Spring Salad with Mint Pesto

Temperatures here in New Jersey have already reached 90 degrees, and that makes me crave salads. I recently ate something similar to this at Thompson Italian in Alexandria, Va., recommended by my friend Domenica Marchetti, who lives there. I split it with my husband as an appetizer, but could easily have eaten it all myself. I liked it so much, I had to try to recreate it when I got home. It's not exactly like the restaurant's version, but it's close enough, and so delicious and refreshing. Start by making the mint pesto. You need a heaping cup of well-packed mint leaves. That will give you more than you'll need for this recipe, unless you're serving more than two people. In that case, just double everything in the recipe except the pesto ingredients. The pesto recipe will give you plenty for four servings, maybe even for six, depending on how generous you are in applying to the salad. Freeze the leftover pesto, which would be terrific with lamb or fish.

Next you'll need some fresh snap peas. I was lucky enough to get these from my friend Karla, who invited me to pick these beauties from her garden, along with some truly delicious strawberries and lettuces. I took some of her tarragon too, for another use.

Just trim off the hard end of the snap peas, and any stringy bit that comes with it. After trimming them, I left these whole for the salad.

You'll need asparagus too, which I always peel to avoid the tough outer layer. Cut them into pieces about 2- 2 1/2 inches long, then cook the snap peas and asparagus in boiling water for only 3 to 4 minutes. I didn't want them to be raw, but I didn't want them soft and limp either, so cook them just a short bit, remove from the boiling water and drop them immediately into ice water to stop the cooking, then drain and pat dry. They'll still have a slight crunch to them.

The restaurant menu said the dish contained preserved lemons, and I didn't have any more homemade from my own lemon tree, but I found some at my local supermarket, McCaffrey's, which seems to carry almost everything I want. If you can't find preserved lemons, I would suggest washing a fresh lemon, cutting it into small pieces then chopping roughly it in a food processor with a little salt and water before adding to this recipe.

Here's what one preserved lemon looks like straight from the jar. I cut it in small pieces before adding it to the food processor to make the pesto.

And here's what the pesto looks like after everything is all blended. Give it a taste to decide whether it needs more salt. Unlike a lot of pestos, this one doesn't use any parmesan cheese. There's already feta in the dish, so parmesan would only compete with it. Even without cheese, the pesto was so delicious, I found it hard to resist digging in with a spoon (ok, so maybe I dipped a finger in -- quality control and all that.).

Add a good dollop of the pesto - maybe 3 or 4 tablespoons - to a bowl with the cooked (and cooled) asparagus, snap peas, toasted walnuts (again cooled) and feta. Mix everything well with a spoon.


Serve on a plate surrounded by radicchio or salad greens of your choice. I dressed the radicchio first with a simple addition of salt and pepper, olive oil and vinegar, then placed the green salad in the center.

I've made this salad twice in the last two days, and decorated it the first time with some yellow calendula leaves (also from Karla's garden). If you've got nasturtiums blooming, they'd be lovely too -- totally optional, but it does add a nice pop of color to the mostly green salad.

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Spring Salad with Mint Pesto

(makes two servings but extra pesto for another meal or the freezer)

For the Mint Pesto

1 cup packed mint leaves

1/2 cup toasted walnuts

1 small clove garlic

1 of a preserved lemon 

1/2 cup olive oil

2 tablespoons water

salt, pepper to taste

Put everything in a food processor and blend, scraping down sides of bowl occasionally. Taste to see if it needs more lemon or salt and pepper. 

Salad Ingredients:

6 or 8 spears of thicker asparagus, peeled and sliced at an angle about 2 inches-3 inches long each.

snap peas trimmed and in the shell (I used about a dozen for this recipe)

1/4 cup (about 2-3 ounces) feta cheese, diced

1/4 cup toasted walnuts, chopped roughly

the pesto from above recipe

lettuce for the base, plus vinegar and oil to drizzle on the lettuce

calendula petals (or nasturtium flowers or other edible flowers) - optional

Procedure:

Make the mint pesto and set aside. Cook the asparagus pieces and the snap peas in boiling water for only about four minutes. You don't want the vegetables to be mushy, they should have a slight bite to them. Remove the vegetables with a "spider" and drop immediately into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking, then pat dry to eliminate any water that still clings.

To a bowl, add the barely cooked vegetables, the feta cheese, the walnuts and some of the pesto. (The above recipes makes more pesto than you'll need for this recipe, but you can freeze the leftover. Mint pesto is delicious with fish, lamb or even pasta.) Mix everything together. Place some lettuce leaves on a plate and season them with salt and pepper, then drizzle a little olive oil and vinegar over the leaves. Arrange the asparagus, peas and feta salad over the lettuce leaves and scatter the edible flowers on top.