Tuesday 14 June 2011

3 Salads

The last days have been full of salad. The intensity reminds me of my Christmas cooky-period before Christmas. One recipe is never enough. Last weekend I planned on bringing a bowl of salad to my sisters barbeque and ended up with three bowls, carrying three bowls of salad.
From left to right: orzo salad, lentils salad and apple-carrot-radishes salad with tahin and roasted sesame seeds.

The credit for the orzo goes to Jen from thebakedlife. Jen, Mr Paula likes the orzo salad best!

Only little was left for Mr Paula after the barbeque

The lentils are my favourite:Lentilles de Puy
Mr Paula had to drive me very far in France because I wanted these lentils and only these, from the outskirts of Puy en Valey, DOC lentilles :-)

I got in touch with lentils during a cooking workshop in Vienna's traditional vegetarian restaurant Wrenkh. Times have changed, they even serve raw steaks these days. *shocked*

The third origins at the cooking workshop, a tabouleh made with couscous.

What I learned at the workshop: tabouleh wants LOTS of parsley. I never liked parsley. In combination with olive oil and couscous it is absolutely delicious!

All of a sudden our bottle of best olive oil melts away. Jen recommends whisking the oil slowly into the vinegar. She is so right!
Ready to serve
Today our dear dozers (see here at the end of the posting) gathered around and let me sleep until 7am. Thank you for that!

Room with a view. The bedroom window, tonight

Good night!

7 comments:

  1. That lentil salad looks so healthy and fresh. I will have to make that. Cold salads are so wonderful when it's hot outside....like right now!

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  2. I have never cooked with French lentils...have you time to give a lesson?
    I am a quick learner!

    My husband would love the pasta salad the best too!
    I think I'd want the lentil salad.

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  3. Adrienne, I will post a recipe today. By the time you wake up it is probably already online :-)

    Hostess of the humble bungalow, I love to give you a lesson! It's on it's way, June 15-posting.

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  4. All of those look quite good -- the orzo and tabouleh are more or less in my arsenal but the apple/radish sounds intriguing! I will have to investigate.

    ps Recently tried a salad recipe that called for heating grape or cherry tomatoes in a splash of balsamic + a dab of sugar until their juices run and they look wrinkled and caramelized. [Much like roasted/grilled veg, but hard to do with such little critters.]

    I found it a nice, if uglier, change from raw tomatoes!

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  5. Thank you to Mr. Paula for loving my salad. I think it's a man thing, the husband sneaks into the fridge before dinner to eat spoonfuls of it.


    The lentil salad looks fantastic. Puy lentils are a bit harder to find in Canada but I will seek them out to make that salad.

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  6. Vix, I don't know if you heard about EHEC, the recent desease in Northern Germany. Today half the office tried my apple-radish salad. I hope ho one drops dead by the end of the week! I might feel guilty. If you want to try it I could post the recipe, too!

    Jen, Mr Paula even converted the imperial measurements to metric and wrote down the recipe in my recipe-folder. :-)
    Beluga lentils might be easier to find in Canada, they are even a bit smaller and black. The procedure should be the same. In Vienna you find those lentils (puy and beluga) in organic grocery stores.

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  7. Yes, if you don't mind posting the apple-radish salad I'd love to try it; I'm a fairly recent convert to radishes. Fingers crossed the office escapes EHEC!

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