Salad Archives - A Byte of Life

Seasonal Kale Radicchio Salad w/ Poppyseed Dressing

I met this delicious seasonal dish at a baby shower a few weeks ago. Let’s set the stage here; I’m not usually super amazing thrilled baby showers attendee. But, one of my very good girlfriends recently had her first shower and there was a sacred promise that there would be no games, which is a huge plus for encouraging attendance. Little did I know that I would be greeted upon entry with a glass of La Marca Processco (which is my favorite) and ushered into a room of absolutely fantastic gals. With a glass of bubbly in my hand and a smile on my face I was shown to the food table. This, my fine friends, was both a visual and tasty delight! There were numerous quiche options, fresh shrimp with cocktail sauce, three types of homemade mini cupcakes and an absolutely amazing kale radicchio salad which I shamelessly had thirds of.

The bubbly was also flowing, but, that has no correlation to the ‘yum’ factor of this salad. Not only was it visually delightful, but it was so delicious that I had to remind myself I was in public and shoving salad into my mouth as quickly as I could was not socially appropriate. It was tangy, creamy, crunchy, herbaceous, earthy and downright amazing. Three bites in I was begging for the recipe. It was a simple and side dish that is easily transported for events and was SUPER tasty. Had I hit the side-dish mecca? Quite possibly my friends, quite possibly.

For halloween our office did a “Crocktober” and one look at the food sign up sheet had my insides yelling for something even remotely healthy! Someone’s got to make a non-crockpot dish to balance this whole situation out right!? So, when asked to sign up for a dish to share I decided that there needed to be a little balance to the baked goods, 3 types of mac n cheese (including one that boasted being ‘texas style’ which apparently meant extra cheese and cream), pork, meatballs, cookies, brownies and otherwise carbacious cheese covered feast that was about to ensue. This festive gathering needing kale, lots of kale. Good, wholesome tasty kale. There was no other thought in my mind than to debut the kale radicchio salad recipe. If we’re being completely honest, I made this salad for a few reasons; one of preservation so I knew there would be something I would eat there, and I also really needed some motivation to blog this recipe (that a few people have specifically asked for in the past week) and try my hand at homemade poppyseed dressing. Unless I had a deadline of hungry mouths tomorrow and feeling the moral obligation to balance out the cholesterol and sugar levels of the office party, this recipe could have been put off for months.

This recipe is so easy and tasty it’s almost ridiculous. It really highlights the fall and winter seasonal flavors that might not be combined in salad form but are absolutely ridiculously good when combined. This recipe calls for one of my favorite seasonal ingredients, pumpkin seeds. Now, if we want to be fancy we’d call them pepitas instead of pumpkin seeds which has a literal translation of “little seed of a squash”. It’s basically the spanish culinary term for a pumpkin seed. I gave the salad a little upgrade by roasting them with paprika before adding them to the recipe. You can find my recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds here and just sub out the salt for paprika. This is one salad where you can really personalize! Next time I might also roast some delicata squash and add it in, or even pumpkin or butternut squash!

This salad is really going to be a seasonal staple for us and will be ever evolved. It makes a great simple, quick meal or healthy and tasty potluck dish! It’s super simple to make the night before and combine when you’re ready to serve. It’s gluten-free, dairy free, nut-free, healthy and easy. Yes PLEASE!

Seasonal Kale Radicchio Salad w/ Poppyseed Dressing

For the Salad
1 head kale, washed, stemmed, massaged and torn into pieces
1 head radicchio, washed and cut and cut in chiffonade
pepitas/ pumpkin seeds
olive oil
paprika
dried cranberries
1 small thinly sliced shallot

Poppyseed Dressing
3 tbsp Katz late harvest sauvignon blanc vinegar
2 tbsp local honey
2 tsp dijon mustard
pinch grey salt
pinch fresh cracked pepper
2-3 tbsp grapeseed oil
1 tsp diced shallot

Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Lay the pepitas out on non-stick foil and spray with olive oil or other high-heat oil. Dust with smoked paprika and toast for 10 minutes, keeping an eye and adjusting time according to how your oven heats. Once they’re done remove from the oven and let cool.

Meanwhile, thoroughly wash and de-stem the kale.

I wash the kale well, and use a large OXO SoftWorks Salad Spinner to dry kale and I absolutely love it! Add a tiny bit of grey salt and massage the kale in the bowl until it reduces in size and turns a darker color.

Grab the radicchio, peel the outer layer, slice in half and core the halves. Pull apart a few layers at a time, fold and chiffonade. The chiffonade technique is basically rolling the leaves and thinly slicing.

Place kale and radicchio in a bowl. Add the toasted pepitas and cranberries to taste.

Place all dressing ingredients in a mason jar and shake to combine.

When you’re ready to serve, add the dressing to the bowl and toss.

Variations
Substitute pepitas for walnuts and add goat cheese and parsley with plain oil dressing
Spiced pecans and dried cranberries with a warm bacon vinaigrette
Mandarine oranges with slivered almonds and a sesame vinaigrette
Roast up some delicata squash, butternut squash or pumpkin and throw it in

Summer Sangria & Salad Shirazi

Friends, we can officially say that we’re closer to warm weather than we have been in MONTHS! I LOVE warm weather eating and drinking, but specifically eating and drinking alfresco. I’m a sucker for rooftop’s, balcony’s, patio’s, and picnic’s! Get me outside breathing the fresh Spring or summer air, put delicious food in front of me, and a drink in my hand and you’ll see one happy gal! I love the transition to warm weather, and eating delicious salads like the one we’ll get to in a minute, but there is one part of the transition that is hard for me. I know, I know, that sounds ridiculous! But here’s the deal: I’m a red wine kinda gal. Not the fruity, light stuff that’s easy to drink in the heat. No, I’m a Malbec, Chianti, Barolo (younger so it’s not as fruity), or Cab kinda gal. Those delicious wines that are not quite as common place at, say a summer picnic! Well, there are two things that changed my life: Spain & Australia.

We took a trip to Spain two years ago, you can read the write up here, and fell in LOVE with Sangria but never really knew what wine I should use to use to make it. That’s where Australia comes into the picture. I lived there my senior year of high-school and fell in love with the country. So, once I got back to the States and started drinking wine, I was drawn to the Australian wines, specifically Shiraz! I was approached by a company to partner in posting an article featuring two of their recipes. Low and behold what recipes do they ask me to do a write-up on and feature? Sangria with Shiraz and a delicious summer salad! It was meant to be! I’ll stop the yapping and let you get to the reading and the drinking, but I had to layer in my little story for you. Below is their article and the recipe for the AMAZING Sangria! Cheers! (My own pictures of these dishes to come soon!! Stay tuned!)

Australia has become quite known for its Shiraz, a great-tasting wine with aromas that vary between fruity cherries, plums and raisins, to complex chocolates, coffee, and earth. The wine can also vary between fresh and fruity to highly concentrated and intense.

The renewed popularity of Australian Shiraz can be widely attributed to Michael Fragos, chief winemaker of Chapel Hill in McLaren Vale, which supplies wine for M&S. Fragos has been touted as one of the few winemakers who have gone to great lengths to promote his country’s wines, travelling across the globe to educate the media and wine connoisseurs about their recent developments. Thanks to winemakers like Fragos, the Australian wine market has flourished, and the land’s own wines have become well-known.

This is probably why, when people hear the word “Shiraz”, they immediately think of the deep, delicious red wine. Unbeknownst to many, Shiraz is also the name of something different entirely: a city in Iran, which has been as a regional trade center for over a thousand years. Shiraz is known as the city of poets, literature, wine, and flowers, and it’s also become famous for a deliciously refreshing summer salad that hails from the beautiful city.

Today, we feature recipes that honor Shiraz — both the deliciously deep red wine of Australia, and the city which gave birth to a light salad — right in time for the summer.

Summer Sangria
Ingredients:
· A bottle of Australian Shiraz
· 1 lemon, sliced into wedges
· 1 orange, sliced into wedges
· 1 lime, sliced into wedges
· 2 tbsp of sugar
· A splash of lemonade or orange juice
· 1 cup of frozen strawberries
· 1 small can of diced pineapples
· 4 cups of ginger ale

Pour the Shiraz into a large pitcher, and squeeze the juice from the fruit wedges into the pitcher. Toss in the wedges as well, leaving out the seeds if you have the time. Add the pineapple cubes (with the juice!) and the sugar, gin, and lemonade. Allow the mix to chill overnight, or for 24 hours if you can. The next day, add in the ginger ale, berries, and ice just before serving.

Salad Shirazi
Ingredients:
· 1 large cucumber
· 1 large onion
· 1 large tomato
· 1-2 tbsp of olive oil
· 1/4 cup of lemon juice
· Parsley
· Salt, to taste

Simply chop the vegetables into evenly-sized pieces, and toss everything together with the olive oil, lemon juice, parsley, and salt. This will make a great side salad that goes well with everything.

Cucumber Tomato Feta Salad

Summer is FINALLY here!! That’s right, ladies and gents, the Pacific Northwest finally has consistent sunshine! With the change of the weather, comes the change of the taste buds. I trade my warming winter ratatouille and warming cast-iron portions of delicious steaming cassoulet for the lighter summer fare like the Cilantro Lime Chicken & Baked Potato Skins I made for dinner TWO nights in a row (yes, they are THAT good and SO simple).

A few of my other “go to” summer meals are:
Hawaiian Poke & Ginger Ono Sashimi
Prosciutto Wrapped Chicken & Asparagus
Healthy Chicken Veggie Spring Rolls with Garlic Ginger Dipping Sauce

This year I needed a new salad, something that was out of my normal cooking pallet. I’ve had different variations of this type of salad (Fez on Wheels Turkish Shepherd Salad, and Tom Douglas’ Home Remedy Jackie’s Greek Salad are two of my favorites) and decided it was time to make it myself.

Of course, after I used the “wing it” approach I realized that looking for a recipe could have been smart idea. Psh, who needs a recipe when you have a photo of the ingredients and taste testing! Next time I WONT forget the mint or the fresh lemon juice. The Epicruious version called for scallions instead of the red pepper and the Simply Recipes version called for 1 tsp fresh chopped oregano. There is also a more italian style version that A Taste of Home posted with mozzarella that I’ll be trying next week! Whatever the variations you use, it’s even better than next day once the flavors marinate together for a while. Also makes a great potluck or BBQ side!

Do you have any special additions or variations of this delicious dish? Next time I’m thinking I’ll add some quinoa!

Ingredients
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/4 c fresh squeezed lemon juice
fresh cracked salt and pepper to taste
drizzle of EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)
2 large cucumbers, peeled and seeded
cherry tomatoes (to taste), washed and halved
1/2 c chopped fresh mint, Chiffonade
7 oz fresh sheep feta, crumbled
1 cup pitted halved Kalamata olives

Directions

To make the dressing, mix the red wine vinegar, lemon juice, cracked pepper and drizzle of EVOO to a small bowl and whisk together then set aside. If you have a jar, you can also just add the ingredients and shake the living heck out of the ingredients to mix. Wash and half the cucumbers, then use a spoon to scoop out the seeds in the center then slice and place in a medium bowl. Add olives. Wash and half the tomatoes and add them to the cucumber bowl. Rinse and pat the mint dry, then Chiffonade it. That’s a fancy little french term for stacking herb leaves on top of each other than tightly rolling them and cutting horizontally to produce long thin strips. Add the dressing to the cucumber bowl and toss lightly, sprinkling in the feta and tossing all the goodness together. Serve as a main with some humus and pita bread, or as a delicious side!

Enjoy!