Im-pulse Salad

Do you ever find yourself wandering around the supermarket, and you notice a product you've never seen before, and pick it up, thinking "Oooh, that looks good. I'm sure I could use that for something yummy". Such impulse buys are all very well, but more often than not, I find that they sit for weeks, drifting ever farther back in the fridge, neglected.  And many times, when they surface, they get thrown out when you realize it is already several weeks after the best before date. Hopefully that's not just me.

The most recent such impulse buy was this:

I say 'recent', but these poor neglected lentils have actually been sitting at the back of the fridge behind the yoghurt for a number of weeks. Fortunately, judging by the use-by date, they keep for months, thanks to the technological benefits of vacuum packaging. So, having found them today, I took advantage of this and decided to actually use them, lest those poor lentils feel completely unloved.

Having removed them from the package, I was obviously thrilled to discover they were quite possibly one of the least attractive items in my fridge. Quite frankly, once freed from their plastic haven, they plopped into the bowl resembling something like a brick, a brick the green-brown-black color of the puddles that my dog inexplicably likes to drink from while out walking. Fortunately, unlike the puddles, they were at least odorless. But you could build houses from these bricks they are so dense. Undetered, I managed to use my fingers to gently prise the lentils apart and ended up with a slightly more attractive bowl of lentils (although still the color of stagnant puddles). It was a step in the right direction, no doubt, but they were still not exactly screaming "Eat me". So I raided my fridge and gave them a makeover worthy of Ty Pennington by coming up with the following concoction, which I have to say is pretty tasty, and not at all unattractive. I have no doubt that at least one child will need a full detailed list of all ingredients before venturing to taste a forkful, but I am reasonably confident that with full disclosure, they will all eat it. And if not, my lunch tomorrow is sorted!

If nothing else, this salad is a lesson in the potential of impulse buys, not to mention the potential of pulses, hence the name I've given the dish. Remember what I said about the Brits and puns? Ha! Best to just humor us, seriously...

Im-pulse Salad

Salad:
1 package of steamed lentils (Trader Joes' package is 17.6oz - if you can't get this, just cook up some green lentils in roughly the same quantity)
1 15.5oz can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
5 oz grape tomatoes, quartered
3 spring onions, finely sliced
1 TBSP fresh chives, snipped
3 TBSP finely chopped fresh dill
4 oz soft goat cheese, crumbled

Vinaigrette:
3 fl oz olive oil
2 TBSP red wine vinegar
1 tsp dijon mustard
1/4 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper

1. Mix together all of salad ingredients except for goat cheese.
2. Make vinaigrette by whisking together ingredients. Add about 1/4 of the vinaigrette to the salad. That is all you will need, to my taste anyway, but the rest is great on a green salad!
3. Gently fold through the goat cheese.