Posts Tagged: lime
mustard greens salad + lime and za’atar dressing
Where I used to farm, we grew a mustard green called Purple Osaka that initiated my love affair with these under-appreciated greens. What started out as plum-tinted, mildly spicy baby greens grew into vibrantly purple leaves with a huge horseradish kick. The first time I sampled one in the field, my mind started buzzing with the culinary options: julienned and mixed into potato or egg salad, in place of lettuce on a roast beef sandwich, and, of course, as a base for a lively salad.
This is not a salad for those who prefer their greens as a relatively neutral base for add-ins and dressings. Especially if you use mature or late-season mustard greens, expect a wasabi-like punch that permeates and punches up the other ingredients. I love that the sweet apricot, tangy pickled onions and pistachios not only add contrasting flavors and textures but also gorgeous gem colors.My default salad dressing is a mustard vinaigrette that I felt would be redundant here, so I made a lime and za’atar dressing that ties it all together.
Mustard Greens Salad
1/2 small red onion, thinly sliced
1/4 c red wine vinegar
1/4 c water
1/2 tbsp kosher or sea salt
1/2 tbsp honey
1 bunch mustard greens, chopped, or baby mustard greens (about 6 cups)
1/3 c pistachios
1/4 c dried apricots, chopped
lime and za’atar dressing, recipe below
1. Pickle the onion. In a small bowl, stir together the red wine vinegar, water, salt, and honey. Add the red onion and allow to sit for at least 10 minutes.
2. In a large bowl, toss together the mustard greens, pistachios, apricots, and red onion. Drizzle the lime and za’atar dressing and gently toss until evenly coated.
Serves 2-4
Lime and Za’atar Salad Dressing
juice of 1 lime
1/4 tsp kosher or sea salt
1 tsp za’atar
1/4 c good quality extra virgin olive oil
In a medium bowl, stir together the lime juice, salt, and za’atar. Slowly whisk in the olive oil until emulsified.
grilled chili-lime corn
Now that we’ve moved into a larger apartment with a little backyard and a large (by Brooklyn standards) kitchen, I’m eager to begin entertaining again. The weather doesn’t hurt either. It makes me feel like mixing up a pitcher of margaritas and inviting my friends and their babies over for a (foot) dip in the (kiddie) pool. And while actually planning the party – particularly the menu – is half the fun for me, we did something a little more half-assed for Memorial Day weekend and thought at the last minute to invite another couple over for the holiday.
The problem is, I’m really not that great of a host. I mean, I can prepare a pretty good spread and enjoy the company, but if things aren’t perfectly planned and executed I find it challenging to keep calm. I’ve always admired how relaxed my mother-in-law is in the face of a party mishap, often reminding me of Julia Child in such situations. Last weekend when we couldn’t get the grill going and all I could think about was how we had no food ready to serve and how I was supposed to be photographing our grilled meal for an assignment, I’m pretty sure my mother-in-law would have been laughing and easily switching gears, turning on the stove to sauté the shrimp and offering another round of drinks to her guests.
Maybe next time.
Our guests didn’t eat this corn. It wasn’t even a planned dish, although sadly there were some parts of the intended menu that didn’t make it to the table until our friends were well on their way home. This was a happy afterthought. The grill was dying down and I wanted to make the most of the stubborn fire we finally started, so I looked in the fridge and put this chili-lime corn together. It was good enough to consider serving at our next party, although to save my fragile frame of mind I might grill the corn ahead of time, cut off the kernels, and serve it as a salad.
Grilled Chili-Lime Corn
4 ears husked corn
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon chili powder
1/2 tsp kosher or sea salt
2 oz chèvre
handful cilantro leaves
1 lime, quartered
1. Preheat the grill to medium-high. In a small bowl stir together the olive oil, chili powder, and salt.
2. Brush the corn with the olive oil mixture and place on the grill. Grill, turning every few minutes so all sides are cooked, until desired level of char. You can’t undercook them – even raw corn is sweet – but you want the chili powder to cook into the corn a bit.
3. Move the corn to a serving plate and sprinkle with dots of chèvre and the cilantro. Serve with the lime, to be squeezed over the corn just before eating.
Serves 4
