Endless salad

I’m on a salad kick, and I don’t care who knows it. It wasn’t really a conscious decision, it just kind of happened one day when I brought home a big box of pre-washed spring mix salad greens and started eating.

But even after munching down a ton of it, a few days in I was all like, holly crap, the more I eat of this box of greens the more it seems to grow. It was like a fake-bottomed plastic container, or a clown car offering up endless salad. And my Jewish guilt wouldn’t allow me to let it go bad.

So I bought cucumbers and all manner of tomatoes. I peeled carrots and chopped up radishes and mushrooms. I bought gourmet croutons and nuts and sprouts and seeds and cheese. Cans of tuna and salmon, too. I boiled some eggs and even picked up some terrific Newman's Own dressing (may I suggest the Family Recipe Italian or the straightforward Caesar) to make the task less arduous when I didn’t feel like shaking up a lemon or balsamic vinaigrette.

I guess it was about a week ago when I suddenly realized that making these salads with the pre-washed lettuce and chunking up a bit of this and shaking on a bit of that, took about the same time it takes to make a bowl of cold cereal, and less time than a sandwich.

And that’s when I finally finished the box of pre-washed spring mix greens.

But then I went shopping again and discovered the San Marino mix, (which is full of baby arugula – score!) and the whole damn process started again.

But you know something? I feel great.

Salad: Try it again for the first time.

I’m off to Whistler tomorrow to attend the GoMedia conference, which is kind of like speed dating for travel writers, whereby an international group of scribes meet with Canadian tourism representatives to discuss story ideas – along with a little horseback riding, hiking, and fancy dinners thrown in for good measure. Then it’s on to Vancouver until the end of the month to catch up with friends, but I will be blogging if I eat anything especially delicious out west -- which you can pretty much bank on.

Fun with beets

Just look at this composed salad of roasted beets, beans, goat cheese and candied walnuts. Almost looks restaurant quality,  doesn't it? Good enough to eat, no? Well let me tell you, I ate it. And it was good enough. And then some.

I'm finishing off my last day in Palm Beach right now, and you know what? I'm just realizing that the last thing I want to do is talk beets. So I'm cutting this short. That said, if you feel like talking beets tomorrow, here's my recipe for a pretty beet salad.

ROASTED BEET SALAD

Preheat oven to 400 F. Take washed, whole beets, cut off the rough root end and green top (save beet greens -- they're part of tomorrow's dinner), then wrap beets tightly in foil and roast in preheated oven for 1 - 1.5 hours, depending on size. When done, let cool for a couple of minutes then pop off the skins in the sink and wash your hands. (Note: I've always imagined that if I planned to murder someone with my bare hands I would first roast several bunches of beets; my scarlet hands providing the perfect alibi.) 

Cut beets into wedges and set aside. Get out some nuts -- walnuts, pecans, almonds; whatever you've got--put them in a small pan, sprinkle lightly with sugar and a touch of cayenne. Toast them until the sugar melts and caramelizes. Set aside to cool. 

Get out some green beans, tip their ends, and then steam them in the microwave for 3 minutes. Set aside.

Finally, get out your final ingredients: goat cheese, a little olive oil, and best quality balsamic. 

Arrange beets, beans and candied nuts around salad plate. Drizzle with a touch of olive oil and a whisper of balsamic vinegar. Sprinkle with some sea salt, or even better, Maldon. Crumble goat cheese overtop. 

It's as pretty as a picture and tastes as sly as the Mona Lisa. 

It turns out you CAN make friends with salad

I was on the wee sun-swept Caribbean island of Anguilla a couple of weeks ago, doing a story for the Globe & Mail on this British territory's delectable lunch truck culture, whereby locals join the cue at food vans sprinkled throughout the Valley to lunch on everything from primal goat stew to smoky barbecue. Great stuff. I mean, really great stuff. But that's all I'll say for now because my story hasn't come out in the paper yet.

In addition to eating at several lunch trucks a day, I also found the time to fit in an additional three meals or so on this island paradise, where spiny lobsters abound and there's never such a thing as too much rum punch. (In other words, my kind of town.)

And that's how I came to eat The Best Salad I've Ever Had. 

It was at Anguillian chef Dale Carty's Tasty's restaurant. Dale, a hard-working chef with a winning smile, was recently profiled in the pages of Bon Appetit magazine by Alan Richman. And for good reason. 

When not running his own colourful, casual restaurant, chef Dale can be found doing West Indies-inspired barbecue over at the Dune Preserve, an awesome beachside tree house bar for adults, owned by reggae legend Bankie Banx (you can see him on the cover of some of Jimmy Buffet's CDs.) 

But back to my salad: It was the crayfish salad. It's not on the menu. You've got to ask for it. The local fishermen bring in the crayfish and if they don't catch enough that day, you can't have this salad. In which case, don't get your shirt in a knot, just order the seafood salad, a close second.

The salad is a symphony of temperatures and texture; there's a base of pert leaf lettuce, then comes the warm grilled local crayfish -- like a sweet cross between lobster and shrimp -- fresh fried plantain chips, pickled peppers, hard boiled egg, a few olives, some carrot shreds and tomato wedges, all perfectly dressed in an unassuming yet vital vinaigrette. It's one of those holiday dishes that you'd love to recreate back home. 

But you just can't.