Red Bean Salad

As much as I despise Mondays they are the day when I get to do all of my grocery shopping for the week.  Who am I kidding I grocery shop everyday, but Mondays are the day when I do most of the shopping. I was pretty proud of myself today I came in waayy under the grocery budget and got quite a bit of stuff which hopefully will last us most of this week. Haha I can only dream

First stop on my shopping trip was Good Foods Co-op where I picked up most of my produce. I love shopping at Good Foods because almost all of the products they carry are natural, organic, whole foods and many of them come from local farmers/producers. It makes me feel good to know that my money is staying in the community plus many of their items are actually cheaper than shopping at Whole Foods.

I picked up zucchini, organic cage free chicken, triple bean blend, cute little jars, butternut squash, almond milk, avocados, eggs, loose leaf sencha green tea, wheat berries, chickpeas, coconut, sprouts, kale, mustard greens, parsley, cilantro, cucumber, clementines, red cabbage, granny smith apples, ginger root, and canned tuna in oil. Everything except the clementines, ginger, and almond milk were organic and I spent around $60 bucks, not too bad right?  While I was shopping I got hungry and headed over to check out the prepared foods bars and see if anything struck my mood. I’ve always heard its never good to shop while you’re hungry so I figured I would take care of my little problem right away! After browsing the salad bar for quite awhile I finally settled on a kidney bean salad which I was blown away by. Composed of red beans, balsamic, olive oil, salt, pepper, scallions, walnuts, carrots, and feta cheese I was not expecting too much but figured it was the best choice in the salad bar to calm my hunger.

After inhaling the salad as soon as I got to my car (yes I keep spoons in my car for these kind of emergencies) I headed to Kroger to pick up a few more things which included almond milk, clementines, eggs, and chicken. While browsing  Krogs to see what kind of deals they had I could not stop thinking about how awesome that bean salad was and I decided I could attempt to recreate it myself instead of paying the $7.99/lb price tag every time a craving hit. Speaking of cravings, i’m obsessed with strawberry sencha green tea and cannot find it anywhere.  has anyone tried/ bought it before? Anyways I returned home from shopping, photographed my groceries (doesn’t everyone do that) put them away, and got to work on my new favorite salad.

Red Bean Salad

adapted from Good Foods

Ingredients:

1 can red beans

1/4 c walnuts, toasted

1 green onion

1/2 large carrot, shredded

2 tbsp feta cheese

3 tbsp balsamic vinegar

1-2 tbsp olive oil

salt

pepper

Directions: Drain and rinse beans and pour them into a large bowl. In a skillet toast the walnuts over medium low heat for about 5 minutes. Shred carrot, chop scallion and combine in the bowl with the beans. Drizzle with oil and balsamic and add salt and pepper to taste. Top with feta cheese and serve!

Gather your ingredients, kidney beans, walnuts, carrot, green onion, balsamic and feta.

Drain and rinse beans, grate carrot, chop up onion and toss together in a bowl. Drizzle with oil and balsamic, sprinkle with salt and pepper, top with cheese, and serve!

Ahh imagine my relief when I tasted this salad and it was IDENTICAL to the original, maybe better if thats even possible! I was in heaven too bad there isn’t any left for tomorrow, I have a feeling it will be even better the next day. Looks like ill be heading back to Kroger to pick up some more red beans hey at least I tried!

Don’t forget you have until Friday to enter my awesome giveaway and if you add me to your blogroll or mention my giveaway in a post you get an extra entry!

Time to get some work done before I fall asleep, today wiped me out!

Have a good night.