Slow Food Waltz

It's Fennel and High School Prom Season
Go ahead, make their day with a bouquet of fennel... or just make a salad with it :)


Will you be my date for the prom?? Ross Carrick, all dressed up for senior prom, contemplates giving his date a handful of pretty fennel stalks with feathery fronds. Instead Ross gave the fennel back to me and I made an egg salad with it! Fennel season corresponds with high school graduation. For a grad picnic, consider make egg salad using fennel instead of celery.



CELERY IS BORING- TRY FENNEL INSTEAD! I love how fresh fennel is... it imparts a slight licorice taste to things, but is so subtle, you can use it in place of celery.



You can eat every part of the fennel plant from the bulbous bottom, to the stalks to the feathery fronds.

Here's a recipe for fennel egg salad from Epicurious.com. I left out the Dijon mustard... I wanted to taste mostly the fennel.

8 large eggs
1 garlic clove
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 fennel bulb, finely chopped (1 cup), plus 1 tablespoon finely chopped fronds

Preparation:
Cover eggs with cold water in a medium saucepan. Cook eggs, uncovered, at a gentle boil 10 minutes. Pour off hot water. Shake pan gently so eggs bump one another (to crack shells). Run cold water into pan to stop cooking. Let eggs stand in cold water 15 minutes, adding more water to keep cold.

Mince and mash garlic to a paste with a pinch of salt. Whisk together with mayonnaise, lemon juice, zest, mustard, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper.

Chop eggs and stir into dressing with fennel and fronds.