Quick Wild Salmon Salad Dinner

This week, I am featuring healthy, home-cooked meals that can be prepared quickly and efficiently, from easy-to-source ingredients.

One of the most challenging aspects about parenting is feeding your family meals that are delicious and nutritiously nourishing, while also being quick. That means no refined white flour pasta, preservative-laden sauces or packaged side dishes. That would be the easy way out.

Eating clean often takes time, planning and lots of made-from-scratch ingredients. But it need not be a burden if your kitchen and pantry are prepared and stocked, ahead of time, for the most common vegetables and other essentials.

I am reminded of a quote by Louis Pasteur:

“Chance favors the prepared mind.”

This works in cooking as well as in business or personal matters.

My kids have come to expect restaurant-style cooking every night. But sometime the wife needs a break. Here’s a meal that she prepared in about 10 minutes. It was a hit, too!

• Canned wild salmon with mayonnaise, paprika and chopped yellow onion

• Romaine lettuce and chopped red onion with olive oil and vinegar

• Sliced candy stripe beets (we almost always have some steamed beets on hand)

• Watermelon radish slices (this one is a favorite of our 7-year-old)

We purchased the wild salmon, organic olive oil and organic apple cider vinegar from Costco (all Kirkland). Everything else was purchased at the Larchmont Village farmer’s market in Los Angeles, from vendors including Underwood Farms and Sunrise Farms.

What are some quick and healthy meals that you’ve prepared for your family lately? Where did you buy the raw materials?