We've all been there - when you are determined to meal prep and put out the best serving of health for every meal on the table, the phase during which your convictions and efforts seem too strong to now turn back into the old you - and yet you miserably fail after that one single bowl of salad that took up all your time and ingredients that you had stocked up for the week. It is not as easy as drizzle on some olive oil and toss it up, when it comes to making the humblest of salads. I have struggled with trying to understand where the time and vegetables disappear off to, when a salad is on the home menu. This piece of writing is thus more to vent my frustration, than to hail the healthy salad - which in the end turns out to be really good after all (and looks gorgeous, to say the least).
I remember making my first salad. After some experience of observing how well some ingredients combined effortlessly into making a tasty bowl, I worked up the courage to try my hand at the act. I was sure it would be the easiest thing to do, as entailed in all the recipes I had researched upon to find the perfect one I had wanted to make. Time (and a lot of it, at that) would teach me that reading about making a salad, and the process itself, were as different as water and wine. And yes we could go into how water was indeed turned into wine, but let's understand that it takes a whole lot of mercy from above to get there. And though my first was a simple Greek Salad, one that promises to take hardly any time with its humble ingredients, only the clock had the nerve to help me see the truth that I was so blind to. We do not live in a world (as yet), where vegetables peel and cut themselves into cubes and slices to just 'drizzle and toss'. And that is the thorn we need to accept with salad that looks as pretty as a blooming rose in the centre of the dining table.
Time has passed since the first, and I am comfortable in my own skin when it comes to 'tossing it up'. However, this came with a pinch of salt (to the wounds) after the first, that the process is not easy, and that it consumes everything you have. Once you accept it though, your expectations are low, and the results are great, because you might even have some leftover tomatoes that you did not have to deplete after all! I want to document the struggle here, so that years later when I look back on my early days, I will be reminded of how much I have grown, and appreciate the lessons I learnt, when I made, what I thought was, the easiest salad to put together in time for lunch.
I had filled in the sheet of meal prep planning template for the week, and was pleased with the achievement. I had amazing things on it to make, such as grilled chicken, salads (yes, in the plural), oatmeal and smoothies for breakfast and the like. It appeared wholesome though frugal in the number of dishes, and extremely healthy. I could see the week ahead filled with energy, thanks to the carefully planned meals I was about to eat. With this vision in my head, I picked out the ingredients from the supermarket, quite astonished to see how expensive eating healthy would turn out to be, with dried berries and nuts that seemed to cost a lot more than what I had in mind. Nevertheless I told myself that this was an investment that would last over many meals. On hindsight, I should have known better since the packet size was not very impressive - maybe there was some wishful thinking involved.
Since I like salads refrigerated, I decided to begin my work with making a great salad that would be full of healthy ingredients. I also believed that it would be the easiest and least time consuming, since it was a simple cut and mix together process, with a basic dressing. Chopping up vegetables is something I like to do, except for the onion, which does not provide much of a pleasurable experience, as we all know. The cucumbers, tomatoes, chillies and lettuce are often cut with care and patience, a therapeutic journey for me. And the same goes for when I use my inspiring strokes of genius, to create the dressing. The only problem is that I take ages to do this, as I was about to discover soon. I started the creation process by mid-morning, with the aim of finishing it off in a few minutes and popping it in the fridge . I took care in washing the ingredients, enjoying the freshness of the water droplets on the greens. I used my priced wooden chopping board too, to add to the pretty picture that was painting itself in my kitchen. All of it looked lovely, and I knew I had quite some alone-time ahead, of wellness.
As I started chopping the onions and cucumbers, I realised that holistic peace was time consuming. By the end of a while, I had a small pile chopped up, including a slightly grazed cut on my finger, thanks to the tomatoes. I was slightly let down by how long this was taking, but told myself that time spent on a single task is subjective, and that I should not let my depreciating self-esteem take a hit on my productivity. I tried to multi-task at that point, so that I could make up for lost time. I microwaved the frozen corn, though the packet stated explicitly that it should thaw without an oven. I also took out the bottles of jalapeno and black olives to add in. I was excited by then to add the roasted sunflower seeds, some dried berries and my all time favourite chia seeds on top, but knew that I had a long way to go to get to that point. By the time I finished chopping the lettuce, I was appalled to see the little clock on the counter, which seemed to have entered a future time dimension. How was it possible that I spent so long just to make a salad, out of all things simple? And let's not forget that I was not even near the 'tossing' part of the process. I was unhappy with this fact, but continued a bit disgruntled nevertheless. I made the dressing, whisking together the olive oil and balsamic vinegar. This also involved a wasted trip to the fridge because for some strange reason, I thought I had the vinegar in there. I added some apple cider vinegar too, to make up for being absent-minded about it, though looking back, I am not sure how that helped. I proceeded to mix in the salt and pepper, with the pepper mill taking longer than it should to grind the required amount. I must have satisfied the continued efforts of time to show me up, by taking an unbelievable amount of time to peel a few pods of garlic to crush for the dressing. After putting together a satisfactory dressing, which helped to elevate my sinking mood, I kept it aside, ready to be poured on in the end.
I thought of adding some grated carrot into the bowl for a new twist to it, but was aghast when I realised that carrots were the only thing left in my fridge, despite spending many hours in the supermarket to shop for the week! I did not understand where I went wrong in my judgement, as I seemed to have either over-used everything I bought, or perhaps not bought enough to last a week. The only things left out were an overload of onions, one tomato, and some lettuce which would not last for even a small bowl of salad. Perhaps a sandwich, I told myself, but knew inside that once out of sight, it would be forgotten till it went rotten to no good. I huffed back to the counter, to finish the salad, with a sinking thought inside that I had nothing left for the week, after so much of meal planning. It was quite a comedy of errors, but I did not find it very funny at that point. An added horror was when I saw the pile in the washing sink that I would have to tackle. It was amazing how one deep bowl of a dish could casue such a mess. My salad came out quite well eventually, despite consuming everything from the shopping basket like a hungry monster! My husband and I enjoyed it for a day and a half, after which the bowl too got empty. And with that, came the demise of my meal plan for the week, and probably the next many weeks, since I took a while to get over the lack of success.
Time, while it passes so quick at the moments we least want it to, does have its good qualities too. It heals, like nothing else can. And with the passage of this slippery thing, I got over my disappointments and was geared up to giving it another shot. I like to think I never give up till I achieve what I want to, even if it takes a lot of time (again, time asserts its importance). And thus my efforts continued. I have learnt a lot, including the importance of acceptance of reality and levels of efficiency, as well as the truth on how practice makes perfect. For instance, I have become adept at peeling garlic, compared to my earlier clumsy attempts that only resulted in garlic clumps under my fingernails, and two hours spent on a single pod. And thus continues the learning curve, with some surprising twists on the way. And while none of us can adhere to constantly being perfect, the good news is that the final product of all the efforts - that beautiful bowl of salad - everytime, makes it worth the while (except of course when you have to order takeout yet again because your fridge is empty)!
