Farro Salad, A Book and Other Creatures

Farro Salad with lots of summer veggies and a tasty garlic vinaigrette is a perfect main course salad. 

It has been hot in Colorado. 62 of 64 Colorado counties are requesting federal disaster relief because of drought.

My yard is hot, tired, cranky and so am I. Yesterday my electrician came over to fix a few problems and while he was opening the electrical box he was stung on his lip by a wasp.

I felt awful but probably not as awful as he did, so I got out the Adolph’s meat tenderizer that my mother in law supplied many moons ago, made a paste, watched him rub it on his lip and thank goodness with a few tabs of Advil he was OK.

Hey, the stuff really works for stings if you didn’t know.

(And when I say my electrician it is because when we redid our home a long time ago he was the electrician we used. It seemed like I was visiting with an old friend!)

While he recovered I ran to Ace is the place and bought wasp spray.

 

And it is still hot and the swamp cooler that was fixed three weeks ago stopped working again.

I am still waiting for that person to show up and so far that wait is going on the 6th day. My brain is truly fried.

Which of course brings me to this salad because salads are appropriate for people with fried brains.

I made this on Friday when my neighbor came over for dinner. It is healthy and delicious and summery. I adapted it from a new book on salads, “Salads: Beyond the Bowl” by Mindy Fox that I checked out from the library recently.

It is a beautiful book written by the editor of the magazine “La Cucina Italiana”. She has some unique fresh salad ideas, glorious photography and lots of creativity.

In my opinion it is written for someone that likes to cook and try new ingredients.

Of course that is just my kind of book but if you like a lot of detail about how to do things or where to find ingredients that are not easily found then this may not be the book for you.

It features such exotic salads as Shredded Roast Rabbit, sliced plum, smoked almond and shaved celery salad in addition to Macaroni salad with yogurt, dill and pickles.

Catch my drift? There is a wide range of salad choices here and there is something for everyone.

This salad went far. After Friday’s meal it then traveled to a Firefall concert (You are the woman that I always dreamed of…I knew it from the  start…) where it was shared on another hot evening between three hot women, if I must say so myself.

It then continued to give for my meal yesterday after my wonderful electrician came. Try it. This is a keeper.

Farro is the oldest cultivated grain in the world.

It is good for those on gluten free diets though it is not entirely gluten free. A ½ c of uncooked farro contains 170c, 5g of fiber and 6g of protein. If you’d like more info on farro click here.

I will tell you many people say it needs to be soaked but I have not experienced that and I have bought two different brands.

It is making a comeback but is still hard to find unless  you have a great Italian grocer around the corner which I do not.

It is also not inexpensive but is really filling. It is chewy, but not hard and it adapts well too many recipes. Use it as you would
use rice.

You can buy it online and some Whole Foods carry it.

I tried it about 10 years ago in an Italian restaurant in San Francisco and I have liked it since then.

Luckily it is easier to find now. And if you can’t find farro use big crusty grilled garlic bread croutons and make a bread salad.

That is really good, too. In fact the author called this a panzanella di farro salad though there is no bread in it.

(Now I can’t get that song out of my head!). “ You are the woman that I always dreamed of. I knew it from the start.—–and that’s the last I’ve seen of my heart. Of my heart.” 

Hey- this salad is good for the heart!

 

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