Monet Salad

I made a salad from our garden the other day and I bulked up the greenery with pansies. The resulting dish was so pretty and the colours made me think of a Claude Monet painting, so I called it a Monet Salad.

It’s a good salad for lunch because the beans and almonds keep me full ‘til dinner.

Serves 2-3

1914-26 Claude Monet Agapanthus. Public domain. See how much it looks like my salad?

Salad Ingredients

One small onion

One packed cup of pansies

A handful of rocket

A handful of endive leaves

A cup and a half of lettuce

One tablespoon of sundried tomatoes

One tomato,

A handful of almonds

One can of mixed beans (about two cups).

One teaspoon of soy sauce

Dressing Ingredients

One tablespoon of honey

One tablespoon of oil (I use the oil from the sundried tomato jar)

One tablespoon of balsamic vinegar

Instructions

Finely dice the onion.

Finely slice the pansies, lettuce, rocket, endives and sundried tomatoes.

Drain and wash the beans

Combine in a bowl

Toast the almonds by tossing them a couple of times in a pan on the stove. When they are almost done, add a teaspoon of soy sauce and give the pan a shake. The almonds will nicely coat with the soy sauce.

Add to the bowl.

Make the dressing.

Mix the honey, oil and balsamic vinegar in a cup. Add to the salad and mix well.

Allow the salad to sit in the fridge for about 30 minutes to cool and for the onion to absorb the dressing and sweeten.

Tips

I find this perfectly fine for lunch on a normal day, but if I was going to exert myself a bit more, I’d add a bit of tinned salmon on the side.

Also, this is a late spring/summer lunch. It wouldn’t keep me going very long on a cold day!