The Soaked Bean

Seeking Nourishment, Finding Traditions

Lardon, Egg + Dandelion Green Salad

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dandelion greensThis is a Swiss recipe, taught to me by a children’s book that Lu’s cousin wrote about making this salad as a girl with her grandmother (Lu’s grand-aunt).

If you’re wondering how you can write a whole book (even if only child-size) about making a salad, then you probably haven’t foraged for greens before.

Nourishing qualities aside, when you forage for something wild your dinner suddenly becomes an experience.  Maybe you take a bus to visit a friend in her village at the top of the lake and pick greens in a field beside a river, or maybe the greens are right smack dab in your backyard.  Either way, there you are, gathering green with own two hands, feet (bare is best) firm upon earth, and as you’re gathering you’re weaving connections, the deep, rooted kind, to your food, to what nourishes you, us all.

eggsI remember my first experience foraging for dinner.  It was in Greece, where old women walk the narrow village streets carrying plastic bags filled with green, “horta” as they’re called there, wild weeds.  I was living in Pelion, a mountainous region south of Thessaloniki and I was handed a plastic bag and instructed to fill it.  I remember thinking how ample the country was as I crouched and picked and crouched and picked, to have nourishing greens growing everywhere.

Looking back, I realize that a lot of what I was foraging for were dandelion greens.  Dandelion!  A plant that grows almost everywhere.  How ample all our lands are, with a little guidance from tradition, from the figurative Greek grandma.

lardons

The secret to this recipe is the sauce, which Lu’s grand-aunt called “stone sauce”, so good it could make even stones seem appetizing. (A much lovelier qualifier than the currently popular “crack”, in my humble opinion).

It really is good.  It makes a more bitter green like dandelion just plain delicious, no matter where you fall on the bitter-appreciation spectrum.  The addition of lardons (small cubes of cured pork belly, not dissimilar to bacon) and soft-boiled eggs is optional, but highly recommended.

The dandelion is a gentle introduction to foraging.  It’s easy to identify and, as it grows in so many regions, is easy to find during this mid-Spring season.  Just make sure to forage away from major roads or dog-walking paths and, as always, to take only what you need.

Happy foraging and happy feasting!

dandelionsaladLardon, Egg + Dandelion Green Salad

Stone Sauce:

  • 1 teaspoon mustard
  • 1 teaspoon cenovis (marmite could be used in its place or it could be omitted altogether)
  • 6 tablespoons olive oil
  • 3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
  • 1/2 shallot, minced
  • 4 sprigs parsley, minced
  • pinch salt
  1. Add ingredients to a glass jar.  Cover with lid and shake until emulsified.

Salad:

  • two handfuls dandelion greens
  • 50gs lardons
  • 2 eggs from pasture-fed hens
  1. Add greens to big bowl.  Cover with cold water and splash of vinegar.  Let sit.
  2. Meanwhile, put eggs in a small, lidded pot.  Cover with cold water and put on stove to boil.  Once boiling, turn off heat and cover with lid.  Let sit for 3-4 minutes.  Spoon eggs out immediately into small bowl of cold water.
  3. Add lardons to cast-iron pan.  Cook on medium heat for 3-4 minutes, until crisp.
  4. Swish greens around and drain water.  Refill and swish and drain until water runs clear.  Use a salad spinner, or pat to dry.  Add to salad bowl.
  5. Add lardons to salad bowl.
  6. Take eggs from small bowl and peel.  Arrange on top of lardons and greens.
  7. Pour over dressing, mix and serve.

Solstice Stone Soup

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soakedriceToday is Winter Solstice, or Yule, the darkest day or longest night of the year, a major turning point in the wheel of the year for light is beginning to return, the Sun king or Sun goddess or God-like figure, depending on yr vantage, is born again, hallelujah, blessed-be, the darkest hour is here and soon will be gone, will be light.

As it turns out, the darkest hour is b4 the eggnog.

Christmas (celebrated just a mere handful of days after Solstice) is one of those holidays whose more earthly (read: pagan) roots have somehow slipped through the cracks, persisted.  The yule log, the mistletoe, the evergreen branch bespotted w/ trinkets, the orange pin-cushioned w/ cloves, the (yes, really) glass of eggnog; no matter what yr spiritual persuasion, whatever holiday you celebrate come December, you’re probably also enacting some age-old traditions and celebrating (even if unawares) not just birth of deity, but more earthly delights, things specific to this point in the season, when we stop leaning away from the light and start leaning toward it.

navets spinach carrots

What better reason to celebrate and merry-make?!  This Solstice, I’m giving you a most practical gift.  A how-to on soup.  That’s right, soup.  Stone soup.  You know, the kind of soup you can make w/ whatever you have on hand.  The kind of soup that gives new life to a bowl of soaked grains or beans, a bunch of wilting spinach, those few forgotten carrots.  Basic soup.  The kind of soup I imagine simmering in a cast-iron cauldron over an open hearth in a cabin in the mountains centuries ago.  The kind of soup I make in my kitchen almost weekly.  Improvisational soup.  The kind of soup that needs, not a strictly adhered-to recipe, but only some gentle guidance.  Self-love soup.  The kind of soup that is deeply–bone-deep, blood-deep, soul-deep–nourishing.

Winter is officially here and what better gift to give yrself and/or yr loved ones than a bowl of all that?

solsticesoup

Stone Soup How-To:

Preface:  There are two cooking habits to get into groove w/ for maximum stone-souping this Winter.  They couldn’t be easier, but they do require a bit of time and forethought.

Habit #1:  Soak some grains.  And/or beans.

There’s a reason for this blog’s name, y’all.  Getting into the habit of always having a bowl of some grain or bean soaking has made preparing nutritious meals on-ze-fly easy as can be for me.  Simply measure out a cup of whatever grain or bean you haven’t used in a while (I rotate through different varieties of rice, spelt-berries, wheat-berries, barley, polenta, black beans, flageolets, etc., etc.) into a bowl, cover w/ warm water and a splash of something acidic (apple-cider-vinegar, lemon, sauerkraut-juice) and let sit overnight or at least 7 hours.  This deactivates compounds that bind-to and prevent absorption of certain nutrients.  Having a bowl of a grain or bean soaking on yr counter everyday means that you’re eating different whole grains and beans everyday which means that your fiber intake is probably soarin’.  More fiber = better digestive health = better overall health.

Habit #2: Make bone-broth. Lots of it.

Having a freezer full of bone-broth is like having a secret spin-straw-to-gold kind of goblin in yr very own kitchen (and w/o all the weirdness regarding yr first-born).  See my how-to on broth here.

Onto the recipe! I’m detailing the last version of stone soup I made, w/ brown-rice, lots of spinach, carrots, turnips and potatoes, but don’t pay as much attention to the specific ingredients as to the method.  Feel free to make adjustments, substitutions; to improvise as you see fit.

#1.  Dice onions.  I usually use at least one large yellow onion to start my stone-soup.

#2.  Heat large, cast-iron pot on medium heat.  Add big knob of ghee.  Let melt and add onions.  Sprinkle w/ salt and stir.

#3. While onions are cooking, prepare your other vegetables:  mince garlic (I like to use 5+ cloves), dice carrots (usually 2), cube turnips and potatoes (2 of each), chop dark leafy greens (I use the whole bunch.  These will cook down a lot, so don’t be shy).

#4.  Add your vegetables to the pot as they’re ready.  Add more ghee if things are looking dry.  Add salt.  I usually follow the above order (1st garlic, then carrots, and so on).  Stir.

#5.  Drain yr grains or beans.  Add them to the pot.  Stir.

#6.  Add your bone-broth along w/ a bouquet-garni (thyme, sage, rosemary, bay laurel).  If you don’t have enough broth to cover the contents of yr pot, add some water.  Turn heat to high.

#7.  Once pot is boiling, skim away any surface impurities (the foam that rises to the top).  Turn heat to low, put lid on pot and simmer.  Simmer as long as it takes to fully cook yr grain/bean, checking tenderness of vegetables while you go.  For this brown-rice version, it took 40 minutes.  For bean versions it’s taken 1+1/2 hours.

#8.  Ladle up and enjoy w/ drizzle of olive oil, plop of sour-cream, squeeze of lemon, and/or whatever else floats yr vessel.

Yule tidings to ye, and merry stone-souping!