I've been crazy busy at uni for the last couple of weeks, so updates have been scarse, as you can see. I handed in a draft of my next paper to my supervisor yesterday, and then spent today setting up analyses to run over the easter holidays and clearing up some administrative stuff. So now I finally have some spare brain cells recovered enough to write about the brilliant salad Danielle and I (mostly Danielle!) created the last night she was here, over a week ago.

Ted was in London for a couple of days, so I left uni at about 7 pm, usually the precursor to a dinner of pasta + olive oil and garlic/chickpeas and herbs/sundried tomato paste and pine nuts/other cupboard staple. Instead, I came home and found preparations well underway for Armenian lentil and apricot soup (which I will write about later) and roast beetroot salad with goats cheese. Bliss. The salad was delicious, with a blend of fantastic earthy flavours - beetroot, walnut oil, sunflower seeds - lifted by the slight sharpness of the dressing and the crispy green leaves. The cheese was quite a soft one, and so was spread throughout the salad when we tossed it. If you wanted a cleaner look you could use a firmer sheeps feta, or just sprinkle the cheese over the salad after tossing it. But it would taste very fine indeed either way. My new favourite salad.

Wash and trim the beetroots. Toss them in a little olive oil, and roast in a moderate oven for about 30 minutes, until they are softened and the skin is very slightly crisped. Remove from the oven and let cool a little.

In a bowl, mix together the baby spinach or mixed leaves, the beetroot, crumbled goats cheese, sunflower seeds and sliced onion. In a little jar, put the walnut oil, vinegar, mustard and honey and shake well to make the dressing. Taste the dressing and adjust quantities if necessary, then pour it over the salad and toss thoroughly. Serve at once.

8 April 2004