Until recently, when I thought of the salad bar, I thought of the chance to exercise my "eyes bigger than my stomach" muscle, and to pay way more for my meal than I had anticipated. While that aspect of the salad bar remains true, I have rediscovered the salad bar as a wealth of ingredient opportunity for relatively little cost.
Sundried Tomatoes: In an attempt to copy the paralyzingly delicious namesake sandwich from the Red Onion in Burlington, Vermont, I was preparing "Red Onion" sandwiches for some lunch guests. The sandwich requires sundried tomato mayonaise. I have never been a big fan of sundried tomatoes and I knew that if i bought a container of them, they would go to waste, along with the money I used to buy them. Then I had a lightbulb moment: I could just grab a few off the salad bar! So for a few cents, I purchased all the sundried tomatoes I needed.
Pepperoni: Next was just last week when I needed pepperoni to make pizza paninis for a quick dinner. I knew I didn't want to purchase an entire package of pepperoni, so I headed to the salad bar and plucked out ten sices. Then I spyed grilled sliced chicken in one of the cubbies, and after confirming that it didn't taste gross, I added that to my container. I rounded out the shopping trip with ten small fresh mozzerella balls. I checked out with one container costing around $4. Along with pizza sauce, mushrooms and spices, the paninis were great. And I wasn't stuck with a whole package of pepperoni.
Shredded Carrots: I grabbed these to save time and effort, when I made my Improv Vegan Chili.
Check it out:
(http://whatiseeanddo.blogspot.com/2013/09/improv-vegan-chili.html)
So, next time you need a small amount of an ingredient that you probably will not use again, go grab it from the salad bar. You'll save money and valueable space in your fridge.
