In 1976 and ’78 Cuisinart provided a wonderful little wire-bound cookbook called “New Recipes for the Cuisinart Food Processor and it was written by James Beard and Carl Jerome. Unfortunately, it is out of print and my copy (I lost my original) came from a garage sale.  Buy it if you can find it; the recipes are magnificent.  And here is the wonderful Green Goddess Recipe.  If you are squeamish about making your own mayonnaise, substitute with Best Buy’s, Trader Joe’s or another good mayonnaise.  This recipe needs to be made in a food processor, not in the SaladSuccess shaker.

Green Goddess Salad Dressing – makes 2 cups

1 ¾ cups mayonnaise

6 anchovy fillets

3 green onions (scallions) chopped roughly

2 shallots halved

2 tbsps of a good white vinegar such as tarragon, balsamic or apple

10 sprigs parsley with stems removed

2 sprigs fresh tarragon leaves or 1 tsp dried tarragon leaves

Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions

With the metal blade in place, add mayonnaise, anchovy fillets, green onions, shallots, vinegar, parsley and tarragon to the beaker.  Process until mixture is evenly chopped, about 30 seconds.  Taste and season with salt & pepper.  Process for 5 seconds.

Optional ingredients: A bunch of chives (coarse chop), 1 tsp of Worchestershire sauce, chopped fresh cilantro, lime (for Southwestern Cobb Salad) dash of cayenne pepper.

Salads: Cobb, Southwestern Cobb (add freshly cooked corn, black beans and taco strips), Spinach with Egg, and Mixed Greens.

Green Goddess Dressing recipe courtesy of James Beard and Carl Jerome

Looking for something different and spring-like, but don’t want to indulge in off season produce?  Try this salad for a change of pace.  Warm and delicious, this will tempt the most demanding palates.

INGREDIENTS

2 red onions finely sliced

Olive oil

2 tsp cumin seeds

2 crushed, pressed or finely chopped garlic cloves

2 tsp grated ginger root

1 ½ cup split lentils – I use the common red lentils that you can find in any grocery store

3 cups vegetable stock or bouillon

2 tbsp chopped fresh mint

2 tbsp chopped cilantro

4 – 5 cups spinach

2 avocados, pitted and sliced

1 tsp hazelnut or walnut oil

4 tbsp Greek or strained plain yogurt – greek has a richer texture

Fresh ground pepper

DIRECTIONS

In a large skillet over medium heat with enough olive oil to cover the bottom, sauté onions until soft, for about 10 minutes.  Add cumin seeds, garlic and ginger root.  Sauté for 2 minutes, constantly stirring.

Stir in lentils; add stock at a ladleful at a time and constantly stirring, until the stock is absorbed – about 20 minutes.  Remove from heat and stir in herbs.

Toss spinach in hazelnut or walnut oil, then divide among 4-6 salad plates or one large serving plate

Mash goat cheese with yogurt in a small bowl (you can also use a stick or mini-blender but don’t puree) and season with fresh ground pepper.

Place lentils among salad plates or serving plate and top with avocado slices and goat cheese mixture.

Courtesy of Salad by Love Food

Now SaladSuccess is not only providing the best salads and dressings to make with our SaladSuccess shaker, but now will provide the measurements if you only want to make enough dressing for one salad.

The bones of this recipe are from Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa with changes to the proportions.  I love this combination on a bed of lettuce since there are so many calories in a single avocado.  Most grocery stores sell very unripe (hard as rock) avocados – I’m lucky that my local farmers market carries avocados.  Unless you have a specialty shop, often Costco avocados are ripe or will ripen in the next few days.

Ingredients for the SaladSuccess Shaker

• Freshly squeezed lemon to the 1/3 orange line of SaladSuccess Shaker
• Olive oil to the top orange line of SaladSuccess Shaker
• 1 large spoonful of  Dijon mustard
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Ingredients for a single salad dressing

• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil
• 1 tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Ingredients for the Salad

• 4 ripe avocados
• 2 large red grapefruits
• Mesclun lettuce or arugula

Just before serving, cut the avocados in quarters, remove the seeds, and peel off the skin. Cut each quarter into 2-3 slices. Whisk all the vinaigrette ingredients and oss the avocado slices in the vinaigrette to prevent them from turning brown. Peel off the grapefruits slices (removing all the white pith), then strip the membranes to release the grapefruit sections.

Arrange the avocado slices around the edge of a large platter lined with mesclun lettuce or arugula. Arrange the grapefruit segments in the center. Spoon the remaining vinaigrette on top and serve.

Courtesy of Ina Garten, Barefoot Contessa.

INGREDIENTS – for a single salad or use the Sherry-Shallot Vinaigrette in Salad Success container
1 minced shallot
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 heads Belgian endive, halved lengthwise, cored, and very thinly sliced (about 2 1/2 cups)
3 small fennel bulbs, halved lengthwise, cored, and very thinly sliced (about 3 cups)
1 large Fuji apple, halved lengthwise, cored, and very thinly sliced (about 2 1/2 cups)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Whisk together shallot, mustard, vinegar, salt, and pepper in a wood, or glass salad bowl. While constantly whisking, add oil by pouring in a thin stream down the side of the bowl. Whisk until all oil is incorporated. Taste and adjust seasoning as desired.

Add endive, fennel, and apple slices to the vinaigrette and toss to coat. Taste again and adjust seasoning as desired. Serve.

Courtesy from Chowhound, Recipe of the Day, 2/3/2010

During the later part of the fall and into the winter, local area beets are readily available.  They are very easy to grow and stay crisp in a refrigerator for months.  I always love their sparkling colors and crispy taste.  This recipe guarantees that beets will be a big hit with you and your family.  You can cook the beets ahead of time. If you want to boil the beets, I suggest cooking them in the microwave (10 minutes on high with a microwavable lid and ½ cup of water on the bottom of the container) , otherwise cooking beets takes about one hour.  For this recipe the beets can be boiled  (one hour  – cover with a lid) or even better, roasted for a more complex taste.

INGREDIENTS

5-6 medium size beets

Olive oil

3 hard boiled eggs – sliced or chopped

Blue cheese dressing made in the SaladSuccess container but replace blue cheese with  gorgonzola cheese

¼ cup chopped walnuts –  optional

1 apple such as Fuji, peeled and chopped (optional)

Lettuce to line the salad bowl – mesclun, Boston or Romaine

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Wash beets, scrub skins and remove greens (use for stir fry.  Place beets in a baking dish, and drizzle olive oil on the beets.  Toss the beets to cover all sides with the olive oil.  Bake until a knife can easily cut the beets, usually for 45 – 60.

Line a bowl or a platter with salad greens.  Slice beets and place on top of greens. Add eggs, walnuts and apples.  Pour dressing over salad.

Many users of  the SaladSuccess shaker have been asking for salad recipes to go along with the dressing,  I guess we all get tired of lettuce and a few wedges of tomatoes, cucumber slices and carrots.  Once of my favorite salads is Belgium endive salad, which is simple, and elegant.  Around this time of year, I get cravings for endives (my husband hates them, which is great since they are expensive and he won’t touch them) and have endive salad marathons at lunch time.  Make sure that you use Reggiano Parmesan cheese – it intensifies the flavors of the endives with the vinaigrette.

INGREDIENTS

Belgium endives – one or two (endive lovers) per person.  Don’t count the kids, it is an acquired taste due to the bitterness of the endives.

Reggiano Parmesan – about 10 beautiful long slices

Sherry & Shallots vinaigrette

DIRECTIONS

First chop off the thick, hardcore end of the endive.

I like to rough chop the endives so that they make little curls.  That way it is easier for the dressing and parmesan to get mixed with the vinaigrette.  However for a more elegant look, you could peel the leaves of endives.

Decorate with the cheese.

When ready to serve, shake the sherry & shallot dressing in the SaladSuccess shaker and pour over the salad.

This is a wonderful, quick and easy recipe that uses the Shallot & Sherry vinaigrette.  If you are able, fresh shrimp off a boat is the best way to make the salad, but those of us that are not as lucky to live near a dock with shrimp boat, can easily make this recipe using pre-frozen shrimp.  From the 3 least expensive frozen shrimp bags – Trader Joe’s, Costco & Safeway, I found that the Safeway “WaterFront Bistro” large shrimp 2 lb. bag with shell is excellent and convenient.  Usually these bags are on sale for $12 to $14 and there are approximate 60 shrimp in each bag.  I use approximately 10 shrimp per salad plate.  If you like spinach leaves, substitute with the mesclun greens.

INGREDIENTS

10 peeled and deveined shrimp per plate

Mesclun Greens

¼ to ½ cup of finely shredded Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese or similar

Olive oil – enough to cover the bottom of the pan

¼ cup white wine

¼ cup chicken stock

1 large shallot, finely sliced

Shallot-Sherry or Classic Vinaigrette

DIRECTIONS

With oil covering the bottom of your pan and using a medium high flame, sautée the shallots, add the wine and stock and let come to a boil.  Toss in the shrimp and cook until pink.  Turn off the heat, add the cheese and mix well.

On a plate with mesclun greens, add the shrimp mixture and pour a tablespoon of the wine – stock liquid over shrimp.  Shake vigorously the vinaigrette in the SaladSuccess shaker, and pour a little less that usual on top of your salad.  If you’d like, add an extra sprinkling of the parmesan cheese, soft boiled egg or garden tomatoes when in season.

INGREDIENTS

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Sherry Vinegar

1 large shallot – rough chop

1 spoonful. of Dijon Mustard

Salt & Pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

Olive oil up to the blue oil line of the SaladSuccess Shaker

Add vinegar to the blue vinegar line

Add chopped shallot and Dijon mustard

2 dashes of salt

1 dash of pepper

Shake vigorously

Laurent Tourondel, the cooking sensation behind the BLT (Bistro Laurent Tourondel), developed this wonderful recipe for coleslaw. In October 2007,

INGREDIENTS

Smooth peanut butter

6 tablespoons fresh lime juice

6 tablespoons Asian fish sauce

6 tablespoons water

6 tablespoons sugar

6 garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoon Sriracha chile sauce

DIRECTIONS

Peanut butter to the ½ blue mark on the SaladSuccess shaker

Add lime juice, fish sauce, water, sugar, garlic and Sriracha.

Shake vigorously and serve over cabbage, carrots & red peppers

Garnish with cilantro mint leaves and chopped peanuts.

Adapted from Laurent Tourondel

Fran Gage

INGREDIENTS

Extra-virgin olive oil

White wine or white balsamic vinegar

3 large spoonfuls of crumbled blue cheese

1 large spoonful of water

Fine sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

Olive Oil to the 3/4 blue marks on the SaladSuccess Shaker

Vinegar to the top of the blue vinegar line

Add blue cheese to shaker and mash with a fork to break down the crumbles

Shake vigorously in the SaladSuccess shaker

Add water

Shake vigorously again in the SaladSuccess shaker

Add salt and pepper to taste

Adapted from The New American Olive Oil by Fran Gage