Spaghetti & Vegan Meatballs

Today's lunch is a great example of utilizing leftovers that would have normally been wasted and combining them with some new items to produce the exact lunch that I wanted to bring today. Last night, when I started thinking about today's lunch, I decided that I would like to have spaghetti. I didn't really want to fix spaghetti for dinner last night though, so I looked in the fridge, made a few discoveries and this is what I did.

I made pizza the other night so I spotted some leftover pizza sauce in the fridge. Normally, I end up throwing this out. But last night I thought, "Hey, that could be spaghetti sauce!" And sitting on top of the container of pizza sauce was a small container of a few unused sliced mushrooms, also from pizza night. It was all starting to come together. I simply cooked up a small amount of pasta, threw the mushrooms into the pizza sauce, um, I mean spaghetti sauce, and topped the whole thing off with 3 Nate's Zesty Italian Meatballs. They're vegan, and quite tasty. I would like to try making my own vegan meatballs one of these days, but last night I was just interested in convenience. And if you're interested in the pizza sauce recipe, it can be found here. It's my favorite pizza sauce recipe because it is so yummy and so simple to make. And now I've discovered that it makes a good pasta sauce too.

I made a quick salad with some baby greens and filled the small blue container with some Ken's Lite Raspberry Walnut Vinagrette dressing. This stuff is delicious.

I finished the lunchbox with some pieces of garlic toast which I made by simply spreading some Earth Balance on some wheat bread, sprinkling it with some garlic salt, and then toasting it until it was nice and crunchy.

Now that I look at the picture of today's lunch, I can see a missed opportunity. I usually try to make my lunch look as nice as I can because it makes me feel good about my lunch when I can open it and see a nice layout, but it also helps to impress people who might be looking over your shoulder when your standing around the microwave at work and can help you spread the word that veganism can be delicious, pretty and fun. Well, when I do this lunch again, I think that next time I will add one more little blue container (like the one that the dressing is in, I have an extra one) and put it down there in that empty space at the bottom of the toast and fill it with some vegan parmesan "cheese". I have some at home, although I can't recall the exact brand right now. That would really finish this lunchbox off.

Anyway, I was a little later posting today because I'm posting AFTER I ate my lunch. Most of the time I do it before. I am happy to report that everything was delicious and I am STUFFED.

Thanks for checking in today and I'll see you tomorrow.