Edible Tulip

101 Salads for Everyday Eating: #52 French Lentils with Nutty Sprouts, Diced Avocado and Grape Tomatoes

I love the texture of this salad and the way the sweet coooked still warm lentils collide with the slightly bitter crunchy dazzle of sprouts. I know sprouts aren't for everyone and you could easily leave them out and add chopped nuts instead but for me they're the epitome of spring. They are as close to that organic earthy taste of the practically living as you can get unless you're willing to get down on all fours.

I'm excited to start sprouting my own mung beans but for now I picked up a package from sprouts for life that contains fenugreek, lentils, kamut and adzuki bean sprouts. Whereas with alfalfa sprouts you can pretty much use them wherever you might favour lettuce i.e. on a thinly sliced toasted piece of sunflower bread smeared with crunchy almond butter and topped with a handful of sprouts, these sprouted seeds are best added to salads.

Always go for the smallest darkest lentil you can find for salads. The large green ones are too hard to cook to that al dente point. The red ones fall apart and are perfect for soups, stews and dals. The brown ones are better than the green ones for salads but try to suss out the French du puy variety. My health food store in Roncesvalles carries a number of bulk lentils and I choose the tiny dark green ones. They require no soaking and very little patience. I put a cup into twice that much water and bring to a boil. At full boil I reduce the heat to medium and cook for 20 minutes. Some are just barely bursting out of their skin splaying open a bit but most are still firm and chewy. Cooked through but not soft.

Lentils

A mix of nutty sprouts or chopped nuts

Some diced avocado

A few quartered grape tomatoes

Fresh dill chopped

A bit of chopped green onion

A tahini dressing is really good here but I stuck to a drizzle of serious extra virgin olive oil, a lot of cracked Himalayan pink salt and a tiny bit of fresh lemon juice.

Tahini Dressing
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 cup tahini
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons hot water

Mash the minced garlic clove in a bowl with the salt. If you have a mortar and pestle, great, but if not use the back of a wooden spoon. Add the tahini and lemon juice and olive oil and combine. Thin with hot water until you have the consistency you prefer. A mini blender is perfect for these sorts of dressings.

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #48 Warm Hard Boiled Eggs with Fresh Dill and Shaved Fennel in a Horseradish Mustard Vinaigrette

Dill has become my fresh herb of choice lately. For a while I was tugging towards the essence of spring, so clogged by February's dull gaze, that I got  swept up in the only verdancy I knew which was a green goddess dressing -- all basil and mint and cilantro blended together with lemon and olive oil and a bit of wasabi. But then I discovered lacinato kale ribboned and massaged in oil (hemp, oil, flax, you name it, kale's a bit of a floozy when it comes to rub downs), but then I got hooked on a salad that was various versions of shaved fennel, chopped fresh dill, thinly sliced Fuji apple, and raw kale. Sometimes I added nuts like sunflower seeds or hemp hearts and occasionally I tossed in some cooked garbanzo beans but it was also super tasty just on its own. I love salads that are built on basics that can stand proudly on their own but are also adaptable to adding a whole slew of other random things. Versatality is key.

When I eat salad for lunch while I am working at home I try to add something warm. An ingredient that shifts the dish a bit -- wilts the escarole or kale just a perfect amount or absorbs the dressing in just the right way; it's often legumes that have been cooked from dry or grains like coucous, quinoa or bulgur, but just boiled, still-warm-to-the-touch, perfectly cooked eggs are excellent too.

I tossed some shaved fennel with a bit of freshly chopped dill, added a few black kalama olives in oil (but small green Nicoise ones would be good too), chopped up some radicchio and spooned the horseradish mustard vinaigrette over top. Hardboiled eggs, still warm, absorb vinaigrette, and are a rare delight tossed with greens, especially of the chicory variety, I love this salad mixed in with a vinaigrette, then scrambled again with torn frisee (that prickly slightly bitter lettuce) folding all the flavours together.

I buy a half carton of eggs from Rowe Farms in Roncesvalles Village. They are, hands down, the best eggs I've ever eaten. I follow the Egg Farmers of Ontario guidelines for cooking perfect hard boiled eggs: place the eggs in a pot in a few inches of cold water, bring to a boil, then cover with a lid and set aside for 23 minutes. They said between 18 - 23 minutes but 18 left mine entirely runny. I like mine just-turned to entirely cooked yolk, no orange moistness left.

Some flaked tuna would be a good protein addition. As would some crumbled goat feta.

I use 2 to 1, light tasting olive oil to white wine vinegar, and shake in a jar with 1 tablespoon of Kozlik's horseradish mustard. The stuff is potent. Nose running inducing. But it is also addictive, delicious, intoxicating stuff. He's a Canadian mustard wunderkid who I first came across at St. Lawrence Market. He's got a stall stacked high with tall, thin mustard jars and an assortment of salty pretzels to give them a try. I picked up this mustard from Rowe Farms too.

Hey. Anyone else getting sick of being whipped by winter? I friend of mine emailed me a while ago concerned she may have died inside without fully realizing it. I'm just so tired, so listless, so... blah. I call it February Flatlining. But March is less than a week ago. Starting Friday, all eyes are pinned on spring.

The lake, which is just a few metres away from where I live in the city, is like a mistriss. Tempting me all day long. I used to think I walked a lot when I lived on the ravine, in mid town, with the foxes and rabbits and woodpeckers and Monarch butterflies, and I'd wander the back trails through thickets of 50 foot cottonwood trees, but now that I see water out my window, and when you're down beside the water, all you hear is waves or clashing ice or sand dunes disintegrating or seagulls, it's hard to pull yourself away. 

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #47 Warm Potato and Green Bean Salad in a Curried Vinaigrette

Years ago, when I was working as the head cook at the art retreat centre up near Georgian Bay and feeding hungry hordes of aggravated artists who spent their days slaying their easels and smudging out bits only to splatter new pieces, this was a favourite salad at the spread. Warm new potatoes, when they are cooked until tender and the flesh splays and the skin breaks, soak up a vinaigrette like nobody's business. I like to keep the acid ratio a bit higher in grain and carb salads in order to avoid an oily overload. The curry powder in this grainy mustard dressing works perfectly -- it's subtle enough not to overpower the delightful simplicity of earthy new potato and crunchy green bean, but it gives it an almost unidentifiable kick. This is one of the recipes that brought the most guests into the kitchen asking: So, about that potato salad, WHAT made it so delicious? I tossed the warm potatoes and the just cooked through green beans with the dressing and then added a lot of chopped cilantro and tossed again, the herbs lose their bite and soften. Dill or parsley would be equally good.

The key to this recipe is to toss the still-warm potatoes with the dressing. They drink it in. The green beans are optional, but they add to the visual appeal of the salad, along with the fresh chopped herbs. Fresh or frozen peas would be a good substitute.

Count on 3 or 4 smallish differently sized new baby potatoes per person

the green beans are more an accent to the dish, so use about a handful and cut into 2 inch pieces

chopped cilantro, parsley or dill

Place potatoes in a large pot. Cover with water and add 1 tsp of salt and a bay leaf. Lower heat and cook until potatoes can be pierced with a fork and the skins break open. This will take about 15 to 20 minutes.

Just before the potatoes are ready to drain, add the green beans and cook for an additional 2 minutes, or until they turn a bright green.

While the potatoes are cooking, make the dressing by whisking together the mustard, lemon juice or cider vinegar, minced garlic, maple syrup and curry powder in a small bowl or jar. Slowly whisk in the oil, until all the ingredients are fully combined.

Drain the potatoes and beans in a colander and shake until the excess water is released. Place in a bowl and toss with the dressing until it is fully absorbed, add the fresh herbs, toss again. Turn out onto a serving platter and sprinkle with sea salt and cracked black pepper.

dressing

3 ounces whole grain mustard
3 3/4 ounces cider vinegar or fresh lemon juice
3 ounces maple syrup
1 garlic clove, minced or crushed

2 tsp curry powder

6 ounces light olive oil or safflower oil

For the past few years I lived on a ravine in the middle of the city and I wrote often about the woods and the way the light spun and spattered through leaf cover. I wrote about dawn and lifting fog. And I wrote about dew on spider webs and copulating beetles. Sometimes the gravelly path was covered in the gooey trails of wandering wayward snails on a mission. It was magical and mostly I miss the bird song but I have found new inspiration. 

I have moved to the edge of the lake with a constantly changing horizon of colour and cloud, light and haze. Waterbirds honk and squack at me and my dog as we scurry the shore like interloping beachcombers.

If you've never experienced the sound of a few swans taking flight, the power of their wings whipping air, the profound beauty of their ascent, I'd give it a shot if you ever get the chance.

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #46 Shaved Fennel and Brussel Sprouts with Hazelnuts, Pomegranate and Orange

Lunch split between 2, with bread and cheese and cured meats

Lunch for 1 in a big bowl

Dinner side salads for 4 on small plates

+++++

If you have the ingredients on hand, this is a super fast quick orchestration under 15 minutes from start to finish.

Ingredients

1/2 fennel bulb, shaved/cut finely/mandolined

6 Brussel sprouts, shaved/cut finely/mandolined

1 head of Lacinato kale (otherwise known as black kale, dinosaur kale, cavolo nero), ribboned

1/4 pomegranate, seeded

1 orange, peeled, pith cut off, sliced into thin slices

handful of raw hazelnuts

white wine vinegar

olive oil

coarse sea salt

Method

A box grater makes quick work of the fennel bulb and the Brussel sprouts. I like to use the single blade and it creates a perfect feathery wedge. The subtle licorice flavour of the fennel is such a natural pairing to juicy orange slices and tart pomegranate (dry cranberries would be a good substitute if fresh pomegranate isn't available). I've used sweet toasted pecans in this salad before -- and they are delicious -- but raw hazelnuts are surprisingly perfect. Lacinato kale (also called dinosaur kale, cavolo nero, Tuscan kale, black kale) is earthy tasting, cool green in colour, coarse in texture until tenderized by a dressing, and in the end, ridiculously delicious. Up there with quinoa, it's one of the best things on the planet for you nutritionally speaking. Get down with kale. It won't disappoint.

Any kind of homemade grain or dijon mustard vinaigrette with a touch of something naturally sweet like honey or maple syrup is great with kale and fruit and nuts. But the salad is so vibrant and alive and complex on its own that once you've compiled everything into a bowl or onto a place a drizzle of olive oil, a grind of coarse sea salt, and a splash of white wine vinegar is also just enough. Toss the salad with your hands. It's a recent discovery of mine and I wouldn't go back.

* if you have an aversion to the licorice zing of fennel, try nappa/Chinese cabbage as a substitute

** if fresh pomegranate isn't available, or if it's too much work, go for dried cherries or dried cranberries. 

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #45 Apple and Celery tossed with Kale and Radicchio

So, here's a sort of delicious take to work tupperware lunch: crisp Fuji apple mixed in with chopped celery, ribboned black kale (the flat kale rather than the curly) and radicchio. Raw sunflower seeds add the nuttiness factor and the honey vinaigrette rounds the whole thing out with a touch of sweetness with its characteristic perfectly subtle manner. I love this salad as is, but you could always add dried cranberries or some sort of hard salty cheese or shredded bits of cooked chicken if you have any lying around the fridge. Legumes don't really meld well with the earthy fruity flavours but quinoa would be delicious. I tend to start with the most elemental ingredients and then build.

Fill the bottom of whatever size bowl you are serving from with chopped washed celery. If it's a single serving tupperware, fill it 1/4 the way up; if it's a large wooden bowl, do the same. Slice into thin wedges pieces of crisp apple (at this time of year I chose Fuji - a mostly sweet apple with a slight bite - but in the true season of Fall I'd have chosen a mutsu or a honeycrisp) and add to the celery. Add a teaspoon of lemon juice or apple cider vinegar to the mix and toss to coat to keep the apple slices from browning. Cut the kale into thinnish (1/2 inch) ribbons, toss in, then chop up some radicchio. Add. Season with coarse sea salt. Throw in a handful of raw sunflower seeds (or, if you prefer, roasted and salted).

Makes 1 1/2 cups

1/2 cup raw, unpasteurized honey, preferably local

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

juice of 1 lemon

3/4 cup olive oil, or oil of choice

In a bowl, whisk together the honey, vinegar, and lemon juice. Slowly whisk in the olive oil. Pour in increments over the salad, tossing to coat.

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #44 Warm Dinner Salad of Roasted Butternut Squash in Pesto on Sticky Black Thai Rice

This is a super quick, super tasty, exotic but straight up sort of vegetarian dinner your girl friends might get around to if you ply them with Riesling or Portuguese Vinho Verde (both sparkling and sassy and the perfect counterpoint to the slight sweetness of the squash and the sticky rice) and serve the meal in pretty bowls. A sourdough baguette and some Manchego cheese would be a bit great, as would a sliced perfectly barely ripe pear. The meal takes about 45 minutes of cooking time but zero prep time and 5 minutes plating time. Do you have something in your repertoire that's faster to prepare, prettier to look at, and equally healthful? Cause if you do, send it my way!

This is the gist of the recipe and then I'll break it down a bit further for you.

Take a butternut squash, wash it, stick it whole on a baking pan and stick into a preheated oven at 350 degrees F. Bake for 45 minutes or until cooked through (a knife will slip easily in and out of the entire squash). Peel cooked squash with a knife and cut into cubes. Toss with your favourite pesto sauce. Many are wildly different. I love the traditional basil parmesan pesto but I also love a spicy cilantro pesto that appears more like a vinaigrette with chopped herbs.

Meanwhile cook the black sticky rice, as it takes about the same amount of time: 45 minutes. Here's a weird fact: black sticky rice (like sushi rice, etc) is considered a glutinous rice, and yet... it is safe for gluten free diets, i.e. it has no gluten. Strange. It can be a bit gummy and I tend to overly rinse it before I cook it and then also drain it and run through cold then hot water again once cooked to clear away the starch. Black rice is referred to as a sweet rice but it ain't sweet. It's got a nutty taste and a solid texture and it's full of vitamins and minerals and fibre, more than brown rice. I find cooking this sort of rice to be more effective if I boil it rather than steam it. Using the latter remedy has resulted in too many miscalculations and soggy rice or uncooked rice. If you triple the water content and bring the rice to a boil, then lower the heat to low, and simmer until cooked through, about 45 minutes for 1/2 cups of cooked rice (3 cups uncooked), you'll end up with a perfectly cooked glistening purple rice to counterbalance your squash.

Top with fresh or fried sage leaves.

If you're not doing the bread and cheese thing (and frankly after the holidays that might be a good thing), serve a large inviting salad mixed with winter greens like arugula, endive and frisee then toss with a bit of shaved parmesan and whatever nut you have on hand: hazlenuts, walnuts, pecans, almonds -- all would be good!

 

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #43 Wheatberry and Basmati Salad with Corn and Pea Shoots in a Honey-Apple Cider Vinaigrette

If there's any reason to make extra basmati, it's the excuse to make fried rice or to save some for a salad the following day. I love how the rice segregates when it's cool losing all of its starchy stickiness. In the heat of summer, I love to toss cold rice with baked tofu and cucumber slices then douse it all in rice vinegar and top with roasted chopped peanuts, but in the fall / winter, a rice salad works best with another grain that is a bit heftier. Helloooo wheat berry. The endosperm addition to the equation (literally). This grain is a delight of chewy nuttiness. I love the sweet subtlety of basmati but I almost like it even more matched with something shorter, chewier, meatier like a whole unprocessed grain such as the hard wheat berry (super easy to cook, by the way, and full of vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals). They tango well together.

Add to the salad the colour and sweetness and general delight of corn kernals and something fresh and slightly citrusy like pea shoots and it's a pretty great lunch.

Ingredients

Leftover cooked basmati rice (or any rice)

Wheat berries

Corn kernals, fresh or frozen

Pea shoots, chopped (substitutes: arugula, fresh herbs (dill, basil or parsley), baby spinach)

To cook the wheat berries: Rinse them under running water. Fill a pot half way with water, add 1/2 cup of wheat berries* and bring to a boil. Turn down to medium heat, and let simmer / slow boil for about 45 minutes. Check for consistency. Al dente or still chewy works best for salads. Once they are cooked through, drain in a sieve, and toss with your left over rice.

Meanwhile...

cut kernals off of fresh cobs of corn (or use frozen), and add to about an inch of water in a flat deep frying pan. Heat over high, tossing constantly, for about 3 minutes, or until the kernals have turned bright yellow. You want to steam the kernals rather than boil them. Drain the cooked kernals in a sieve and toss to shake off all the excess water.

Add to rice and wheat berry mix. Toss with dressing. Add in any fresh tasting greens: chopped pea shoots or arugula or baby spinach or chopped fresh herbs (cilantro and parsley combined or basil or dill or fresh chives). You could also use tender rainbow chard leaves or dandelion leaves if you have either on hand, just ribbon the leaves thinly. Tossed with the warm ingredients, they will wilt a bit, which is what you want! -- it saps any bitterness. 

Honey Apple Cider Vinaigrette, makes about 1 cup but it keeps in a jar in the refrigerator**

1/2 cup of honey (always buy unpasteurized raw honey ideally from close to where you live -- local honey is made from local bees who obviously use local pollen providing you with antibodies)

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1 green onion, minced

3/4 cup olive oil

Coarse sea salt and cracked black pepper

Whisk together the honey and the vinegar, add the juice of the lemon and the green onion, whisk again, then add the olive oil until blended. Spoon over the salad, tossing until absorbed.

*1 cup raw wheat berries equals 2 1/2 cups cooked.

**Old mason jars or mustard jars rinsed and soaped in hot water make perfect salad dressing containers. You can seal them tight enough to be able to shake vigorously.

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #42 Red Spinach and Chinese Celery with Sweet Walnuts in a Maple Syrup Vinaigrette

Well, hello there. It's been a while. I had a very busy summer of moving house and then I let it all hang and unfold as it should through the Fall to the smell of algae and the light of the horizons over the lake out my window. I am so happy in my new neighbourhood. It's a magical place filled with antique chandelier shops, vintage dress boutiques, a vibrant and still thriving video store (!), a cheese shop, an eco meat shop, multiple bakeries, some grotty coffee shops filled with miscreants and characters who talks to themselves, but it's lovely and alive and I feel at home. I often snap the leash on the dog and we head out into the world and it takes us 3 hours to make our way back. There's just so much to see.

A favourite fall salad. Red spinach is a beautiful thing. It's made up of little vibrant leaves strung together on a very weedy, reedy, chewy, sweet stalk. I've never seen anything quite like it before in the lettuce world and I've been around my greens, as you know. They were piled high in gentle, puffy stacks at the Chinese grocer and even when I grabbed moundfuls and stuffed them into several clear plastic bags, I didn't seem to make a dent in the cloud . It's chewy and sweet and herbaceous but subtle. Add in some chopped Chinese celery and you're talking. It's like regular celery but more narrow, less celery tasting, and it looks like thick stalked parsley.

I threw in some candied nuts because they are sweet and crunchy and round out the flavour perfectly.

This is great as a very simple lunch eaten with a hunk of bread and some grassy mountain cheese or with dinner and a side of pork and rice.

Candied Pecans or Walnuts

2 tablespoons unsalted butter or light vegetable oil: safflower/sunflower/grapeseed

2 tablespoons organic sugar or light brown sugar

1/2 cup raw pecans

Set a nonstick pan over medium heat. Add the butter or oil and the sugar until they have melted together, toss in the pecans, and stir to coat. Cook through for about 1 minute. Transfer to a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper / waxed paper and continue cooking in the oven for 10 - 15 minutes at 350 degrees F.

Salad Dressing

When I make lunch at home, I pour dressing from a glass jar where I've already prepared the dressing (honey jars are perfect!). But this recipe will make enough for 4 side servings.

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard or whole grain mustard (or really any authentic mustard you enjoy that has a kick and a bite to it)

2 teaspoons white balsamic vinegar

1/4 cup olive oil (or any light tasting vegetable oil like sunflower, safflower, grapeseed)

2 teaspoons pure maple syrup

salt and pepper

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #3 Steamed Cauliflower in a Caper Vinaigrette with Parsley and Thyme

Most vegetables have different personalities when they're cooked: braised radishes become sweet, subtle, downright alluring; broccoli eaten raw is often wooden and uninteresting but fried in peanut oil with cashews or tossed with rapini in sesame oil it can be a magnificently earthy conduit of flavour; and cauliflower -- the wall flower at the vegetable dip party, white and bulbous -- turns tricks when roasted or stewed in tandoori spices or pickled. Even if you don't like pickles, you will like pickled cauliflower. Trust me. It's addictive.

This cauliflower salad isn't so much pickled as steamed and then, while hot, doused in a dense vinaigrette with capers for extra acidity and bite.

And, when it's cooked just enough that it loses its cruciferous burn, cauliflower absorbs ingredients swiftly and dutifully. Refrigerated, this salad retains its zing and vibrancy for a few days although I like it best just cooked, still steaming.

Great with grilled white fish or tossed with pasta and toasted breadcrumbs.

Cauliflower Salad with Parsley and Thyme in a Caper Vinaigrette**

1 large cauliflower, broken into florets

2 garlic cloves, mashed/pressed/minced

1/2 cup chopped parsley

1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves (run your hands down the stem, the leaves will shed easily)

1/4 cup grape tomatoes, quartered

3 tablespoons capers, rinsed

3 tablespoons white wine vinegar

6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

red pepper flakes

salt

** Garbanzo beans are a personal choice but great if you're looking to make this a salad lunch.

1. Place a steamer in the bottom of a large pot over one inch of water. Place the cauliflower in the basket and bring to a boil. Steam for one minute, lift the lid for a few seconds, then cover again and steam for 6-8 minutes, until tender. Drain and rinse under cold water for 2 minutes and set aside in a colander to continue draining. 

2. In a large bowl, mix together the garlic, parsley, thyme, tomatoes, capers, vinegar and olive oil. Season with the red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Add the cauliflower and toss together. Marinate at room temperature for an hour. Serve warm as a side to grilled fish. Serve cold as a salad on a bed of mixed lettuces.

Makes 6 side portions or 3 single portions.

p.s. Grow herbs. As much and as many as possible. Then experiment. You can't reproduce the vitality that fresh mint or basil or lemon thyme bring to a dish, especially the simplest of dishes like sliced tomatoes or tossed greens or grated carrots, and in the fall when the first frosts hit your sage will still rally and you can casually toss some into your mushroom risotto. Herbs, in a pinch, especially for simplistic palettes, can add just enough punch to make a dish interesting.

50 Salads for Everyday Eating: #2 Lentil Salad with Grated Sweet Potato and Black Olives in a Curried Dressing

This is a salad for a winter day: a dull, drab January day in need of resuscitation. It has spark and colour and enough weirdness to arouse the curiosity of a co-worker: radishes and black olives?

Once, I had a friend - we've lost touch, haven't spoken in years - who married young and lived with her husband in an apartment above one of the most popular Chinese restaurants in Toronto, on Spadina Ave. There was a large deck, perfect for midnight summer soirees, and a hammock that hung between the bedrooom and the living room. At 3 a.m., when I was stumbling out onto the spit-strewn smelly sidewalk, there was always a line up out front of the restaurant. The place would be packed. Back at the party, they were still calling down for the special order of "green tea" which meant budweiser in cans in a paper bag at a premium. But apart from all that, what I remember about her, and we always remember something about the people we meet, was that she liked to go to St. Lawrence Market on a Saturday morning and she liked to buy fresh sesame covered Montreal bagels, chewy and sweet, and then she liked to eat the warm bread with salty black olives and crunchy hot red radishes. I was pretty sure she was onto something.

I love lentils. They're like perfect little morsels of earthiness. This salad uses the smallish brown Eston lentils (although these days I'm cooking the tiny black beluga ones and then combining them with a slightly larger chewier brown lentil. I like the contrast). Any lentil would work, but avoid the big, fat green ones. They're better served in a soup. Lentils shouldn't be mushy. They should act like a sprinkling of nuts, something dense, dark and wonderful.

Legumes typically go well with a lot of different flavours. Last winter, I couldn't get enough of a salad that I took to work all winter long: lentils in a mustard vinaigrette tossed with a generous amount of escarole lettuce - the sweet, bitter, crunchy sort - and just before eating I'd heat it in the microwave for a minute until the lettuce just barely began to wilt and then I'd toss it all together: the steaming lentils, the pungeant vinaigrette, the almost cooked greens, and it was, I'm not kidding, one of the most incredible things I have ever eaten. It was France. It was moss. It was eating the most delectable thing you dug up from the ground.