Quick and easy side dish- bean and onion salad

This is a recipe for a tasty side dish which costs almost nothing, is very healthy, and takes less than five minutes to make. Compliments main courses which are fatty or creamy, as it is both light and acidic.

I found myself with pork chops and 40 minutes to make dinner. I make porkchops the way my mother always did when I was growing up- coat 'em with breadcrumbs and shove 'em in the oven. Dinner obviously needed to consist of something more. It's early August in New York, hot and sticky. Dinner should be light. We always treated our pork chops like schnitzel- with lemon juice on top. I thought that instead, it would be nice to have a lemony, acidic side dish instead.

Looking around the house, I grabbed some cans from my pantry.

1 can of corn
1 can of red kidney beans
1 can of chick peas.

All three were drained and then rinsed before going into a mixing bowl. I had a half a vidalia onion sitting in the fridge looking to be used. That was chopped medium sized and added as well. To the bowl was added a few generous dashes of lemon juice.

Note that this is meant to be lightly acidic, so have a light hand with the lemon juice. If you're unsure of how much to add, taste and adjust as needed.

 Finally a tablespoon or so (I measure with my fingers and add as I see fit) of dried thyme is thrown in, and the bowl is folded with a wooden spoon. Don't worry too much about the thyme- it's a nice flavor, but not overbearing- so if you add too much, it isn't likely to ruin anything by any means.

Place mixing bowl in refrigerator and let sit to chill.

A nice variant on this recipe is to throw in some mozzarella balls and couscous (maybe even some chopped up parsley) to make a tabbouleh salad.