Cucumber, Tomato, and Chickpea Salad

[valoise]

I bookmarked this one over a year ago, but promptly forgot about it. I've been thinking about eating more salads for lunch and gave it a try. There are many similar salads online, but this one is at noblepig.com/2013/04/cucumber-tomato-and-chickpea-salad/


Cucumber, Tomato, and Chickpea Salad
2 large tomatoes , chopped
1 English cucumber. chopped
1 can chickpeas, drained
2 tablespoons finely chopped red onion
3/4 cup chilled seasoned rice vinegar (more or less if needed)
Freshly ground black pepper
In large bowl gently toss together tomatoes, cucumbers, onion, and chickpeas with seasoned rice vinegar. Let sit for 15 minutes to marinate, stirring a couple of times. Season with pepper and serve.

I really liked it. I hadn't used seasoned rice vinegar before and wasn't sure if it would have enough flavor on it's own, but it's fine. I didn't need to add any additional salt.

Italian Chicken Wraps

[fuzzyred]

It is afternoons for me once again, so I went with another lunch food this week. This recipe for Italian Chicken Wraps came from the Tasteofhome Contest Winning Annual Recipes 2010 cookbook.

( Recipe )

Thoughts and Variations
My regular grocery store didn't have an easily identifiable "stir-fry vegetable blend" so I have no idea what this recipe originally intended. My choices were a Thai-style stir fry blend, a Chinese-style stir fry blend, a Portuguese mix, an Italian mix, or a Parisian mix. Since these are "Italian" chicken wraps, I went with the Italian vegetable blend (which included sliced carrots, romano beans, zucchini, red bell peppers, and lima beans) and then prepared it using the pan fry instructions on the Thai package. I also could not find the ready-to-use chicken strips, so I sliced and pan fried two chicken breasts instead (it was a package of 4 chicken breasts weighing 28 ounces, so the two I used were hopefully about 14 ounces total, which is close to the amount in the recipe). I used reduced fat Zesty Italian dressing because that's what the store had, and I used a bit more than a quarter cup of Parmesan cheese, since I had to grate mine from a brick and that made easier measuring.

It came together pretty quickly and the most complicated part of this recipe was trying to find the packaged ingredients listed. I don't know that I made the best choice in vegetable blends, because they aren't my favourite vegetables, but they did seem to mix relatively well with the Italian dressing and the Parmesan cheese. The warm dressing was a nice change, although I'm not sure you actually need the whole 1/2 cup that the recipe states. There is a lot of flexibility in this recipe, and I could see using this as a starting point for all kinds of wraps in the future if I'm looking for a quick lunch that's not sandwiches.