Crossover salad


 I love salad. My grandfather, may he rest in peace, would have loved to hear me say that.
   There was a time in my life when I absolutely despised any sort of raw vegetable on my plate. My grandfather and I, two stubborn Sicilians, would get into loud shouting matches when I - know it all tween that I was - would steadfastly refuse to eat my salad.
   He was a health food guru, long before it was stylish, ate raw foods (punctuated by an occasional serving of freshly caught seafood or a free range chicken that he got from a friend). Nearly everything he ate came from his back yard garden. He lived to be 97 years old and the only medicine he ever took was an aspirin.
   So, some time in my 30s, I discovered that salad wasn't so bad. I discovered that eating well was the key to having the energy to live well. And I discovered that raw fruits and vegetables (or cooked ones) can be used in so many different ways that you never have to eat the same things twice...unless you want to.
   ("I told you so," my grandfather is probably saying from his little garden in heaven.)
   Now, we often compartmentalize salads into separate categories of fruit salad and veggie salad. This salad is both...and it is surprisingly tasty and you'd hardly know you were crossing that imaginary line between the two kinds of salads.

Crossover Salad
Is it fruit? Or is it veggie?

1 tomato, sliced thinly
1/4 of an onion, sliced thinly
2 tablespoons of feta cheese
2 cups of cantaloupe, sliced thinly
Salt and pepper, to taste
A pinch each of rosemary, sage, thyme (from the garden), crushed and cut into tiny bits
3 basil leaves, cut thinly
  • Put  half the cantaloupe on a plate, add a layer of tomato and scatter some onion on top.
  • Sprinkle with the herbs, salt and pepper. 
  • Put a tablespoon of feta over that layer.
  • Repeat the layers
  • Sprinkle some vinaigrette, if you'd like.
Vegan.

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