The Salads of Spring

Soon enough, it's going to be the time of year when it's warm and beautiful outside, time to put away all those hot soups and toasty slices of bread, time to bring out the fresh fruits and crisp salads. It's been too long without fresh greens in my life! Maybe I'm spoiled having spent the better part of the past two years living right smack in between the beach and California's salad fields, but seriously? Produce in Manhattan is in a shameful state. Thankfully, there is a tiny but serviceable farmers' market in the plaza outside my office on Wednesdays, with a nice little greens stand so I can get my fix. I can already tell it's going to be a lifesaver when it starts getting too hot to eat anything but cold, crispy, sharp lettuces with the bare essential dressings.

Lest you run away screaming at the thought of plain old iceberg lettuce salads and, you know, nature, I have a little secret recipe to share. It's kind of weird. Kind of weird, but great, as many recipes are. I found it in one of the cookbooks I splurged on while in Japan last summer, from Tokyo's gorgeous and ever-popular Afternoon Tea. It has recipes for all of their famous treats, like sable cookies, chai milk tea jam (YES), chestnut cream tea, and all manner of deliciousness. Their farmer's salad recipe is deceptively simple--I promise, you'll make it and slap yourself for not thinking of it earlier.

In fact, it's so ridiculous, I won't even post actual ingredients. Here's what you do--
1. Wash and cut your greens to your desired size. (I like Trader Joe's "just the leaves" green leaf lettuce, cut into 1-inch chunks and rinsed in cold, cold water. Crunchy!)
2. Put two slices of hearty, whole- or multi-grain bread into the toaster.
3. While you're waiting for the toast, toss your greens in your favorite light dressing. (If you can find it, I love Cindy's Kitchen Rosemary and Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette, or if I'm stocked-up I'll whisk together olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper, a frozen garlic cube, and herbs de Provence in a bowl right quick.)
4. Fry one egg, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a little hot sauce if you like things with kick. (Fry this in a little cooking spray instead of butter or bacon grease.)
5. Butter your toast.
6. Cut toast and fried egg into 1/2-inch cubes, so they are easily spear-able with a fork but not unwieldy. Enjoy.
(*) Options for extra flair can include some pan-fried Canadian ham, bacon, cheese shavings, poached egg instead of fried, really anything you might be tempted to throw into an omelette.

This is a nice weekend breakfast/brunch dish for me, and my mother swears by it when she's trying to lose weight: salad for breakfast. It's unbelievable what you can create when you break out of the toast-omelette mold. Check out your local Asian grocery for Japanese "non-oil" dressings in sesame, ginger, soy sauce, nori, carrot, and shiso flavors.

If you are still feeling a little unprepared for your salad days (genius, Karen!), I have a few helpful links to share:

-The Washington Post is so clever, they've created an online SALAD SPINNER.
It's actually quite good if you're curious about flavor combinations, or like me, you just really enjoy thinking about food.

-From the men's health section of WebMD, some secrets of the restaurant salad bar. (I will refrain from describing the Rajneeshee cult salad bar-salmonella incident in this post.)

-Chopstick NY reports on the not-so-new rage in Tokyo, "cafe gohan". Going to cafes all over Tokyo was just about my favorite thing ever when I was living there. My particular favorite is the Globe in Mishuku (Setagaya-ku), which is half antiques shop and half fresh-baked-goods-and-espresso cafe. Their white chocolate/mango muffins and antique wooden farmhouse tables haunt my dreams still.

-Again from Japan, cosmetics and healthy food company DHC has a lovely recipe for grilled asparagus salad.

Unfortunately for me, it's still raining cats and dogs here in New York and all I want is some nice hot soup!

Tea-Braised Chicken

In my effort to eat healthily and lose weight this year, I've started logging my daily caloric intake using the CalorieKing Nutrition and Exercise Manager. It's worked okay so far, I think the best part is the fact that the program forces me to get at least thirty minutes of exercise every day or else I DON'T GET TWO CHECKS, and failure is not an option for me. Sure, I'm not REALLY losing weight, but I'm tracking my weight and calories daily and every little bit helps. That and the weekly cardio-kickboxing PLUS mat pilates twice a week WITH strength training and elliptical machine time invested, I don't need any thinspiration crushing my weight-loss spirit these days.

ANYWAY. Chicken!
This recipe came from three very delicious, very different inspiratory meals. Braising, as you may know, involves meat cooking in liquid until it's all soft and shreddy, much like what you get from a slow cooker. I love that kind of thing, as Delicious Inspiratory Meal #1 reminded me the other day: Hawaiian pork lau lau, slow cooked in ti and and soft, fragrant taro leaves until absolutely buttery. If it weren't covered in chunks of pork fat, I'd eat it every day with Best Foods macaroni salad and Japanese rice.

Delicious Inspiratory Meal #2 was a batch of tea eggs I made a few weeks ago, saving almost all of the delectably pungent star anise cooking liquid to reuse someday soon. Every summer during my last two years of high school, I always went to the same Chinese teahouse--Lucy's--with my mother at least once a week to have lunch, drink "Oriental Beauty" tea, and do the daily newspaper crossword puzzle. The service was terrible, they always got our orders wrong, there were little pink ceramic pigs all over the place for no good reason, and it smelled overwhelmingly of sugar and flowers, but it was our girl time together and we always finished the paper AND the crossword puzzle. Victory, of course, was the best part, but Lucy's daily lunch special was pretty great. Garlicky, salty mustard greens, hot white rice, curried tofu or chicken, and TEA EGGS. I have craved them ever since Lucy's tragically closed when I was in college, oh yum.

Delicious Inspiratory Meal #3 comes from the above cookbook on cooking with tea that I picked up in Japan this summer. In it, the author uses various Chinese, Japanese, Indian, and British teas to flavor an impressive variety of dishes from salads to soups to stir-fries. Burmese fermented tea leaf salad, corn chai potage, oolong tea and almond-crusted fish and chips are all recipes on my list to try very soon, considering the bulk of loose leaf teas and tea bags I need to use up before I move apartments in late December.

Thus was born my tea-braised chicken. Take the following ingredients and place them in a deep-ish frying pan or a medium saucepan, so the liquid covers at least ninety percent of the chicken:

1 boneless skinless chicken breast, flattened or sliced in half lengthwise
liquid leftover from 1 recipe for tea eggs
1 star anise
1/2 cup white wine
1 chicken bouillon cube
1/4 tsp black pepper or Japanese sansho pepper
1 tbsp ground or fresh ginger

How-to:
1. Bring all of the ingredients to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for at least twenty minutes until the chicken is done and can be shredded with a fork.
2. Serve over salad with Asian dressing, in fried rice, in a Vietnamese-style sandwich on French bread.

Enjoy! I wish I had photos, but my sad wee single chicken breast looks rather inconsequential in a leftover plastic container. Ah, well. Leave a comment if you try it!

image from allabout.co.jp.