Great Green Salad

I love salad.  Everyone should love salad.  Sometimes you just can’t be arsed though.  But this is a great salad so if you can be bothered, make the effort.

Great Green Salad

For the salad:

½ -1 lettuce – I like mignonette but use whatever you prefer.  You’ll sometime see it called                             butter lettuce
½ fennel bulb, sliced thinly – shaved even
1-2 crisp granny Smith apples (or a crisp pear or blood orange, whatever’s in season)
A handful each of parsley and mint
Dill if you happen to have some around
½ an onion, sliced very thinly – prep explanation below

For the dressing:

lemon juice
1 heaped tsp seeded mustard
olive oil
salt and pepper
1 garlic clove, crushed

Onion first.  I’m often not a big fan of raw onion, it can be too overpowering a flavour especially in a salad.  But if you soak your finely sliced onion in either cold water or vinegar (or a combination of both) for at least an hour before you want to use it the real sting that the onion has will be dramatically lessened and you will be left with a crisp lightly onion flavoured bit of goodness that is perfect for a salad.  You can leave this step out and you can leave the onion out all together, it’s just a little something extra that I occasionally do if I feel the urge.

into a big salad bowl put:

finely sliced fennel; well washed an dried lettuce leaves, torn up into smallish bits; apples, sliced into thin crescents; herbs; onions.  You could also, at this stage, throw in some nuts if you happened to have some around.  Some toasted walnuts, almonds or hazelnuts would be great.  I didn’t have any.

to make the dressing you want about 1 part oil to 2 parts acid (lemon juice).  Put them in a jar with the mustard, salt and pepper and a clove of garlic that you have lightly crushed with the back of a knife.  Put the lid on the jar, shake until well combined.  Taste and adjust the seasoning as you like.  Pour on the salad just before serving, try not to let the garlic clove fall in the salad but it doesn’t matter if it does.

I served this with cheese and silverbeet rolls and maple syrup baked parsnips.

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