Texas wildfire salad.

Texas wildfire salad. Arugula and seared zucchini with habanero herb dressing. © Ryan Schierling

We've been running a bit of a hot spell here in Central Texas, and the pepper plants are about the only thing in our garden that are tolerating the heat. Our patch consists mainly of jalapeños and habaneros this year. The jalapeños we use with frequency, but the habaneros are a little tricky because we either need a fresh harvest large enough to make hot sauce, or we have to find ways to use what ripens in a steady trickle. If you're familiar with habaneros, you know that this little orange pepper packs a wallop of heat. While it may not rank at the top of the Scoville scale, it is up there high enough to warrant wearing gloves when cutting them and taking measures to avoid any juices that may aerosolize in the chopping process.

So, I decided to make a habanero salad dressing out of a couple of them. Of course, right? For continuity of color, I chose to include orange bell pepper – well, in addition to the fact that there is nothing meaty about habanero peppers and I wanted to add some substance and body. There is a reason for the popularity of habaneros and it's not all about its spicy reputation. Habs have a wonderfully distinct, almost fruity, flavor that transcends the heat. With the addition of garlic and some fresh Texas tarragon (Mexican mint marigold) leaves from our garden, the resulting dressing is creamy in texture without being heavy and has a boldness that is both tangy and mildly herbacious.

Slaw of wee little cabbages.

Brussels sprout slaw with grapefruit-fig vinaigrette. © Ryan Schierling

Where we have merely dedicated a five-day stretch to the subject, one could potentially spend a lifetime dedicated only to documenting variations of slaw. As much as we appreciate the cruciferous veg, we are not the people to make such an exploration of a specific side dish our exclusive focus. However, we would be remiss if we did not include a variation using Brussels sprouts for this "5 days 5 ways" celebration of slaw.

Brussels sprouts are oft referred to as "wee little cabbages" in our household. This is technically fitting as they are members of the same genetic family – from the Brassica genus, to be exact – and in excellent company with some other very delicious vegetables such as broccoli, cauliflower and, of course, cabbage. When it comes to sensitivity to the more bitter aspect of this family, Brussels sprouts are probably one of the trickier to develop a taste for, but the little bit of work it takes to complement that touch of bitter is well worth it. Where cooking serves to soften this bitterness, a raw salad requires an act of embracing and balancing it. 

Ranch-style crudité slaw.

Broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage slaw. ©  Ryan Schierling

For the longest time I thought I hated cole slaw. As it turned out, I just didn't like that typical picnic-style slaw with creamy and weirdly-sweet dressing. You know, the omnipresent variety you find in tubs in the supermarket deli.

The first "cole slaw" that I remember liking made a big impression on me, so much so that I wasn't really sure if it even could be considered a slaw so much as a shredded cabbage salad. Granted that was some [blah-blah-blah-redacted] years ago. The strangest thing is that this entire episode was also a defining moment in my appreciation for ranch dressing. Weird and tangential on the surface, I know, but I will explain.

I grew up in a household where blue cheese and Roquefort were the default, everyday salad dressings of choice. I was never one of those kids who put ketchup on everything or wanted to dip anything deep-fried in ranch dressing. In fact, I didn't really find ranch of much interest except as a suitable dunk for raw broccoli and cauliflower on the crudité platter – until that one day when someone served me shredded cabbage "cole slaw" made with ranch dressing instead of the usual fare. Suddenly a variety I could get behind! It just made sense, really. While I may not gravitate to ranch dressings for my salads, there is something to be said for the way certain vegetables are complemented by the creamy, tangy, herb and garlic flavors at its essence. This is doubly true if you make your ranch-style dressing fresh and from scratch.

Cucumber salad #4.

Cucumber bruschetta. © Ryan Schierling

When I was a younger man, inexperienced in the ways of life and love and the kitchen, I thought bruschetta was kind of an Italian salsa – a tomato, onion, basil and balsamic-based topping for toasted baguette rounds. I didn't know the garlic-rubbed toasted bread was actually the bruschetta, and it was my first experience with the glory that is balsamic vinegar. There wasn't Mario or Giada or Lidia or Mary Ann on teevee telling me what to do.

Proper terminology or not, I ham-fisted a lot of toasted bread topping with tomato and red onion, garlic and basil, balsamic vinegar and olive oil, and it bolstered my confidence in the kitchen (and in life and love).

That might be a lot to ask of a bruschetta, but I think it's handled it well over the last 20 years, because I've been making adaptations on it ever since. Julie came up with this recipe. We went back and forth a bit, tasting multiple versions and then agreed that I am the crusty, chunky, slightly acerbic, and she is the cool, crunchy sweetness.

Together, somehow, we are a delicate, fresh spoonful on grilled sourdough baguette. Bon appetit. 

Cucumber bruschetta

1 sourdough baguette, cut into 1/2" rounds, oiled and grilled until toasty

4 cucumbers, peeled, center seeds removed, diced

2 scallions, minced

6-8 large basil leaves, chiffonaded

12-15 red cherry tomatoes, cut in half

cracked black pepper

cucumber bruschetta dressing (below)

Mix cucumber, scallions, dressing and a pinch of salt together. Plate bruschetta, spoon cucumber mix on top. Put half a cherry tomato on top of each slice of bruschetta with cucumbers, top with the chiffonade of basil and freshly cracked pepper.

Cucumber bruschetta dressing

1/3 cup white wine vinegar

1/3 cup cup oil (we used equal parts vegetable and olive oil… it seems to emulsify better)

1 tablespoon honey

1/8 teaspoon ground white pepper

1 small pinch kosher salt

1/8 teaspoon dijon mustard

Mix vinegar, honey, pepper, salt and mustard together in a medium-sized bowl. Whisk in a steady stream of oil until emulsified. 

Bleu for you.

Blue cheese dressing. Iceberg and bacon optional. © Ryan Schierling

Ah, the classic iceberg lettuce wedge with blue cheese...

Cool. Crisp. Refreshing. A pungent cheese that speaks straight to the heart of a "stinky cheese" lover like me.

It's no secret I'm a huge fan of what Ryan calls "challenging cheeses." I'm pretty sure I come by it naturally, though. Big "shout out" to Mom and Dad, here, because unlike most American kids of my generation who were brought up eating Ranch dressing on every-freaking-thing, I grew up eating a lot of blue cheese. By this I mean it was the salad dressing of choice in our family. At restaurants it was always "four salads with blue cheese, please."

That simplicity quite possibly made up for some of our more ambitious meat-substitution requests when dining out. At home it was always either blue cheese or Roquefort, a blue cheese of a slightly different color, you know... for variety. About the only way I remember eating Ranch was as an occasional dip for raw vegetables. Even then I didn't get the appeal, and Thousand Island just seemed like a visit to the dark side.

Looking back, it's actually a little surprising that we never made blue cheese dressing from scratch when I was growing up. Granted, we were pretty picky about the brands we chose (the best supermarket varieties are in jars in the produce section) and there are plenty of bad blue cheese dressings out there. So, I very much appreciate the serendipity of having this wonderful recipe grace my repertoire via Steven, my fabulous father-in-law-in-a-former-life. I asked him, recently, how he had come upon it and this is the story he related.