Tasty Thursday: End of Summer Watermelon Salad

We've been blessed with a gorgeous yellow watermelon from our CSA share several times now.  First one went to my Dad's birthday celebration where it got rave reviews from all ages and provided some adorable photo ops with a baby who was having a ball feeding it to himself.  Last week's melon was left for my daughter to share with some company she had while we were out of town for the weekend, however she ended up not using it.  So when I picked up my share this week I knew I still had the one in my fridge and with there being little space for another one I chose the smallest one I could find and set out to make something with the older melon ASAP when I arrived home.  This is what came of it:

Into your nice, large salad bowl place the following ingredients then toss to mix:

Half a lovely organic yellow watermelon, cubed (reserve rind for pickling if desired)
Two cups organic home-sprouted mung beans
Two organic carrots, shredded
One small organic onion, chopped
A handful of organic cilantro, chopped
Sea salt and ground pepper to taste (optional)

I added balsamic to this, however one of the folks in my house doesn't have  a taste for vinegar lately so we dressed the salad individually once plated.  I served it over a bed of organic spring mix greens.

What are you waiting for?  Go cut that watermelon you have sitting in your fridge from this week's CSA share and enjoy!

Tasty Thursday: Kale Salad

This is a version of Kale Salad made by my coworker's daughter.  Hers is out of this world; I know it is one of those cases of the secret ingredient being love because I add the same things and although mine is yummy, hers is heavenly.  Thank you for sharing with me, Niya!

The particular batch pictured here was made with Lacinato kale.  Normally I use curly kale, but this week Lacinato was available at my CSA.  It was nice to have that variation on a salad I make every week to bring to work for lunch.

One bunch freshly washed kale, chopped
Just enough olive oil to cause the seasonings to cling to the leaves
Sea salt,  freshly ground pepper, dried minced onion to taste
A clove or two of minced garlic
1/4 cup nutritional yeast (I really like the taste of nutritional yeast so I tend to go a little heavy on it)

Toss in a large bowl, cover with a cloth and allow flavors to blend, mixing now and then as you walk by it when you go in the kitchen.  Store what isn't consumed at the first meal in a glass jar in the fridge and enjoy a tasty lunch tomorrow.

Tasty Thursday: Another Variation on Chickpea Salad

I've decided not to call this 'Mock Tuna Salad' any more. First, because there's nothing mocking about it, the stuff tastes great. And second because why promote the eating of fish in any way, even if just using the name of a fish dish to describe a delicious, vegan dish.

This variation has the usual can of TJ's chick peas and Vegenaise. The greens are CSA salad mix. I'm trying to go easy on the salt lately because I'm so darned addicted to it so I used granulated onion instead. And the new ingredient?

Flor de Izote in brine. Yum. Adds a nice tang and just a bit of crunch. I saw a big jar of it in the International section of our little local market and thought it looked interesting. At $5.49 the jar is a bit pricey but I thought it was large enough to last quite a few meals so I gave it a try. I'm glad I did!