It's easy being green...

Meat is a big thing for my family. So much so that we can't wait for the thermometer to climb high enough to have an excuse for an outdoor barbecue. This weekend we didn't need any excuses; the weather was beee-yoo-tiful, and it's Memorial Day, the barbecue holiday of the year and the unofficial start of summer. Time to take out my white pants and sandals!

Since the BBQ would be full of meat, I thought I'd turn to the Grills and Pasta chapters for some lovely veggie and BBQ-friendly recipes.

62. Green Sauce (Salsa Verde) - *Grills*
63. Lentil and Vinaigrette Salad - *Grills*
64. French Bean and Avocado Salad - *Pasta*

The first two recipes could be made in advance, but not too far in advance, so I got started on them while I was still home. The title for this post is an appropriate one, and it's funny because I didn't plan for my menu to be so 'green', it just turned out that way.

The sauce was quite simple to make. It is basically a mixture of chopped gherkins, mustard, chopped shallots, and garlic, with some chopped herbs (I chose mint and parsley) forked through.

To this the oil and vinegar is added. The consistency of the salsa is up to the cook, and my mother-in-law tends to blend all the ingredients to make a loose sauce for fish. Since I was going to use the salsa as an accompaniment to meat, I decided to chunkify it and use less oil.

The lentil salad was just as easy to prepare. I pounded some garlic with olive oil to a paste, and to this I added mustard, vinegar, chopped shallots and a tin of lentils. Tom says you could opt to use just-cooked lentils, but it wasn't mandatory so I didn't bother. To the mixture, I added some chopped parsley, and that was all there was to the salad! I had a quick taste-test before I put it in the fridge and I must say YUM-O!

I prepared the avocado salad when I got to my sister's since avocados tend to oxidize fairly quickly. All that there was to it was blanching some green beans (couldn't find French, but who's counting?) in boiling water for a couple of minutes and then draining them. Once cool the beans were added to some torn up lettuce leaves and slices of avocado. I dressed the salad with lime juice and a dash of olive oil and salt.

Everything turned out be just so delicious. I was hesitant about serving lentils as a salad, especially since lentils are not a big thing to Russians. In fact, my family was examining the salad while the meat was grilling trying to figure out if there was even a Russian word for 'lentils'. Turns out there is, but I don't remember it now! The lentils were actually the first to go, and the salsa verde and salad plates were licked clean. They were all perfect accompaniments to the grilled chicken, filet mignon, and pork chops and sausages we had. Yes, they like their meat! I for one was really happy with all my contributions since I'm not the biggest meat eater - at least I didn't go hungry, quite the opposite.

A couple of views of my plate:

My brother-in-law's specialty is his grilled meats (that's chicken with salsa verde) and grilled sweet potato.

Another view of the recipes - this one is with the avocado/green bean salad at the bottom.

Lovely outdoor meal, thanks to Cupboard Love and some enthusiastic barbecuing men!