One of the things about shopping and eating as locally as possible is (1) you need to learn to menu plan and (2) you have to be willing to adjust the menu plan.
We were all set to have a nice big Kitchen Sink Salad (more on this later!) for lunch today, because we’re working in the home office. But we had this great Chili Braised Beef last night, and there was some left over. You can’t just let a batch of slow-cooked deliciousness go to waste, so we halved the salad and used up the reheated beef. I admit it isn’t quite as pretty as yesterday…but like chili, it sure tastes great on the second day.
Now as for the Kitchen Sink Salad, it’s just what it sounds like – a big bowl of vegetable yumminess. Here’s what we featured today:
Start with the dressing – an acid, some mustard, and oil. In our case, the zest and juice of 1/2 an orange, 15ml/1 tbsp. sesame oil, and 15ml / 1 tbsp. Dijon mustard. Whisk this together. Then I grated in 1/2 a red and 1/2 a yellow heritage carrot I bought at Kelly’s. Next, some artisanal lettuce – curly endive and a bit of butter lettuce. There was a bit of broccoli – not enough for two, but enough for salad. I steamed it for a minute to take the edge off the crunch, but when I’m in a hurry I’ll just chop it a bit more. Peel and dice the remainder of the orange, and throw in a few black sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, and almonds for good measure.
Toss it all together and start imagining – you can change the ingredients every time. Beans instead of nuts – sure! Vinegar instead of orange? Why not? Olive oil, or canola…yum!