Cheap. Fast. Good! Salad

Has anyone heard about Border's going out of business? Well, they are. I was at the mall and decided to stop in to see their massive going out of business sale when I found this book. 

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You can buy it at Amazon. Mine was on sale for about $8 and I used up a very old gift card so it was free. I don't know who Beverly Mills and Alicia Ross are but the title and recipes looked interesting. The emphasis is really on cheap and fast cooking for the family. There are even short articles about affording food for a family of 4. Very useful information. I have not had time to try recipes from the book yet but I did get to try a salad dressing recipe with a salad I made to eat during my class break.

Step 1: peel, devein, and season shrimp. I used salt, pepper, and a cajun seasoning but you can use anything.

Step 2: cook in a little bit of oil on a pan. You can see that I bit off the tail of the shrimp on the bottom to taste test and it was deelish!

Step 3: My salad was made of butter lettuce, green onion, and clementine wedges. It was really a salad made of whatever I had at home. I would've liked to add cucumbers and some nuts for crunch too if they were available.

Step 4: make the dressing. I'm not going to reveal any proprietary information because I used the recipe from the book, with some tweaking. Basically olive oil, balsamic vinegar, some seasoning, and chopped garlic. I added some coconut vinegar too.

I brought the shrimp, dressing, and salad in separate containers to class and assembled in the big tupperware the salad was in. Shake shake shake and you're done. The school does not have a microwave and I'm tired of buying the cold turkey wraps on campus. I've gotten creative with my salads for class. I have to consider foods that will still be tasty (and safe to eat) when they're cold. I must say, this was one of my most satisfying dinners on campus, EVER! Thanks to the cajun seasoning on the shrimp and the dressing from the cookbook. I'm pretty sure my breath was oniony and garlicky because there was alot of that in the salad but no one noticed, did they?

It was also someone's birthday and a classmate brought in bundt cakes from Nothing Bundt Cakes in Los Gatos. I've had these before and they're so good. There's a different filling in each cake. A great alternative to cupcakes.