This posting is for my sister Nat. She’s been asking me for this recipe ever since she visited in early May. My cousin Nik sent me a recipe chain pyramid thing to which I haven’t replied yet either, but I plan to.

Margaret (a former colleague) once made this salad for one of those potluck things you do at work. You have to balance the ingredients based on the number of people you are making the salad for.

• Fresh tomatoes. I use either cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, or just small vine tomatoes.
• Some fresh mozzarella balls. I usually get a bucket from Costco, but when everybody was here, we just got a half pint at Safeway. The mozzarella balls are usually preserved in olive oil and spices.
• Fresh basil.
• Salt and pepper to taste.

Quarter the tomatoes. Half the mozzarella balls. Chop the fresh basil. Mix in a bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste. Very simple. Very tasty. Very fresh.

Obviously, this recipe goes very well with crab-stuffed chicken breasts grilled on the BBQ, that grilled asparagus (how did we do that?), and a glass of Alan’s Bush-Field Pinot Noir. It tastes even better when you have friends and family enjoying it with you.

Over ten years ago, my friend Vicky told me about peanut butter and cucumber sandwiches. I thought, Yuck! Peanut butter and cucumber? Disgusting.

Last summer, I accidentally tried the combination though. I was having peanut butter on toast for breakfast. I was also making a salad for my lunch. I guess I used the same knife for buttering peanut butter and cutting the cucumber.

If you know me, I always have to sneak a quick taste of my ingredient–especially if it is a raw vegetable. In this case though, some peanut butter had rubbed off on my cucumber slice. WOW. I thought. How delicious.

And I thought of my friend Vicky and how she told me ten years ago that it was a great taste combination. And I thought how unfortunate of me to have dismissed it so quickly, without even trying. And I thought, how unfortunate that I have been missing this delicious, crunchy, savory, taste for ten years.

And now I’m glad that I have actually tried it. I eat peanut butter on toast with slices of cucumber all the time. I will encourage you not to dismiss it so quickly either. Because in ten years, you’ll be thinking of how you once read somebody’s blog and they encouraged you to try this new, unconventional combination, and you didn’t because it sounded yucky. And when you do try it, you’ll wonder why you didn’t try it sooner. And you’ll remember me, maybe, and you’ll wonder what I’m doing. And maybe you’ll look me up.

I don’t need to look up where Vicky is. We keep in touch. She now lives in France, with her husband and two (yes two!) children. I’d like to visit her this year. I think I’m going to try for September. And this time, if she recommends any sort of taste combination, I’m not going to dismiss it so quickly. I’ll give it a try.

My aunt and my sisters have been visiting me in California. We had an awesome time! Mainly though, we ate. We ate. We drank. Then we ate some more. My sister asked me for the salad recipes I made. I said I would post them on my blog. So–ben, voila!–here is one:

One head of butter lettuce. Tear into bite-sized pieces and wash in a fancy-dancy salad spinner. Spin until the lettuce is dizzy (or you are dizzy, or you can’t tell the difference because you have been drinking the bottle of wine you opened half an hour ago and you have an empty stomach. Remember, you haven’t eaten. You are just starting to make the salad!).

Retrieve glass bowl from where ever the glass bowl is stored in your kitchen. If it is your kitchen, you know where the glass salad bowls are. If you are in your sister’s kitchen, you will have to investigate each cupboard and drawer to find out where they are stored. Depending on the size of the kitchen, this particular task might take a few minutes.

Ok. Glass bowl. Dizzy lettuce. Put the lettuce in the bowl. Pat down so the lettuce is densely layered on the bottom of the bowl and it starts to regroup.

Open a can of corn niblets. This was the first time I used white corn niblets. I normally use yellow corn niblets. Well. You decide what you like better: white corn, yellow corn. Doesn’t make a difference. More likely than not, you are going to have one of them in your cupboard.

Rinse and drain the can of corn niblets and layer them on top of the dizzy lettuce in the bowl. Not a bad combination so far.

Chop a large tomato into cubes. Should I say: cube a large tomato? Well. Whatever the language, you get the idea: one large tomato is now in chunks. Layer the tomato chunks onto the corn niblets.

Find the can of tuna in your cupboard. Staple ingredient: tuna. Open the can, drain the liquid. Put the tuna in a bowl to chop it up with a fork so that it is now flaky. I like to add minced onions–just a wee bit of onions, minced into a pulpy mess–for flavour. Mix the onions with the flaky tuna. Layer the minced onions and flaky tuna onto the tomato, corn, and lettuce in the bowl. Hmmmm…now you have dizzy lettuce and flaky tuna in one bowl. Maybe you should have another drink of wine.

Ok. So now you should have lettuce, corn, tomato, onion and tuna all layered in the glass bowl. You can actually use any kind of bowl. I just like glass bowls because you can see the layers and it makes it more of an interesting conversation piece. Especially, if by now, you are on the second bottle of wine and you still haven’t eaten. You can decorate the top of the salad with boiled eggs sliced in half. Be artistic. Be creative. There are no rules.

The dressing takes some trial and error before you figure it out. I learned how to make this basic dressing when I lived in France and it has been in my recipe repertoire ever since. Scoop some Dijon mustard into a small mixing bowl. Once around the edge with olive oil. Well–maybe another round just so there is enough. Start mixing in circular motions. Add vinegar to the mix. Keep mixing until the oil, mustard, and vinegar have blended. Use the vinegar to modify the consistency of the dressing. If you’ve added too much vinegar, add some more oil, or mustard until you get the right balance. This is where the trial and error comes in. Too much mustard and it will make your nose sting. Too much vinegar and it will make your mouth pucker. Too much oil and–well, you’ll figure it out.

You can pour the dressing directly onto the salad and serve or just keep it in the bowl so each individual can put the right amount on their portion. The idea with the layered salad is that it becomes a tossed salad as soon as people start digging in.

That’s it. Bon Appetit! Dig in!

Don’t forget: Finish the wine.