My subconscious likes salads

Last night, I had a wonderful dream. Other people dream of world peace (which is a good thing) or dates with George Clooney (a date with George would be a good thing for sure), but that was not my dream. I dreamt that I was making a salad. It was beautiful. I created a new dressing and was raving about it. I had perfect butter lettuce leaves and buttery avocado.

Why yes, I am a complete food nerd and probably need to get out more. Why do you ask?

I woke up happy and hungry. I wrote down my subconscious' dressing recipe and resolved to make the dream salad for dinner tonight. I did and lo, it was good. So here it is:


Dream Salad

Makes 4 servings as a side salad. Double or quadruple for larger groups.

Butter lettuce (around 8 large leaves)
1/2 avocado, in 1-2 cm dice
Tomato, sliced in wedges
3 cm cucumber, sliced
2 radishes, sliced
1 large mushroom, sliced

Dressing Ingredients
(Makes 1 cup, enough for several salads, halve or quarter for smaller serves)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 cup good fruity extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon maple syrup
4 good pinches salt
2 pinches black pepper
enough white wine vinegar to make up to 1 cup

1. Put the all but the last dressing ingredient in a 1 cup (or more) measuring cup.
2. Add white wine wine vinegar until there is 1 cup of dressing.
3. Whisk dressing until oil is emulsified.
4. Put all salad ingredients in a salad bowl.
5. Add enough dressing to salad to coat (about 1/4 cup for the amount of vegetables above).
6. Toss until well coated.

You can refrigerate the remaining dressing. I imagine you would be able to keep it for several days.

Now I'm off to bed. I may even dream the secret coke recipe...