Piquant Pineapple Salsa

The post title may say "salsa" but I'm having this for lunch as a salad. Very simple recipe with pineapple, cucumber, onion. The veggies are dressed in red wine vinegar, liquid jaggery, chilli flakes, basil, and garlic.

Cabbage, Grapes, Olives Salad in a Red Wine & Poppy Seed Vinaigrette

I had a bit of salad left over from yesterday - the lettuce was wilted, but the rest was fresh. So, I reused the kalamata olives, gherkins, and peppers; and added cabbage and black grapes to the mix. The vinaigrette is made of 1 part red wine vinegar, 2 parts extra virgin olive oil, sprigs of oregano, and a heaping of poppy seeds. I'd bought the poppy seeds ages ago and hadn't even opened the pack till today -  Had seen a salad dressing somewhere with poppy seeds added, so why not?!

Fennel, Peppers, Lettuce Salad

I had this salad for brunch yesterday sitting in our office canteen, in a rather conspicuous location next to the water cooler. Two girls at work (one a total stranger) asked for the recipe, saying it smells so good (Thank you, rosemary), and two guys commented on the fact that seeing a Parsi girl eat vegan raw is as rare as well, seeing a hippo in Alaska. Just not the normal run of things. And that eating tofu (not in the below recipe) and raw veggies is just needlessly putting yourself through torture.

Fennel, Peppers, Lettuce Salad

Ingredients:

• 2-3 cups of baby/lolo lettuce
• 2-3 cups of roquette lettuce (arugula)
• 1 cup of fennel bulb and leaves
• 1 green pepper
• 1/2 red pepper
• 3-5 pickled cucumber
• 5-10 black olives
• 2-3 sprigs of rosemary
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil

To make:

• Wash and chop up your veggies.
• Make a sald dressing of chopped up rosemary and olive oil.
• Pour over the salad.

Lettuce, Apple, and Cucumber Salad

Inspired by my salad yesterday, today, too, I made a salad with hitherto unused ingredients - apples and cucumbers. You can prevent apples from going brown after you cut them by rubbing some lemon/lime juice on them.

Lettuce, Apple, and Cucumber Salad

Ingredients:

• 2 cups iceberg lettuce, chopped finely
• 1/2 a large apple, chopped
• 1 cucumber, sliced (skin on)
• 2 tablespoons black olives, chopped
• Handful of mint
• Tablespoon of olive oil
• Juice of two limes
• Handful of fennel leaves
• Handful of walnuts

To make:

• Chop and mix all the veggies.
• Juice the two limes - The juice of one of them will be poured over the chopped apples to prevent them from going brown.
• The juice of the other lime will be combined with the olive oil to make a dressing.
• Pour over the salad.
• Garnish with walnuts, mint and fennel leaves.