Long Time No Update + Garden Meal College Hack

Hello everyone! Oh well, it's been exactly five months since I last updated this blog. (last updated: 6 July 2014) Sorry peeps! The second semester had been really crazy and hectic, so I could barely spare some time to blog, let alone figuring out new ideas for painting, etc.! (Um, the ideas are actually spent on my assignments)

So here I am, still alive, still breathing, with a peaceful zen ambiance around me because guess what, it is the school holidays!

Without further ado, let me share the easiest college meal ever. In fact, it can be as complicated or as easy as you wish.

SALAD.



Now I know what you might be thinking. "Salad? Uh no, not again!" what comes to your mind? Boring? A bed of greens? Diet food? Be glad to know that you are wrong. Blame that on the restaurants which serve salad as a bed of iceberg lettuce topped with two slices of sad tomatoes. In fact, the possibilities of salads are literally endless. You can make a salad with a spectrum of veggies, delicious fruit salad topped with marshmallow and cream for an ambrosia (okay that's unhealthy, but fruit ambrosia exists!), pasta salad... the possibilities are endless! In fact, one can easily turn an innocent salad sinful by loading it up with fatty toppings like mayonnaise, bacon, cheese, candied pecans...

  

But... these should be healthy. They are salads after all, right? (Pictures taken from Google)


OH HANG ON THERE.

What am I supposed to talk about? Oh yea, DORM-ROOM FRIENDLY SALADS! By dorm-room friendly, I mean salads which can be made with minimal tools(e.g. just knife, spoon, fork and fruit peeler), and without electrical appliances apart from kettle. Yes, I mean salads which can be made without rice cooker, slow cooker, blender etc. and even refrigerator!


In fact, given the right tools, right materials, ample time and a creative mind, salads can even become works of art!

    

  

All pictures are sourced from Google Images.

Being a student, I usually don't care about decorating my salads though. As much as I would love to have salads-in-a-jar as cheap college lunches every single day, I have no refrigerator to store my dressings and produce. Hence, my salads will be made with simple ingredients which can be easily consumed by one person or two, last for at least a day under room temperature, require little preparation besides washing and can be easily assembled.

On the plus side, the need for simple ingredients calls for a relatively healthy salad too, unless if you fill your salad with stuff like frankfurters, fish balls, a ****load of oily dressing, etc.

Let's get to the ingredients shall we?

Fruits

• Apple
• Orange
• Pear
• Banana
• Avocado (best shared among four people due to the fat content)
• Kiwi
• Pitaya/Dragon fruit
• All types of berries (strawberries, blueberries, raspberries etc.) 

Note that the berries should be consumed on the day of purchase and a box of berries makes two to three servings. In Malaysia, the smallest box of strawberries weighs 250g; the other berries 125g. Local strawberries (those from Cameron Highlands) are significantly cheaper than their imported counterparts too, although I must admit that the imported strawberries are larger and sweeter.


Vegetables

• Broccoli (I recommend buying small head of broccoli which weighs 300g and below because it can be easily eaten at one sitting)
• Tomato
• Carrot
• Pumpkin (buy the pre-cut one because you can't finish a whole pumpkin in a day unless if you are prepared to feed 10 friends)
• Baby corn
• Cabbage (again, buy the pre-cut one. 300g of cabbage serves four or five college mates)
• Baby spinach
• Bok choy (best blanched)
• Cucumber/zucchini (can be used for low carb veggies pasta as shown here. Mine's quite gross though, much apologies!)
• Salad greens (Coral, Butterhead, Romaine etc.)

Add-ons

• Nuts (any nut is okay)
• Seeds (any seed is okay)
• Goji berries
• Dried fruits
• Braised Tofu (If you can get one; my campus is near to Tesco so Ican get it from the food court. Crumbled, this goes well with vegetable salad and should be eaten as soon after purchase)
• Canned beans (good for three to four servings, per can. Rinse before using to remove the excess sodium)
• Chia seeds
• Oats, cooked (can serve as dressing too. 1 tbsp of oats goes along way)
• Sesame seeds
• Spices
• Roasted nori sheets, torn into pieces

Dressing

• Sesame oil (oil)
• Olive oil (oil)
• Apple Cider Vinegar (acid)
• Brown Rice Vinegar (acid)
• White Vinegar (acid)
• Lemon juice
• Yogurt (If you consume dairy. For nondairy option, try to find soy yogurt, coconut yogurt etc. I personally have not seen nondairy yogurt yet)
• Soy sauce (combined with sesame oil and brown rice vinegar for a full Asian flavour!)
• salt and pepper if you want to make vinaigrette with an oil and acid

I recommend you to go crazy with the vegetables and fresh fruits, because they are filled with fiber, vitamins and minerals, and low in calories. Dark leafy greens pack a hefty protein, calcium and iron punch too. Nuts and seeds are good but watch the portion sizes. You can check the nutrition information for nuts, seeds and beans here.


You can see the samples of my salads in these links:

http://sharonnghy94.blogspot.com/2014/09/aint-no-ramen-in-college.html
http://sharonnghy94.blogspot.com/2014/07/this-is-what-i-call-big-breakfast.html


Here are my recent ones to get you drooling... Hee hee.







You can go with any creation that you fancy! Here, I have veggie salads and fruit salads. As for the second picture, I turned my salad into fruits with chocolate dip. The "dip" is made of chocolate beverage mix and chia seeds.

See, you can be really creative with your salads even if being confined in college where no fancy kitchen appliance is allowed.



Zucchini noodles, a.k.a. zoodles, where you make "noodles" with a vegetable peeler (image from Google)

For example,as aforementioned, you can make pasta out of carrot, cucumber and zucchini. Here are some pictures from Google Images to get you inspired. Sure, most of the sauces call for a blender, but let us just be grateful and be resourceful with what we have.

  

  

  


Of course you can have fruit salads with or without dips as dessert, make Asian veggie salads, Fruit and veggie mixed salads, lettuce cups, etc. The sky is the limit.

Eat your rainbow and save money from eating out. Have fun with your endless salad creations!