avocado salad and bachelor antipasta plate

are you tired of the same old peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for dinner night after night? would you like to have a nice bowl of cereal, but the milk is curdled? ...which brings me to the most difficult part of these recipes: gathering up the nerve to open the refrigerator.

(btw, where in the cornbread hell is the "d" in "refrigerator" and if that's the deal, lord, why does it unceremoniously show up in "fridge"? ??

that D should be more Tenacious.) 

did you listen to that? 

if not, do not even bother to read any further...

because this is just a tribute to the greatest refrigerator in the world!

AVOCADO SALAD for one:

the key here is to live where you can get a good avocado. (if you live in the hinterlands, substitute with toshiba apples or beef jerky.)

-slice your avocado in 2 and eat 1/2 of it with salt, pepper (and lime if you have it).
-place other 1/2 of avocado aside.
-open refrigerator and remove that mushy head of lettuce.
-remove mushy parts of lettuce.
-place unmushy parts on a plate.
-open fridge (again) and locate some old salad dressing. (the older the better. possibly the 'creamy cilantro' that wasn't as good as it sounded when you bought it, but it's better now, i promise.)
-pour a little* dressing on your lettuce** and mix with a fork.
open fridge again.
-find leftover parmesan cheese from your last pizza delivery and dump a little bit or a lot on.
-spoon out other 1/2 of avocado on top.
-add salt & lots of pepper.

and that's it. it's real good. if you happen to have carrots or onions in the refrigerator, don't add them to this particular salad. it's a total waste of time, but you can eat them while you cook.

and for you meat eaters, here's a great dish to go along with that one in case you didn't have enough unmushy lettuce for the salad to fill you up.

BACHELOR ANTIPASTA PLATE:

-open fridge (i know...i'm sorry!) and locate and remove any pizza less than 3 1/2 weeks old.
-while you're at it, locate and remove the container of sliced jalapenos that came with the pizza. and any old bologna that may be under the egg carton.
-(if there are eggs in the egg carton, extract them, too. because you can always add a fried or boiled egg to almost anything, especially salads and antipasta plates.)

-fry a slice or 2 of bologna. (or any available lunch meat or spare venison backstrap or sausage if you're real lucky.)
-scrape off the pizza toppings onto the fried bologna. (toss the crust. in the trash. it's too chewy when microwaved and it's most likely tasteless, anyway.)
-add jalapenos and nuke it all for a while. 

(tip: "a while" is sorta like "a dash" or "a pinch." i find 123 is a pretty universal microwave cooking time except for reheating cold coffee as it makes the cup too hot to hold.)

oh! & i almost forgot.

you're gonna have to open the fridge one more time to look for some more salad dressing. if you have any old italian dressing you're in luck big time. slosh some on top of your bachelor antipasta plate and you can call it, "deluxe.".

i have more great recipes to share. (but being the slacker that i am, i probably won't.)

or as the paraphrased french say... "enjoy, say la bone a pete."


* this is a tricky one. i can't really help you much, but suffice to say, too much dressing drenching is irreversible even if you have more stuff to add to the salad. if you get your lettuce too soggy, revert to the usual pb&j dinner.

** if you have some saltine crackers in little plastic packets that you got from a restaurant...crumble them up (before you open the packet) and pour them on the lettuce at this point of the preparation. (this "can" also work to "sort of" alleviate the above mentioned culinary snafu.)