Sassy Radish

I get emails from time to time asking me what I, as someone who works from home mostly, eats for lunch. I can tell you this much: it’s not glamorous. Often, I’m so busy that I barely have time to toast a piece of bread and spread some peanut butter over it, and lots of recipes I test don’t a proper lunch make, unless you want to argue that cake, especially if it includes a vegetable or two, can be justified as lunch.

There have been times, I’ll admit, to heating up Trader Joe’s chana masala, and before you shake your DIY finger at me in judgement, I just would like to say: Trader Joe’s makes a mean chana masala. How? I don’t know, but they do.

Generally, it’s not uncommon for me to be reheating whatever dinner leftovers we have, and unlike my husband, I love leftovers. Of course, as a last resort (or an insanely strong banh mi craving), there’s always take out.

On days when I allow myself to take a wee break to compose my lunch, there’s a fun trip through the pantry. I’m generally good at cobbling together a decent lunch for myself when time allows. Today was one such day. And I decided to make myself my favorite tuna salad.

Continue reading my favorite tuna salad.

I know: a salad in January is so cliché, but I promise, I’m not here to sell you some diet plan, or urge you to eat healthier, or stop baking cookies and cake. It’s winter after all, and turning my oven on keeps the house warmer. Besides, I like cookies and cake so much, I’ve never been one to stop eating sweets once the New Year turns up. My mantra is the same as it’s always been: eat what you want to eat and be happy. Life is too short otherwise.

We tend to eat a lot of citrus this time of year. I suspect you do too because there’s not that much other fruit around that excites. It feels warmer, sunnier just eating an orange segment; it’s a good antidote to puffy coats, hats, and scarves. We stockpile our citrus: oranges, clementines, grapefruit all sitting in the crisper at the same time. I like having options; who knows what I’ll feel like eating for a snack? And oftentimes we cut up citrus into this salad to give this one and that one a break.

Continue reading citrus salad with creamy poppy seed dressing.

Poor Caesar salad. For the remainder of Spring and all of Summer it’s filed away, not once remembered. We think of it only when the weather turns on us – cold rain becomes an everyday thing, sweaters and scarves emerge, and we put away iced coffee and leave home clutching our thermal mug full of the hot stuff.

I, for one, lament this unceremonious Caesar salad dismissal. I miss the emulsion of lemon, garlic, Parmesan, anchovy, and olive oil, and could eat it practically every day. I’ve been known to make this slurry and slather it on a thick piece of country bread. It’s so good, so potent, so unapologetically bold – it’s not some small-time vinaigrette, delicately coating your salad leaves.

Continue reading asparagus caesar salad.

Well, you guys are really just swell, you know that? A girl gets gushy and you leap in there with her and get gushy right back! Thanks! And in case you were wondering, it’s making me grin from ear to ear. I feel a gigantic internet hug coming on, do you?

This salad isn’t just any salad, so by pushing the post back, I’m sure I’ve bruised its feelings somewhat. By now it’s probably off in the corner somewhere skulking and pouting. It was all ready for prime time and then, unceremoniously and without warning, it was pushed aside.

Continue reading cucumber radish salad.

I’m convinced that smoke detectors cause more injuries than prevent them. I was making dinner last night – nothing crazy – just a simple weeknight affair: some roasted fish, some cabbage with hot sauce, some sautéed spinach that needed rescuing. Everything in this dinner cooked pretty quickly, and there was little prep work – it was simple, unfussy, satisfying fare. Andrew was minutes away from home. We were going to eat and finish dinner before 9 pm, which, on weeknights when he isn’t working from home, is an accomplishment. The world was mine for the taking.

Or so I thought. But the universe had slightly different plans for me. The smoke detector decided it was too smoky. I happen to disagree – I could see as clear as day (though Andrew might claim it was a tad smoky in the kitchen). But all was fine and good – nothing was burning, nothing was even close to burning. But a few seconds after I set a hot baked fish on the counter, the alarm went off, and because I flail when I startle (and that detector has been known to raise the dead), I accidentally, in my flailing, happen to touch the edge of the baking tray the fish was on. For a few seconds, which was all that was needed to do the damage. All the while the smoke detector was blaring and a neutral female voice was calmly informing me that there was a fire. There wasn’t. I know because I was there. American smoke detectors are such drama queens.

Continue reading apple and fennel salad.

This is the salad of my childhood, the salad present at every family gathering I can recall, the salad appearing at every Russian banquet table I’ve ever been to in America, the salad regularly lurking in many Russians’ refrigerators.

In my family, we’ve always referred to this salad as Olivier or Zimniy (“of winter”), but in America, sometimes I see this salad referred to as the Russian salad. And though Russians eat a lot of different salads, perhaps this one wins in the popularity contest department.

Continue reading salad olivier.