8.28.2010

A Pretty Summer Salad

Mike and I hosted our good friends the Bradley’s last Saturday night for dinner and a movie (except the movie was at the theater and by the way it was so bad it would have been way better for us to get a rental).

We saw Eat, Pray, Love and if all you want is a huge close-up of Julia Roberts’ big teeth, than this is the movie for you. I slept through Italy, Keith slept through India and Mike through Bali. Debbie was the only alert one and I am not sure why since she didn’t like it either.

Anyway, back at our house I served appetizers (the movie is very long so we were all starving) and then a simple dinner of the Barefoot Contessa’s Shrimp Scampi, garlic bread and a really pretty fresh summer salad.

Here is the salad recipe and ingredients for four:

3 large freshly grown tomatoes (only really available in the summer of course)
8 very thin slices of red onion
Small can of slice black olives
4 oz. feta cheese crumbled (try to crumble yourself –the other stuff is dry)
16-20 asparagus spears you have lightly blanched, placed in ice water, drained and chilled

Dressing: Mix together 1/3 c. red wine vinegar, 2 tsp. sugar, ½ c. salad oil, ¼ tsp. basil and oregano and 2 tsp. fresh chopped parsley. Shake it all together until sugar dissolves.

On a nice large salad plate, lay tomatoes and onions in a pretty curve. Top with feta cheese. On the other side of the plate, lay the asparagus. Drizzle with dressing.

I assembled everything before we left and drizzled on the dressing when I was ready to serve. Try this – it is pretty and delicious!


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