Summer meals

As it turns out, I am not a gourmet cook. To complicate matters, Trey and I have very different food preferences. He is a meat man and starch man. Doesn't care for green foods. I could live off of humus and vegetables. And mexican. And ice cream.

And then there's Jones.

The kid likes to eat. But not just anything. He has expensive taste: Greek yogurt, fresh fruit (currently on a blueberry and kiwi kick) and cheese. The only vegetable he will eat comes in a pouch. You know, the baby food that is about $1.50 a pop. A buy them in bulk because it makes me feel better about his lack of vegetables. And meat? Only if it's ground very finely and in something like spaghetti or tacos.

As you can see, this poses a problem for meal planning.

Throw in busy schedules and the hot Mississippi summers, and I pretty much avoid the oven for months.

So I am on a quest: light, fresh, easy summer meals that is pleasing to my whole family.

Enter Pinterest.

Goodness, I love Pinterest.

I saw a recipe for poppyseed chicken salad. All three of us love poppyseed chicken casserole, so I gave it a shot.

Poppyseed Chicken Salad
Source: myrecipes.com

I loved it. Trey thought it was good, but he was hungry two hours later. (I think he would have preferred it on a sandwich with a bag of chips on the side.) Jones picked through it, ate the fruit and some of the chicken then demanded "booooberry and yaaaguuurt".

I considered it a success.

You can find the recipe HERE.

I altered it a bit for ease and personal taste:

I used Tyson pre-cooked, pre-chopped chicken.  I added diced green and red grapes, strawberries and chopped pecans, then stirred in the Poppyseed dressing.  I found that the fat free dressing was super watery, but the light version looked creamier with only 1 gram of fat. (I think it was Ken's Steakhouse brand) It was a good choice.  Kinda tangy. I just added enough until it looked good.  Then I put a big scoop over a bed of romaine lettuce. 

It was really good.  A different take on the traditional chicken salad and it took 10 minutes to have the meal on the table. 

So there you go. Not exactly mind-blowing or revolutionary, but it's a summer meal.  Would be yummy by the pool with crackers or pita.

Happy summer eating.  Hope you stay away from the oven as well.