Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Food from the balcony

I like growing herbs. It is rewarding to use my own herbs when I cook.. not to mention convenient and cost-effective.

However, I find it even more satisfying whenever I bring in food from the balcony to the table. And I don't mean just herbs that are used to flavour dishes, but "real" edibles like fruits or vegetables.

I don't have a lot of edibles right now, just a baby batavia salad that isn't growing particularly well, a tomato that refuses to fruit and a malabar spinach.

I like the Malabar Spinach. It is so easy to grow.. and I've used it a few times in my salads now. Each time I use it, I'm inspired me to want to grow even more edibles.

One day, hopefully, my balcony will be like a "roof-top greenhouse"..

One day..

Yesterday, I made a salad with promegrenate with some of the leaves from my own balcony.

Ingredients
Salad leaves
From my balcony:
- A few leaves and flowers of the malabar spinach
- A few fresh mint leaves
- A few "gotu kola" leaves
Half a promegranate
A handful of toasted pinenuts
Some Greek feta cheese

I made an Asian vinaigrette dressing to go with this salad - which is simply some balsamic vinegar with extra virgin olive oil and sesame sauce.

It's a very colourful salad and the only thing lacking is a handful of cherry tomatoes from my tomato plant to go with it..


Salad with Pomegranate

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