Have Lunch with Me: Shrimp Salad!

Have Lunch with Me: Refreshing Shrimp Salad!

This is another light and easy lunch that this housewife adores!  It's my go-to in the summertime when I want light and cool fare.  

No hot oven or stove! Filling! No guilt! Ready in minutes!
Perfection!

I always have frozen shrimp on-hand for little lunches like this one.  I buy them on sale, usually buy-one-get-one-free.  I also always have an assortment of veggies since I feed a nice variety to my birds and guinea pigs.  They love when I make a salad because there's always little leftover bits that they get as a mid-day snack.

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Shrimp - 1 dozen, large, pre-cooked, frozen, tail on, peeled, de-veined

Dressing - 1T Lighthouse Homestyle Ranch

Romaine lettuce - 2 leaves torn into bite-sized pieces

Broccoli florets

Carrots - shredded

Snow peas - cut in half width-wise

Sea Salt & Freshly cracked black pepper

I wash all my veggies the day I get home with them from the market so that's one step of prep that's already done!

I put the frozen, pre-cooked shrimp into a colander in the sink and rinse them with cold water for a few seconds, give them a swirl and rinse again and let sit while I continue prep.

I get the rest of the veggies ready.  The lettuce gets torn into pieces and placed in the bottom of the bowl.  Layered ontop are the snow peas, broccoli florets, and shredded carrot.

Then I rinse the shrimp some more.  By this time they shouldn't have ice on them.

I put the vegetable trimmings into the compost bin, put anything extra away and get a small plastic storage container out.

The shrimp should be thawed by now (I give them a pinch to make sure they aren't icy inside), this should be about 5 minutes after prep started.  I lay the shimp out on the counter beside the sink ontop of a few layers of paper towels and I give them a firm press with another dry paper towel.  When they seem almost dry I take a dry towel in my hand and gently squeeze each shrimp one by one and place them into the plastic storage container .  I need the shrimp to be nice and dry so the dressing will adhere to them and not be a watery mess.

The dressing is added on top of the shrimp in the container and I add a few shakes of sea salt (or kosher, but never table salt) and a couple of grinds of fresh black pepper.  Then I put the lid on and shake gently to coat the shrimp in the dressing and seasonings.   

Then I place each shrimp on top of the salad bed.  I definitely prefer to dress just one component of my salad instead of the whole thing so there is never a puddle of dressing in the bottom or the risk of the salad being over-dressed.  It's also handy for portion/calorie control if that's a concern.