Daily salad

This salad is simple, tasty, healthy, easy to make, and easy to pack for lunch. Also, it is relatively cheap, compared with the pre-packaged salads from the stores. Here is what you need to buy:

1 iceberg lettuce

1 green or red or yellow pepper 

1 small onion (optional)

1 pint grape (or cherry) tomatoes

1 avocado

Parsley, oregano, and/or basil (fresh if possible, but dried is fine) 

Salt and pepper

These quantities make 4 portions of salad. If you need one portion only, you can divide the vegetables in 4, cut only one portion and refrigerate the rest.

Note that you will make not just your salad but many other recipes better if, instead of buying a jar of basil or parsley flakes, you buy a small basil or parsley plant and plant it in your garden. It will taste so much better you will wonder how you settled for dried leaves before, and at the end of the season you can pick any remaining leaves, dry them, and put them in a jar, and they will still be more flavorful than what you can buy pre-packaged in the spice aisle at your local supermarket.

Iceberg lettuce keeps better if you tear the leaves, instead of using a knife. After you cut the avocado, wrap it with cellophane, put it in a plastic container or a jar, and refrigerate it. You can place the rest of the onion and any leftover pepper in a jar in the fridge as well, as long as it is tightly closed. 

Also, you can use any other tomatoes, if you do not mind the liquid they leave in the salad.

Be creative and add any other vegetable if you like, e.g. broccoli, green beans, radishes, etc. I buy vegetables which are on sale and in season. Peppers in particular tend to be more expensive when they are not on sale.

Salad dressing:

Mix together in a bottle:

1/4 cup of vinegar

1/4 cup of water

1/2 cup of olive oil

If you want a more filling lunch, you can add 1-2 boiled eggs, 1-2 oz. (50 g)  Feta cheese, or bacon. Leftovers of ham or grilled chicken can also be added, as can olives, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Choose your own choice of protein!