Cancun Salad

What the heck is Cancun Salad? Here's the story.

When we first started going to Cancun, we were staying in Pat and Tom's condo in Cancun. This was when Cancun was a little more than a village, when the road from the airport to the city was one long stretch of sand and emerald/turquoise water, when the majority of people who went to Cancun were not on "All-inclusive" packages, when Carlos and Charlies was the biggest and raciest restaurant in town. When...well you get the picture, it was in the 80's.

We cooked in some nights and if we wanted a salad, we improvised because we were afraid to eat the lettuce. And so was born Cancun Salad....a salad of raw vegetables. Vegetables that we could scrub and disinfect to our satisfaction. Carrots, avocados, onion, green bell pepper (couldn't find a red or yellow bell pepper in Cancun then), zucchini, broccoli, cauliflower, tomato. Whatever looked good and crisp in the market. Maybe even some cheese. Add some salad dressing and there you have it, Cancun salad. A salad of anything but lettuce.

The Cancun Salad has become an important part of our diet while we don't have a kitchen. We get hungry for vegetables and some of the little places we eat serve rice and beans and guacamole but not a lot of salads or vegetables. So at least once a week, we buy a chicken from Pollo Feliz and make a Cancun salad. It is one delicious dinner!