day and left it to chill until serving. No overheated kitchen for me!

Tonight, I'm making microwaved baked potatoes, topped with chopped, microwave-steamed kale, some diced ham and a cheese sauce. It should all go together quickly, and not create too much kitchen heat.

How about you? What are your favorite heat wave suppers?

7 comments:

  1. Although we're entering a cool snap (with flooding rains) it's typically very hot here during summers in the heartland. I like to cook a pot of whatever grain in the morning before it gets hot. Then I start a pot of pinto beans in the crock pot and let it cook on my patio to keep the heat out of the house. From this we make burritos, tostadas, burrito bowls, soft tacos etc. Just add shredded cheese, salsa, lettuce, whatever's in the fridge. I've also made quesadillas on the grill. Hope this helps.

    ReplyDelete
  2. We had pasta salad for dinner and lunch as well. Very refreshing when it is so hot outside. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Your salad looks very refreshing! We like tuna-pasta salad in Summer with lots of dill, chive/scallion, dried onion, black pepper. I never thought of serving it with the lettuce/greens inside.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Looks delicious for a hot or cold day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Looks good! So I had to go right into my kitchen and make a chicken pasta salad with a whole bag of mixed veggies. I throw a lot of dill in mine and an onion with mayo and mustard. No lettuce or greens in ours but I think I could serve it on a bed of lettuce if I needed to stretch the meal.

    Alice

    ReplyDelete
  6. Your dinner looks good! I wouldn't call myself a picky eater but am not a fan of pasta salad, sadly. But we eat a lot of regular salad when it's hot, sometimes alongside some rotisserie chicken from Sam's Club or other simple meat. Eventually, we get tired of not using the oven and use it despite the heat, LOL. We've been blessed this year to have only a few days over 100 so far, though much of August is left to go.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Tuna salad with pasta, mayonnaise style, is one of our favorite side dish salads. We were raised on a scoop of mac salad (often served w/o the tuna) and two scoops of white rice on our "plate lunches" (as they are called), still served anywhere around the islands if we desire this kind of comfort food (except these days, for the health conscious we may find toss salad and brown rice served instead. Just not the same!!)

    Hope you have a fantastic vacation!! You certainly could use a break from the hard work and diligence that you put into your daily schedule.

    Contrary to your weather, our summer so far has been very moderate. Not the usual so hot and sticky that some years are so unbearable. Just walking across the room would cause a sweat.

    Have a great day!!

    YHF

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for joining the discussion today. Here at creative savv, we strive to maintain a respectful community centered around frugal living. Creative savv would like to continue to be a welcoming and safe place for discussion, and as such reserves the right to remove comments that are inappropriate for the conversation.

FOLLOW CREATIVE SAVV ON BLOGLOVIN'

Follow
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Be a voice that helps someone else on their frugal living journey

Are you interested in writing for creative savv?
What's your frugal story?

Do you have a favorite frugal recipe, special insight, DIY project, or tips that could make frugal living more do-able for someone else?

Creative savv is seeking new voices.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

share this post