Quick Pickled Beet Salad #FoodieExtravaganza

Fresh cooked beets, lightly seasoned and covered with sliced onions can be quick pickled with vinegar to make a lovely bright salad for beet lovers. It gets better and better as it marinates in the refrigerator so don’t be afraid of making this salad a day ahead. 

Even when I was a young girl, this was one of my favorite side dishes. To the best of my recollection (and I am sure my mom will write to set me straight, if need be) my grandmother and mother always made it with canned beets. But perhaps that was just a modern convenience that came into fashion in the ’60 and ‘70s. I do not recall ever seeing a fresh beet until my husband’s stepmother showed me how she cooked them. The secret, she said, was to choose beets that are the same size so that when you cover them with cool water and boil them whole, all of the beets will cook in the same amount of time. And the peels slide right off! Perhaps I am easily impressed but that part seemed like magic.

As my own girls were growing up, we were a small family divided by the beet - two lovers, two haters - so I seldom cooked them, especially when my one fellow lover went off to university and I was sorely outnumbered by the haters. I’ve given up trying to convert the unconvertible so occasionally when my husband is traveling, I’ll make this dish and eat the whole darn thing myself. And this summer, when it was just Mom and I, we enjoyed it together. Divine.

Ingredients
5-6 medium beets (Total weight 1.4lbs or 650g, to give you an idea of size)
1/2 medium purple onion
1/2 cup or 120ml apple cider vinegar
Sea salt
Black pepper
Drizzle olive oil to serve

Note: As recommended, make sure to choose beets that are reasonably the same size so that they will be cooked through at the same time.

Method
Rinse the beets to remove any dirt and then cover them with fresh water in a medium sized pot. Cook over medium heat for 50-60 minutes or until sharp knife slides in easily. Cover with lid and leave to cool.

Drain the water and rinse the beets again. Put on an apron or otherwise protect your clothing from possible beet juice, then gently rub the peels off of the beets.

Rinse the beets again. Dry the beets on some paper towels then slice them a little thicker than 1/4 in or 6mm. Slice the onion as thinly as you can manage.

Lay the beets out in more or less one layer on a deep plate and sprinkle them with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Separate the sliced onion pieces and spread them over the sliced beets. Pour the vinegar over the whole plate and cover with cling film.

The salad can be served in as little as about half an hour. Or store it in refrigerator, covered tightly with cling film until the next day.

Drizzle with a little olive oil before serving, if desired.

Enjoy!

Foodie Extravaganza celebrates obscure food holidays or shares recipes  with the same ingredient or theme each month. This month our host is Camilla from Culinary Adventures with Camilla and we are celebrating National Pickle Day on November 14th early with eight tasty pickle recipes.

We hope you all enjoy our delicious pickled creations this month and come back to see what we bring for you next month.

Posting day is always the first Wednesday of each month. If you are a blogger and would like to join our group and blog along with us, come join our Facebook page Foodie Extravaganza. We would love to have you! If you're a spectator looking for delicious recipes, check out our Foodie Extravaganza Pinterest Board! Looking for our previous parties? Check them out HERE.

The Pickled Posts

• Cuban Sliders by Making Miracles
• Danish Smørrebrød (Open Sandwiches) with Remoulade by Caroline's Cooking
• Dill Pickle Hummus by From Gate to Plate
• Easy Pickled Sweet Peppers by Cherishing a Sweet Life
• Pickled Brussels Sprouts by Our Good Life
• Pickled Peppers by Culinary Adventures with Camilla
• Quick Pickled Beet Salad by Food Lust People Love
• Southern Fried Pickles by The Freshman Cook
• Zupa Orgokowa (Dill Pickle Soup) by A Day in the Life on the Farm

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Passion Fruit Vinaigrette

Passion fruit vinaigrette is tangy and light, with just a hint of fruity sweetness, the perfect dressing for salad or to spoon over pan-fried fish. We especially love it on salmon.

Most of the year I tend to have a jar of homemade vinaigrette lurking somewhere in the refrigerator, nestled amongst the myriad jars on my over-packed top shelf.  It invariably contains some combination of lemon juice or vinegar, olive oil, garlic, mustard, salt and black pepper and perhaps some honey or pomegranate molasses. I fish the jar out and let it rest for about 10 minutes at room temperature until the olive oil turns liquid again and then I give it a shake. If there’s not enough dressing left in the jar for that night’s salad, I add more of this, a little of that, until there is, once again, enough. Measurements are not really necessary but a general rule of thumb is one part acid (vinegar or citrus juice) to three parts oil.

Early this summer I was making up a fresh jar of vinaigrette when I spied a few passion fruit languishing in the fruit bowl. With passion fruit, there’s a narrow window where the fruit is wrinkled and ripe and wrinkled and dried out inside and mine were approaching the other side. So I scraped the black speckled pulp out of four of those little orbs of tartness and added them to the dressing I was creating. We ate it over everything for the next couple of days! And then I made some more. It keeps for a week or more in the refrigerator, if it lasts that long.

Ingredients
Pulp of 4 small passion fruit – 1/4 cup or 65g
1 small purple onion
4 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
1/2 teaspoon flakey sea salt (I use Maldon’s.)
Several generous grinds of fresh black pepper
1/2 cup or 120ml extra virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard

Method
Peel and mince your onion. Add it to a small bowl with two tablespoons of the vinegar. Add in the sea salt and a few good grinds of the black pepper and set aside. Marinating the onion in the vinegar mellows some of the sharpness and bite.

Put your passion fruit pulp in a clean jam jar and mix it around with a knife or fork to loosen it up and separate the seeds.

Add in the olive oil, the onion/vinegar mixture and the last two tablespoons of vinegar. Give the jar a really good shake.

Now add in the dry mustard and shake again until very well combined.

Store in the refrigerator until ready to use, shaking well again before lightly dressing salad or spooning it over cooked fish.

Here are a couple of photos to give you an idea of uses for the dressing. The first is a simple salad with butter lettuce, ripe tomatoes, cheese and shoestring carrots. The passion fruit seeds add color and crunch!

The second is pan-fried salmon the flavor of which far exceeds its accompaniments of fresh corn on the cob and peas. As much as I love sweet corn it still would have been a rather bland meal without the passion fruit vinaigrette!

Enjoy! Go ahead and make a jar! I’d love to hear what you’ve tried it on.

Summertime Fresh Corn Salad #BloggerCLUE

Sweet summer corn on the cob and vine-ripened tomatoes join green pepper, carrot, jalapeño, olives and feta in a light oil and vinegar salad dressing for a substantial salad that is perfect light fare for a hot summer day.

It’s August and in the northern hemisphere, where most of our Blogger C.L.U.E. members live, August means it’s hotter than the hinges on the gates of hell. Or perhaps that’s just Dubai. Not to imply that it’s hell here. In fact, most of the year, Dubai is a very pleasant place to live with clean roads (never mind the crazy drivers), well stocked shops, good medical care, decent internet speeds and despite the recent cessation of nationwide subsidies, pretty cheap fuel for our cars. So we tolerate summer, hibernating in our air-conditioned homes, until the heat lifts and we are free, free once more to enjoy the great outdoors, sailing in the clear blue waters of the Arabian Gulf and enjoying life in the heart of the desert.

But for now, we are living on salads.

Every month for Blogger C.L.U.E. Society, each member is assigned another blog in which to hunt for recipes which fit our clue or theme. What could be more perfect for August than “beat the heat?” My assignment is the delightful blog A Palatable Pastime and I had a great time searching around Sue’s tasty site for summer treats, lingering on her cantaloupe margaritas and raspberry gelato before coming back to page one in the search and, given my love of sweet corn, this wonderful fresh corn salad.

The only thing I cooked, and even that ever so briefly, was the corn on the cob. Sue parboiled her carrots as well but I left ours raw because we like them very crunchy. I also don’t have garlic powder on hand so I subbed fresh garlic. This salad is way more than the sum of its parts. Put together, the ingredients elevate each other and become a meal. This is a very versatile and forgiving salad. If you adore carrots, by all means, add more. Not a fan of green peppers, leave them out. It can be made ahead or eaten right away. In short, this recipe is a keeper. Thanks, Sue!

Ingredients
2 fresh ears corn, shucked – I also halve mine so they can fit in my pot.
1 small clove garlic
1 fresh jalapeño
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoon white balsamic vinegar
1 medium carrot
1 medium bell pepper
Generous handful pitted black olives (read: half a can!)
Small bunch green onions
1 medium to large fresh tomato
3 oz or 85g feta cheese
1 large bunch fresh cilantro
Salt and pepper

Method
Boil your corn on the cob in salted water for 3-4 minutes, then drain and cool in very cold water. It should be cooked a little, but still crunchy.

Measure your vinegar and oil into a large bowl. Mince your jalapeño and garlic clove and add them to the oil and vinegar. The garlic and pepper start to infuse into the liquid, which will help the over all flavor later.

Peel your carrot and split it down the middle lengthwise. Slice it thinly on the diagonal. Cut your green pepper into similarly sized pieces and slice your olives.

Add them to the large bowl.

Your corn should be cool enough to handle by now. Cut the kernels off the cobs and chop the onion tops and cilantro. Core and chop the tomato into pieces.

Add all four to the large bowl.

Give everything a really good stir, making sure to get all the way down to the olive oil, vinegar and garlic at the bottom. (That’s why I had you put it in a large bowl, better for a thorough stirring.)

Crumble your feta and add in all but a few pieces. Sprinkle the salad with salt and a few good grinds of fresh black pepper. Give it another really good stir.

Transfer the salad to a serving bowl, if desired, and finish it with the rest of the feta.

Enjoy!

Here's a list of our Blogger C.L.U.E. Society participants this month. I can't wait to see which recipes they've found for our "beat the heat" theme.

• Asian Watermelon Salad by Lora from Cake Duchess
• Beat the Heat Negronis by Christy from Confessions of a Culinary Diva
• Blueberry Icebox Pie by Kate from Kate's Kitchen
• Curried Chicken Salad with Cucumbers by Rebekah from Making Miracles
• Frozen Cherry Lemonade by Anna from annaDishes
• Homemade Gingerale by Lauren from Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Icy Rum Punch from the Islands by Debra from Eliot's Eats
• Mango Jicama Salsa by Lisa from Authentic Suburban Gourmet
• No Bake Berry Cheesecake by Christiane from Taking on Magazines
• Oreo Cookies n Cream Ice Cream by Heather from girlichef
• Peach Ice Cream by Liz from That Skinny Chick Can Bake
• Pecan Brittle by Kelli from Kelli's Kitchen
• Prosciutto Parmesan Arugula Sandwich by Lea Ann from Cooking on the Ranch
• Roasted Tomato Soup by Sue from A Palatable Pastime
• Southwestern Skillet Dip by Alice from A Mama, Baby and Shar-pei in the Kitchen
• Strawberry Rhubarb Sorbet by Kathy from A Spoonful of Thyme
• Summertime Fresh Corn Salad by Stacy from Food Lust People Love
• Tipsy Palmers by Wendy from A Day in the Life on the Farm

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Tuscan Bean Salad #BloggerCLUE

Perfect picnic fare, this delicious salad of kale, cannellini beans, grape tomatoes and canned tuna can be made ahead because it gets better as all the tasty ingredients spend more time together.  Seriously, we had only the tiniest bowl of leftovers so it got lost but my daughter reclaimed it from the refrigerator four days later. Still delicious! How many salads can say that?!

It’s Blogger C.L.U.E. time again, where I am assigned another blog from our group in which to snoop and find a recipe to share that fits the current theme or “clue,” which is Picnic. My favorite part of this process is getting to know my fellow food bloggers because although we have a love of tasty food in common, it’s great to find other commonalities and learn about their interests, work, families and the cities in which they live. This month I spent time getting acquainted with Kate from Kate’s Kitchen.

Kate and her husband recently moved house and I’ve been following that story with interest because, you know, moving is kind of my thing. I know the drill only too well and it amuses me to read other people’s stories of the trials and tribulations of a move. Kate has done it with aplomb, still working in the field of finance, cooking deliciousness and recently posting a fabulous mushroom lasagna roll from under a pile of boxes with scant kitchen equipment. She’s an avid gardener so her recipes often take advantage of that fresh, homegrown bounty. I’m so jealous of the rich soil of Indiana!

So, I needed to hunt for picnic friendly recipes! I love taking salads along to picnics or potlucks so that’s where I started my search. I was spoiled for choice on Kate’s blog, bookmarking her Blueberry Watermelon Salad with mint and lemon, Lana’s Chicken Salad with roasted chicken, grapes and pecans, her Lemon Apricot Salad with lemon curd (!) stirred through it,  Green Bead Salad with Black Beluga Lentils made with tasty sun-dried tomatoes and salami, and Kate’s lovely Blue Cheese Potato Salad with bacon.  I simply couldn’t not make up my mind until I got to the Tuscan Beans with Tuna. Sold! We ate it for dinner with yesterday's Chickpea Moroccan Flatbread.

The couple of minor changes I made:
I was catering for one vegetarian (younger daughter) who isn’t so strict that meat or fish can’t touch her veggies but she didn’t want to eat the actual tuna so I just made little piles of it on top instead of mixing it in. If you want to make this strictly vegetarian, use olive oil instead of the tuna oil. And, obviously, leave off the tuna itself. Kate’s salad called for normal kale, which was on my shopping list, but I couldn’t resist the gorgeous purple kale I came across in my nearby supermarket. Kate adapted this recipe herself from Food Network where they used garlic and cooked the kale. I liked her easy no-cook method but decided to keep the original garlic since we are fans and I totally forgot to buy Italian dressing. Massaging the kale with the oil and vinegar softens it nicely without cooking if you want to serve immediately. Otherwise just mixing everything and leaving it for a while works great too, especially if you are taking it along to a picnic.

Ingredients
3 cloves garlic
3 tablespoons white balsamic
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
2 cans (5 oz or 151g each) tuna packed in olive oil
1/2 lb or 225g purple kale (I medium head – bigger or smaller will still work.)
1 15.5 oz or 439g can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup or 170g grape tomatoes
3 inner stalks celery with some leaves
3/4 cup or 100g pitted ripe black olives
3.5 oz or 100g roasted red peppers
Salt and pepper to taste

Method
Chop your garlic and put it in a big salad bowl with the vinegar and a sprinkle of salt and pepper while you get on with the rest of the salad. This takes a little of the sharpness off of the garlic.

Cut your little tomatoes in half. Pull the strings off of the celery and chop it into pieces.

Remove the hard stems from your kale and cut the bigger leaves into smaller pieces. Small leaves can be left intact. If you are using thicker dark green kale, slice it finely.

How could I resist?!

Squeeze the tuna oil into the salad bowl with the garlic and vinegar and give it a stir and a sprinkle of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Set the tuna aside for later.

Add in the kale and use your hands to massage the dressing into the leaves.

Slice your olives and roasted peppers.

Put everything, including the rinsed cannellini beans, into the bowl with the garlic, vinegar and oil. Toss to combine. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Add the tuna and toss again. (Or set it on the top of the salad.)

Enjoy!

• (Almost) Nancy's Chopped Salad w/ Oregano Vinaigrette by Heather from girlichef
• Apple Chips by Lauren from Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Barbecue Chicken Salad w/ Smoky Barbecue Vinaigrette by Kate from Kate's Kitchen
• California Quinoa Greek Salad by Christiane from Taking on Magazines
• Carrot Cake Cookies by Kathy from Bakeaway with Me
• Chicken Salad w/ Peanut Dressing by Azmina from Lawyer Loves Lunch
• Chicken Waldorf Salad by Aly from Cooking in Stilettos
• Duck with Pear Wraps + Limeade with Chia Seeds by Kelli from Kelli's Kitchen
• Fried Apple Pies by Liz from That Skinny Chick Can Bake
• Frozen Minty Cardinal Punch by Christy from Confessions of a Culinary Diva
• Green Bean & Corn Salad by Alice from A Mama, Baby and Shar-pei in the Kitchen
• Loaded Baked Potato Salad by Lea Ann from Cooking on the Ranch
• Mushroom Parmesan Muffins by Kate from Kate's Kitchen
• Oatmeal Peanut Butter Date Cookies by Rebekah from Making Miracles
• Olive Sables by Lisa from Authentic Suburban Gourmet
• Puff Pastry Antipasto Squares by Anna from annaDishes
• Smoky Pimento Cheese Spread by Debra from Eliot's Eats
• Sweet and Spicy Barbecue Baked Beans + Chickenburger Roll-in-a-Basket by Kathy from A Spoonful of Thyme
• Thomas Keller's Chocolate Chip Cookies by Kim from Liv Life
• Tuscan Bean Salad by Stacy from Food Lust People Love
• Watermelon Feta Salad by Jean from Lemons and Anchovies
• White Bean, Bacon and Rosemary Salad by Wendy from A Day in the Life on the Farm

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Spicy Asian Noodle Salad with Lobster

With spicy dressing, juicy lumps of lobster and fragrant bean thread noodles this Spicy Asian Noodle Salad is like a vacation in your mouth.

AKA Vacation in Your Mouth

There’s just something special about lobster but you can also sub tiger prawns or shrimp.

Yes, please to Comfort Food
When someone offers to send you a copy of a cookbook called Adventures in Comfort Food: Incredible, Delicious and New Recipes from a Unique, Small-Town Restaurant, you do not turn them down. You say, “Yes, please!” After all, here we are coming into the cool season and comfort food is what it’s all about. This particular cookbook is full of recipes from chef and owner, Kerry Altiero, of the small town award-winning Maine restaurant Café Miranda, which brings comfort food up a whole bunch of notches, serving favorites like Lobster Mac and Cheese and Brussels Sprouts in Cream and dressed up hot dogs.

As Chef Altiero says in the introduction; “We offer a huge menu that mixes traditional American fare with Italian, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Thai, vegan . . . whatever strikes our fancy. Our motto is “Because We Can.” We serve wonderful, surprising, innovative food that defies expectations and wins over all kinds of eaters. This cookbook will help you do the same at home, whether you are cooking for world-weary sophisticates or picky toddlers. Your kitchen may never be the same.”

And while I am under no obligation to tell you only nice things about this book, I must admit that I have only nice things to say. Most of the recipes have just a handful of ingredients and the simple preparations let the freshness and quality of those ingredients shine through. If that appeals to you as much as it appealed to me, I am pleased to tell you that I also have one copy to give away! Make sure to scroll down to the bottom of this post and enter the drawing.

Vacation in My Mouth
How these cookbook blog tours work is that we are given a list of recipes that can be shared. I was most intrigued by the dish called Vacation in Your Mouth, from the Party Food chapter, so that’s the one I chose. I mean, really. With a title like that, how could I resist?

Years and years ago, when I was living in Brazil, a dear Burmese friend taught me how to make a fresh and refreshing salad with softened bean thread noodles, crispy fried ground pork and dried shrimp, all tossed in a lime vinaigrette with chilies and cilantro. I used to make it all the time in a great big bowl, because it was a family favorite and then, because I struggled to find the dried shrimp, it got out of rotation.

This beautiful dish from the Adventures in Comfort Food cookbook reminded me of what we had been missing, albeit it on a fancier, smaller scale. And I realized that the dried shrimp are not absolutely essential. Lobster works too! Okay, I admit we may not have it with lobster every time, but I will definitely be serving this again, perhaps with shrimp or even crab meat.

I made the recipe pretty much as written, except for substituting a spicy pepper for the poblano, which was one of the chef’s suggestions, and I couldn’t find baby romaine so I bought a local green for scooping up the salad.

Serves 2

Ingredients
For the salad:
4 oz or 113g cooked lobster meat
1 poblano pepper, seeded and minced (Or sub a spicy pepper of your choice.)
2 scallions, green and white parts, sliced on the bias
Juice of 2 limes
2 tablespoons or 30ml extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon or 15ml Thai fish sauce
6 leaves basil, preferably Thai, shredded
4 sprigs cilantro
1⁄4 cup or 44g Thai bean thread or rice vermicelli noodles, soaked and chopped (I about doubled this because I couldn’t for the life of me get the bean thread noodles apart to weigh out only 44g.)

For garnishing:
Pinch kimchi flakes
1 teaspoon black sesame seeds
2 sprigs cilantro
2 thin rounds of lime
10 leaves romaine lettuce

Method
Mix together everything but the garnishes.

Spoon the mixture into martini glasses.

Make sure to include all the good limey, salty juice. Sprinkle with the kimchi flakes, black sesame seeds and cilantro.

Garnish with a lime round on the edge of each glass. Place the glasses on a plate and arrange the romaine leaves around them, attractively.

Fill leaves with mixture—crunch!

The chef’s drink suggestion: A nice Moscato with a little bit of sweet goes well with the spicy flavors. Or perhaps enjoy with a nice simple beer such as a Sebago Saddleback Ale.

Tell me that doesn't look like a Vacation in Your Mouth?! 

Enjoy!

Buy your own copy of Adventures in Comfort Food: Incredible, Delicious and New Recipes from a Unique, Small-Town Restaurant by following this link.

*This post contains affiliate links. I received a copy of the cookbook for review purposes with no other compensation.*

Chickpea Tabouli

Tabouli is a picnic-friendly, make-ahead salad of fresh herbs and tomatoes, which is usually made with bulgur or cracked wheat. This simple gluten- and wheat-free version substitutes chickpeas for the bulgur, upping the protein and adding extra flavor, making this chickpea tabouli salad a great choice for everyone at your party, barbecue or picnic.

A few weeks ago I was researching recipes that would be appropriate for the Jewish Passover celebration for a post with my Sunday Supper group. I came across a rendition of tabouli made with chopped almonds instead of the bulgur wheat, because all grains, including wheat, are prohibited during Passover.

Now, I’m a fan of almonds and I even like them in salad, but one of the reasons I love tabouli is the way the wheat soaks up the flavors of the dressing and the herbs and even the tomato juice, becoming more delicious with time. I just didn’t see almonds doing that. So I pondered. What would absorb the dressing? What else would GO with tabouli?

You already know what I decided from the title here but you are probably asking yourself why this didn’t become my Passover post. Well, after I had made the salad, more research revealed that are certain Jewish sects that don’t allow any legumes, including chickpeas, during Passover! So I found another recipe for chocolate chip bar cookies with ground almonds, which was absolutely delicious and didn’t violate any Passover rules for that post.

But you know what this salad IS perfect for? Kick Off to Summer Week! It looks remarkably similar to regular tabouli so make sure to put a gluten-free label on it so everyone knows they can eat it!

Ingredients
For the salad:
2 cans (8 1/2 oz or 240g each, drained weight) chickpeas
Large bunch green onion tops (2 1/2 oz or 70g)
2 bunches cilantro or coriander (4 1/4 oz or 120g together)
Medium bunch of fresh mint (3 oz or 85g)
5-6 medium tomatoes (1 1/4 lbs or 570g)

Note: I’m giving weights for the herbs and tomatoes but know that these are just what I used and if yours weigh a bit more or a bit less, it’s all going to be good.

For the dressing:
3 tablespoons or 45ml fresh lime or lemon juice
1-2 cloves garlic (I used two – because we like it garlicky!)
1/2 teaspoon sea salt or to taste
Freshly ground black pepper
6 tablespoons or 90ml olive oil

Method
First thing in the morning, or even the night before you are planning to make this salad, strain and rinse your chickpeas and leave them to dry for an hour or two spread out on a kitchen towel. I don’t know that this is absolutely essential but remember, we want the chickpeas to absorb dressing, so drying them out a bit increases that ability.

In a food processor, pulse your chickpeas in batches until they are small crumbles and resemble bulgur wheat if you hold your head just right and squint a little. Do not overfill the processor or overpulse or you’ll end up on your way to making hummus.  (Which is a good thing, but just not today.)

As you finishing pulsing each batch of chickpeas, put them in a big salad bowl with plenty of room to stir.

Chop your green onions finely and add them to the chickpeas and stir.

Pick the mint leaves off the stalks and cut the hard part of the stalks off of the cilantro.  (The little narrow stalks near the leaves are fine to leave in.) Wash both thoroughly several times and dry in a salad spinner or a dry dishcloth.

Cut the tomatoes in half and cut out and discard the core. Chop the tomatoes into little pieces.

Chop the herbs thoroughly, rocking your big knife back and forth on a cutting board.

Next add the herbs and then the tomatoes to the chickpea bowl.  Stir well.

Now to make the dressing: Mince your garlic cloves and combine them in a small bowl with the fresh lime juice.

Sprinkle in about a 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt and a few generous grinds of fresh black pepper. Add in the olive oil and whisk until the dressing is thoroughly mixed.

Pour this over your salad and stir well and you are ready to eat!

Like traditional  tabouli, this chickpea version gets better and better as it sits so you can make it ahead without any problems. It was great the first day, then it went out sailing with us the day after I made it AND it was just as good three days later when I finished the last serving. That’s why I always make a big batch.

Enjoy!

You can find my recipe and instructions for traditional tabouli here. 

Need more recipes and ideas for Memorial Day and making the most of summer? Check out these links from my fellow Kick Off to Summer participants.

• Lemon Honey & Rosemary Grilled Chicken Skewers by From Gate to Plate 
• Sausage & Veggies Tinfoil Dinner by Summer Scraps 
• Baked Rosemary Garlic Fries by Keep it Simple, Sweetie 
• Homemade Natural Bug Spray by The Haas Machine 
• Memorial Day Festivities by Lil Huckleberries 
• Corn Cob Jelly by Hezzi-D's Books and Cooks 
• Marshmallow Fruit Dip by Forty Eighteen 
• Trail Mix Oatmeal Cookies by Lady Behind the Curtain 
• BBQ Invitation Printable by My Daylights 
• Rhubarb Crisp by Love in the Kitchen 
• Mixed Berry Sweet Rolls by Like Mother, Like Daughter 
• Liberty Embroidery Pattern by Bits of Ivory 
• Red White and Blue Trifle by We Like to Learn as We Go 
• Chickpea Tabouli by Food Lust People Love 
• Dark Chocolate Pistachio Cookies by Life on Food