Once is Good, Twice is Better

This afternoon through tonight, for the second time this week we were at a friend's house for dinner and karaoke. This time dads weren't invited, as most of them were at work or out of town or both. So, four moms, myself and all the corresponding kids (10 of them) gathered for a very extended play date.

But this blog is about dinner so I'll get right to it. My friend's husband was out of town (remember, he was our chef the other day) so we ordered some Italian food from Marino's Pizzeria in Arlington Heights. It doesn't seem to have great reviews on line, but it was fine for us, because we didn't have to make it. Actually, I did make two things:

*banana peanut butter muffins
*southwest tuna salad (pictured above)

From Marino's, we had:
*cheese and pepperoni pizza for the kids
*eggplant parmigiana
*minestrone
*cavatelli with meat sauce (oops, I wanted cavatappi!)
*spaghetti carbonara
*rolls
*mugicha (barley tea) for me and the kids
*Corona for the rest of the ladies
*ice cream
*raisin sandwich cookies (these are not exactly what we had, but a pretty good representation)

Southwest Tuna Salad (recipe from the back of a Target tuna pouch)

8 oz. lettuce (romaine or another non-wilty type is best), washed and torn
7 oz. pouch tuna
1 cup black beans (I used the ones I cooked up the other day, canned would be fine)
1 cup corn (I used frozen)
1/2 cup ranch dressing
1/2 cup salsa
1/2 cup shredded cheese

For transporting this to my friend's house, I mixed all the ingredients together but the lettuce. I incorporated the lettuce (which wasn't just lettuce, but actually a salad leftover from the night before, so tomatoes, cucumbers, broccoli and celery, also a red pepper I diced in, were bonus ingredients) just before we ate. As for the amount of lettuce, if you don't have a scale, it's tough to know how much 8 oz. is. I weighed my salad and it was actually 14 oz. Even with 14 oz. of salad, I still felt like the rest of the stuff overpowered a bit. Next time, I would add even more salad, or maybe reduce the amount of ranch? In any case, my friends all really liked this salad, even though it wasn't so Italian, and I think you will too!