Boiling up a hearty soup is a typical way to use up spare vegetables and herbs. Freeze your recipe in portions, and you’ve got meals to use (and share) for weeks!

Fresh chopped salads are another way to get vegetables on your plate, and a great way to experiment with flavors and textures. Salads aren’t just for summertime enjoyment, either. A healthy helping of salad in wintertime can build up stores of essential vitamins and minerals to help shake off the effects of cold and flu season.

Registered dietician and chef/owner of Healthy Bites, Katie Cavuto Boyle, suggests you eat those winter salads, and she offers a few tips at the Food Network blog on eating fresh even when there’s snow on the ground.

She suggests starting with crunchy winter lettuces such as kale, chard, radicchio or endive as a base, and then adding layers of flavor and texture. Seasonal citrus fruits or late-season pears add a punch of antioxidants, while nuts add protein and healthy fats and oils. For more veggie forkfulls, use veggies canned or stored from your summertime harvest, such as peppers, tomatoes, squash and others, as healthy add-ins. Top it off with a choice of protein (chicken, shellfish, eggs, etc.) and the meal is complete.

The salad combinations are endless! Be sure to check out Burpee Home Gardens' list of salad dressing recipes here, and share your favorite salad toppings in our comments section below.