strawberry-mint salad with honey-balsamic dressing

This recipe is a variation on a recipe in Audrey Alsterberg and Wanda Urbanowicz’s rebar modern food. If you’re skeptical about putting fruit in a dinner salad, this salad will change your mind. If you can get really sweet, fragrant strawberries, there is no reason to eat anything other than this salad until the strawberries run out. I eat it every day until really fantastic strawberries are no longer available, then I just wait until next year.

If you want to eat this with something else, try it with any kind of a sandwich or toast with a topping. I tend to like eating so much of this salad for dinner that a nice fat slice of toast (I love to use our Rise & Shine Bakery’s toasted walnut or seed bread) drizzled with olive oil or spread with hummus is all I really need. But you could also make roasted red peppers and goat cheese on toast, and that would be a divine combination!

dressing

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons honey
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
½ large white or purple onion, minced very fine
¼ teaspoon sea salt or kosher salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
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1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Whisk all the dressing ingredients together, except the oil. Slowly drizzle in the oil while whisking. Season with more salt and/or honey to taste. I usually make a double batch of this and keep it in the refrigerator—it lasts quite well. If the dressing separates, just bring it to room temperature and whisk it back up to combine.

salad

3-4 cups ripe, fragrant strawberries
2-3 stalks fresh mint
10-12 cups of leaf lettuce or baby greens, washed, dried and torn into bite-sized pieces

1. Cut strawberries into slices.
2. Pick the leaves off the mint, wash them, and just before serving, chop them finely.
3. Fill a big salad bowl with the greens. Toss with dressing to your taste, then add the mint and strawberries, toss once more, and serve immediately.