The Weekly Salad. . .or My Salad Days?

As I mentioned in my first post, I've been thinking about blogging for quite a while. After deciding that the topic of this blog would be the art of the salad, I immediately knew what to call it: "My Salad Days." According to the all-knowing Wikipedia, the term "salad days" is an idiomatic expression referring to one's youth or heyday. The expression originated in Shakespeare's Anthony and Cleopatra. Why do I know this underused, somewhat obscure expression? Simple, my dad has a wide vocabulary and often includes in his speech underused, somewhat obscure expressions.

"My Salad Days" would be the perfect title for this blog. Certainly, no one else would think of this title for a blog! Boy, was I wrong. I tried several versions of the title: "My Salad Days," "The Salad Days," but they were all taken. Interestingly, all of the salad days blogs I visited seemed to be about youth or heydays. None of them were about salad.

I was ready to begin blogging, but I lacked a title. Thankfully my husband swooped in and suggested "The Weekly Salad." And guess what? It was available! Huzzah! For those less in the know than my political historian husband, "The Weekly Salad" is a play on The Weekly Standard, a weekly conservative magazine and blog. Let me be clear, I am in no way conservative and "The Weekly Salad" has nothing to do with politics.  (Really, can you imagine a conservative regularly eating salad as meals? Never! Meat and potatoes for the conservatives; salads are meant to be appetizers and side dishes.) The name just sounded right, and my goal with the blog is to post a new salad recipe each week. Get it? A weekly salad. In short, no politics here. With that, I give you a very liberal salad recipe. It involves leftover Mexican food, which clearly means we should open the borders.

Leftover Mexican-Polenta Salad

I hate wasting food, especially when leftovers can be combined into a delicious salad. In the fridge, I had a container of left over asiago-kale-broccoli polenta and black beans, shredded cheddar and salsa from a recent Mexican takeout order. (Have you ever been to New York's many Chinese-owned Mexican takeout restaurants? They are amazing and feel healthier than the standard Mexican takeout place.)

I combined about three-fourths of the polenta you see here with the black beans, cheddar, a few tablespoons of the salsa and half a head of chopped romaine. I planned to chop the polenta into cubes, but it was pretty crumbly. I just tossed it in with everything else and mixed. Voila!

Another re-purposed success!