This salad is so EASY and so GOOD! It came out of a gardening flaw that I cannot get past. I hate to pull up heads of lettuce. It’s so silly, but it makes me sad. I much prefer to harvest leaves one by one, but this does cause a problem… bolted bitter greens. Wah, wah, wah. So last summer, I found myself with many large little gems. I was determined to find a way to use them when I remembered a trick my friend, Gustavo, showed me. Massaging the dressing into the greens…
Hoping this, plus the sautéed sunflower seeds, could make my bitter lettuce palatable. It worked!! The only other addition was sliced carrots (sliced with a potato peeler). The thin but wide strips work perfectly in this super simple salad.
It’s fast, tasty, and my guests love it every time. And even better, you don’t have to over ripen the lettuce in your garden, just use a dark red lettuce and you will get the same effect. I can’t expect every one out there to start taking up my bad gardening habits!
- SALAD INGREDIENTS:
- 2 carrots
- 1 head of dark red lettuce
- ¾ C Sunflower Seeds
- 1 T EVOO
- 1 T honey
- 2 t salt
- DRESSING INGREDIENTS:
- ½ C EVOO
- ⅛ C ume vinegar
- Start by making the sautéed sunflower seeds. Add 1 T EVOO to a pan on medium heat, then add the sunflower seeds and coat well. Once they begin to heat up, add the honey and salt and mix together well. When they start to golden, remove them from the heat and flatten they out on a plate to cool down. Once they are cool, they will become brittle and you will break them apart as you add them as the last ingredient to the salad.
- While they are cooling, chop and rinse the greens. Dry them in towels or a salad spinner.
- Next, slice your carrots with the potato peeler. If the slices are long, but them down to 3 inches in length after you have them all sliced.
- Mix the greens and carrots together in a bowl and add the ume vinegar and ½ C EVOO. Massage the dressing into the greens and carrots well.
- Finally, add the sunflower seeds and serve!