A New Kind of Salad

I remember some years ago, when "seasonal eating" had become a new trend, there were all kinds of recipes for salads that did not involve lettuce. These were meant to be fall or winter salads, when lettuce isn't growing anymore. They included things like shaved celeriac, kale, or radicchio. I remember reading those recipes and thinking, "Yuck. Lettuce salads for me, thanks."

And here I am, eating my words. And no lettuce.

This year in the garden had a confluence of two events that led to this. One is that the grasshoppers ate all the second planting of lettuce that A. planted for me. The other is that A. bought several collard green seedlings in the spring that grew to truly impressive sizes with the rain we've gotten this year.

The grasshoppers are also eating the collards, but the plants are so big that the damage is almost all on the big outer leaves, leaving the smaller interior leaves mostly untouched.

I do not love collard greens cooked, but when I was deprived of my lettuce for the salads I prefer to eat in the summer, I remembered those non-lettuce salads. Specifically, the recipes for "massaged kale."

The massaging part is pretty much breaking down the tough leaves of kale with an acidic dressing with salt--both salt and acid break the leaves down a little--that is then kind of kneaded into the leaves with the hands. The kale is first cut into thin ribbons, which breaks it down some anyway, and is then broken down further by being squeezed with the hands. This makes it softer and easier to eat. 

It's a lot of work, honestly, to make an edible food.

I don't like kale for the very reason that it's so aggresively tough, so I don't grow it. But I did have all those collards, which aren't quite as resistant to eating as kale, but are still pretty rough when raw. And so I tried the same method for the collard greens that is recommended for kale: I sliced it very thin, added a mustard vinaigrette, and kneaded it for a minute with my hands.

It worked. 

So this is what I now use as my lettuce substitute. And that is why my salads now look like this:

Collards, pickled onions, chickpeas, Aunt Belva's pickled beets, and feta cheese.

I had a similar salad one day when I sat down to lunch with the eldest child. For him, I had made bowl of pasta with leftover pasta, some bacon I needed to use, cream cheese, butter, and peas. 

A perfect illustration of the dietary requirements of a 45-year-old woman versus those of a 15-year-old boy.

I still like lettuce salads better, but I'm glad to have figured out a workable substitute for this summer, at least.

Snapshots: A Corporal Work of Mercy

A few months ago, our priest said a funeral Mass for a lady who grew up here and lived here most of her life. She had moved, however, and none of her family was here anymore. Her daughters sent her ashes to our priest and asked him to bury them here, as it was what their mother had wanted.

There was no one at the burial except me and one other lady from church--and the priest, of course--and there was no marker for her grave. Her daughters had a little memorial plaque made for her and sent it just recently to the priest. There was no way to set it in the ground, however.

I had thought I would just have one of the boys make a wooden cross to afix it to or something, but then A. and one boy ended up shaping and chiseling out a stone to put the plaque on. After it was done, we went to the cemetery so A. could set the stone in concrete. 

It is very flat there.

Edited to add: That photo doesn't show the actual grave marker Son made, but I think some of you assumed it was one of the ones in the photo. I figured out how to obscure the personal details of the plaque he was working with, though, so here's the actual marker he made.

Flowers courtesy of Poppy.

My brother and his daughters have started making cards for the children for their birthdays. I love these cards. I got a text from my brother a week or so before the new 13-year-old's birthday asking if the birthday boy was still into tanks.

Well. I mean. Is there such a thing as a boy who grows out of tanks? I don't think so, and replied to that effect. This was the card my brother made.

This is a card made by a 49-year-old boy for a 13-year-old boy. Perfect.

The school supply lists have been posted on the school Facebook page. We still have a month or so before school starts, but I figured I should take advantage of the quiet house while A. was gone with most of the children and sort through what I already had so I could figure out what I needed.

I have a lot of folders.

I found quite a lot of things I forgot I had stashed away. Like boxes of crayons and colored pencils, and a 12-pack of glue sticks. I even found pencil boxes and scissors for everyone. Yay.

This little dude was hanging between the two chains on my bedroom ceiling fan.

I squished him. I don't care if it was Charlotte herself, I will not have a spider suspended above my face while I'm sleeping.

And last, some flowers. Of course.

Some below-the-hill flowers--and berries--A. brought me.

The big bookcase arrangement when I still had hollyhocks.

And the big arrangement without hollyhocks. This is what I'll bring to church tomorrow for the altar. It was better with the hollyhocks. Curses on the hollyhock-eating grasshoppers.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.