Tuna and Rice Salad

Tuna and Rice Salad is easy to make, healthy and a family favorite!  AND it’s Gluten Free!

Do you like salads? I mean, you eat so many it’s a wonder you haven’t turned green or least had your ears get longer and developed a fluffy tail? Me too.

Do you often make a dish and have WAY more left over than you thought?  Yeah, I have that problem too.

Do you hate to throw out good food?  Double ditto on this one!! I cannot STAND  to waste food.

My motto: there is a perfectly good recipe out there that I can use this left over in or I can at least think one up!

Enter Tuna and Rice Salad!

I’ll make rice as a side dish or a main ingredient in a dish at least twice a month.  I know my cups of rice to water ratio backwards and forwards.  I know how many cups of cooked rice a certain casserole is going to require.  Sooooo why did I think I needed to fix four cups of cooked rice at one time??!!  Brain fart? Too much multi-tasking? interruptions? just got off the phone,? my family was demanding too much of my time? 
Pick an excuse, any excuse will do.  You can probably tell I do not admit to mistakes, excuses yes, but not mistakes.

Anywho, I’ve got these two extra cups of cooked rice and we just had rice with orange chicken last night (I would share the orange chicken recipe, but it is not blog worthy yet).
The weekend is coming up where I take a day off from cooking ie, it is either made and we have it on hand or we fast, because I refuse to use my day of rest working over a hot cook top or oven!  I just have to have a day to regroup mentally and physically.

I love tuna or chicken salad, there is just something about a cool salad with a cracker or on a sandwich that is refreshing and  gives me a lift mentally (and helps with the hunger also!)
I did not have any left over chicken but I did have my favorite tuna in the pantry, so tuna would be the ingredient to combine with my leftover cold rice.  I’m all about eating something that not only tastes good, but is good for the body.

Tuna has to be my all time favorite healthy food! 
Among my reasons to eat tuna:
       contributes to weight loss (Big ol Yay!)
       boost energy
       helps to reduce risk of heart disease and
       helps to prevent inflammatory diseases such as gout and arthritis

I wanted a healthy quick salad, but I did not want it to be sweet like my usual tuna salad; maybe a more Mediterranean flavor…yeah, that’s what my taste buds are telling me.  What, you’ve never had your taste buds speak to you?  Are you sure about that?  When was the last time out of nowhere you wanted a thick, rich dessert?  Taste  buds talking to you, just sayin’.

I made this wonderful Tuna and Rice Salad with ingredients I keep in stock in my pantry for my Mediterranean days.
I cannot begin to tell you how refreshing this Tuna and Rice Salad is!
Those flakes of perfect tuna, sliced black olives, lime juice, artichoke hearts, mayo and dill paired with chilled rice…be still my heart.
The texture of the rice and tuna compliment one another while the lime juice, dill, black olives and artichoke hearts add a slightly tart, salty taste all brought together with mayonnaise!

 

This Tuna and Rice Salad was perfect on some gluten free crackers (mine just happened to be rice), a bed of lettuce or just right off the fork.

Yall, I’m not kidding, this Tuna and Rice Salad absolutely rocks!

Best part?  Gluten Free!

Enjoy!