Salad Season – Make ’em Sparkle and Sing

When it’s too hot to cook you know it’s salad season. In the dog days of summer, we’re craving the tang, coolness and crunchiness of fresh vegetables. Every host and hostess wants the flavors on their table to sing, sparkle and connect with their hungry guests’ cool cravings and different tastes.

The salads we’re showcasing here have been tested and/or tweaked in the Food for the Ages’ kitchen. They are all colorful, delicious and cool. Just what we need in these 90-degree days! The first recipe below is interpreted from Yotam Ottolenghi’s cookbook, “Plenty More.” I used green cabbage in this “Sort of” Waldorf, but the red cabbage makes the dish more colorful still. This recipe is vegetarian but is easily made vegan with substitutions for the sour cream and mayo. The Beet and Burnt Eggplant salads are vegetarian and vegan!

Salad Season – Sort of Waldorf

Serves 4

Salad

• ¼ red cabbage shredded
• 2 Granny Smith or other tart green apples, halved, cored, then quartered and sliced thinly with skin on
• 6 celery stalks, cut into ¼ in slices
• ¼ cup toasted slivered almonds, or hazelnuts
• ¼ purple onion thinly sliced
• ½ cup dried tart cherries
• ½ cup fresh dill, chopped

Mayonnaise

• 1 small shallot, finely chopped
• 1 cup real mayonnaise such as Hellman’s
• 2/3 cup sour cream
• 1 tsp maple syrup
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 Tbsp cider vinegar

Toast the nuts either on the top of the stove or in the oven at 325 degrees F for 30 minutes, scattered on a cookie sheet, until they are perfectly dry and crisp. Let them cool then crush roughly. Set aside.

Combine the mayonnaise ingredients in a blender and blend until just mixed.

Place the cabbage, celery, apples, cherries, dill, onion and mayonnaise and ½ tsp salt and some ground black pepper in a large bowl.

Mix the mayonnaise and the salad mixture together and chill thoroughly. Before serving, scatter the nuts on top.

 

My mother always served delicious pickled beets with onions during salad season. Here is a slightly French-ified version that always gets high marks.

Salad Season – Beets Vinaigrette

Salad

• 1 lb cooked and peeled beets, cut to julienne/matchstick size
• 1 Tbsp sweet onion, chopped
• 1 Tbsp chopped parsley

Dressing

• 3 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 Tbsp tarragon vinegar (use a ¼ tsp tarragon with white wine or white vinegar, if you don’t have tarragon vinegar. I made my own by steeping fresh tarragon in white vinegar, as shown in the picture above. You can steep it for 3-4 months to get the most flavor from it.)
• ¼ tsp Dijon mustard
• ½ tsp sugar
• Salt and pepper

Use canned matchstick beets, or cook your own beets and cut into julienne. Note: Orange beets cook to yellow, not orange. I used red beets.

Mix dressing together and combine with the beets, onion and chopped parsley. Cover and refrigerate and turn occasionally with a spoon.

Salad Season – Burnt Eggplant with Yellow Pepper and Red Onion

Serves 4

Calling all smoked eggplant lovers! This delicious recipe is taken from Yotam Ottolenghi’s “Ottolenghi: The Cookbook.” Like the Middle Eastern Baba Ganouj or the Romanian dish Salata de Vinete, the smoky flavor of the eggplant requires that you burn the outside of it! You can do this on a grill during salad season or on a gas stove top or under a hot broiler in your oven. Serve this salad with a crusty bread.

• 2 medium eggplants
• 2 yellow or green peppers, cored and cut inot 2/3 inch dice
• 1 medium red onion, coarsely chopped
• 24 cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1 1/2 ounce chopped flat-leaf parsley
• 4 1/2 tablespoon sunflower or nut oil
• 6 tablespoons cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• Coarse sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Place eggplants directly on 2 separate moderate flames on the stove top and roast for 12 to 15 minutes, turning them occasionally with metal tongs, until the flesh is soft and the skin is burnt and flaky. By this stage your kitchen will have the most magnificent charred smell. (Alternatively, place the eggplants under a hot broilder for about an hour, turning them occasionally and continuing to cook even if they are burst.) Leave to cool slightly.

Make a long cut through each warm eggplant. Using a spoon, scoop out the soft flesh while avoiding most of the burnt skin on the outside. If you don’t like the seeds, try to remove them as well. Leave the eggplant flesh to drain in a colander for at least 1 hour or overnight.

Coarsley chop the eggplant flesh. Mix all the remaining ingredients together, then taste and adjust the seasoning. It should be robust and pungent. Serve within 24 hours.

Enjoy salad season and keep cool!