Top Five Friday: The Taxman Cometh!

People try to live within their income so they can afford to pay taxes

to a government that can't live within its income. 

~ Robert Half

A

hh! It’s almost that special time in Spring that we all look forward to with such anticipation: Tax Day!  I am woefully behind this year in getting my taxes filed.  I swore up and down that it would be different this year, but I was earlier last year!  My accountant just rolled her eyes when I asked to come in tomorrow. 

On top of that, I misplaced my W2.

Paper organization is not one of my strengths.  But hey, a person can’t be beautiful, a great cook, musically gifted, AND organized!  It just wouldn’t be fair! 

So what does such a person do two days before the deadline?

Come up with five fun things to do INSTEAD of getting your taxes done, of course!  Hopefully it will ease the pain when the Taxman cometh.  Enjoy!

Go for a Hike

I recommend deep into the forest or high on a mountain.  Then you really won’t remember any of your boring chores.  Taxes? What taxes?

Have Spikes Pushed Under Your Nails

Well, maybe that is a bit extreme.  How about a pedicure instead?  It’s the next best thing to the spikes.  Do this preferably with your best gal pals.  I went to a spa in a tiny podunk town in Pennsylvania, and they served margaritas to us while we had our footsies scrubbed, massaged and polished. Heaven!

Read a Book

Especially since it’s Library Week.  Even better, take your book with you to read while you get your pedicure.  Brilliant!

Watch the Grass Grow

What?  You would rather do your taxes?  L-a-m-e!

Throw a Cocktail Party

Even more than a hike, if this is executed correctly, it will really make you forget taxes.  And everything else.  Plus, you can save your friends from their taxation woes.

And all done with perfectly manicure feet, a well-read mind, and on beautiful green grass.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

What would you rather do than work on your taxes?

National Library Week: April 8-14, 2012

A book is the only place in which you can examine a fragile thought without breaking it, or explore an explosive idea without fear it will go off in your face.  It is one of the few havens remaining where a man's mind can get both provocation and privacy. 

~ Edward P. Morgan

I

t’s  National Library Week!  I’m a little late with the notice, but there are still two days left to celebrate the awesomeness that is a library!  Hat tip: Debbie Ridpath Ohi over at Inkygirl ~ where she has cute, ROTFL illustration to go with the theme.

When I was growing up, the library was a magical place, filled with adventure and excitement.  The ladies that worked there [forever it seems!]  knew our family very well.  We always walked out with our arms full of books; they were skeptical that we could read them all within the allotted time we had them checked out.

I don’t remember how much my mother and my sisters read, but I certainly devoured my stack fairly quickly.  Inevitably, though, we had to extend our time, and generally were still late returning our books.  Oh the shame!

My local library introduced me to Nancy Drew, The Bobbsey Twins, The Boxcar Children, Trixie Belden, Sherlock Holmes, Miss Marple, and Hercule Poirot ~ notice a pattern here?  Not to mention the classics: Treasure Island, Heidi, Swiss Family Robinson, Tale of Two Cities, Little Women, and of course, Little House on the Prairie.

Reading can be a huge mind opener and most people can’t afford to buy all the books that a lirbabry offers.  We certainly could not have.  But because of that library, I fell in love with books, and ultimately, with writing.

We don’t often think about it, but libraries really are guardians of knowledge and freedom.  A people that can’t read are a people more susceptible to manipulation and deception.  Today, we seem to have become a people that can read, but chooses not to.  Even with the advent of e-books, people are reading less and less substantial, mind-expanding works, and settling for the crumbs of pulp fiction – the fast food of writing.  Easy to swallow and oh so tasty ~ but a steady diet of that and eventually you’ll die of a heart attack, complications due to obesity and general lack of nutrition!

Nowadays, libraries don’t just stock books; they host educational events.  Mine is hosting a series of events around organic farming and sustainable living.  I’ll be attending as many of the talks and farmer panels as I can, so expect to hear more about that in the coming weeks.  At eh MyLibrary site, you can find a library near you.

Step inside ~ an adventure awaits you somewhere among the stacks!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

When is the last time you visited your local library?  What books did you check out?

Love Me Tender: Crossing Musical Generations

Music is forever; music should grow and mature with you,

following you right on up until you die. 

~ Paul Simon

M

y mother was in love with Elvis Presley for many, many years.  In fact, we were set to go see him in concert in 1977, when we got the news that he had died.  I was still very young then, but I remember going to the concert hall and watching a video tribute of his life; it was dark, smoky [probably with weed], and filled with sound women mourning the passing of a legend.

Fifty-six years ago today, Elvis Presley’s first single, Heartbreak Hotel  hit #1 on the charts.  I know this in part because

1)      I looked it up when searching for a topic to write about for today.

2)     See opening paragraph.

I was one of the lucky ones.  Although my parents are not musically gifted themselves,  I was classically trained on the piano from the time I could walk, and there was a variety of music played in the house throughout my childhood.  Records, 8-tracks, and cassettes from eclectic artists like: Elvis, Frank Sinatra, Eddie Fisher, Doris Day, Bing Crosby, Sammy Kay, Glenn Miller, Michael Legrand, The Statler Brothers, Johnny Cash, The Oak Ridge Boys, Tom Jones, several tango and rhumba records from South and Central America, and soundtracks like Oliver!, Exodus, Kiss Me Kate, and Pal Joey all lived next to Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, and Debussy.  And of course, no vinyl collection is complete without The Reader’s Digest Hits of the ‘50s and ‘60s. 



The King



Remember The Unicorn by the Irish Rovers?  And Bobby Goldberg’s Honey?  And my personal favorite growing up – Love Child by The Supremes.  They were all in that box of 10 or 12 records.

As I grew up, my musical taste expanded, but I never stopped loving the old songs.  Instead, I added to the collection: The Bee Gees, Jim Croce, Duran Duran, Foreigner, Journey, Michael Jackson, every Barry Manilow album ever made [yes, you read that right], Ace of Base, Enigma, The Secret Garden, Loreena McKennitt. . .the list goes on [just like the beat.]

So I was shocked and yes, I admit, a little disgusted, when a friend of mine who is GenY had never heard of Love is Battlefield by Pat Benetar.  Her excuse?  “I can’t be expected to know that! I wasn’t alive then!”

Yeah, honey.  Neither was I when Mozart wrote Concerto #21, but I know it!

But maybe I’m being too hard on her and others like her.  Maybe I’m just one of the few lucky enough to be surrounded by all genres of music from a young age.  And not everyone views music like I do: as important and necessary as the air I breathe.

Paul Simon is right: music is forever.  And no matter what the genre or what era it was written in, it still has the power to touch hearts.

Especially broken ones.  Thanks for the memories, Elvis.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

What is your favorite music from an era NOT your own?  And did you grow up surrounded by music?

Poetry without Fear: National Poetry Month

We are living in a great age for poetry.

~ Anne Eliot

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pril is National Poetry Month.  I’ve already begun to celebrate it by composing a new song.  It doesn’t match the spring colours, or warm spring days at all.  Forbidden love, angst, and large doses of frustration.  And of course, minor chords.

Oh. Yeah.

You already know some of my favorite poets.  Another one I enjoy reading is T.C. Samford.  His poems appear in different literary publications, including a chapbook of original poetry, Crossing the Border, written with poetry buddy Peter McEwen, and which he very kindly sent me.  Tom is one of my more fascinating and prolific pen friends.

Many people, both writer and reader alike, shy away from poetry.  Too difficult to pen, too complex to read and understand.  There are some self-important poets [and painters, sculptors, etc] who seem to create in order to confound and confuse.   But it doesn’t need to be that way. 

Art should not be feared. 

The point is to play ~ in writing poetry, with words, rhythm, structure, rhyme, imagery. This month, I encourage you to try some poetry play.  Share your playtime creations with us in the comments.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

By the way, the first person who can identify where today’s quote comes from will receive a free copy of Josephine Ross’s Jane Austen’s Guide to Good Manners.  Happy Easter and Blessed Passover!!

The Gift of Receiving: Accepting Another's Gifts

. . .the bridges had been blown up; we squat on piers that don’t connect anything. . .
~ Ruth Kluger 

R

uth Kluger wrote her memoir, Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered  about her experience in Austria during (and after) World War II.  After reading Richard Chess’ unpacking and exploration of her observations about bridging the gaps between “my memories” and “our memories,” I not only want to read the book, I want to take his class at UNC!

This gap is illustrated by an incident where Kluger and some friends were relating their experiences of claustrophobia.  The stories they offered seemed piddling compared to the one she could have told regarding her ride in s stifling boxcar to Auschwitz.  She felt that to have told it would have been rude, that somehow her friends would have resented her.  So she remained silent.

That struck me: this fear that Kluger had to share her story because it might make someone uncomfortable.  She said: “And so my childhood falls into a black hole.”  Chess goes on to discuss how an experience can be informative versus transformative and then relates that to writing. 

But I am stuck on the loneliness of Kluger’s statement.

Perhaps it would have been inappropriate to share her memories with the group.  Perhaps she knew that they would not have received it well.  But what if they had been open?  What if the sympathy she feared she might have elicited was what was needed in that moment?  Such a feeling could have been healing, both for her and for her friends.

Why is this?  Why is receiving a gift ~ whether it be of their time, talent, love, support, or even something material ~ so difficult for us at times?  What makes us uncomfortable with another’s generosity?  Chess discusses this discomfort and relates it to writing and learning:

The desire to understand may also be a natural reaction to the discomfort of being confronted with something new and strange, a discomfort that can trigger feelings of inadequacy and failure. Most of us, I expect, don’t want to sit with such unpleasant feelings, and we might be willing to do anything within reason to rid ourselves of them.

Feelings of inadequacy and failure.  Could that be why we are sometimes poor receivers?  Do we think we are unworthy of the gift?  Maybe we have received gifts in the past that were not freely given ~ that came at a price or with emotional strings attached.  But then, those were not real gifts.  They were bribes, Trojan horses.  So fear of gifts becomes a defense, a protection against further pain.

And we do not like pain.  As Chess says, we will do “anything within reason” to avoid it.  Some of us will even do things outside of reason.  But that is a topic for another post.

It might help us to move in the direction of becoming better receivers if we remember that a gift is always given twice: to the receiver and to the giver.  And when we don’t receive someone’s gift, we both lose. Henri Nouwen, the 20^th century mystic, observed

. . . by receiving we reveal to the givers that they have gifts to offer. . . . we make givers aware of their unique and precious gifts.  Sometimes it is only in the eyes of the receivers that givers discover their gifts.

What an incredible and freeing idea! That in receiving a gift well, we are in turn giving back.

May we all work towards becoming better receivers of each other’s gifts.

Oremus pro invicem,
~ Mikaela 

Have you ever felt uncomfortable when you’ve received something?  Were you ever resentful when a friend shared their story?  Share yours in the comments!

Playing Dress Up: Spring is Bustin' Out All Over!

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes.  Art is knowing which ones to keep. 

~ Scott Adams

P

astels are traditional seen as the official shades of Spring, but the flowers and shrubs now blooming in my yard are all eye-popping, bada-bing colours.   Colour, no matter what the shade, always captivates me.  But there is something about the this time of year, when the earthy browns and sleepy greys of winter surrender the stage to the candy apple reds, watermelon pinks, lemon yellows, blood oranges, robins’ egg blues, and fresh-mown grass greens of spring. 

It brings out the ADD decorator in me.

The grey plaid flannel sheets come off the four-poster and the yellow and blue cotton sheets go on.  The blankets get washed and packed away in the cedar chest [yes, some of us still have those!] and the light weight cotton blankets are taken to the orchard to air out.  The cranberry red and gold damask curtains in the office come down and the white and red floral cotton prints go up.

But the cleaning and decorating brushes are in full force outside my castle walls as well.

Here in blogdom, gone is the pumpkin orange background and chocolate brown font.  I love those colours, but I was bored with them.  Time for something springy and fresh, yet bold and still my signature.  And red is definitely my signature.

The background photo was taken by Canadian photographer, Zadenka Darula.  I found it on the 123rf.com website ~ my go to place for reasonably priced stock photos.  And some are real works of art, like Darula’s flower.

I revel in the redness and aliveness of it!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Like it? Love it? Hate it? Don’t give a rats bottom?  Comment and let me know!

New Series and a Poll

Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia. 

~ E.L. Doctorow

I

t has been seven months since I moved back to the family homestead.  It has been an interesting journey so far and it isn’t over yet!  I have been jotting down notes, thoughts, rants, and raves since September, but I haven’t shared them yet.

Part of the reason is that I am still processing things.  But life is about processing ~ it doesn’t end until our life does.  Sometimes part of processing is sharing that process itself with others, receiving encouragement and respectful and loving criticism, and giving encouragement and hope to another’s journey.

The other reason is I haven’t been sure where the proper forum for sharing those thoughts and lessons learned is.  This blog is mainly about art and culture, which can cover a broad number of topics ~ fine art, performing art, food, manners, poetry, etc. 



Spring has Sprung! Lilacs in my backyard - photo by Mikaela D.

But sharing my experiences in choosing to move back with the family and the trials and joys that go with that choice, as well as trying to realize my dream of starting an organic and sustainable hobby farm ~ is that an art?  It could certainly fit in with the discussion of culture. I know several bloggers whose passions led them to create different blogs: Joanna over at The Art of Everyday Wonder, for instance, has a couple of blogs that cover related but different subjects.

Now, I don’t write just for the heck of it.  Ok, maybe I do ~  I can’t not write.  However, I don’t share my writing just for the heck of it.  You, dear readers, are the reason I post.  And since I can’t decide, and this journey is too crazy and fun not to share, I’m going to leave it up to you!  On the right, you will see that I created a poll.  It will be open until April, Friday the 13th [mwhahahaha!] 

Vote early and vote often!  And get your dead relatives and friends to vote too!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Lecture Series Announced: Art in the Life of Faith

Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures. 

~ Henry Ward Beecher

 

T

he cobwebs in here are ginormous!  Goals, goals, goals.  Looks like they still ended up on the cutting room floor despite my best intentions.  The road to the hot place and all that, what?

But that does not mean I have been eating bon bons and watching the idiot box.  Oh no, my friends!  La Belle has been making truffles while the chocolate is hot.  So to speak.  Had a brilliant idea back in January, let it ferment for about a month and a half.  And then popped the cork on a new bottle of artful awesomeness at the end of March.  Behold!



Miranda, Sir Frank Dicksee

Painting a Path to Heaven: Art in the Life of Faith – a monthly series of lectures designed to explore how we are lifted up by art and beauty, how imagination allows us to perceive it, the vital effect that art and culture have upon our emotional, spiritual, and psychological life and what it means to live a life full of creativity and faith.   

The first lecture is on the healing power of art and it will be held on Saturday, April 14 at 7:30pm in Alexandria, Virginia.  You can find out more here.

If you are in the area, we would love to have you!  If you do attend, come and find me and introduce yourself.  Then you can tell me whether I look like I write.  Ha!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Top Five Friday: The Meatless Maven

A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age.

~ William Shakespeare

Ah the first Friday in Lent.  And that means basically don’t overeat and don’t eat meat.  Which are two really good pieces of advice for any day of the year, actually.  Ok, I confess.  Although I am trying to get back to my 80% raw eating lifestyle [I refuse to call it a diet], it is only 80%.  The rest of the time, I eat organic, lovingly-treated meat.  And potatoes.

So today’s edition of the Top Five Friday is all about what to make when you need, or want, a meatless dinner.  You can also check out some of the salads I posted.  Or even the Oysters from last week.  

Crab-Stuffed Flounder

Not really the spirit of the fast, is it?  Well, at least it meets the letter of the law!  I’m not really sure why fish makes the grade [note to self: google that]; I always thought it had something to do with blood in the meat.  But then when I gutted a fish for the first time, I discovered, much to my chagrin, that fish have blood too! Ewwww!  Anyway, this recipe from the queen of butter, Paula Deen, is pretty awesome for any day of the week, but it makes a Lenten Friday a little easier to bear.  Especially for the non-Catholic friends of ours who bear the brunt of our meatless grumpiness.

Spinach Mushroom Tarts

Two of my favorite veggies: spinach and mushrooms come together in one amazing and fabulous looking entrée.  And yes, it’s raw.  I love Susan Powers’ recipes ~ she makes living the raw food lifestyle look, well ~ stylish!  And the food truly is raw-mazing.  Not to mention really, really good for you.  I saw these tarts and went straight to Whittingham’s to buy the little stainless steel molds.  Totally worth it! 

Spicy Glazed Salmon

I love my salmon.  Especially when it’s wild caught in Alaska.  I’m surprised at how many people don’t know that farm-raised fish is not the healthiest way to get your Omega-3s.  They swim around in little [or big] pools.  Which, yes, may get cleaned.  But still.  How would you feel is you had to swim around in your own…yeah.  Now you understand! 

Now that we've got cleared up ~ this is a super yummy recipe that I’ve made for dinner countless times: both for just myself and for dinner guests.  Always a winner.  And in the summer, I’ve substituted basil for the cilantro.  You can also use dill.  Just take out the soy sauce.

Veggie Chili

Tofu is not my friend.  And probably not yours either.  Process anything is not good for you.  I have given in before, but generally I stay away from soy products.  Another post for another time!  So I forgo the veggie crumbles in this recipe and put in red wine, green peppers and regular diced tomatoes.  And my shredded Daiya “cheese” of course.

Pan-Seared Scallops

I stopped ordering scallops in restaurants because they were always overdone and just plain wrong.  So there’s no recipe to link to because mine is the best and the simplest ~ IMHO.  Buy scallops.  Rinse.  Melt butter in pan.  Put scallops in.  Salt and pepper to taste. Watch very closely, turning with tongs every so often until lightly golden.  DO NOT OVERCOOK. 

Make pesto out of fresh basil or spinach.  Serve the scallops on a bed of pesto. Voila!  A little bit of heaven!

Happy Friday!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

What are your favorite meatless dishes?

Accenting the Positive: Giving Up and Getting In to Lent

[Penance] does not mean sacrifice and self-denial in the first place, but a “change of heart,” a victory over sin and a striving for holiness.  The sacrifices of fasting and self-denial are only means and signs of this spiritual penance.  If people understand this well, they will not put the main effort in Lent on technical feats of abstaining from pleasures (which sometimes make them proud or vain), but in sincere contrition, prayer and humble fight against their faults.

~  Fr. Francis X. Weiser, S.J



"In Ictu oculi" by Juan de Valdes Leal



Ash Wednesday.  Time to dust [no pun intended] off those New Year’s resolutions and try, try again!  Lent is less about doom and gloom, and more about changing one’s heart.  Unplugging from the world for forty days and re-aligning one’s spirit with what is really important in life: Love, Faith, Generosity, Authenticity.

Many people give up eating a certain type of food, such as chocolate, or literally unplug by giving up Facebook or personal email.  While good, those things miss the point and don’t really go far enough.  My friend Terry [who is the most awesome tenor eh-ver!] said it best on Facebook the other day:

“Think it matters if you stop using Facebook for 40 days…it doesn’t.  How about 1 posting a day about something that matters…perhaps there’s a charity you care about.  That might be something to post instead of cats wearing bowler hats.  Giving up meat? So?  Do it…but maybe spread the word about sustainable, small independent and local farmers while you’re at it….”

There’s a great story in Scripture where Christ talks about a man possessed by a demon, who gets rid of the demon, and sweeps the interior clean; but then the demon gets bored wandering around, finds seven more demons worse than he is, and comes back inside the guy.  What?!  That’s not fair!  The guy got rid of the demon and swept his house clean!  Yes, but he didn’t put anything in the space left by the demon’s absence.

It’s not enough to stop eating fast food [the evils of which is a post for another day!] or sweets.  It’s not enough to stop watching so much reality TV or spending so much time on the computer or the internet.  Getting rid of those behaviours is a good and laudable thing!  But put something in its place.  Otherwise the bad habits will come back stronger then before! We have enough negativity in our lives; do something positive!

Personally, I haven’t finished taking stock yet to see where I need to clean house.  But in one area is definite: after my gall-stone cleanse, I fell off the 80% raw-vegan-juicing lifestyle wagon I had been riding for so long.  My bank statement alone is enough to accuse and convict me!  So one thing I’m giving up is eating out ~ healthier for my wallet and my body.  And in place of eating out [where in the world does that food come from anyway!?], I will be making my own fresh smoothies and juices and eating only organic, sustainable foods.

What about you?  Do you observe Lent?  What are you giving up and getting into? 

Oremus pro invicem,

 ~Mikaela

Top Five Friday: Throw Me Some Beads! The Mardi Gras Edition

Creole is New Orleans city food.

Communities were created by the people who wanted to stay

and not go back to Spain or France.

~ Paul Prudhomme

It’s almost Lent.   And that means Mardi Gras, the feast where Catholics traditionally used up all the animal-related products before the 40 days of fasting began on Ash Wednesday.  Eastern Catholics still follow a strict, “black fast” – no eggs, meat, or dairy.  Western, or Roman Catholics are little less, well, we're just wimpier ~ and with good reason. I had one professor in college who was Eastern Catholic and he was always grumpier during Lent then the professors who were Roman.  Just sayin’.

A die-hard Virginian I may be, but I love my Deep South sisters and Nawlins food ranks up there as the best a Southern foodie can get.  Chicken, crawfish, shrimp, and lots of butter.  And always that question: isn’t gumbo the same thing as jambalaya?

Fried Oysters

My favorite way to eat oysters is baked in their shells with garlic and parmesan on top.  But with a dairy intolerance, that is right out.  Happily, frying is not.  [Although I admit I don’t do as much of that lately.  Having gallstones really helped me get in the habit of healthier eating!]  This is a great recipe, although I didn’t use saltines, I used gluten-free breadcrumbs.  And it actually came out beautifully.

Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya

No, this is not the same as Gumbo, y’all.  Jambalya has rice, lots of it.  Think of it as the Creole version of paella.  Gumbo thickens with a flour-based roux.  For this recipe,  I used long grain brown rice in place of white because 1) I’m all into that health stuff; and 2) I’m not from Nawlin’s so no French Quarter grandmother is turnin’ ovah in her grave as I gleefully put my own Virginia stamp on things.

Ramos Gin Fizz

It’s great to be Catholic and Southern.  You get to drink things like a gin fizz. Also bourbon.  But I wanted to highlight this Nawlin’s classic.  Enjoy after a day sweating in the kitchen over a hot stove ~ preferably not into the gumbo!

            Ok, fine.  Another great one is the Sazerac.  Awesome.

Beignets

Confession: I’ve never made these.  However, I’m dying to try them this weekend for my friend’s Mardi Gras bash.  So if I get around to making them, I’ll let you know how they turn out.  I have eaten them before, if that counts.  And they are waaaaaay better than doughnuts, y’all!

King Cake

Ok, I’ve never made this one either.  This one is on the list this weekend as well because all the ones I have ever had at Mardi Gras parties were made my non-Nawlins people and they were dry and well, yucky.  Hopefully none of them is reading this now.  Might as well try my non-Creole hand at this favorite too!  I even have last year’s baby ~ which technically means I should have hosted this year.  Maybe I'll get it again this year!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Any favorite foodie traditions for Mardi Gras?  How do other non-Nawlins foodies celebrate?

2012 Goals: Second Month Check In

Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go. 

~ T.S. Eliot

According to my calculations, I haven’t gotten very far in reaching my goals, even though I took a risk with such a huge list this year.  Try as I may, I tend to get overwhelmed pretty early in the journey, and simply stop looking at the road signs.  No wonder I get lost and end up looking over the Resolution Ravine ~ I see a lot of dried old bones and fresh carcasses down there!

So while I am trying to figure out what method of tracking my goals will help me to actually accomplish them, I have decided that in at least one department, I can add something that will definitely help: posting here weekly about my goal struggles and progress [when there is any!] and asking for your input on how you conquer the Overwhelmedness Ogre.

Together, let’s see how far we can go this year!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Top Five Friday: Gettin' Your Green On

Salad "freshens without enfeebling and fortifies without irritating."

~ Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin (1755-1826)

Last week I highlighted my top five favorite soups. This week we look at salads.  I know ~ you don’t like to eat your veggies. I understand that salads are easier to munch on in the summer time when the tomatoes are red and juicy and warm from the sun’s caress in your garden, and your hands smell like the crisp and spicy basil leaves you just plucked.  But salad has its place in the winter too.  And even if you haven’t had a mild winter like we have had so far here in Virginia, you can still enjoy the energy and pick me up you get from eating your veggies.

Cornbread Salad

Also known as layered salad, I make this for summer BBQs and it is a great way to get those veggies down!  The recipe I have actually used is in one of my coveted Southern Living cookbooks, but this one has most of the ingredients and the point of these salads is to play a little.

Fig and Goat Cheese Salad

I discovered this sexy little salad while searching Epicurious for a 4 course dinner for fourteen friends I hosted a couple of weeks ago.  Actually, I took this recipe as a suggestion and made substitutions all over the place.  Figs are not in season, so I used dried instead; raspberry and run raisin goat cheese instead of the yogurt; arugula instead of pepper cress; and I topped it off with balsamic vinegar and EVOO.  Wow.  Now I know why figs are known as nature’s candy.  Even my friends who do not like salad ate it up!

Heirloom Salad

Okay, I agree: this salad really is better in the summer when everything is straight from the garden.  But it still makes the list as one of my top five salads.  I adore fresh tomatoes and basil still wet with dew.  If you are dairy-intolerant like me, forgo the cheese altogether or use Daiya’s Mozzarella ~ love that brand!  It’s not only non-dairy, it’s non-soy.  Yay!

Panzanella Salad

This is a great winter salad because it has bread in it.  And although I try to eat as little gluten as possible for health reasons, fresh French bread is my weakness.  I have used a variation of this recipe several times and each time it’s a hit.  The key is to let the salad sit for a little while so that the bread absorbs the juices from the tomatoes, cucs, and the EVOO.  This one can be an entrée.

Warm Beet Salad with Bacon

Growing up I hated beets.  Now I love them.  Especially in the juicer.  Ahh!  My favorite café in North Arlington is Cassatt’s Kiwi Café and they serve a simply amazing beet salad with goat cheese and honey.  This recipe has the same idea (brown sugar), but with the added yumminess of bacon.  And as we all know, everything is better with bacon!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

What are your favorite salads ~ for winter or summer?