Afternoon Meadow

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Easily made, hearty, yet with a subtly flowery touch. A salad like a summer meadow in the afternoon (Rcp# 71)

Ingredients for ‘Afternoon Meadow’

  • 5 handfuls of a basic salad (I used red romana salad, red oak leaf salad is very good here as well)
  • 2-3 handfuls of mixed regular leaf salads or wild herb leaf salads. Ask at your local farmers’ market. Some grocery stores now have them, too. Plus, optional: one handful of edible blossoms. Also from the farmers’ market or organic grocery stores.
  • 3 portions of grill cheese (plant-based or dairy; Greek-style halloumi cheese also works)
  • 7 large cauliflower florets
  • 5 apricots
  • 7 round red radishes, size medium to large (means a little less than the size of a walnut)
  • 15 – 20 fresh ripe blackberries
  • canola oil for frying

For the Sauce

  • 25 – 30 fresh chives
  • 15-20 fresh basil leaves
  • 5 – 6 fresh mild mint leaves (see Side Notes below for if you use wild herb leaf salad and/or halloumi)
  • 150 ml olive water (from a jar with olives, preferably green)
  • 2 tablespoons of agave syrup (rice syrup will work as well)
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 6 tablespoons oat yogurt
  • ½ teaspoon bear’s garlic in oil (alternatives: 8-10 chopped garlic chives or ½ teaspoon frozen bear’s garlic)
  • mild salt
  • You will also need three salad bowls that can hold a large salad for one person, or three large pasta plates.

Preparations for ‘Afternoon Meadow’

  1. Wash and chop the herbs for the sauce using a cradle knife.
  2. In a regular dessert bowl, mix the agave syrup with the olive water and stir until the syrup has dissolved.
  3. Add all of the sauce ingredients to the bowl, stir well, and set aside. Cover with a colander.
  4. Wash the salads, leaves, and edible blossoms (if using) and set them aside in a colander to drain. Keep the basic salads and leaf salads separate (they will be combined later in the salad bowls).
  5. Wash the cauliflower florets and small red radishes. Cut the cauliflower into thick slices, about 7–8 mm, and slice the radishes thinly, about 2 mm. Set them aside separately on a plate.
  6. Wash the blackberries and apricots. Slice the large blackberries in half. Remove the pit from the apricots and cut each fruit into eight wedges.
  7. Heat a medium-sized frying pan with canola oil. First, fry the cauliflower slices on high heat. Then, turn them over and turn the heat down to low. Flip again once one side is browned. Remove from the pan when browned and cooked through, then set aside on a plate.
  8. Sauté the radish slices in the same pan. You may need to add a little canola oil. Remove them from the pan when they are just slightly browned and set them aside on a plate. You can use the same plate as for the fried cauliflower. Set the pan aside.
  9. Gently tear the salad into appropriately sized pieces. Arrange the basic salad in the bowls and put the leaf salads on top.
  10. Slice or cube the grill cheese (or halloumi).
  11. Add a little canola oil to the pan and heat it to medium. Briefly sauté the apricot wedges. You just want to lightly sauté them and warm them through. Then, remove them from the pan and set them aside on a plate.
  12. Increase the heat under the pan, add another spoonful of canola oil, and then add the grilled cheese (or halloumi) slices or cubes to the pan. Sauté, but be careful they do not disintegrate.
  13. Arrange the cauliflower, radish slices, and apricots on the salad leaves in the bowls. Spread the salad dressing over the salad.
  14. Add the grilled cheese.
  15. Add the blackberries (and the edible blossoms, if you have them) last.

This serves three as an opulent lunch or supper salad. You can also arrange the entire salad in one large bowl for a buffet.

Side Notes:

  1. If you use edible blossoms or a wild herb leaf salad, use 7-8 mint leaves. However, if you use real halloumi cheese, stick with five mint leaves because traditional Greek halloumi, which is made from goat and sheep milk, already contains mint.
  2. This salad tastes great with any kombucha spritz. Our favorite drink right now is made with 100 ml of kombucha (ours is homemade), 80 ml of grape juice, and 1 tablespoon of elderflower blossom syrup. Add enough drinking water to fill a tall glass (250-300 ml). It’s a perfect mix to stay hydrated together with the salad.

Please note: For all my recipes (text) on this blog (By MagS, Parsley-Lane Blog) I grant a CC license under the terms of BY-NC-SA 4.0 (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike). For further explanations, please see the Legal Notice or visit creativecommons.org.