If you find that your veggie consumption is lacking in these collegiate days, you can easily brighten up your diet by adding one of nature’s most versatile and delicious greens — arugula.
First, when storing your arugula, you’ll want to remove it from its original packaging and roll it in a paper towel. Place the rolled paper towel in a zip-top bag, and put that in your fridge. This way, only the proper amount of moisture will come in contact with the vegetable, and the leaves won’t become slimy. It will keep this way for well over a week.
But now that you have your over-a-week’s supply of arugula, what are you going to do with it?
Virtually anything! Arugula has the distinction of having a very subtle yet pungent flavor. If you eat a leaf on its own, you’ll notice its distinct pepperiness, and it can sometimes even taste spicy. However, arugula is still light enough to be used in any way you would use spinach or lettuce, and not overpower the other components on the plate.
One place to try arugula is on your standard tuna sandwich. It delivers the same crunch and moisture of lettuce, but its unctuous flavor complements the light (if often bland) tuna. Arugula is an option for a wide variety of sandwiches — chicken salad, turkey, or egg salad are all great choices.
Arugula also goes wonderfully with eggs. You can put it in an omelet as you would spinach, put that omelet into a sandwich (yum!), or top an arugula-based salad with a fried egg. For the salad, just put a big pile of arugula on a plate, and add a sunny-side-up egg. Along with some dressing, you’ve got a delicious, and healthy lunch. Any additional vegetables would be welcome as well.
Then there’s pasta. Just boil your pasta, and move it to a bowl with olive oil and toss in some arugula. The heat from the noodles will slightly wilt the greens, but not make them gummy. You could also toss in roasted garlic, tomatoes, basil, mozzarella, or parmesan cheese.
Even if you do not want to cook with it, I would assert that arugula is crunchy enough (and tasty enough) that you could eat it straight out of the bag, just like chips. Maybe that’s a radical idea, and maybe America isn’t ready to start snacking on bare leaves yet, but arugula is outrageously delicious and good in just about anything you make.
