Dressing Your Salad Kindly

“Pour the dressing around the sides of the bowl, and then, using your hands, gently push the greens into the dressing to coat them. You want the greens glistening, not limp. Once the leaves are dressed to your liking, gently transfer them to a plate.” – Bobby Flay

There’s this strange ritual I’ve seen people go through when they get a salad at, say, a cafeteria or takeout lunch spot. These are the salads that come in a clear plastic container, along with the dressing in a sealed pouch or cup. The customer opens the container, opens the dressing pouch, pours the dressing on the salad, closes the container, and then proceeds to shake the bejeezus out of the container, turning it every which way during the process. Then they reopen the container and proceed to gracefully eat the poor scrambled salad.

I tried this once and it’s certainly more efficient than using a flimsy plastic fork to stir in the dressing, which usually results in a lot of the salad ending up on the table or floor. The solution I prefer is to pour some of the dressing on the salad, mix that little part and eat it, and then pour some more of the dressing on, rinse and repeat. A little more time consuming but it gets the job done and seems like a more respectful way to treat your food.

When at home however, with plenty of time and a big enough bowl, Bobby Flay’s gentle massaging method is definitely the most loving and artistic way to dress a salad that I’ve ever come across.

And don’t you just love his description? The word “glistening” is so perfect — you can just see the gorgeous leafy greens and smell the aroma of the imported olive oil coating them. Mmmm.

Yam Noodle, Snow Pea and Asparagus Toss

I’m thinking maybe add some cooked cocktail shrimp and have a complete meal!

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Yam Noodle, Snow Pea and Asparagus Toss Yum
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Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Servings
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Ingredients
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Servings
people
Ingredients
Votes: 0
Rating: 0
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Instructions
  1. Grate or mince ginger and garlic. Whisk together first 7 ingredients in a large bowl.
  2. Shave carrots into ribbons and add to sauce mixture; toss to coat. Set aside.
  3. Rinse snow peas and remove the little strings. Rinse and trim asparagus and cut into 2 inch pieces. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add snow peas and asparagus; cook until crisp-tender, about 2 minutes. Remove vegetables with a slotted spoon to a colander; rinse with cold water until cool. Add snow peas and asparagus to carrot mixture.
  4. Add yam noodles to boiling water; cook until just soft, 6-7 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Add to bowl; toss well. Slice basil and sprinkle over top.
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Curried Chickpeas with Rice

Here’s another recipe from Cooking Light magazine, which I adapted to make even healthier.  The original recipe used pork but I made it vegetarian by using chickpeas instead.  I also swapped out the regular dairy milk and used light coconut milk, and swapped the white flour to millet flour, although it would probably be just fine without any flour at all.  I added garam masala and increased the amount of curry powder because the original was bland.  I think the result is a really nice vegan meal.  Having pre-cooked rice and chickpeas on hand makes it a super-fast weeknight meal. Continue reading “Curried Chickpeas with Rice”

Black Bean and Salsa Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

This meat-free dinner is adapted from a recipe my husband found on his favorite cycling podcast website. So you know it’s got to be good if it was developed with athletes in mind, right? Well, we made this and dug into it and thought we went to heaven.  The spicy smoky flavor of the black beans combined with the creamy sweet potato is a marriage of flavors that’s meant to be. I’m not kidding, try it and if you don’t see angels I will eat my cycling socks. Continue reading “Black Bean and Salsa Stuffed Sweet Potatoes”

How to make “Bowls”

“Bowls” are a newly popular concept, and for good reason. They are fresh, generally quick to put together, tasty, and relatively inexpensive.

Think Chipotle, SweetGreen, or pretty much any of the “healthy fast food” franchises popping up in malls across the country. Essentially it’s a pile of stuff in a bowl, with lettuce/greens on the bottom, and stuff on the top. Hm… sounds kind of familiar, right? Like a salad bar? Yep, exactly like a salad bar. The difference is in the marketing, and the proportions. it’s a little bit of salad with a lot of “stuff” arranged in a colorfully pretty selection of “wedges” around the edge.

Literally, it’s just a bowl of different wholesome, nicely flavored ingredients, that you then pour some sauce on and mix together, like… well… like a salad. Yeah.

Creamy Rice with Salmon

I got this rice with salmon (arroz con salmon) recipe from a food blog written by a Columbian woman.  I’m so sorry I’ve lost track of the url of that web site but I made a lot of changes to the recipe anyway, so it barely resembles the original.

I removed several ingredients, changed several others, and used leftovers to compile the dish instead of creating it from scratch.  It was surprisingly good!  I served it with sautéed beet greens but I recommend choosing a side veggie that’s more neutral in flavor, like broccoli or green beans.  The beet greens were good but the strong flavor overpowered the more subtle taste of the rice dish. Continue reading “Creamy Rice with Salmon”