Spring & Summer Recipes and Simple Meal Ideas for Long Days from Sam's Club

Weather in Wisconsin sucks. There are at least 3 {usually more} super cold months of winter. I'm sure you can imagine our need for nice weather outdoors come spring time after the rain stops.

Once spring hits, we spend quite a bit of time outdoors. It starts with the yard work, then moves on to the planting and just enjoying our yard. We put a lot of time, effort and money into it, so we might as well enjoy it. We grill out at least a couple of times a week.

Sam's Club armed me with $40 to prepare a spring recipe, so yesterday we headed out to our local Sam's Club in search for dinner.

Of course it was packed since it is Memorial Day weekend. I don't know what possessed me to brave any store this weekend!

It was definitely worth it though because they had samples galore, so we were able to try a bunch of different stuff. Lil Man was all excited and kept asking to go to every "try out" station. It was kind of funny. Later we filled him in that they're called samples.

I went there prepared to get everything I needed to make some kind of side dish and I would share the recipe with you. However, as always nothing went according to plan. BUT, that really isn't a bad thing. I think it turned out better!

Earlier, I mentioned all the free sample stations throughout the store. We couldn't resist these chicken, asiago cheese and spinach brat type things we tried. They were absolutely delicious, so we just had to snag up a pack.

The going through the refrigerated section, I found a 5lb container of potato salad for under $4! That is an insane price considering I'm lucky to get 1lb of the stuff at the grocery store for under $3. My guys are shrimp fiends, so we had to grab a double pack of jumbo spring with cocktail sauce. When I saw the Single Square Fresh Strawberry Cake, I couldn't resist grabbing it because I had tried it one of the previous times I was at Sam's Club.

I didn't have my own recipe per say, but I did get a complete meal, that was already thrown together {besides cooking the meat} and it was so simple. We did a ton of yard work after we came home, so I would have dreaded preparing food anyway. There are many times in the summer that's it's just so much easier to grab stuff from the deli and my "Spring Recipe" kind of features that I suppose. The only difference is that I spent a ton less!


Here's the spread of food we had, enough to feed the four of us, my brother and the neighbor with plenty of leftovers. In fact, I will be taking the rest of that potato salad to a friend's house this afternoon for another cookout. That container just saved me another day of cooking, awesome!

I'm sure you're just dying to know how everything was, so I'll tell you. It was delicious! The meat was yum, which we already knew it would be. The shrimp was huge, just look at the size of that thing. it's around half the size of the bun!

But that potato salad is what we were surprisingly raving about! I was a bit skeptical about buying it because you just never know how a salad is going to taste. But, for under $4 I couldn't resist.

I made the kids' plates, so the man starts eating before me. He said "Wow, this potato salad's actually pretty good." So I dug into mine, and said something along the line of "Hmm, it really is". It was not only better than we had expected, but better than the stuff from the deli at the grocery store, which by the way he will not eat.

We will definitely be going back for more of that, and also trying the coleslaw next time!

I did share an amazing meal idea with you. But since I didn't share a recipe, I'll share one from the summer recipe collection on Sam's Club website. Sam's Club carries fresh fruit galore, like shown above at totally reasonable and sometimes super low prices.

Watermelon Salad

* 1/4 c. fresh orange juice
* 2 T red wine vinegar
* 2 tsp. sugar
* 2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
* 1 tsp. salt (more if needed)
* 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
* 6 cups Spring Mix
* 4 cups, diced watermelon
* 1/2 cup finely sliced red onion
* 1 cup crumbled feta or chevre cheese
* 1/2 cup sliced almonds or pine nuts

"Add all the dressing ingredients, except for the oil and 1/2 of the cheese, to a blender. Blend until combined. With the motor running, slowly add in the oil and blend briefly until the dressing thickens. To Serve: arrange the lettuce on 4 plates. Top with watermelon, onion slices, remaining cheese and almonds. Drizzle with vinaigrette."

Sam’s Club provided me with a $40 gift card for my participation in this campaign. Opinions expressed are my own or my families and are not influenced by any form of compensation. Take it or leave it. Click here to view my full acknowledgment policy.