Double Whammy

I'm blogging to you now from

Brockville, Ontario, my new home base for the next 6 months. In case you were wondering why I dropped the ball again and missed yet another week of my salad challenge, I will use the excuses of moving to a new city, and starting a new job (which means adjusting to a new sleep schedule). So this post will be a 2 for 1 deal of salad fabulousness.

Earlier this week I decided to try my hand at veganizing the Caesar salad. Perhaps one of the most popular salads around, and decidedly not vegan, this dressing traditionally contains egg, anchovies, and parmesan cheese. Needless to say, making this salad animal-product free is no easy task. I started by searching what else was out there on the internet. I came across several variations, but the one I decided to go with was found on Recipezaar. I chose this recipe since conveniently the recipes on this site are rated by those who have tried them, and this one was given a nearly perfect score.

Vegan Caesar I: Julius

Greenery of choice (romaine is traditional, but all I had was spinach)

croutons

Veggie Bacon - fried and crumbled

Vegan Ceaser dressing

This salad was definitely tasty, and the dressing had some zing (and Caesar style garlic breath) but I'm going to have to classify this as a food fail because it really tasted nothing like a real Caesar salad. It didn't even look like Caesar dressing on account of the soy sauce. On the up side, it tasted really good on roasted potatoes!

Tonight's salad was anything but traditional. I'm not sure why, but I started thinking of how I could incorporate chocolate into a salad. I remembered that Susan over at FatFree Vegan Kitchen has made balsamic chocolate cookies before. She explained that balsamic vinegar actually enhances chocolate flavour, and so I figured that a chocolate balsamic vinaigrette would have to be delicious. When I was in the grocery store I spotted raspberry flavoured balsamic vinegar, and I was sold. I'm sure that you could make this recipe with regular balsamic vinegar, but I highly recommend this raspberry flavoured vinegar if you can find it.

Strawberry Salad with Chocolate Vinaigrette

Serves 1

4 or 5 strawberries, sliced

2 tbsp sliced almonds

greenery (I recommend baby spinach)

Dressing

1 tsp cocoa

1 tsp raspberry balsamic vinegar

1 tsp olive oil

1 tsp honey/agave nectar

This salad was seriously decadent. Seriously. Go out and make it.

Salad Challenge Countdown

Salads made: 15 Salads left: 37