Remember that beet salad I mentioned on Monday? There’s a recipe on the other blog! Check out this fabulous Lime and Beet Salad. And make it. You won’t regret it.
Category: salads
Classic Curried Chicken Salad
This week Sean is out of town, and I am eating like a total single lady. By that I mean on the couch, surrounded by magazines and watching How I Met Your Mother. By that I also mean I’m eating super easy salads, for which most of the prep work was done Sunday night. This Curried Chicken Salad is a perfect example a of single lady dinner. It took me about 15 minutes to throw together, it’s simple and summery, and its served in endive leaves, for goodness sake.
I love Curried Chicken Salad because it is totally classic, but still a little unexpected. It’s easy, but seems kind of decadent. It can be varied in endless ways, or kept simple and basic. I had originally intended to eat this chicken salad wrapped in lettuce leaves, but I couldn’t find any with that good cup shape. However, the endive was perfect: It added just the right amount of bitter crunch. This salad is also great wrapped in a soft whole wheat or green spinach-y tortilla.
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Healthy Salads for Spring and Summer
There is something about warmer weather that just calls out for us to start eating more healthy salads. They are cool and crunchy, and full of thing that make us feel better about ourselves going into those seasons-of-lesser-clothing. Well, some people go into seasons-of-lesser-clothing. I’ve been known to wear cardigans all through summer, because I’m a total weirdo. But I still want big, crunchy salads. Unfortunately, I think with salads I can occasionally feel a little stuck. What goes after lettuce? Which vegetables go well together? And when is fruit acceptable? Can I think of another salad dressing besides a basic vinaigrette? Sometimes I need some healthy salad inspiration. Do you?
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Super Herb-y Wild Rice Salad
We renewed our CSA recently, after an unintentionally long break. Our CSA is from Full Belly Farm out in Guinda, California. I love getting a CSA box: It keeps me from buying and eating the same vegetables every week, and it forces me to be more creative in the kitchen. Not to mention I like taking at least some of my grocery shopping out of the industrial food chain and giving money to people who are committed to building and nurturing their land and all that other Wendell Berry-esque stuff.
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Field Fresh Chopped Salad with Chicken
I’ve always loved the idea of eating a great big luscious crunchy salad for dinner. But I’ve never been very good at coming up with creative ideas for main dish salads. I tend to get stuck at lettuce and carrots. And my basic vinaigrette is great, but it can get a bit monotonous. But there is a prepared salad from Trader Joe’s that I love: the Field Fresh Chopped Salad. It’s sweet and savory and fresh and crunchy, and I got in the habit of buying it for solitary dinners and occasional lunches. Then I looked at the ingredients. The poor chicken in this salad is full of so many preservatives, and I know the vegetables could be fresher and more full of flavor. So I decided to make this salad myself.
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Tortellini and Avocado Salad
Update: The giveaway is closed. Thanks to all who entered!
Heidi Swanson’s Super Natural Every Day is one of these books. It’s just so lovely, and Heidi has a gift for thinking up original, creative vegetarian recipes that go beyond sauteed kale and tofu stir-fry. Even when I don’t follow her recipes exactly, I find so much inspiration just looking through this book. I probably do so at least once a week.
This tortellini salad is one example of how inspiring this book is. I love that all of her recipes encourage variation and substitution, based on what’s available for you. What she really encourages is playfulness in the kitchen, and a willingness to experiment. Heidi’s recipes often remind me that the best times in the kitchen are when you’re trying something new and untested, because frankly, even when things don’t turn out the way you expect, they almost never turn out inedible, and you usually learn something new. Food is fun and nourishing and satisfying even when it’s imperfect.
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Grilled Portobello Mushrooms with Corn and Tomato Salad
The grilled portobello mushroom is ubiquitous. It’s a standard vegetarian burger substitute on many menus. I recently read a food magazine (Bon Appetit, perhaps?) in which an author begged to an end to the ever present portobello. I myself have had many grilled portobellos, and I’ve never found them too compelling. I hardly ever want to order such a thing in a restaurant, and if I’m at a barbecue, well, give me a burger. But for some reason this week, the idea for this portobello and corn salad dinner popped into my head and wouldn’t let go. I wanted the seemingly most overplayed thing you can put on a grill.
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Fig and Herb Salad (and a juice cleanse verdict)
I finished my BluePrint Cleanse juice cleanse last Saturday, and the verdict is: totally worth it. I felt terrific: focused, calm, happy. At no point did I feel hungry, deprived, fatigued, or even cranky. The juice was super tasty, although I have to say, after three days I was ready for some new flavors. I couldn’t wait to get in my kitchen and cook some food again.
The timing of the cleanse was kind of perfect: I finished it up the day after my cast came off, so I was doubly ready to cook, to mess about with all the glorious produce we get from our CSA each week and experiment. It was the best feeling. There are a few things the cleanse experience made me realize: 1) I didn’t really know until after I finished that what it had largely been about for me was self-discipline. I needed something to bring me back into control, after a month of feeling very much that things were out of my control. 2) I love love love food. I think about food and cooking a lot. I read about food and cooking a lot. Food is kind of my life. 3) I eat a lot when I’m bored. Who doesn’t? But it’s not a great habit.
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Pesto and Egg Potato Salad
Despite the fact that I’ve been trying to stop buying books lately, I picked up two new cookbooks shortly after we moved into our house. I figured they were worth trying to find the space for, and I was right. At first glance, Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty: Vibrant Recipes from London’s Ottolenghi
and Heidi Swanson’s Super Natural Every Day: Well-loved Recipes from My Natural Foods Kitchen
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Orzo and Bean Salad with Sweet Potatoes
One thing that is really hard for me about life in Walla Walla is the lack of a Trader Joe’s within a 200 mile radius. Whenever I travel to Portland, or even California, I stock up and drag all my TJ’s loot back home with me. I even shipped a box of kitchen goodies home from San Diego this winter, and have been happily enjoying my Candy Cane Jo Jo’s since then. One thing I always pick up is a can or two of their Marinated Salad Beans. These beans are awesome for a quick weeknight dinner, and this salad is one of my new favorites. In fact, I love it so much that now that I’m out of Trader Joe’s Marinated Salad Beans, I’ve been working on making the same vinaigrette to marinate my own salad beans. I’ve also found a few other brands that are more widely carried, and they make a decent substitute, although I don’t think they’re quite as good.
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