Salad. It’s green, arguably good for you and as a general rule, nothing to write home about. For some, a salad is just the short stop between a deep-fried, cheese-laden appetizer and the main course. It’s something many people begrudgingly consume as an excuse to eat something far worse, as if salad had the power override our gastronomical bad decision making.
I actually really enjoy a good salad. I like how incredibly versatile a salad can be with its infinite ingredient combinations and dressing options. Being raised in the south, I have a fondness for the classic green salad smothered in Ranch dressing topped with bacon, hard boiled eggs and croutons. If there’s a roasted beet salad on the menu (and there almost always is), I’m all over it. Then, there’s the classic “kitchen sink” salad that I regularly make at home which as the name suggests, is compromised of whatever’s in my crisper drawer and pantry that I fee like adding to a large bowl. When it comes to salad, I’m usually on board.
As my mission to make 100 new recipes continues, I thought it appropriate to try out a few new salads this year. I have a few go-to preparations and am regularly inspired by salads I find on restaurant menus, which I attempt to recreate at home to varying degrees of success. But truthfully, it never occurred to me to find recipes for salad. No time like the present!
I have more vegetarian cookbooks in my collection than any other subject. This stockpile can be traced back to my early college days when I, and many of my friends, were dabbling in vegetarianism. Obviously this attempt at reinventing myself didn’t stick but I got a lot of fantastic recipes out of the experiment. Flipping through some of these books from that time in my life allowed me to reminisce, not necessarily about the food I prepared but rather, that era. Like looking though old photo albums, I was transported back to a very interesting and consequential time in my life and I am grateful for that.
Although I wasn’t successful at finding a salad recipe from my college-era cookbook collection, I was able to find one in a book I picked up recently. Yes, that’s right a new book… something I most certainly don’t need. My newest bibliophile acquisition is Edible: A Celebration of Local Foods. It’s part cookbook, part profile on the local food movement in America. This book is 100% up my alley and some of the recipes are really inspiring. One in particular caught my eye, the Arugula and Fennel Salad.
This simple salad has only a handful of ingredients but is really, REALLY good. This salad comes together quickly and is one of those dishes that you can impress your friends with. Here’s the recipe.
4 cups lightly packed arugula
2 small fennel bulbs
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice (plus more if needed)
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 pound Parmesan (or nutritional yeast to taste for a vegan mod.)
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Another reason why I was inspired to make this salad is because it reminds me so much of my good friend and fellow blogger, Dana, who is personally responsible for my love of fennel bulbs. She makes an Italian style sliced fennel salad that is very similar to this recipe so naturally I thought of her first!
If you’ve never tried fennel, I think this is a great starter dish. Raw fennel is crisp and has a mild licorice flavor that pairs really well with the peppery arugula greens. I personally wouldn’t touch a piece licorice candy with a 10 foot pole but LOVE fresh fennel bulb. Now, let’s make some salad!
If you happen to have a salad spinner, put the greens in and let the arugula soak in cool water while you prepare the rest of your salad. When you are ready, remove the strainer, dump out the dirty water, replace the strainer and spin until dry. Add dry arugula to a large salad bowl.
Next, remove the green stalks from your fennel bulb. You can add them to this salad but I personally think they are rather stringy and a little dry. I generally run them through my juicer for a sweet addition to my green juices. You can also compost them or if you have veggie-loving dogs like ours, feed them to your dogs.
Slice off the bottom, root end of the bulb. Cut on the diagonal to remove any hard core that remains. Remove any outer layers that look bruised or dry. Cut the bulb in half, then slice into thin pieces. Add to your bowl of dried arugula.
This recipe calls for 2 tablespoons of freshly squeezed lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil. I would use that as a guide but add as much as you’d like. I ended up using the juice from a whole lemon and probably more olive oil than the recipe suggests. As I am known to do, I just eyeballed it. Add the salt and pepper, again to taste.
If you are adding cheese to the salad, you have two options. If you want to be “fancy” use a potato peeler to cut ribbons of the hard cheese then add those gently to the salad. If you want to maximize your cheesy distribution, I’d go with a microplane or cheese grater. If you just want to skip out on the cheese altogether, my suggestion is to add some Nutritional Yeast in lieu of the Parmesan. This is a vegan-friendly cheese substitute which I actually really like and use pretty regularly in my own kitchen.
Once everything is in your bowl, mix well until all ingredients are well-distributed. If don’t plan to serve this immediately, I would hold off on the dressing and cheese until right before you’re ready to eat. You don’t want to a sad, limp salad at your dinner table!
That’s one good lookin’ salad and it tastes just a good as it looks! With all of the washing, chopping, squeezing, cheese grating and mixing I had to do, this salad took about 7 minutes from start to finish. Really, not much time at all. It’s a great first course, side dish or complete light meal. I enjoyed it with the next recipe I’ll be sharing, Chicken Pepperonata!
Although I thoroughly enjoyed my salad, I have to say the exercise in memory was even more enjoyable. Thumbing through my old books brought back fond memories of my early college days, reminded me of a great friend and even prompted me to remember how lucky I was to be raised in a home that valued fresh veggies… even if they were covered in delicious Ranch dressing. Who knew a simple salad could elicit such sentimentality? Here’s to you, Arugula and Fennel Salad!
100 First Tastes 