Monday, June 23, 2008

When I was green in judgment ...

I always thought that the phrase 'salad days' meant the happy days of one's youth, but was interested to see on Michael Quinion's World Wide Words (worth a visit if you love words), that it first appeared in Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra ( 1606), where Cleopatra says “My salad days, When I was green in judgment”, referring to her relationship with Julius Caesar when she was young. (See the full entry for salad days here.) So basically it means a period of youthful inexperience, which is perhaps not completely inappropriate for this post - I started changing my eating habits only 9 months ago. (About time.) One of the major changes was having a salad as a main meal every day. Here are two recent ones I've made:
Number 1: I always add beans (for protein) of some type, a little cheese, and nuts for crunch. The crunch-factor of salad is Very Important to me, to the annoyance of my husband. This one had: mixed salad leaves, half a chopped carrot, about 9 chopped raw almonds, 20g feta cheese, 1/3 tin of butter beans. Juice of half a small lemon, drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil, ground sea salt and black pepper.

Number 2: Eeek! No more chickpeas, borlotti-, butter- or red kidney beans in the cupboard! So I used a slice of bauernbrot (german farmer's loaf - half-rye) chopped and drizzled with olive oil. Added a chopped apple, almonds, and blue cheese this time around. My goodness, the bits of bread look humungus in my picture! Yummy yum yum. I could live on salad all year! What are your favourite salady ingredients?

4 comments:

kendalee said...

D makes a wonderful warm salad with seared tuna and a poached egg on a bed of rocket, with baby plum tomatoes and capers. Sounds a bit of an odd combo perhaps but it's delicious and nice even when the weather isn't too warm. I love crunch too and sprinkle my salads liberally with seeds - toasted pine nuts are my favourites! Good oils for ageing joints too, I'm told :o) x

Anairam said...

Mmmm, kendalee, it sounds like I should pay you and D a visit! I do a very nice balsamic-roasted pear salad with blue cheese and walnuts on rocket. And D can make the delightfully sounding seared tuna salad. And then we can just gobble it all up!!!

Anonymous said...

Hallo Anairam, to answer your question: my salads must include big chunks of Feta, Calamata Olives and Peppadews.
Your salads truely look very appetising and inspiring - perhaps it is time for me to try something new!
And by the way, please tell how your health improved since you changed your eating habits.

Anairam said...

Scorpio: Sorry for my tardy response. I love feta and calamata olives too. Somehow I do not usually add olives to my salad though. I think I am too lazy to get that damn pip out! Peppadews add a nice spicyness, I admit. Oh, my health has changed SO much for the better! I have lost eleven kilos, without dieting. True, I did a few other things, like cut out quite a lot of alcohol! But I feel so much better!