It was a Danish friend, Anne, who now resides in California, which made me aware of this English-language blog, My New Roots, written by Sarah Britton.
My New Roots is based in Copenhagen, Denmark. The subtitle is “How to make healthy choices every day.”
And Anne was right – it is truly amazing. The first thing I noticed about it, was the quite wonderful photos accompanying the blog’s recipes. Fortunately (for my own peace of mind) I could also read that the blogger has worked for five years to perfect it. So there is still hope for my one month old blog!
But the recipes are definitely worth looking into too.
It was Salad below, that Anne put a link in to, and it just looked so beautiful that I had to try.
Sarah Britton wrote that it serves a crowd, and you can safely believe her. I made half a batch of dressing and only a third of the rest of the ingredients, and yet there were at least Salad for three people – the kind of people that eat a lot!
Purple Power Salad
(Serves a crowd!)
3 Tbsp. cold-pressed olive oil
3 Tbsp. lemon juice + zest
1 Tbsp. liquid sweetener (raw honey or maple syrup)
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
2 tsp. ground cumin
pinch cayenne, if desired
2 tsp. rosewater (optional, but delicious)
1 ½ tsp. sea salt (to taste)
1 cup / 140g pumpkin seeds
1 red cabbage /1kg
1 cup / 150 g dried black mission figs, chopped
1 bunch purple carrots / 500g (regular orange carrots are fine)
1 cup each chopped parsley and mint, leaves only
1. Whisk all dressing ingredients together and set aside.
2. Using a mandoline or very sharp knife, slice the cabbage as thinly as possible. Place in a very large bowl. Slice the carrots horizontally into rounds, or as desired, add to cabbage. Wash the herbs well, spin dry, dice the parsley (including stems) and mint (leaves only). Add to the bowl.
3. In a dry skillet over medium heat, lightly toast the pumpkin seeds until fragrant. Remove from heat and set aside.
4. Pour dressing over the veggies and herbs and toss well to coat. Add pumpkin seeds and fold to combine. Season to taste (the salad may need more salt at this point). Let stand at room temperature for about 30 minutes, toss before serving and enjoy.
Note 1: I think the ground cinnamon adds a wonderfull taste, which goes well with the figs and the pumpkin seeds. But it does have that….say…sort of christmassy feeling to it. If you don’t want that at this time of the year, I guess you can leave it out.
Note 2: I think that Black Mission Figs are from the US. I read somewhere, that fransiscan missionairies planted it in San Diego a couple of hundred years ago. I wouldn’t know where to find it in Denmark, but I bought some really lovely organic figs from Turkey instead. That was fine.
Note 3: If you like mint, use loads of it. It goes really well with the red cabbage.
Note 4: If you are not used to eating reaw cabbage, your stomach might get to work so much, that you’ll have a slight stomach-ache, if you eat a lot of the salad. It is not dangerous, it is just healthy training of your stomach! But maybe you should eat a little less of it – and do it every day 🙂
Visit Sarah Brittons blog at http://www.mynewroots.org/site/