You can substitute all manner of vegetables. While Sugar Snaps are yummy, you can use Baby Carrots instead. Try beets, cucumbers, green beans, and roasted summer squash as the season cycles.
INGREDIENTS (serves 2 – 4)
- ½-lb. Baby carrots – tops trimmed, sugar snap peas – trimmed, beets, peeled, cucumber, sliced, green beans, trimmed, summer squash, sliced into rounds and roasted
- ¼ lb. Feta Crumbles – goat or sheep’s milk feta works. We’re fans of Haystack Mt. Goat Feta
- ½-cup Red onion, sliced extremely thin
- 1 cup Extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/3-cup Fresh lemon juice or white wine vinegar ( make it ½-cup if you like a tart, high acid vinaigrette)
- 3 cloves Fresh garlic, minced (can you dried or fresh green garlic – both work)
- 3 TB. Your choice of fresh dill or mint, minced
- To taste Sea salt and fresh ground pepper
DIRECTIONS:
- Blanch or roast your veggies as you prefer. Roasting takes longer but brings out more of the natural brix (sugars) in the veggies. Blanching is quicker and will add less heat to your kitchen. Blanch just until veggies are brightly colored, or soft to touch.
- Toss cooked veggies with sliced onion; then make vinaigrette and toss with veggies. Place into serving bowl. Top with large hunks of feta, or even 1/3-in. rectangular slabs like the Greeks do. Salt and pepper a bit more to taste. Add more minced herbs to garnish if you prefer.
- TIP: Be generous with the vinaigrette, not stingy. Buy the best baguette or artisan loaf you can find and use bread to dip into the bottom of the bowl to soak up dredges of vinaigrette and feta. I once watched two Greek men and a young boy do this on a fishing doc in Cephlonia, Greece. To communally share one dish and break all food safety rules, and eat with gusto and few words, until the three locals were dipping bread into the bottom of the shared dish. This still informs me today.
