2 July Sallets with Flowers and Herbs

2 July Sallets of Greens and Flowers

We decided since it would be hot in July having salad would be good. I had 3 kinds of mint ready to be harvested, but because there is a gentleman who is allergic to mint who usually attends Fighter Practice and we were going to have our Cooks Guild meeting at Fighter Practice in July I chose to make two salads.

Both salads had a small amount of purchased iceberg lettuce mix added to some shredded

cabbage (which is not exactly in season but it worked as a filler and I had it). Then I added a good

amount of Lambs Quarters and Common Mallow leaves. I sliced some carrots which were not very

large (carrots will not reach full size until late Fall). The week before I had found where some purslane was growing at the park so a while before the Cooks Guild meeting I went and gathered it, thoroughly washed it and added it to the salad. Zianna brought some more mallow leaves and yarrow from home. We separated that into two salads and in one was mixed chopped basil and parsley. It was

topped with a layer of a different kind of Mallow flowers, four cucumber blossoms and one large

squash blossom in the center. No one ate that one and I was later told it was because it was too

beautiful.

The second salad was mixed with a mixture of chopped mint, orange mint, and chocolate mint.

It was topped with a sprig on mint in the center surrounded by mallow flowers. I remembered to take

photo's a few minutes after we all started taking food and that salad had obviously had some taken from it so the photo doesn't completely reflect how it looked in all of it's beauty.

To dress the salads I brought salt, pepper, extra virgin olive oil, rice wine vinegar and a rose

infused apple cider vinegar. The recipe for the rose infused vinegar I found in a magazine called The

Herb Quarterly. This is the recipe:

Collect enough red rose petals to fill a quart jar (use very young petals: a rosebud that's just

about to open is ideal. Shake the petals to remove debris but do not rinse them under water. Even the

smallest amount of water clinging to the petals will make the vinegar murky and unattractive. Loosely pack the petals in a clean quart jar. Pour in apple-cider or white-wine vinegar and agitate with the handle of a wooden spoon to dislodge bubbles.

Cover with plastic wrap and set in a warm area. Shake twice daily for at least four days. Strain

out the petals and add one tablespoon brown sugar to the rose vinegar. Try it on fresh greens. Store in a cruet or a clean, recycled salad dressing bottle.

I only made about half the recipe, put it in a jar with a lid instead of covering it with plastic

wrap and didn't add the sugar. The apple-cider vinegar looks very similar to red wine vinegar when it is done and that was using the dark pink roses I have instead of red roses. Although the recipe was from a modern source roses were used for flavoring in the middle ages and Renaissance much like vanilla or other flavorings are used today so a rose infused vinegar could have been period.