I’ll admit it… this is about as close as I can come to making a 30-minute meal; in that regard, I’m no Rachel Ray. However, when the mood strikes me and the ingredients are at hand, I have been known to put together some pretty nice dinner salads. This one was tasty (although Cat, as I’m beginning to find out, is not overly thrilled with roast beef of any type.) The greens: a mix of spinach and romaine. I had some really pretty button mushrooms, some shredded white cheddar cheese, and some leftover flank steak to buff things up, and for something interesting, I made “pickled” great northern beans. (Basically, I rinsed them, tossed with apple cider vinegar, sugar, and very thinly sliced white onion, cut into 1″ lengths, then set them aside to marinate for about an hour before assembling the salad.) I topped the whole thing off with some cracked black pepper, and drizzled a bit of the “marinade” over mine in lieu of dressing. Cat opted for homemade buttermilk herb on his. Light & easy… and rounded out with some toasted egg bread. Weird to eat in the dead of winter, I guess, but I love salads any time of year.

You gotta remember these things… the stuff of potlucks and funeral wakes, even birthday parties and ladies’ luncheons in the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s… jelled salads made with Jell-O, cream cheese, whipped cream (or whipped topping, more likely,) some sort of fruit (often pineapple,) and sometimes nuts. No matter what the flavor of fruit or Jell-O used, they always have one certain “taste” underneath, and I have been craving that for about a year, now.

A few weeks ago, for my grandson’s first birthday party dinner, my mother decided to make (in honor of his and my son’s love of pears, presumably) a recipe she’s been toting around in her binders for at least as long as she’s been home from Saudi (and that’s like 13 years) for something called “Nutty Pear Salad.” I fell upon it like a wolf, no doubt… my over-indulgence made somehow less embarassing by the fact that my daughter-in-law’s stepmother was doing the very same thing. And I vowed to make one (or one similar) at home, soon. Soon was last night, and by the time I was done with it, I had Nutty Pear Citrus Salad.
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