Sentimental Living

Joy, Hard Stuff and the In-Between

Recipes

A Closeness to Fall, Time Away & Lemon Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

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The mornings are crisp. The sunrise has grown lazy, only making her appearance on the white of my walls at half past 6. I found myself in the mountains this past weekend with a glistening of frost on my windshield. The sunlight has that peculiar golden hue that signals the closeness of fall. Suddenly, the rush of summer has come to a halt. The tomatoes are still bursting, and my bowls are filled with wrinkled ripe stone fruit but I also spy winter squash at the markets. I have the urge to buy one, maybe roast it, and tuck it into something warm. Autumn is coming. A season I have always loved but have been longing to put off and post-pone this year.

I have struggled with letting go of summer. Did I get enough from her? I camped 7 times, which is maybe 7 times more than last summer and yet it still feels like I did not eat enough tomatoes, husk enough corn, climb enough mountains, celebrate enough of this life, jump in enough bodies of water, bask in enough sun or grow enough in this season of my life.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how to eat a peach. I’ve noticed that each season has begun to have a certain inanimate object, usually a plant, that becomes representative of that time in my life. Spring was daffodils. Winter, bags of fresh milled Canadian winter wheat. I have bought box after box of peaches since the first ones that actually smelled like peaches arrived from California. I have watched them ripen further still in bowls in my house. I’m always trying to think of how to eat them. Grilled. In salads. Crisps. Hot sugar crust cobblers. Roasted jams. On toast. In bourbon milkshakes. But have I just picked one up and eaten it greedily as I did as a child? That was good enough then. There was no need for fanfare or a production. In my head I have visions of my tanned childhood self, smelling of chlorine eating peaches straight from the tree only out of doors as the juice dribbled down my chin and my fingers. This was summer. Last weekend I ate a plum that way. It actually tasted like a plum. Since moving to Montana, it might be one of two, maybe three plums I’ve had that actually tasted like something. It was heaven. Why don’t I do this more?

Fall, I’m starting to grow excited by you. I’m mourning summer a bit because this one in particular meant so much to me in so many hard and wondrous ways. I’m very much in the middle of so much. I remember this past September so well. Can it really have been a year already? It feels like I have accomplished nothing yet am on the verge of so much. When we’re in the thick of it all we often can’t see beyond the end of our own noses. It’s probably when we most get in our own way. I certainly feel that way rather frequently.

With this change in seasons and the changes in my own life I’ve experienced in the past month I’ve felt a pull to step away from the world of Instagram. I have all these ideas, plans for change and transformation, new projects (i.e. #versatileveg, which is still going to happen but just not quite yet) mulling around in my head, in process already, but if you read my last post you’ll know I decided it was not quite the moment to launch full steam ahead. For me this is the moment to come back to myself and I find Instagram to be at odds with that. It’s a platform I love so much in so many ways but right now it feels noisy and a place of comparison. Creatively, I feel really inspired or on the verge of inspired right now. I photograph daily for the joy of it. I’m spending more minutes with a pen in hand or click clacking at my keyboard searching for the words to tell my own unique story. So I may be sharing more on this space but I may not. You can now sign up on the right to be notified when I do post if you are interested in seeing and reading about my experience of this time in our magical world.

I did want to leave you with on new recipe in honor of #versatileveg. Zucchini has been a close second behind peaches for the plant of this season. For once in my life I can’t seem to get enough. I’m stealing them from my mom’s plant almost daily; she’s even had to ask me to leave her some. Zucchini is the underdog of summer that everyone eagerly casts aside and bakes into bread because they have no idea what to do with it. I can eat zucchini every which way every day but lately I’ve craved the comfort of the chocolate studded muffins of my childhood. When our neglected abundance led to squash the size of me the only redeemable use of the oversized variety was a spiced bread. I have made three in the past week seeking to maintain the nostalgia of what I ate as a kid but to brighten and simplify the recipe. This summer I have relied heavily on fresh lemon in my baking and I was reminded that it goes quite well with chocolate and zucchini, and cinnamon. All my favorites together. I’ve chosen olive oil for ease and because it happens to pair quite well with all my key flavors too. Quick breads should be quick and whenever possible one bowl. This is exactly that. You can bake it as muffins or as a loaf, I’ve done both. Regardless, it will be something heavenly to bite into in the morning with a cup of hot tea as you too watch the sunlight drift into that peculiar hue of autumn. 

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Lemon Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread
Author: 
Recipe type: Breakfast, Dessert, Snack
Prep Time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 1 loaf or 12 muffins
 
This is an easy one bowl recipe that will help you get through an abundance of zucchini and the change in seasons. The lemon adds brightness, the chocolate that indulgence I crave, the whole wheat flour a heartiness, it's only slightly sweet, and the olive oil plays well off all these things as our main source of fat. It's not too decadent for snack time or breakfast and it freezes quite well.
Ingredients
  • 2 cups coarsely grated zucchini
  • ½ cup olive oil
  • ½ cup full fat yogurt, greek preferably
  • ½ cup brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • zest of 2-3 lemons
  • 2 eggs
  • 1½ cups whole wheat flour*
  • 2 teaspoons cinnamon
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt
  • ½ cup chocolate chips (optional, but who would want to leave these out?)

Method
  1. Preheat your oven to 350˙F. Grease or spray a loaf pan or muffin tin with oil.
  2. Wrap the zucchini in a clean dish towel and roll it up and wring it out to pull out the excess water. Set aside. You can skip this step in a hurry but it does help to lighten up the crumb and texture a noticeable amount. Both are still extremely delicious so choose your own adventure here.
  3. In a large bowl whisk together olive oil, yogurt, brown sugar, vanilla and lemon zest. The zest of two medium lemons adds a bright note but is not too lemony. I really like lemon so I opted for three to get that burst of citrus. Add eggs one at a time whisking in between until full incorporated. Whisk a further 30 seconds to a minute until the batter thickens slightly. With a spatula fold in the zucchini.
  4. Sift flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt directly over your wet ingredients. Fold in until almost all the dry bits are moist. Add your chocolate chips and continue to fold in until everything is just incorporated, being careful not to over mix.
  5. Pour into your prepared loaf pan or if making muffins use ¼ cup measuring cup to fill each muffin cup. The loaf will bake at 350˙F for about 50-55 minutes. Muffins take about 25-30 minutes. They're both done when the edges start to brown and toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then remove to cool completely on a wire rack. Or do as I do and eat one with a thick lashing of butter immediately.
  6. These will stay fresh for a few days and freeze nicely. If I bake a loaf I pre-slice it before freezing a will pull a slice straight the frozen and toast in cast iron for a yummy quick breakfast.
Notes
*I use Eat Grain organic sifted Red Fife flour in almost all my baking. This 100% whole wheat flour is a little less dense than some of your average store varieties due to the their sifting and milling processes. I'd recommend you bake with a white whole wheat flour like King Authur's or do a 50:50 mix of whole wheat and all purpose if you're working with a more traditional whole wheat flour and prefer a lighter final crumb.

‘Magical’ Green Smoothie

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I moved into my apartment in Bozeman on a Sunday in late September. We’d spent all day boxing things up in Big Sky and arranging the pieces of my Montana life thus far haphazardly into a U-haul. In the dark we unload those pieces into my new Bozeman life. Exhausted I stood in my new very dark kitchen and surveyed my ‘home.’ Tears threatened. What had I done?

In an attempt to comfort my growing anxiety the first thing I unpacked was my Vitamix and my peanut butter. I found all the ingredients necessary to make my favorite smoothie at that time and arranged them neatly on the counter so that their familiarity would greet me the next morning when I awoke to my uncertainties. At least, I wouldn’t start my day with a pseudo crisis of faith over what to eat for breakfast. As I gathered my cinnamon and soaked almonds for nut milk, my fears lessened. Maybe it was going to be ok. If I could make this smoothie in this new place, maybe this new place dungeon and all wasn’t so bad. Maybe I had not made a mistake in believing Bozeman was my next step.

As an over thinker it’s amazing the number of times I have quickly made a decision without considering how that decision actually manifests in reality. I decided to go to a jumpstart program the summer before my Freshman year of college with out connecting the dots that I’d be leaving my friends 6 weeks early. I studied abroad in Australia with out realizing what it really meant to leave my boyfriend behind for three months and go somewhere that I knew not a soul. That was one of most frightening drives to an airport I’ve ever made. I kept hoping my mom would give me an out, tell me I didn’t have to go. Time and again I make decisions that feel obvious and easy in the moment and then suddenly I’m thick in the change and suddenly the weight of the I realize I’d never fully considered the repercussions of my choice. I’m in part thankful for this. I would have missed out on so much richness and forward momentum were it not for this form of cognitive dissonance.

While I still return to that peanut butter green smoothie now and again, I’ve evolved in my smoothie making. This was the smoothie of last summer and the smoothie that marks the beginning of my truly falling in love with not only my Bozeman life, but also my Bozeman ‘dungeon.’ I was newly single, living alone, running a lot and running on serious mountain trails for the first time. I was grieving the loss of said relationship, but I was also growing back into myself and taking ownership of my life in new ways. I vowed to live simultaneously with my grief and joy. I planted seeds in my garden and watered them barefoot in the early mornings, wide-eyed every time I found a new green shoot. I ate toast and smoothies or matcha wrapped in a blanket and the first rays of sun on the porch each morning. Soon I filled that porch with friends. The first time I made this smoothie the word that came to mind was magic. Maybe my tastebuds were amplified by my personal rejuvenation or maybe it really is a bit magical. I don’t use that word lightly. I’m not really one of those people who promises you life changing anything, but this time in my life was life changing and I still make this and think, damn this is good.

 

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Magical Strawberry, Lemon & Green Smoothie
Author: 
Recipe type: Smoothie, Breakfast
: Vegetarian, Plant Based
Serves: 1
 
Note: Depending on your strawberry and spinach ratio the color of your smoothie may be less than Instagram worthy, but we don't really care about that do we? There are a couple really important ingredients to the flavor of this being on: lemon zest, bee pollen and mint. The bee pollen really adds this floral note that complements the strawberries and lemon. It is pretty easy to find at your local health food store and farmer's markets. The lucuma powder is totally optional so don't buy it just for this smoothie.
Ingredients
  • ¾ cup nondairy milk of choice (I use cashew or coconut)
  • big handful of spinach (go as big as you want)
  • 1 heaping cup frozen strawberries
  • ½ small frozen banana
  • 10 big mint leaves
  • heaping teaspoon coconut butter or teaspoon of coconut oil*
  • 1 scoop vanilla protein powder
  • two teaspoons bee pollen (see above)
  • zest of one medium to large lemon
  • 1 teaspoon lucuma powder (optional)
Method
  1. Add all ingredients to your high speed blender. Blend on high until completely smooth.
  2. Pour into your favorite glass and enjoy.
Notes
*Garden of Life Vanilla Protein and Greens is my favorite

Why I Cook and Crispy Broccoli with ‘Cheesy’ Jalapeño Sauce

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The first time I made pickles was the morning after a boyfriend had broken up with me over the phone. I already had the pickling cucumbers in the fridge, a project planned for a later date, but I decided at 7:30am with a heavy heart that the pickling schedule was moving up. If I could pickle, then my grief schedule might be delayed another hour. Never having pickled much of anything save quick pickled onions, I started with internet research. I wanted to make the pickles of my childhood I snuck by the fork full straight from the jar of my grandmother’s fridge. As Google does, my search was rewarded with thousands of recipes. I compared several, an amateaur guessing at the result with the most promise and as often happens in my cooking decided on making a mix of two recipes as none had quite everything I was hoping for in a pickle. I felt excited. In short time, I’d have pickles ready to be eaten by the fork full straight from the jar. For a moment, my despair was occupied with spices and brine.

Over the weekend someone asked me how I got into cooking, a question for me that is more about the why than the how. It wasn’t something I always did and I don’t have a particularly interesting story as to how I grew so obsessed, but I do have a lot of whys. Yesterday, I thought about one reason that seems to be consistent over the course of my adult life. Yesterday, was an awful day. The cumulative days were building to it. I have been going through a lot with my health and after months and months of coping, being positive, keeping perspective, picking myself back up, trying again, surrendering, starting over, I believe you get the point, I reached a breaking point. At some point, I will tell more of this story because I believe it is an important one and is becoming a defining piece of this chapter of my life, but while I still stand in what feels like quicksand I am both an ineffective storyteller on the subject and unable to tell my story  from a healthy place. Feeling so lost physically and emotionally in my own body, the only one I have for the next however many decades I get to be in this world (which I do really hope is quite a few), I went to see my doctor and I sat in her office and cried. And then I came home and made bread. And cooked chickpeas. And turned the cooked chickpeas into chana masala. There were a dozen other things lining my fridge shelves ready to be eaten and despite my emptiness, my grief, my sense of loss, my desire to sleep for a while, I still found my hands dirtied in a bowl of flour.

I was called into my kitchen yesterday, for many reasons but perhaps the biggest lies in the basic treatise to cooking: there is a beginning, middle and end. There are questions along the way, detours, last minute additions and changes, but you start with one thing and you eventually end with another. Life is not this way. Or not in a way we can see when we are in the thick of it. That fiend hindsight might suggest it is this way, however the unfortunate pitfall to hindsight is that it is by definition useless to the your seemingly dire current circumstances. One of my closest friends talk a lot about the ways in which we soothe ourselves. I cook to soothe. I cook because it makes sense to me when little else does. And if it doesn’t, I make the recipe again and again until it does. Cooking also comes with rewards: something potentially delicious to eat and magic. You start with one thing and end up with something else entirely. Would you like ice cream, custard, creme brulee? All you need is cream, sugar and eggs. An onion in the hands of a chef can be transformed into so many different things with only the addition of heat and fat. In my hands flour, salt, water and wild yeast become a sourdough bread that might make you consider if bread is the right word for all that other stuff you’ve been eating.

Originally, I had intended to write to you about how I am a champion for vegetables. It’s the reason this recipe exists. That story too is saved for another day, but not this recipe because I want you to have it in case you need an appetizer for Memorial Day Weekend. This is delicious. Easy. It happens to be vegan, though I suggest you don’t tell anyone that, I don’t and everyone thinks it’s cheese. I have made this numerous times for the diehard meat and potatoes lovers and they love it. The trick is in the crispy broccoli because everyone loves cheese sauce already.

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Crispy Broccoli with 'Cheesy' Jalapeño Sauce
Author: 
Recipe type: Appetizer, Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten-free
Prep Time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 4
 
This is one of my favorite things to make because it surprises people. It's basically a lot of roasted broccoli with a good sauce that happens to be vegan but tastes anything but. It's unassuming and I love that it wows. The key is in getting your broccoli crispy and finishing with the lime.
Ingredients
  • 2 crowns of broccoli with stems if possible
  • Olive oil
  • Sea salt and fresh cracked pepper
  • ½ cup of cashews, soaked overnight or in boiling water for 30 minutes
  • 1 heaping tablespoon of nutritional yeast
  • 1-2 cloves of garlic
  • 2 pickles jalapeños
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
  • Juice of half a lemon
  • Juice of one lime
Method
  1. Preheat your oven 425˙F. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and set aside.
  2. Chop your broccoli heads into fairly uniform pieces, creating a flat side whenever possible as opposed breaking off individual florets. Chop your stems into chunks similar in size to the florets. Place on your prepared baking sheet and drizzle with a healthy glug of oil, season with salt and pepper and toss with your hands to coat. Don't skimp on the oil here, it's important to developing crisp broccoli. Spread broccoli heads and stems into an even layer on your baking sheet. If it is crowded prep a second baking sheet. Crowding leads to steaming and we want crisp broccoli.
  3. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the broccoli has begun to char. Do not stir. You want to encourage browning on one side.
  4. Meanwhile make your spicy cashew 'cheese' sauce. Place all remaining ingredients, except for the lime juice into a high speed blender with a scant quarter cup of boiling water. Blend on high, adding more water by the tablespoon full until desired consistency is reached. I strive for a fairly thick sauce that isn't quite pourable. Taste and adjust salt, lemon and nutritional yeast to preference.
  5. Once your broccoli is done serve alongside 'cheese' sauce on a serving platter. Finish with the lime juice. Serve warm or at room temperature.
Notes
You'll likely have some cashew cheese sauce left, which is really not so terrible. It is excellent as a topping for tacos, other vegetables, on nachos, basically anywhere you like spicy cheese sauce.

Rhubarb Cornmeal Upside Down Cake

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Two years ago I was in the south of France at the beginning of spring. There was asparagus everywhere. All different sizes and colors. There were french radishes too and perfect baby artichokes in a shade of purple that reminded me of velvet. I’d never paid too much attention to spring produce before. I had grown up with tomato season, the kind where we had such a surplus my job was leaving full grocery bags on the doorsteps of our neighbors. Then there was pumpkin season that also came with apples, which meant apple pie. But spring was lost on me until I stood in the early morning sunshine in Nice looking at row after row of all that spring had to offer.

When I returned to the US in May, I found myself in Washington at a farmers’ market surrounded by even more perfect asparagus, the first garlic scapes of the year and piles of rhubarb. I had been wanting to get my hands on some rhubarb for weeks. The only other time I had bought rhubarb before was to make strawberry rhubarb pie for a boyfriend’s birthday in college. That was my understanding of the purpose of rhubarb, you put it with strawberries and a lot of sugar. However, thanks to the food blogging community around the world I found out about the endless possibilities that lay hidden in those deep red stalks.  When I got my bunches home I was so excited and a little overwhelmed. I had saved 30 different rhubarb recipes in the last month, I didn’t know where to start.

This has become a theme in my seasonal cooking. There are certain things that are the crown jewels of such a limited window of time each year. I spend weeks, sometimes months (ahem, tomatoes) waiting for their arrival and when they finally come I’m almost a bit shell shocked that they’ve actually materialized in my kitchen.

This year I got caught up in the throes of a love affair with ramps and neglected my poor friend rhubarb until this week. I kept thinking back to this simple cake I’d made with my Washington rhubarb two years ago. I had every intention of making it again, but when I found myself chopping rhubarb in the first wisps of morning this week, my mind wandered to cornmeal and then down the rabbit hole of recipe development I went.  

This cake is everything I was hoping for when my mind started it’s wander. It is a bit toothy. It’s dense. It has moisture for days and it’s a bit sweeter than I might normally allot myself in weekday bakes. But it’s rhubarb season which means winter has really and truly come to an end and upside down cake feels like the right way to celebrate that feat.

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Rhubarb Cornmeal Upside Down Cake
Author: 
Recipe type: Dessert, Vegan, Gluten-free, Refined Sugar-Free
Prep Time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 8-10
 
A few Springs ago I made a simple rhubarb cake I found on one of my favorite food blogs. It was inspired by the author's grandmother and I could taste that in each bite. I was going to make it again when I found the first rhubarb of the season in Montana but then I started thinking about a cornmeal cake. Something a bit toothy. My mind wandered further and I decided I wanted it to be plant based and gluten free. I added just enough lemon and almond to make the rhubarb shine. This ended up an upside down cake because after making it once and my rhubarb sinking to the bottom I realized this could be my redemption after a failed upside down cake attempt this winter. I love how this turned out and I love that while it uses a few bowls, it doesn't require a mixer.
Ingredients
  • Topping
  • 1 pound rhubarb
  • 1 cup coconut sugar, separated*
  • 2 tablespoons cornstarch
  • One medium to large lemon, zested and juice from half, separated
  • Wet Ingredients
  • A little less than one cup plant based milk
  • 1 tablespoon ground flax
  • ¼ cup canola or olive oil
  • ¼ cup applesauce
  • ½ teaspoon almond extract
  • Dry Ingredients
  • 1 cup oat flour, plus one tablespoon, separated**
  • ¾ cup cornmeal
  • ¼ cup almond flour
  • ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • For Serving
  • unsweetened thick greek yogurt or coconut yogurt, if vegan (optional)
Method
  1. Remove tough ends of rhubarb stalks. Slice rhubarb into long thin ribbons with a chef’s knife or vegetable knife. Cut ribbons into about 3-4 inch pieces in length. Toss in a medium bowl with ½ cup of coconut sugar, cornstarch and lemon zest. Set aside for about 20-30 minutes, mixing every so often.
  2. Squeeze juice from half a lemon into a measuring cup. This will be about 1-2 tablespoons worth depending on your lemon. Fill measuring cup to one cup mark with plant based milk. Stir and set aside to curdle for 10 minutes. You just made vegan ‘buttermilk.’
  3. In a small dish, mix 1 tablespoon ground flax with 2 ½ tablespoons of water. Stir and set aside for 10 minutes. You just made a flax ‘egg.’
  4. Grease and line a 9” springform pan with parchment paper. Line a baking sheet with foil and place prepared springform pan on top.
  5. Preheat oven to 350˙F.
  6. In a medium bowl whisk together 1 cup oat flour with cornmeal, almond flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
  7. In a medium bowl, combine curdled milk, flax egg, remaining half cup of coconut sugar, oil, applesauce and almond extract until uniform. Fold in dry ingredients with a spatula, stirring to combine, but not over-mix. Let rest for 5 minutes.
  8. Meanwhile, line the bottom of your springform pan with the softened rhubarb. You can make an elaborate pattern or I chose to make a roughly even overlapping layer with all pieces facing the same direction. It’s ok if you have enough rhubarb to start a second layer, I did. There will be quite a bit of juice left in your bowl. Mix your remaining tablespoon of oat flour into it with a fork, ensuring it mostly dissolves. Pour into the pan over your rhubarb. Using a spatula scrape your batter over the top of the rhubarb. The batter should be fairly pourable but still thick. Carefully smooth it out as needed trying not to disrupt your rhubarb layer.
  9. Bake in the middle rack of your over for about 50-60 minutes, until the edges begin to pull away from the sides and cracks form on the top. You can alternately do the toothpick test however, the denseness of this cake means it will likely never be completely clean, so use that as more of a gauge.
  10. Remove springform pan from oven and allow to cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes. Run a knife around the edges and then remove the outside ring. Allow to cool completely then place your serving dish upside down on your cake, ensuring the cake is centered. Invert your cake and serving dish in one motion. Now your rhubarb layer should be upright. Remove your parchment paper.
  11. Serve at room temperature alone or with a thick lashing of yogurt if you fancy, but it was delicious alone. Store at room temperature covered. This cake is so moist (everyone's favorite word) it can be made a day ahead and stored covered at room temperature.
Notes
*If you don't have coconut sugar, substitute light or dark brown sugar.
**If you don't have oat flour, I'm sure you could substitute an all purpose gluten free flour or all-purpose flour.

My Life in Brooklyn & a Salty Tahini & Romaine Salad

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June Wine Bar, Brooklyn

Sometimes it’s fun to try on a different life. It’s probably part of the reason I love travel so much. Last week I pretended I lived in Brooklyn. Staying solo in a friend’s apartment helped. I had context for the space, I knew a few stories about the meals that had been eaten at their table and the life of the person who calls it home. Armed with a list of recommendations from the true resident, I wandered around Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens reimagining myself and my life as a New Yorker.

Even though I was there just a few short days I had my routine. I’d wake up to white walls beginning to turn blue in the early morning light each day. I’d read in bed, something Montana Tori never does. I’d think about running for a while and finally I’d go running. (Ahh, New York Tori and Montana Tori have something in common). Mostly I ran along the Brooklyn Piers eventually crossing the bridge. Sometimes I ran to Prospect Park. I’d return home and make breakfast. Toast. Always toast. I made avocado toast and toast with local labneh and cherry tomatoes–no peanut butter toast for New York Tori. After, I would shower and think a lot about coffee.

It was hot in New York. Like 90˙F hot. Everyone was outside and everyone was smiling in the surprising spring heat. The friend whose life I borrowed for the long weekend, recommended I look for Ethan Hawke at Blue Bottle on Dean Street. I went there almost everyday alternating between the creamy, syrupy New Orleans iced coffee and a mocha. I just can’t quit milky slightly sweet coffees. I’d sit on the bench in the sun and read some more and spy a little into the lives of the New Yorkers around me. A mom and her daughter dressed in a matching color palette. A student disappointed that she dropped out and now works 7 days a week. A man much older, surreptitiously admiring her. A fellow artist drawing in his journal.

Spring in Brooklyn

New Orleans Iced Coffee & Salad

Lunch with a Greek wine

After coffee, I would return to the apartment to work. When it was lunch time I would make a giant salad from all the vegetables I had purchased at the greenmarket. Usually, I had a glass of wine too. I was living on the 4th floor during 90˙F weather but I had the good fortune of making friends with the owner of the wine shop across the street. He suggested, rather urged me to drink a semi-sparkling Greek orange wine in that weather. He was right.

At the conclusion of lunch it was back to work until my mind reached it’s limits for the day. I’d venture out into the buzz of the city evening. One night I had dinner with a friend. Another I tried a vegetarian tasting menu. I cooked too. But more than once I found my way to a neighborhood wine bar for wine. I would sit at the bar imagining my Brooklyn life. Was I writer? A photographer? The doctor I once wanted to be enjoying a glass of wine and a deep breath after a long shift? Was I someone’s partner? A mother? All of these things, perhaps. From my seat at the bar, I watched rosy cheeked patio diners laugh and smile and sip their wine beneath the glow of carnival lights. I envied them a little. And I felt content because sometimes I too am them, just not that night. Another night, a salad on the menu piqued my interest. I knew I should enjoy the beautiful vegetables waiting for me in my fridge but I was intrigued by the combination of romaine with tahini, and I really wanted a second glass of wine. Tahini isn’t even my thing. But as I sweat in my barstool I couldn’t think of anything more delicious sounding. I ordered it. And I fell in love with the salty tahini dressing and the hint of licorice–was that tarragon? I ate it slowly. I drank my wine even slower. I watched the sky turn bright orange between the heights of the buildings through the windows. I read my book about love, true New Yorkers sitting outside under the carnival lights around me. And then I thought about ice cream.

•••

 
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Salty Tahini & Romaine Salad
Author: 
Recipe type: Salad, Side, Brunch, Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten-free
Prep Time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 1, or 2 as a side
 
This is my re-creation of the salad I described above from June in Brooklyn. The dressing is a bit salty but it is meant to be. Using good tahini really helps here, I like Soom Foods a lot. The textures here matter. You want the big pieces of lettuce and chunks of cucumber. I think the saltiness of this really complements a warm day. If you want to make it more of a meal, there is an option to add chickpeas. This recipe easily doubles and triples for an easy side to bring to a party or for a brunch.
Ingredients
  • Dressing
  • 1 heaping tablespoon tahini
  • juice from ½ a medium to large lemon
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher salt*
  • 1 teaspoon water
  • Salad
  • 1 head of romaine lettuce, local if you can get it
  • ¼ of a large English cucumber
  • fresh mint (about 8 large leaves)
  • fresh tarragon leaves (about 1 large stems worth)
  • cooked chickpeas (optional)
  • toasted sesame seeds
  • thinly sliced radish (optional)
Method
  1. Combine ingredients for dressing in a small dish and use a fork to mix and thoroughly break up the tahini so that you have a uniform dressing.
  2. Taste and add more water or lemon to thin. It should be salty.
  3. Tear romaine leaves and heart into large pieces and chunks and add to a medium bowl. You want them to be on the larger size but not too big to eat.
  4. Cut your cucumber in half and deseed with a spoon that you scrape along the center. Discard the seeds or you can add them to the romaine, which is what I did to reduce waste.
  5. Cut each cucumber half into thirds lengthwise. Then cut into thirds again on a slight angle. Again, you want bigger chunks here for both texture and so that you get bursts of the fresh cucumber flavor as you eat your salad. Add to the bowl with romaine.
  6. Give your mint and tarragon leaves a rough chop and add to the bowl.
  7. Add a handful of chickpeas, if using, to your bowl.
  8. Pour about half the dressing into your bowl and toss to evenly coat. Taste and add more dressing as needed, you will likely have extra left over.
  9. Serve in a large bowl topped with toasted sesame seeds and radish slices if using.
Notes
*If you are sensitive to salt then start with less. It may taste salty on it's own, but once you add it to the romaine the saltiness will be dulled by the high water content of the lettuce. But again you can always add more and everyone's salt preference is a little bit different.

Pea + Mint Avocado Tartine a Year Later

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I remember these weeks of 2017 very vividly. I can’t quite put my finger on why but as I walk through them in 2018 I find traces of them around every corner. Maybe it is the daffodils that I have once again filled my home with. Or that this time last year I started going to a gym and one year later I voluntarily continue to go because it’s not really your ordinary gym. Possibly, it’s that this week a year ago, I felt the strongest I had ever on a work out and then bam, my initial adductor injury decided to rear her ugly head. To add further insult to injury I’m able to run even fewer miles now than I was running 365 days ago. Something about those final weeks in March and those first weeks of April feel transformative and meaningful with a year’s worth of reflection and living under my belt. And yet, as I remember them I have remembered them with a sense of sadness. Sadness because sitting here today it is easy to look at my life a year later and feel like nothing has changed, that in some ways, in too many ways, I am either the same or further behind my spring self of 2017.

My inner critic who has far too strong a voice in my head wants to see it that way, especially right now, where so much feels hard and never ending. It wants to tell me the story of how I’m not good enough because: ‘Look, look at the progress of the last 365 days, can’t you see there isn’t very much?’ I could look at it that way. Part of me wants to because I had envisioned myself sitting in a very different place when I was buying daffodils last March. Irregardless of that fact that those thoughts are plain untrue, that isn’t the mindset I want to have. All this thinking that results in me finding the ways I am lacking and not enough. It needs to go. It helps no one. Least of all me. And I have grown, tremendously in some areas. In others I am in the thick of it and all I can really do is throw my hands up in the air and surrender myself to the process, commit to the process and acknowledge it may be sometime before I can really see or measure the growth. Patience has never really been my thing.

Here is the on paper comparison:

Spring 2017

I was injured. But I was able to run my first half marathon.

I was stressed about my weight.

I was stressed about my finances. 10 weddings booked.

I was in a relationship and yet I felt like I was living my own life fully independent of it.

I found I was physically stronger than I believed.

I felt guilty about all the things I had in my life and my ability to travel.

I filled my house with daffodils.

I discovered my love of hot almond milk tea lattes.

I didn’t believe in myself as a photographer.

I wanted to control everything. (But I didn’t know it).

I really wanted to start a blog.

I had this idea about photographing women.

I was really really hard on myself.

I could not get my sourdough bread to properly rise.

I was afraid to be alone.

I wanted to spend more time with my family.

Spring 2018

I am injured. But I have not given up. My resiliency surprises me and makes me proud.

I am stressed about my weight, but I am working hard to take a new, intuitive approach to my health that is really hard but that I deep down believe in.

I am stressed about my finances and yet I am honoring the call to a slower pace this year despite it. 8 weddings booked for the year.

I am single.

Despite all my setbacks in all forms of training I feel like a stronger athlete and person.

I feel less guilt and more gratitude for what I have. I travel guilt free.

I am writing these words surrounded by daffodils.

I am drinking peanut butter hot chocolate as I write these words.

I am more in love with photography than ever. I recognize that it is a part of how I experience this world and my life. And that I have something to offer the photographic world.

I want to control everything (still). But I see it now.

I started this blog and it while it has taken me almost a full year from the first post to actually share here, I believe in my commitment to write and share my story. Or I fake that belief on the days I am filled with doubt.

I am photographing women for a project but I’m afraid that I don’t have the follow through to see the project through.

I am hard on myself but kinder.

I can consistently bake sourdough bread that rises.

I am not afraid to be alone.

My mom and I talk on the phone almost daily. We are closer than ever. This last 365 days has been filled with so much joy because of her.

A very good and very wise friend once told me about her future 80 year old self. They’d already had a conversation about the life this 80 year old woman would be looking back upon. But what this friend pointed out that I had too often failed to consider was that the path to reaching that joy filled slightly eccentric a bit nutty 80 year old self was not linear. Life feels very nonlinear right now. Progress is in the smallest of steps, the slowest of breaths. It’s in the choice to keep fighting, to keep pushing, to keep giving myself grace, to granting myself rest when that need is only as quiet as an itch. It’s the sum of all my choices and not each move on the board because some of them feel like, ‘WTF was I thinking there?’ or ‘I finally know what I am doing’ often in the same day, sometimes the same hour, the same breath. Basically, this feels like a very weird time in my life.

A year ago I made this ‘springy’ avocado toast (which I’m calling a tartine because I love France and feeling fancy and it is an open faced sandwich so that makes it a tartine) with the intent of sharing it on this blog very soon after first consuming it. I made it the first time I went to my gym. It feels right to finally be sharing it a year later as I in some ways live an identically different life these hundreds of days later. One key difference in the recipe is last year I made it on stunted sourdough that I made with my own two hands. This year, it’s made on sourdough I lovingly coaxed into rising and producing an even and moist crumb.

Happy spring friends!

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Pea + Mint Avocado Tartine
Author: 
Prep Time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 1
 
This comes together so easily and if you opt for a poached egg it is quite filling. If you live somewhere where winter tends to hang on the bright mint and frozen peas serve as a reminder that spring is coming. If you can grab a loaf of delicious sourdough from a local bakery it will make all difference. I used Mycopia greens from the Farmer's market which are delicate and delicious but arugula or mache would be great here too. If you go the dairy free route with the cheese, I recommend Kitehill Chive Cream Cheese spread or Treeline Cashew Cheese Scallion Flavor.
Ingredients
  • ¼ cup frozen peas, thawed
  • ¼ large avocado or ½ a small avocado
  • ¼ teaspoon yellow mustard powder
  • 5-8 large fresh mint leaves, divided and thinly sliced
  • sea salt to taste
  • thick slice of sourdough bread
  • goat cheese, ricotta or dairy free spreadable cheese
  • greens of choice
  • olive oil
  • lemon juice
  • salt and pepper
  • sunflower seeds, toasted
  • radish, thinly sliced
  • poached egg (optional)
Method
  1. Toss your greens with a drizzle of olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper in a bowl and set aside.
  2. Toast your bread in a toaster or on an oiled cast iron skillet flipping to brown each side.
  3. Meanwhile, in a small bowl mash the peas, avocado, mustard powder, half the mint leaves and sea salt with a fork until a rustic mix forms.
  4. Spread toasted bread with your a layer of cheese of choice. Top half the cheese layer with your pea and avocado mixture. Top the other half with your salad greens. Finish with a poached egg if using and sunflower seeds, radish, the remaining mint and a final squeeze of lemon juice.

(Fear of) Taking Up Space & an Everyday Winter Salad for One

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I still struggle greatly to feel ok about taking up space on the internet. I actually think that it parallels a similar feeling I have in the physical world. I am afraid to take up space. I cannot bear a world with more of me in it, yet that’s what I want. I want to have a voice and tell a story, but I want to do so in a way that does not cause ripples. I want to quietly enter the waters, unannounced and only make a great big splash at just the right moment, when everything is perfect and I have explained myself and everything in just the right way so that there is no chance of misunderstanding, no way to offend, I want to be the embodiment of boldness in the guise of gracefulness. Can we be both and be both well?

I have never been graceful or quiet and actually myself at the same time.

I am graceful in the kindness and understanding I extend to people, especially those who have hurt me, but not in how I move through the world. I might be graceful when I run, but not in the moments of the race that matter most, not in the painful ones where I dig deep and have to verbally coach myself through the final 800 meters, the final minutes where I can feel the tiny fibers of my muscles tearing under the load of physical demand. I am not graceful then and I am not quiet. I am uncoordinated, a bit too loud, extremely talkative, very opinionated, fiery, as passionate about the planet as I am about good sourdough bread and the importance of cake with all the fat and sugar being part of a balanced diet. I am all of these things. I like these things about myself. But I am afraid for other people to really see them and me. Especially as I become more Tori and these things that make up who I am, multiply and take up just that much more room in this world. And there is more me available to the world. And yet, for so many years I have longed to do just that. If I could have any career right now, it would be motivational speaker.  I feel like I must have a lot of ego to write that, but it is nonetheless true. If I could tell all my stories, my truths, my pains, share my shame, my suffering, my joys, my loves, my passions, my highest of highs on a stage, I’m pretty sure I would jump at the chance to do it, even if the audience is one.

As a child, we gradually stopped having people over to our house. We lived in a fixer upper and year by year just as many new projects got started as the ones that remained unfinished. As grandparents grew older and some of them died, our possessions grew. They took up space greater than the person who left them ever did and my grandfather George, he took up the whole room. I have always been surrounded by stuff and ‘mess.’ Out of embarrassment, my Mom who knew better than I did in my teens, encouraged me to go to friends houses instead of having them to ours. Gradually, no one came over, at least not without weeks or what felt like months notice so we could prepare and clean and hide the mess that we were.

“And isn’t the whole point of letting others into your life supposed to be that you get to be who you really are rather than who everyone else expects or even wishes or demands you be?”  Emily Nunn, The Comfort Diaries: My Quest for the Perfect Dish to Mend a Broken Heart

This past summer after 8 months of living in a new city, in a new home, an incomplete one with little furniture, bare walls, 12 kinds of flour, 10 types of dried beans, a college bed that journeyed all the way from California to Montana that still lives like a college bed on the floor sans box spring, I decided to start letting people into my true messy life. I had been waiting for the perfect moment when everything was clean and done and organized and my home resembled more of the home I felt people expected and demanded of my successful white, middle class self. Instead, I invited people into my little dungeon as I lovingly call it (basement apartment with tiny windows in a state with loooong winter) without an apology for the state of things and the incompleteness of my life. Because I was missing the point and missing out on what I loved most–feeding people at my table.

Reading those words in that book that were previously followed by words about not having people in her new home because it was not ready yet (when are we ever ready for anything, especially anything really good?) I thought of this little home on the internet I’m trying to create and how the same concept basically applies. It is unfinished. It is as bare as the walls in my own home. It has no polish. It has no clearly defined purpose or mission. It has no format. It’s a passion project. It’s a place I hope becomes a home. Yes, I acknowledge that as public space I’m inviting a lot of people into my life who may have plenty of demands and expectations of me that I do not ask for. Those are not the people I am here to serve. They are not the people I write to or really care to join my table both virtual and real.

This space is for those who want to see who I really am and in return feel the freedom to be who they really are. Some days that will be easy to do. Others it will be muddled and confusing. It will be a mess.

Here is a recipe that’s as unfinished as my home on the web, my home in Montana, and as unfinished as I am as a person. I have been thinking about this ‘recipe’ for a month but it’s lack of precision and thus imperfection kept me thinking about it.  I have not invited you to my table to eat a simple winter salad of beets and citrus because I was afraid that this all too real way I cook might not translate to your home. I was afraid it was lacking just like I’m afraid all to often that I am lacking. So, if you make this and you don’t like it or you find my lack of specifics frustrating, I am truly sorry about those things. But I’m also not sorry because this is how we learn to cook and sometimes there is so much freedom when formulas are guides and we can pick and choose how we borrow and enhance them for our own needs. The best things, relationships especially are born that way in my experience.

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My Everyday Winter Salad for One
Author: 
Recipe type: Salad
 
Ingredients
  • 1-2 steamed or roasted beets, peeled. (I love the color of Chioggia and golden beets and often buy those because their vivid colors brighten even the dullest of winter days. I encourage you to do the same.
  • 1 orange (blood or Cara Cara are my winter favorites) or a Grapefruit (depending on size, you may only need half the segments)
  • a few gratings of citrus zest (feel free to use a mix)
  • greens of choice (I love microgreens here or the small tender winter/spring lettuces like mycopia or mache that pop up even in Bozeman. Arugula is another great choice)
  • maple syrup
  • vinegar (apple cider is wonderful here, or white balsamic. When using lighter colored beets I avoid regular balsamic because it muddies their beautiful color, but it works in a pinch)
  • good olive oil, or walnut oil or pumpkin seed oil
  • herbs of choice, roughly chopped or torn (tarragon, mint or chives or all three)
  • toasted nuts or seeds of choice (my favorites are pistachios and walnuts)
  • sea salt
  • fresh ground pepper
Method
  1. Depending on the size of your beets, quarter them or thinly slice on a mandolin or with a sharp knife. Depending on the day, I will vary the presentation of my beets because I have found that this small variation livens up my meals and the different cuts create different texture and therefore taste. Place cut beets in a small mixing bowl. Grate a few good shavings of your chosen citrus over the beets and set aside. Using a sharp knife, typically a paring knife, cut off the bottom of your citrus so that it sits flat on a cutting board. Working from the top cut ribbons of the peel away including the white pith exposing the beautiful citrus flesh. It’s ok if some of that flesh comes away with your sections of peel. Supreming citrus is a bit of an art and with practice you’ll end up with less flesh on your peel. I’ll warn you that supreming can feel like a tedious task but again with practice the movements will become second nature and you might even appreciate this slowing down and the attention this task requires. Once you have removed all the peel and white pith (if you removed too much of the flesh, do as I do and and suck that delicious fruit off the peel before discarding or squeeze those sections over your bowl of beets to release the juice), while holding the fruit in one hand and your knife in the other, cut each segment away from the remaining pith by making cuts as close to the pith as possible. Do this over your bowl of beets to capture any juice that escapes. Alternately, with really juicy oranges, especially smaller blood oranges that are ripe, I’ll cut them into rounds and pour any juice from the cutting board over the beets as I add the orange slices.
  2. Add a generous pinch of flake salt and a few grinds of pepper to your bowl. Add a splash of maple syrup, vinegar of choice and olive oil to your bowl and toss to combine. Taste and add more of anything you feel lacking. Add your chopped or torn herbs and toss again.
  3. Make a small bed of greens on a plate. Top with your beet citrus mix. Garnish with more herbs and nuts or seeds of choice. Enjoy!
Notes
Additional Inspiration: Add in some avocado for creamy boost of fat, mince a little shallot and add at the same time as your makeshift dressing, add a little full fat greek yogurt or creme fraiche with the dressing, or do all of the above.

Peanut Butter Cup Hot Chocolate

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I’ve begun this post about 50 different ways and I’m certain that I have about 50 more ideas hoping for their chance to surface. Apparently, I have a lot to say. Which is a good thing since I want to be a writer and write more and share more of what I write. But it’s also poses a challenge: which words to share today? Which words to share with this particular recipe? Are there right words? Perhaps, sometimes there are. Perhaps sometimes certain things need to go together to form the whole of their potential and perhaps other times we just choose something and we send it out into the universe and move on.

For some reason, this peanut butter cup hot chocolate recipe feels very near and dear to me, like a child I’m birthing into the world, one that deserves just the right preamble. It’s a representation of so many things I love, and so many facets of the 30 something woman I have grown into and am really getting to know.

It’s an embodiment of my love of mornings, a love I’ve only been able to put into practice for the last two-ish years yet this habit feels like a tangible marker, a notch, a worn indent, that I can touch and neatly see: Before and After. At some point, I hope I can see that it was me all along.

It feels like a representation of the forgiveness I’m seeking towards myself right now and the acceptance of myself that is growing day by day. This morning as I drove through the cold smoke surrounded by the blue only available in predawn winter mornings I felt that forgiveness and acceptance gain a millimeter of footing within me. There was an exhale and the space of that breath is now occupied by just a little more love for myself.

It feels indulgent. Luxurious. Like the simplest and brightest moments of my daily life do. Because I didn’t know I could have it so good.

It feels soothing and safe–places I’m currently seeking out quite often as I also go through a season of change where so much feels so hard. I often think, wow, I didn’t know it was going to be this hard. Or why is this so hard? Or how can it be so good and so hard at the same time?

And it is quiet and expansive. Two things I crave daily no matter where I am in the world. Two words that I’m beginning to recognize are not only a craving but also a necessity for this season of change.

In the end I have said everything I’ve previously written and none of it at all. But these words feel right. They feel like they capture a little piece of why I’m here taking up this space on the Internet and why I want you to be able, if you choose, to make this simple cup of childlike thick hot chocolate too.

 

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Peanut Butter Cup Hot Chocolate
Author: 
Recipe type: Drinks
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 1, 12 oz drink
 
For me, this is an everyday beverage that drinks like an indulgent treat. I often drink it in the morning with my breakfast, as a late afternoon snack if I've had a big training day, or as an after dinner dessert. Inspiration for this drink comes from my childhood love of Reese's and my friend Jen who was the first to suggest adding peanut butter to coffee.
Ingredients
  • 1 cup plant based milk
  • ½ cup water*
  • 2 tablespoon cacao or cocoa powder
  • 1 heaping tablespoon peanut butter (my favorite brand is field day organic)
  • 1 medjool date, pitted (or substitute 1-2 teaspoons maple syrup)
  • ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
  • Hefty splash of vanilla
  • Pinch of Salt
  • Optional: 1-2 teaspoons of maca powder, 1-2 teaspoons of ground flax
Method
  1. Add all ingredients to a small sauce pan and heat over medium heat until the milk is quite warm and almost simmering.
  2. Add everything to a high speed blender and blend on high for 1-2 minutes until the date is fully incorporated.
Notes
If you don't have a blender, swap the date for maple syrup and whisk until everything is combined and a little frothy.
*You could reduce the plant milk to ¾ cup and add ¾ cup coffee for a peanut butter cup mocha. It's delicious too.

 

Beginnings and a Montana Spring Salad

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For a brief period of time I had a Tinder account. It started as a joke. A distraction. A lightness in the midst of a great heaviness. I’m someone you might not expect to have a Tinder profile and I think the taboo of it is what drew me to it. All the swiping left and right was fun but I wasn’t actually going to use it. Except then I did. Because between all the ab pictures (which were a definite swipe left) I also found a large number of individuals like myself seeking real connection.

A Tinder profile, for those not familiar is comprised of a few pictures and a very brief character count to summarize who you are. With my ration of words, I chose a few to highlight my cooking abilities. Thus the most common conversation starter I received from my would be dates was, ‘What’s the best thing you can cook?’ My answer: ‘salad.’ As you can imagine, that immediately led to countless first dates. Every man, especially the hunters and cold smoke seekers that populate south west Montana, want to eat really good salad. But it’s true. I make really great salads. (Most of the time).

Salad also happens to be one of the first areas of cooking where I began to take chances and use my imagination. I remember the first time I made a garlic balsamic vinaigrette. As I slowly whisked the olive oil into the vinegar I witnessed my first emulsion in the making. It was magic. The simplest of recipes but this was 15 or more years ago when there was no Instagram and foodies were those who wrote for Bon Apetit, not every middle class millennial. I remember the first time I candied pecans for a salad. I remember gathering pomegranates from the trees at the end of the drive and seeding them and tossing those in with the pecans. That salad was magic and unlike anything I’d eaten before.

Since much of my journey with food began with greens, a good dressing and the right toppings I felt it was a good foundation for this space. I’ve written countless first drafts. But I never shared them. Some were deep with bits and pieces of my life story. One was about running. There was a lot of vulnerability. Others were explanatory: here’s why I’m throwing my voice in with the countless others already taking up space on the worldwide web. Or why I deserve a place. I decided that no explanation is required for creative projects, especially one you’ve been thinking about for over seven years. Finally, when I started writing about Tinder and one of my go-to salads of the last year, I knew I’d landed on a winner.

This salad is one of my favorites. I typically have all the dressing ingredients on hand and the base is so versatile you can top it with what’s in season and what’s on hand. This specific recipe also features what have become one of the secret weapons in my kitchen—fresh herbs. I used to buy cilantro and maybe some basil at the store to make Caprese salad with. I’d only branch out to Italian parsley, oregano, dill etc. when I had a recipe in mind that required a specialty herb. Enter, Date Night In and a certain avocado salad found within it’s pages that’s literally avocados with a cup of fresh herbs and it serves two. My eyebrow raised at the reading of one cup. And I know that I shied far away from the full cup the first time I made it. But not the second, or the third, or the fourth. And my fridge was changed forever. There’s always an assortment of fresh herbs waiting for me.

Back to the salad we’re actually making today which is an adaptation of another ‘herby’ salad recipe from Ashley Rodriguez’s book. (Please go visit her beautiful and inspirational site, it’s truly one of the best out there, and I’ll be mentioning her again). It’s the perfect back pocket recipe for company or when you want to dress up a weeknight meal. It comes together easily. The dressing makes extra which you’ll definitely be happy about, and this version represents how I feel about spring in Montana—winter just doesn’t want to let go. The herbs and butter leaf lettuce paired with the shallot dressing are an ode to the reawakening of spring, but the grapefruit and watermelon radishes are the footholds of winter. It’s fitting that on this April day it’s snowing in Montana.

Welcome to this little place of mine. I’m so glad you’re here.

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Not Quite Spring Salad
Author: 
Recipe type: Salad, Appetizer
Serves: 4 as a starter
 
Ingredients
  • Dressing
  • 1 tablespoon minced shallot
  • 2 teaspoons honey
  • 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard (I typically add extra because I love this flavor)
  • 2 tablespoons full fat Greek yogurt*
  • 2 tablespoons Champagne vinegar
  • Juice of one medium lemon, Meyer if you can get one
  • 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
  • Freshly ground black pepper to taste
  • Salad
  • 1 head butter leaf lettuce, leaves removed and carefully torn into large pieces
  • 1 small-medium watermelon radish, thinly sliced (I use a mandoline) or substitute 3 red radishes
  • 1 grapefruit, pith removed and sectioned
  • 1 avocado, quartered and thinly sliced
  • Heaping ½ cup of chopped assorted fresh herbs (I used dill, mint and tarragon, but parsley, cilantro, and basil are also wonderful)
  • 2 tablespoons shelled toasted pistachios, roughly chopped
  • Flake sea salt (Maldon is my favorite brand)
  • Freshly ground black pepper
Method
  1. Make the dressing: Whisk together the shallot, honey, mustard, yogurt, vinegar and lemon juice until combined. Continue whisking as you gradually add the olive oil. Add salt and pepper. Taste and add more seasoning as needed.
  2. Assemble the salad: Put lettuce leaves into a large bowl and toss with ¼ cup dressing. Add more dressing as needed.** Arrange the leaves on four plates. Top with the herbs, reserving some for the final garnish. Next top with grapefruit segments and ¼ avocado per plate. Continue topping with radish slices, more herbs and a sprinkle of your pistachios. Finish with a sprinkle of flake salt and a few grinds of fresh cracked pepper. Serve immediately so your beautiful lettuce does not wilt.
Notes
This recipe is adapted from "Date Night In" by Ashley Rodriguez.

*Another great option would be an Icelandic Skyr type yogurt such as Siggi's. For those looking for a dairy free option, I have yet to try this with a non-dairy yogurt but bear in mind that the thickness of Greek yogurt is what makes this dressing. If you go the non-dairy route I would try a coconut yogurt like Coyo that is oh so creamy.
**This recipe makes more dressing than you'll need and you'll be happy about the leftovers. I recommend starting by adding less dressing and add more as needed. Butter lettuce has a delicate leaf that we want to preserve and this is a thicker dressing. You don't want to miss out on the flavor though, so your leaves will be weighed down a bit. I recommend tasting a leaf to determine if you have enough dressing before proceeding.