Thursday, January 13, 2011

Amazing lentil salad

I just realized that I've never posted here the amazing lentil salad I often have for lunch. It's great because it's a sturdy salad that keeps well all week, I make a huge batch on Sunday and get 4 days of lunches out of it. So here it is:

Lentil & Kale Salad

(Yes, I know the idea sounds horrible, but it's actually quite good, so hang in there and give it a try.)

1 cup dry lentils
1 bunch kale
4oz fresh shiitake mushrooms
2 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp dried mustard
1/8 - 1/4 cup fresh herbs (whatever's in your garden, I tend to go with parsley, oregano & sage), measure them loose and then finely chop
1/2 - 1 tsp salt
Pepper to taste

Sort through the lentils and pick out any rocks, then put in a saucepan with 3 cups of water, bring to a boil and simmer over low heat for 20-25 minutes. You want them tender, but not falling apart. Drain them and set them aside to cool.

Wash the kale, remove the stems from and loosely chop it. Slice the mushrooms into thin slivers. In a large saucepan bring 1/4-1/3 cup of water to a boil, stuff all the kale into the saucepan, then throw the mushrooms in as well, cover it, and simmer for 3-5 minutes. No longer, you don't want to overcook the kale, it should still be bright green and tender.

Make the vinaigrette dressing by mixing the olive oil, vinegar, dried mustard, herbs salt & pepper. In a large bowl mix the lentils, kale & mushrooms, then top with the dressing and toss. Chill for 2-4 hours.

2 comments:

  1. Yum!! Will definitely have to try this soon! I LOVE lentils. For the dried mustard, can I just use mustard seed and grind them up?

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  2. Ack! Mo, I totally didn't see that you commented on this back in March. No don't use ground up seed, you want the stuff that's a super-fine powder. It's powerful stuff and you don't want to get a chunk of it.

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