Lunch Box Delight - Layered Prawn Salad

This is a colourful, filling and tasty alternative to the trusty ham sandwich. Now I know it is early in the year for anyone to start complaining about their school lunches, but this will brighten up any ones day.
I personally think that we all eat with our eyes and this is a feast for the senses. It's bright colours, mouth watering smell and the mix of flavours and textures. The salad photographed above was enjoyed by me on an outdoor picnic in the Mall while at the Longford Marathon recently, it acted as a dinner on the run and kept me full until evening.

This post is mostly a guideline, as every lunchbox is different so you decide. I have also listed the ingredients in the order that they will be needed, so your bottom layer will be lettuce, next the tomato etc. until you top it all off with a large dollop of cocktail sauce.

Makes: You decide!!

Ingredients
Iceberg lettuce, shredded
Tomato, deseeded and diced
Cucumber, deseeded and diced
Sweet red pepper, deseeded and diced
Canned Sweetcorn
Penne pasta, cooked, cooled and dressed in olive oil
Large cooked prawns
Vinaigrette
Cocktail sauce

Method
Wash all your vegetables and remove the seeds from the tomato and cucumber (if not your salad will turn to water in a matter of minutes) and dice as necessary. I recommend that you try to match the dice to the size of a sweetcorn kernel, so that everything will be uniformed and fit nicely onto your fork. Start to layer from the bottom up as follows: shredded lettuce, deseeded and diced tomato, deseeded and diced cucumber, deseeded and diced red pepper, canned sweetcorn. Pour the Vinaigrette over the salad, add the cooled pasta, a large handful of cooked and peeled prawns. Make up the cocktail sauce and drop large dollops onto the prawns. I like a light sprinkle of paprika to top everything off. Enjoy!

Top Tip:
To deseed a tomato, cut it in half and scoop out the seeds with a spoon, then dice the flesh. to deseed the cucumber, cut in half lenght ways and run the spoon down the centre leaving just the firm flesh.