**This post is part of a month-long series as I participate in the Salad as a Meal Challenge.
People complain to me all the time that salad doesn’t work as a meal. To some extent I agree–if you take a narrow view of salad as just lettuce, tomatoes and such. But there are so many different ingredients that you can put in a salad to make it hearty, healthy, and filling. But the most important salad ingredient for me: The dressing.
If you have a flavorful, robust dressing, you will like your salad more. Really. Not a mayonnaise-y gloppy mess dressing (although if you like that sort of thing, more power to you), but a rich dressing with good quality vinegar and oil, fresh herb,s and spices.
In honor of the beautiful weather this past weekend, we had a barbecue with some friends (although it was too cold so we ended up with an electric grill inside, but it was still delicious!). I volunteered to make a big potato salad because, really, what’s a barbecue without it? You may have guessed from my comment above that I abhor mayonnaise, so I made my potato salad with an olive oil based dressing–the basil-lemon dressing from Salad as a Meal. Delicious! I boiled and cubed some red-skinned potatoes, added some chopped eggs, celery and scallions, then tossed the whole thing with the basil-lemon dressing.
I can’t share this recipe with you since the cookbook has not yet been published, but here is one of my own dressing recipes that I developed recently and have completely fallen in love with.
Red Wine Vinaigrette w/ Shallots & Rosemary
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 shallot, sliced very thinly
2 tsp finely chopped fresh rosemary
hefty pinch of salt + more to taste
1/3 cup light olive oil
- Place vinegar, shallots, and rosemary in a small mason jar. Allow to sit for at least 30 minutes, preferably an hour.
- Add salt and oil, cover, and shake until emulsified. Add more salt to taste. Store in the fridge for up to 2 weeks (remove from fridge about 15 minutes before you plan to use it so the oil can de-solidify).
I love the idea of using this dressing on potato salad. Never liked mayo with it. Great post! :))
[…] how she was going to approach the challenge for her blog readers, then dove right in and wrote a little homage to the importance of the dressing on a salad, for which she put Patricia’s Basil-Lemon Dressing on a potato salad. (Rella, I am sure […]
I LOVE rosemary – next to basil I think it’s the best scented herb available! Thanks for the recipe. Looking forward to mosre of your SAAM posts!