critical tools for garbage salad

When I was in 3rd grade, I ate lunch with my dad nearly every weekday. Although my school day went to 3 PM, the school didn’t permit children to eat lunch at school until 4th grade. I remember my mom grumbling that this was a conspiracy to keep moms from working outside the home, and she endured it awhile, but finally when her youngest child (me) hit eight, and having been out of the workforce since her oldest child was born (sixteen years earlier) my mom was ready to get back to work. She cobbled together a schedule for me of lunchtime playdates with friends and — since her job didn’t allow her the flexibility to drive home for lunch each day, but my father’s did — Lunch with Dad.

Lunch with Dad was great. We would sit at the dining room table, he at the end and me around the corner next to him, and play double solitaire between bites. I have no recollection of my meals – a rotating menu of sandwiches, I expect — but Dad always made what he dubbed Garbage Salad. He’d start with a plate, a big carrot and maybe one of the enormous white daikon radishes he’d grown in our front yard, and the box grater. He’d grate himself a bed of vegetables, then rummage in the fridge for good-looking leftovers and toss those on top, together with perhaps a scoop of cottage cheese and a sprinkling of peanuts and a splash of vinaigrette. He ate this nearly every day when he was home, the ingredients varying with the seasons and the contents of our refrigerator. Now that I don’t have kids coming home for lunch any more (happily, mine are fed well at school, from kindergarten on), I find myself reaching for the box grater, looking for good leftovers, and composing Garbage Salad, too.

You might want to rename your version of this salad, though sentiment and honesty will always keep it Garbage Salad in my house. As for the ingredients, I find people have strong feelings about cottage cheese, and while I like it well enough I’m not going to risk family harmony by bringing any into the house. Today, my version of Dad’s salad used more salad greens, because our CSA share is bursting with lettuces, plus a shredded beet, a shredded kohlrabi, a tomato, some leftover stir-fried green beans and some toasted pumpkin seeds. Sometimes I take the time to boil an egg and chop that into the salad, sometimes I toss in some cannellini beans. Tonight, we’re roasting potatoes for dinner, so any leftovers will likely go into tomorrow’s salad. The main thing is to get out that box grater and some shreddable vegetables – carrots, summer squash, beets, kohlrabi, parsley root, radish – and start with that base, because as my Dad taught me, they soak up your vinaigrette and make a delicious bed for just about anything you find to put on top.

Every summer, we visit my parents so we can glory in East Coast summer weather, grandparental (and parental) affection, and the abundance of my father’s garden. Depending on when we arrive, we might be gorging on berries or potatoes, and this year my dad promised both, but he also offered kohlrabi, a crop he had tried for the first time. “I hope you will pack your favorite kohlrabi recipes,” he emailed me before we arrived.

Well. Favorite cookie recipes, favorite muffin recipes, sure, but I had to Google kohlrabi to even know what it looks like. I’ll save you that step:

kohlrabi growing

kohlrabi on the way to the kitchen

So, as it turns out, kohlrabi is something like a turnip and something like a radish: crunchy and refreshing, with a slightly sharp tang. It’s delicious, and pretty versatile: you can eat it raw, grated into salad (recipe below), you can cook and eat the leaves (which we did, flavored with a little soy sauce and sesame oil), you can cut it into sticks and roast them (we did that, too) or make it into a gratin (which we might do when it’s cooler). Because yes, our CSA is now bringing us kohlrabi every week, so it’s a good thing we’ve learned how to cook it, because now we’ve really learned to like it!

Raw Kohlrabi Salad

First, make your vinaigrette; I like Deborah Madison’s mustard vinaigrette, from the indispensable Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone:

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, or fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons sour cream or yogurt
2 shallots, finely diced
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
2 tablespoons snipped chives
Salt and freshly milled pepper
1 tablespoon chopped parsley
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons capers, rinsed

Combine the vinegar, shallots, garlic and 1/4 t salt in a small bowl. Let stand for 15 minutes, then whisk in the mustard, sour cream or yogurt, and oil until thick and smooth. Grind in a little pepper, then stir in the herbs and capers. Taste and adjust the seasonings if needed.

Then, peel and grate a pound or two of fresh raw kohlrabi, or use a mix of kohlrabi, parsley root, carrots, and beets — whatever vegetables you happen to have on hand. Dress with the vinaigrette and serve.

I’ve written here before about the food my family takes to travel, the food we’ve eaten on journeys, even the food that has greeted us on our return, but not yet about this particular food/travel issue: cleaning out the fridge before leaving on the trip.

Tonight, on the eve of our 2+-week vacation, and with friends coming to stay in our house ten days from now (and so a week before we get home), I had to think carefully about what we should use up and what could stay put. When the eggs ran out late last week, I didn’t replace them; that half loaf of sandwich bread goes in the freezer, as does that end of baguette, sliced into cubes for croutons and tossed into a bag. We’ll use up the milk in the morning, but the last stick of butter will be fine. It’s the produce that’s trickier, of course. Tonight I found myself adding lots of vegetable sides to our pasta dinner: green salad with shredded carrots; roasted zucchini; roasted potatoes; fresh snap peas. The meal looked a bit like this, the kids ate a ton, and the crisper was nearly empty.

Nearly! I still had a bunch of beets to deal with, so quickly pickled them using the recipe recommended by a reader (my sister!); the recipe was fast, and the pickles will keep until our friends arrive.

Last up: zucchini, which our CSA has been providing at a rate faster than we can handle. I’ve made them into pancakes, fritters, and soup; shredded them into salads or tossed them, roasted, onto pasta with walnuts. Tonight, running out of steam, I grated four cups and stuck it into the freezer for a future soup. Then finally, because I always have time to make muffins, made these lemony zucchini muffins from the fabulous King Arthur Cookbook:

2 c flour (I use a mix of all-purpose and whole wheat flours)
1/2 c granulated sugar
1 scant T baking powder
1 t salt
grated peel of 2-3 lemons (the recipe calls for the peel of just one lemon, which just isn’t enough for me)
1/2 c chopped, toasted walnuts (optional)
1/2 c raisins (optional)
2 large eggs (I’d run out of eggs, but luckily still had egg replacer from when my vegan niece lived with us last year!)
1/2 c milk
1/2 c vegetable oil
1 c shredded, unpeeled zucchini

Preheat the oven to 400.

Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and lemon peel in a large bowl. Stir in the walnuts and raisins.

In a 2-cup liquid measure, combine the milk, oil, and eggs. Pour into the dry ingredients and stir until just barely combined. Fold in the zucchini.

Spoon batter into a 12-cup muffin tin and bake for 20-25 minutes, until a tester comes out clean. Let cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then turn out of the pan to finish cooling.

Some of the muffins will come to the airport with us tomorrow, and the rest will wait in the freezer for our friends, because if we can’t greet them ourselves, at least we can greet them, in absentia, with muffins.

My family’s vegetarian, so our meals never fall into the classic “meat and two veg” pattern many of us grew up with, but most of our suppers still do offer something recognizable as a main dish and some other things that are clearly the sides. But not always.

I’ve written in the past about a dinner the boys and I make together sometimes when Tony is out, a sort of vegetable buffet, and recently we did a springtime version: pickled carrots, beets, and cauliflower, roasted new potatoes, snap peas, steamed broccoli with lemon, spinach with pine nuts and raisins, fava bean puree, and hummus. A little bread and cheese might have rounded it out nicely, but we happened not to have any, and the kids were happy to dip vegetables into the purees (or even, in Eli’s case, just eat hummus by the spoonful). It felt like a picnic, and on a foggy night in San Francisco, the bright colors and distinct flavors brought a little splash of sunshine into the room.

But this spring, there hasn’t been time for much baking because I’ve been going a little crazy with the vegetables. I signed up for a CSA to pick up at my son’s school (because, vegetables + kid in one stop? I couldn’t resist!), without dropping either our other weekly produce pick-up (which tends to supply more fruit), the bi-weekly mystery box, or even my farmer’s market habit. It’s just hard to resist all this great spring produce, and we’re going to be out of town most of June, so I’m stocking up while I can. And then, trying to find new ways to use all the bounty.

Inspiration came, as it often does, from the farmer’s market, but from a different source than usual: not a produce vendor, but the pickle people! The Pick-a-Peck stand is a regular fixture at our farmer’s market, and the pickles are great: spicy, crispy, delicious. One night before dinner, a friend and I ate an entire jar of the pickled green beans. But I started (sorry, pickle people) to think about how much I was spending on vegetables, vinegar, and spices and decided to cook up some of my own. So far, the pickled cauliflower is my new favorite — it’s fabulously crunchy with great flavor — but the pickled carrots are delicious, too, and the beets are a mainstay for me, summer and winter. I don’t recall any longer where I found the beet recipe, which exists on a scribbled piece of steno paper in my recipe binder; if you recognize it, please let me know so I can give credit:

2 lbs beets
2 c white vinegar
1 c granulated sugar
2 T kosher salt
1 t allspice berries
1/4 t whole cloves
1/2 cinnamon stick

Simmer the beets in boiling water until tender, 30-60 minutes, depending on their size. Let cool and then peel and slice.

Bring remaining ingredients to a boil, add the sliced beets and cook for one minute. Cool and refrigerate.

These all keep for about two weeks in the fridge, though they never last that long in my house.

Last summer when we visited my parents, the boys experienced the treasure hunt of digging potatoes. This spring, to bring the process full circle (backwards!) they planted. Both boys have done a fair amount of seed planting, both at home and at school, and Eli’s recent picture demonstrates some understanding of the process:

But potatoes are different. They don’t grow from seeds. And since we don’t have the space nor the climate for potatoes here, I’m grateful that my kids could head out to the garden with my dad for a brief farm lesson in the dirt.

I was stuck inside on crutches on the day they planted, so I have no story to relate about the event, but my sympathetic husband took some lovely pictures (you can click on them to enlarge):

As I approach my tenth wedding anniversary, I’ve been reminiscing about our extravagant celebration of my parents’ fiftieth, a cruise in southern France, guided over by a wonderful crew, including the inimitable Chef Charlie. Charlie made every meal an event, and now when Eli asks to light the candles or Ben folds all our napkins in a new way, I think about what we all learned at Charlie’s table.

Of course, life is not a cruise through southern France, and there is no Chef Charlie here to make one of the things I loved most about this trip: our daily lunch of les trois salades. Here, it is just me with my vegetables, but with the farmer’s market and the CSA ramping up, I’m doing pretty well with some new combinations. Check these out:

wild rice salad with oranges & pumpkin seeds

The recipe came in our CSA box, and is credited to Jonathan Miller:

2 c cooked rice (I used a mix of brown and wild rices; this is, of course, a perfect use for leftovers)
the zest and juice of one orange
3-4 more oranges, peeled, sectioned, and chopped into bite-sized pieces
1/3 c toasted pumpkin seeds
a handful of chopped cilantro or parsley
a handful of spinach leaves

Toss all the ingredients in a bowl, and season with olive oil, salt, and pepper to taste. You could also add some grilled fish or chicken to this, or crumble in some feta or ricotta salata.

Salad #2

chickpea and dried cherry salad

This one came from Real Simple magazine; the amounts are for 4-5 people, but, like any salad, it scales up and down easily, and to taste.

6 cups of mesclun (I had baby romaine, arugula flowers, and miner’s lettuce, so it was particularly pretty)
2 carrots, scrubbed or peeled, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced
1 15 oz can chickpeas, rinsed
1/2 c dried cherries (a staple in my house since I discovered this recipe)
1/4 c fresh dill sprigs
4 – 5 T vinaigrette

Toss all the ingredients together, season to taste with salt & pepper, and serve.

And finally, courtesy of one of my food heroes, Jamie Oliver, comes the tarragon salad.

tarragon salad with grapes & shallots

Again, the measurements aren’t entirely precise here (I’m sure my handfuls are smaller than Jamie Oliver’s) but it’s a salad: use amounts that look good to you.

2 shallots, peeled and very thinly sliced
a pinch of sugar
4 T white wine vinegar
4 small bunches of fresh tarragon, leaves picked from the stems
4 handfuls of green and red seedless grapes, sliced in half
ricotta salata or pecorino cheese, grated on top, to taste

salt, pepper, and olive oil to taste

Toss the shallots with the sugar and vinegar and let sit a few minutes, while you pick over the tarragon and slice the grapes. Toss the tarragon with the grapes, shallots, and some of the shallot-y vinegar. Grate cheese over the top, and season with salt, pepper and olive oil.

If you don’t have lots of tarragon, or don’t want a full salad of it, by all means augment with other greens. But try it just once with nothing but tarragon; it’s delicious, and truly, you will feel transported. Perhaps not all the way to southern France, but pour a crisp white wine and slice some crusty bread, and you’re almost there…

This side dish/appetizer is so easy that it would be dumb–if it weren’t so cute. It came about one day last spring, when I was looking for a really fast, mess-free, new way to serve the fresh tomatoes the kids eat every day when they’re in season. Marginally decent tomatoes are just beginning to make their way into our market, so the Tomato Surprise has made it’s way back to our dinner table.

The idea is simple:  sprinkle a  little salt in a small, shallow dish, pour in about a tablespoon of olive oil and splash or two of  balsamic vinegar.  Cut a tomato in half, then in quarters, then put one half the tomato in the dish (you can see how this is a snap for 2 kids). Tuck a basil leaf (or mint, or cilantro, something fresh and spare-looking) and serve. The “surprise” is that the dressing is under the tomato. For some reason, my kids think this is one of the best things ever. They eat it nearly every day as a quick appetizer, or sometimes even for snack or lunch.  I like it because it’s neat and, obviously, healthy. The food looks like what it is, but with a little flair.  As I’ve suggested before, when it comes to food, looks matter.   If you like, you can experiment and make an inverted caprese by putting a thin, quartered layer of mozzarella under the tomato.

The 2nd grade curriculum at my son’s school is built partly on the study of communities, so every month or so there is a field trip to a different part of the city, where the kids hear stories about the neighborhood and eat some snacks: fried chicken feet in Chinatown, tacos in the Mission, you get the idea. The Civic Center field trip was timed to hit the Farmer’s Market, and although Ben missed it because of a nasty case of strep throat, the kids had such a ball, tasting fresh produce and chatting with the farmers, that the 2nd grade teachers decided to put on a classroom farmer’s market the following week.

The kids were assigned a single fruit or vegetable, and worked with partners to create informational posters about their produce:

Ben was assigned the orange, and not only did it give us a nice excuse to talk with the orange farmer at our neighborhood market, but (at my dad’s suggestion) we checked out John McPhee’s lovely book on oranges and learned this:

“Botanically, [oranges] are spectacularly complicated. They can be completely unripe when they are a brilliant orange and deliciously ripe when they are as green as emeralds. An orange grown on one side of a tree is better than an orange grown on the other side. Citrus is so genetically perverse that oranges can grow from lime seeds. Most California lemons grow on orange roots. Most Florida oranges grow on lemon roots.”

Oranges are crazy! And they’re also delicious. The farmer’s market offered naval oranges, Valencia oranges, and Moro oranges, so we bought some of each for Ben to cut up and share with the students, parents, and school staff who came to the market. He even wore an orange shirt for the occasion.

Ben loved the project, as his enthusiastic classmates clearly did, too. And I loved seeing food and farming get such close attention in the classroom. Now all we have to do is find room at the school for a garden…

It’s a snack food, a packable lunch dish, a side dish, an appetizer, an all around helpful thing to have in your kitchen. It’s lightening fast to make. It’s completely addictive.  It’s a way of getting your kids to eat more raw vegetables.  And even you won’t be able to stop eating it with salads, with crudite, for lunch, before dinner, after school. Even if you don’t like the bottled stuff, try this.  There’s no comparison. And there’s nothing like having a big batch of something healthy to pull out and feed the kids when they’re begging for food and dinner isn’t quite ready.

I dug up this recipe a few years ago, and while we don’t always have it the refrigerator, it’s the kind of thing that the kids suddenly remember and beg for. Last week it was Finn’s turn to remember that “pink dipping sauce” and so I made it. I had half a head of iceberg lettuce in the refrigerator, left over from fish tacos the night before, and we whipped up a batch of dressing, and it has lasted us all week.   I served it to them first over wedges of lettuce, which Finn thought was just about the best thing ever.

The recipe makes a lot, but it keeps really well (even gets better as the flavors blend), so we portion it out all week long, mostly with carrots and celery, which I precut and keep in the refrigerator.

The original recipe is here. My only change is to substitute ketchup for chili sauce and add a dash of tabasco (or more or less to your taste).  I usually don’t have pimentos, so I often leave them out, but when I’m short on pickles I’ve thrown in a few pimento  stuffed olives; you can leave out the egg, but it’s much better with it in.

Homemade Thousand Island dressing

• 1 1/4 cups mayonnaise
• 1/3 cup ketchup
• 1/4 cup chopped drained pimiento
• 1 large hard-boiled egg, shelled, finely chopped
• 3 tablespoons finely chopped dill pickle
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 2 tablespoons drained capers
• 2 tablespoons chopped green onion
• Tabasco or other Hot pepper sauce