Lettuce Wraps for Lunch

Read this post if....

1. you're hungry

2. it's lunchtime

3.you'd like something not as heavy as a sandwich and not as wimpy as a salad

4. you miss Jimmy Johns lettuce wraps (what? you never tried one of their lettuce wraps? Go find one right now. Wait, you can't because you're in NY and Jimmy Johns has yet to make it's way over here? Ok, continue reading...)

5. you want something delicious and cheap

About twenty minutes ago, I was all of the above.  So I decided on lettuce wraps for lunch and am REALLY glad I did.  I think you'll like these!

What you'll need:

Romaine lettuce

Sandwich meat

Condiments

Sandwich toppings

Yes, these ingredients are purposely vague because this lunch basically just incorporates whatever you have in the fridge or whatever you feel like eating at the moment.

 Start out by cleaning two large romaine leaves

Add some condiments.  On the left leaf I put some spicy mayo (mayo+sriracha) and on the right, some dijon mustard.

Add some meat and/or cheese.  Hard salami on the left, and Swiss on the right.

Now it's time for the toppings!  Add some of whatever you like!  Roasted red peppers, sprouts and more meat! (I used turkey as well on the right one)

More toppings!  Thinly sliced cucumbers on the left, chopped jarred artichokes on the right.

Oh wow. These are good.

Some more ideas, especially for the vegetarians out there: add some avocados, grilled tofu, grilled zucchini, hot or banana peppers....

Enjoy!

Quick Leftovers Idea

Law students like me have little time, little money and very little energy to think about what to eat during the week.  Sunday night dinners are ideal for leftovers that I eat throughout the week in various forms.  

Here's an idea for when you have a little leftover (still delicious) steak and veggies from the night before:

Stack a little steak, asian slaw (basically cabbage with a little oil and rice wine vinegar) sliced cukes on top of your bread of choice.  Drizzle with leftover peanut sauce and spice it up with sriracha.  Fabulous, filling, and an excellent way to clean out your fridge.  

Besides being yummy, the sandwich also happened to pass my law school lunch test: 3 hours of property law reading without snacking.  

It is now on my go-to for week day lunch.

Chicken, zucchini and smoked mozzarella panini

For all of you that don't know me, I am a 22 year old law school student living in New York City on a law school budget, in a typical (read: small) apartment.  I love fresh, whole foods, trying new and weird dishes and experimenting in my kitchen, all of which are especially fun to do in the summer when farmers markets pop up around the city with fresh, cheap, and delicious produce.

I figured I'd start off my first blog post with today's lunch, a simple and easy panini that is absolutely delicious and easy to make, especially if you have either or both a George Forman grill or a grill pan.

The farmers market on my corner shows up on Wednesdays so on my way home from class, I picked up a few zucchinis--I will be so sad when the summer zucchinis are gone--and contemplated what I was going to do with them on the rest of the walk home.  As a student, I constantly make big batches of food on the weekend and make a variation of the same dish for the rest of the week.  This weekend, I had sauteed a bunch of chicken cutlets and had a few leftover, along with some smoked mozzarella I bought from the Amish Market in midtown.  They have an amazing assortment of cheeses at really reasonable prices!

I decided to grill the zucchini, and cut one small one into thin slices lengthwise (about a quarter of an inch thick).  I then grilled them on a grill pan (although the George Forman would have been a fine substitute) and let them cool off for a second while I slathered my thin, round bread  (I like Deli Flats, but this would be good on any type of bread) with honey mustard, and heated up my chicken quickly in the microwave.  When the chicken was heated through, I cut generous slices of the mozzarella to place on top of the chicken and bread and put an even amount of zucchini slices across the sandwich.  

The whole sandwich gets placed (gingerly--it's pretty big now) on the Forman grill, and it heats up in just a few minutes.  It is ready when the bread has nice grill marks and the mozzarella is bubbling.

This meal is pretty cheap and easy to make with leftovers; it happens to be delicious as well. Enjoy!