Corn, Tomato and White Bean Salad

Anytime I can eat fresh vegetables raw it's a good thing, but carrot sticks just aren't my bag. Here are a couple of quick recipes for raw salads, and one cooked one.

Corn, Tomato and White Bean Salad

Ingredients

2 ears fresh uncooked corn, removed from cob
2 small summer squash, any type, diced

1 container cherry tomatoes, cut in quarters

1 can small white beans

1 small spring onion or green onion, chopped small

salt

pepper

olive oil

seasoned rice vinegar

Tools

Knife (serrated helps with the tomatoes)
Bowl

Spoon

Method

Dice and gently mix ingredients. Adjust vinegar and salt balance to taste. Mix again and chill.

Works with any corn/bean/squash/tomato combo.

chopped fresh herbs like basil, cilantro, parsley or oregano are optional

Broccoli Salad

Broccoli supposedly helps fend off the potential carcinogens in grilled food, so bring this one to your next barbecue.

Ingredients

2 big heads brocolli, cut up in small florets, including stems cut into dice or slices1 red, yellow or orange bell pepper

2 green onions, sliced

1/4 cup chopped almonds (pine-nuts or other nuts ok to substitute)

cole slaw type dressing

(mayo, rice vinegar, olive oil, sugar, salt, pepper)

tsp of hot sauce (optional but delicious)

Tools

Knife

Bowl

Whisk for dressing

Method

Mix dressing in bowl with whisk, chop and dice vegetables and nuts and toss with dressing to coat. Chill.

Warm potato salad

Ingredients

10 baby Yukon gold potatoes, sliced

green top of one spring onion (make this and the corn salad and use up one spring onion)

a few strips of prosciutto, speck or cooked bacon, cut into small pieces

apple cider vinegar

good olive oil

hard-boiled egg, optional

salt and pepper

Tools

Saucepan

Knife

Bowl

Method

Slice potatoes into water, boil until fork tender

If you don't already have a hard-boiled egg, put eggs (might as well have them on hand for next time) in a small saucepan when you put the potatoes on, and bring to a boil. Lower to simmer and set timer to 12 minutes. When timer goes off, run cold water over eggs to chill and peel. If you are doing this in advance, just turn the eggs off at about 9 minutes and let the pot cool down to room temperature, then refrigerate the eggs.

Slice onion, cut prosciutto into 2" strips (I like the smoky element of "speck" or smoked prosciutto)

Drain potatoes

Lightly mash potatoes with egg, onion, vinegar, oil, salt and pepper while still warm.

Gently mix in prosciutto.

Check flavor balance, adjust.

How big is a dice? Well, imagine that a fork full of salad should have at least one piece of each thing on it. If your broccoli is so big that nothing else would fit on the fork, then it's too big. With the corn salad, I like to make everything except the tomatoes a little bigger than corn sized. But it's no big deal. Cut it as big as you like, and adjust the seasonings the way you like them. The traditional salad dressing proportion is 1 part vinegar to 3 parts oil. Yesterday I made the corn salad and warm potato salad both in 15-20 minutes including cooking the potatoes, which cook faster when sliced about 1/3" thick. They were yummy together with some previously cooked beets, and a green salad.