Green and Grains

About author / Amy Powell

World traveler; gourmet 30 minute meals; lover of exotic ingredients; winner on FoodTV's Chefs vs City; graduate French Culinary Institute. Her recipes will tantalize your taste buds.

Hallelujah! Hallelujah! The sun is finally here. After weeks of storms pounding the West Coast, the skies parted, the sun came out, the temperature rose 20 degrees, and the first spring asparagus appeared at the market. But such is the way with April showers that another storm and cool-down cannot be far away. This leads to the awkward question of how exactly to celebrate the arrival of that asparagus along with the first pea shoots and fava beans while acknowledging that occasional chill and rain might still call for winter’s hearty comfort food.

Spring’s greens and comfort food together are almost an oxymoron. The bright green veggies in season right now like English peas and pencil thin asparagus call for quick cooking, just enough but not so much as to muddle their vibrant flavors. Long cooking and the rich flavors of comfort food would be a quick death-by-drowning for veggies whose flavors are brightest when crisp and fresh.

A recent meal at a new salad restaurant in San Diego called Salad Style, gave me an idea. Salad is not hard to eat year round in San Diego where the average daily temperature is 70.5° F. For the rest of us not so blessed with perpetual sunshine, eating salad for a main course can be almost painful when the sky is cloudy and rain is coming down. But a few of the hefty, balanced salad options at Salad Style seemed perfect for spring main courses, whether rain or shine.

My lunch at Salad Style was the Moroccan Couscous Salad, a study in the balance of grains and greens. The organic leaf lettuce was coated nicely with the just cooked chewiness of couscous. The salad did not stop there: tangy feta, crisp asparagus, plump currants, and crunchy toasted almonds played with the flavors of “Moroccan spices”, mint, and lemon vinaigrette. It was the sort of lunch that makes you rethink the idea of an entrée salad.

The play of greens and grains might be the perfect solution for spring’s vegetables and unpredictable weather. The greens get their proper “just cooked” treatment with enough heft to the salad from the grain to get the warm and satisfied feeling that comes from more traditional comfort food fare. At the same time, unlike the rich creams, sauces, and cheese of most comfort food, the grains add bulk to the salad without adding heft to the waistline, a good thing bathing suit season is around the corner.

For English peas I imagine a salad with arugula, white rice, mint, toasted pine nuts, and ricotta salata. Asparagus was pitch perfect in the Moroccan salad but I could see it working as well in a Vietnamese beef noodle salad with seared skirt steak, glass noodles, and baby spinach. The Mexican salad may be standard fare at any number of chain restaurants, but one could take it back to the roots, and to the next level, buy adding in some quinoa, a native grain to Central and South America, along with fava beans (or fresh lima beans), cotija cheese, shredded Romaine, crunched up tortilla chips, diced red pepper, and tomatillo salsa as the base for a salad dressing.

In a world of Chinese Chicken and Ahi Tuna Niçoise, finding a unique salad that both celebrates the vegetables and works with the season can be a difficult task. But done at home, mixing some of winter’s grains with spring’s greens can have surprisingly delicious results. Whether eaten al fresco or in front of a roaring fire to ward off the lingering cold, a hearty salad of greens and grains is just the sort of meal to herald in the changing of the seasons.

Serves/Makes: 4

• 1/2 cup quinoa
• 2 Romaine hearts
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1/2 cup crumbled cotija cheese
• 1 cup shelled fava beans
• 1 small jicama
• 1/4 cup tomatillo salsa
• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• Salt and pepper
• 2 handfuls tortilla chips, crushed
• Optional protein such as cooked chicken or shrimp