Conference turris::cooks

	I bring alot of salads.  I put all the vegetables in a plastic
	container (this is the bowl) and I keep my lettuce in a baggie
	until ready to eat.  The salad dressing is kept in the fridge
	at work.  I usually bring a slice of bread or a dinner roll to
	have with it.  Most of these are fairly low calorie.  You can also
	prepare them the night before since they do take a bit longer
	than a plain old sandwich (just keep the lettuce separate).

	Some of my favorite salads :

	- combine 2-3T salsa, 1-2T low-fat yoghurt, chopped tomatoes,
	  chopped green peppers, other chopped vegetables, grated cheese
	  if you want, and shaved turkey.  I put this all in the bowl
	  and keep the lettuce separate.  The salsa and yoghurt serve
	  as the salad dressing.  Avocado is good too.  I sometimes 
	  bring tortilla chips with this one.

	- diced turkey, with diced green peppers and cukes.  Serve
	  with a dressing of soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger, and garlic.
	  The lettuce is optional with this one.  I sometimes have
	  two salads!  This one, and a tossed salad on the side.

	- Leftover chicken, shredded.  Shredded carrots and diced celery.
	  Lettuce.  Serve with a light blue-cheese salad dressing combined
	  with Franks Red Hot Sauce to taste.  Its sort of like buffalo
	  wings!

	- macaroni salad.  Cook tri colored rotini, toss with tons
	  of chopped veggies (carrots, onion, broccolli, zuchinni,
	  green peppers, black olives, etc.).  Toss the whole mix with
	  Kens Light Ceasar Salad Dressing (or Italian if you prefer).

	Karen

    I got tired of sandwiches years ago, so I always have leftovers.
    Of course, it is pretty easy to create leftovers when there are only
    two in the family, since it is usually as easy to make four servings of
    something as two; when you need to make a bigger amount than that you
    may not have a pan that big anyhow, or whatever.  So, lunch today was
    spinach fettucine with mushroom sauce, leftover from last night's
    supper.  Tomorrow I will have macaroni and cheese, which was Monday
    night's supper - had that for lunch yesterday so I wanted a different
    thing today!  I have a class on Monday nights, so that is always
    "casserole night", since food has to be prepared ahead of time and just
    popped in the microwave for a while, unless I want sandwiches for
    supper (ugh...).
    
    When we are going to be real busy and won't have time to prepare "real
    food" for supper, I try to make something ahead of time that will make
    a whole lot of leftovers, like a pan of lasagna, and freeze them in
    individual portions.  Of course this way you may not know for sure what
    you have for lunch (unless you are more careful about labelling things
    in your freezer than I am) until it thaws out, but that's OK.  If an
    "experiment" was unsuccessful enough that neither of us really wants to
    eat the leftovers anyhow, I don't bother to save or freeze them (and I
    mark the recipe in the cookbook as not being any good, so we don't try
    the same "experiment" again in the future!).
    
    Some things don't microwave real well, like leftover quiche (crust gets
    soggy), but most things don't even taste "leftover" that way.  Some
    stuff, like leftover soup, is pretty messy to cart in to work unless
    you heat it up before you leave home and put it in a thermos bottle.
    
    I used to eat yoghurt and granola and a piece of fruit for lunch, but I
    got sick of making granola (anyhow, the way I make it, it is far from a
    low-calorie or low-fat food, anyhow - but it's GOOD!!).  Of course,
    some people like ramen noodles for lunch - too salty for me!
    
    /Charlotte
                                                                        

    I'm not too keen on sandwiches, so I usually cook dinner and plan to
    have leftovers.  That way, when I'm cleaning up after dinner, I can
    just put the leftovers in lunch containers, and we have lunches for the
    next day.  For instance, today I have roast chicken with garlic
    potatoes (there's a great recipe for those in here somewhere). 
    For tomorrow, I have last night's leftovers which are veal in mustard
    and cream sauce (recipe also from this file) with rice and asparagus. 
    London broil makes a nice lunch, and usually the piece has enough so
    that there are leftovers.  I'm planning on making a prime rib for
    dinner on Saturday since we are having company, so I bought a large
    roast with plans for leftovers for lunches next week.
    
    Pasta of any sort makes a nice lunch and reheats well.  I've found that
    about the only thing we don't like leftover is stir-fry-type dinners. 
    I would think that by just cooking a bit extra with dinner, you could
    come up with some great leftovers that you like.
    
    Cathy

    Hi Linda!  Today I'm having homemade chicken soup.  I used the Dazey
    seal bags and have an electric wide mouth kettle.  Any boil
    in a bag item would work.  I also bring in salads.  These make for
    a decent lunch. Sandwiches can get monotonous.

    I too am sick of sandwiches for lunch, so here's a few suggestions:
    
    Browse thru the grocery store - they have wonderful items that you
    can now heat up in the microwave, like: Mrs Bud's chicken pies (they're
    fresh, not frozen) and if you want to get into frozen - there are
    tons of different meals you can choose from...  Also try soup, you
    know what they say: Soup is good food!! I personnaly will not eat
    a salad for lunch, I don't think it's filling enough...
    
    Also, If you want to take a sandwich for lunch, try something different
    with it - I just recently started buying sub rolls or bulkie rolls
    It doesn't really taste different, but for some reason I like it
    better in a roll (My husband thinks it's because it reminds of getting
    something out to eat rather than bringing your lunch...)HA!HA!
    
    Hope this helps!!
    
    S
    
    P.S. If you don't have a microwave in your office, sorry!!
    

    I bring my own lunch in quite often.  But I usually rely on the
    good old microwave.  What's good for lunch: any type of pasta with
    sauce, beef stew, soups, red beans & rice & cheese & scallions, ma-po
    tofu with rice, chili...  Just about anything with sauces will be good.  But
    you do have to get one of those plastic containers that are leak proof
    (Zayres' sell some that have a screw top instead of a snap top).
    
    As for sandwiches, I tried spreading hummus on French bread, or just
    bring in good french bread and assorted cheeses (like boursin). 
    Keeping the sandwich ingredients separate is also a good idea
    (especially if you hate soggly bread from the tomatoes or from the
    tuna).
    
    .-1  There are baked stuffed shrimp recipes in the notesfile.  Quite
         good ones, in fact.  I don't know off hand where they are, but
         if you have time, try doing a dir/title=shrimp or something, or
    	 I can look up the note # from my collection at home.
    
    
    Stella

    
    I got sick of sandwiches, too, so I started using floured tortillas
    for bread.    
    
    I stuff them with everything and roll 'em up.  You can make pizza
    type: pour pizza sauce, pepperoni, mozzarella...nuke it few minutes
    voila!  
    
    Other optins:
    		-soft tacos
    		- turkey/ham/roastbeef sandwiches (great warm too!)
    		  especially with Mayo & mustard.
    
    		- meatball
    		- I've even put chinese food in them
		- meatloaf
    		- lasagna
    		- tuna melt
    
    Not only easy but cheap! 
    
    K

    I bring my lunch to work nearly every day so I have a few suggestions.
    
    During the summertime I bring salads of all sorts - its really great 
    when the veggies are their freshest.  I make a big plastic container 
    of the basic salad - lettuce, tomatoe, carrot and cucumber, without 
    spices or dressing.  Then each day I put a good amount into a smaller 
    container and add different things such as tuna, boiled egg, cheeses,
    peppers, onions, leftover chicken etc.  This is really great because 
    the salad can last 3-5 days depending on what's in there and it's so 
    easy to just grab a little and "spice it up" that morning.
    I switch to yogurt and fruit a few times a week to break the monotony.
    
    During the fall and winter I depend on soups!  I still will make salads
    like mentioned above, but in smaller quantity.  I just make a big batch
    of minestrone, chicken, veggie or other kind of soup and then put it
    into small containers and freeze.  Sometimes I'll make 2 kinds of soup
    and freeze it all to double my choices in the morning.  If I remember
    to take it out to defrost the night before I'll have to keep it cool
    during the work day.  But I have found that if I take it out in the
    morning and leave it in my desk all day it's defrosted by lunch time. 
    Pretty convenient.
    
    Of course there's always leftovers that I bring in.   Just cook a
    little more the night before so you can have lumch for the next day.  
                                                             

Well, we've been conditioned for lunches. We've had a microwave oven in
the kitchen since 1973 (not the same one, naturally). Our first one was
an Amana RadarRange, and they place heavy emphasis on "planned-overs"
rather than leftovers in all their books. So, my wife's cooking habits
almost always produce far more servings of a recipe than we can eat at
one sitting. We have cabinets full of snap-top containers of every size,
and the refrigerator and freezer have lots of planned-over food in
various containers.

So, it's quite natural for me to bring in something to zap for lunch, and
equally natural for me to not understand the need for this question.
Realizing this was a revelation for me. We've become brainwashed to carry
food around in plastic thingies and zap something for lunch - or dinner -
or whatever.

The bottom line is, if there are two people in your household, cook for
more, and Tupperware it away for a future lunch.

Art

    With thanksgiving coming up, and many many turkeys about to be
    cooked, I thought I'd mention this.  
    
    I always freeze my leftover turkey, all except enough to go with
    the leftover stuffing and gravy for a few traditional post-holiday
    meals.  If you slice or cube the meat and freeze it in lunch-size
    amounts (3 ounces or so, for me), then you can bring that and a
    salad for lunch, plus some sort of bread (I like bagels).  By
    lunchtime the meat will be thawed.  A good zesty italian dressing
    goes nicely with turkey and salad.
    
    This solves the problem of needing "more than salad" for lunch.
    Salad plus meat (could be cubed ham or things like cheese, too)
    plus some sort of bread makes a lunch that will keep you full.
    Bring an apple or other fruit for mid-afternoon munchies, and
    you're all set.
    
    --Louise

How about making some special "leftovers" just for lunch.  Try some Tandoori
chicken.

Buy some Tandoori paste at an Indian/SEAsian Grocer (or make your own, recipe 
is elsewhere in this file).

Mix about 1/4 cup paste with 1/4 cup plain yogurt.  Place chicken parts in the
mixture and coat thoroughly.  These parts can be with or without skin or bones.
Boneless breasts work nicely as they require the least amount of hands on work 
(if you like to eat chicken with the fingers, tandoori causes the dreaded red
pistachio fingers).  Do this 1 day ahead.

Either grill or roast the chicken as you normally would.

This can be eaten cold along with or in a salad, or reheated with rice.

It's spicy enough to satisfy your garlic lust, but leaves you with a bit less
offensive breath.

    For a change of pace you might try one of these, with supplements
    of course, and a beverage:
    
    Peanut butter stuffed into an apple or celery sticks
    Cottage cheese in celery sticks or cucumber boats
    Tuna salad or egg salad in cucumber boats or stuffed in tomatoes
    Chicken or turkey wings or drumsticks
    Hard-cooked eggs
    A hefty soup                
    Chili                                
    Cheese hunks or slices                   
    Nuts - a variety including peanuts, cashews, almonds, etc.
     alone or with raisins, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, etc.
    
    I try to keep my lunches on the nutritious side!
                                                    
    Sheila