uh, stuff

two really good salads in honor of cool salad weather.

1.
chop medium and carmelize in oil (olive ok, light vege maybe as lower smoke pt. your tolerence for smoky house, really) 1-2 onions. i cheat on this by fast sauteeing til close to translucent and then turning it down for the sugaring. I have no fricking patience. anyway, while that's a doin, boil small pan water, covered, clean and snap into reasonable lengths green beans. i used two medium onions, about 3 T oil, couple good handfuls beans, and one red pepper for this salad but do as you will. anyway, when water at boil blanch til peak vibrant (45-90 sec, depending on beans) and take out. rinse with cool or be lazy and shake an ice tray over. make green beanish size pieces out of the red pepper. so when all is prepped chuck together with leftover onion oil in something with sides and shake over some tarragon vinegar. just a couple shakes, you will add more later, it's just to make the flavors meld at this state. light sprinkle of salt, sea being preferred. put in fridge. leave at least 20 min, or up to 5 hours. (maybe longer- i don't know, it doesn't make it that long here) if you remember give it a stir from time to time. when ready to eat, stir, correct salt, give another shake t v or i like a parsimonious amt of plain old white v. really light hand but I think it pulls it together. this sounds simple, but its flavor is more than the sum of the parts and it's really bright. remember to keep going with the onions til a couple turn black and nearly all have browned edges, you want the sugar to be really dominant.

2. sort of same theme but more fancipants. clean and halve lengthwise 4-8 leeks, removing older looking layers, terminal bulb and all green 1 inch above fork. add maybe 3 T oil (olive) to non stick pan (you can use a real pan but who needs the aggravation?) and medium flame til brown on both sides, turning as needed. you will need tongs for the turning unless you are way jedi. this takes a while. do it first. also, take 2 med or one grande carrot, peel (i don't usually but do it here) and whack into inch lengths. put wee amt water in wee pan and cook til easily poked. take out and cool with ice. take same pan chuck water add 1-2 T oil, heat and then in with one big clove garlic, whole, that you've smacked and peeled all food network style. needs to be broken for oil entry. if you're all garlic central you could use more but for this salad try one so it doesn't compete with the leeks. anyway, fry at medhi til medium brown or more to the point til when you smell it it doesn't smell acrid, but just barely that done. you can use the oil for something else or just be a wasteful wasteful american, sigh, and throw it away. take out and into FOOD PROCESSER, WHICH YOU REALLY NEED TO DO THIS RECIPE, perhaps I should have said that sooner. anyway. into food processer with carrot and a couple big sloshes olive oil and a couple bigger sloshes of apple cider vinager, like 1/8 cup? more? play with it. and some tarragon v. If you had other weird ones like sherry or whatever you could give that a shot just i would say no balsemic- too sweet and the color with be ruined. puree, add big pinch sea salt, whirl, correct. so then chop some other stuff, i recommend french radish, avocado and a really decent tomato. arrange r, t, l, and a as artfully as you can on butter or red or heirloom lettuce, as you prefer, and then jackson pollock the carrot dressing over. if you want to thin it with water so it pours go ahead. I really liked it thick. this had non vegetarians licking the bowls.