Our Summer Project

As you know, the salad du jour blog has been on hiatus for the last three months.  In that time, we've built and enjoyed many great salads. However, we took on a side project that made the task of writing about our latest leafy creations (or setting up a meaningful photograph) to document their momentary beauty impossible.  

Over the last twelve weeks, we had the pleasure of being foster parents to two of the most adorable kittens I have ever seen.  At five days old, they were only a little larger than peanuts, their eyes were sealed shut, and they couldn't hear.  Nevertheless, they needed to eat every few hours, and to keep them strong and healthy we had to learn how to bottle feed them.  After we managed to pour a few millimeters of formula into them, we had to burp them and coax them into letting out the milk at the other end.  This turned into a full-time job.

As they grew, and they seemed to double in size every few weeks, they discovered the joy of standing, of walking, then running.  Soon, they were running sideways, jumping, leaping and turning in mid air, clinging to the side of their cage, to any available furniture, or my pant legs.  They also developed a love for the computer, and following the cursor was about as much fun as a kitten could have while sitting down.  Soon, sitting was impossible, and every blog article we attempted to write looked like this:

ttttttttttttttooooodaaaaay, wwwwwwwwweeeee hhhhhhad aaaaaaavocaaaaaaado iiiiiin ourrrrrrr  sallaaaaaaad.........

So, we took a break.  The kids grew up to be fantastic feline citizens, and both have been adopted out through the Austin Humane Society's adoption program.  I don't think the kittens developed a love for salads while they were here, but we helped to give them a bigger life, which is exactly what we're supposed to do, isn't it?

Grapes across America

In the last six months, just about every salad we've made includes grapes. We keep a steady supply of seedless grapes on hand, and these gems have earned a place of prominence in our salads.  We slice them down the middle and the interior exposure collects and intensifies flavors from the olive oil, balsamic vinegar, the spices, and sea salt.    

There are several varieties of seedless grapes grown in North America, and interestingly, grapes can be crimson, black, dark blue (seriously?), green, yellow, and pink in color.  The USA is the eighth largest grape producer in the world, and because of the grape's natural hardiness, they are grown in numerous areas across North America. Although we've yet to add the dark-blue varietal to our salads, it's good to know that there's an exciting flavor (and color) frontier in the grape world that we haven't experienced yet.