Hungry?

In the past four months I've lost 20 pounds, which is great, since I had at least that much to lose after years of living it up at American Laser Centers. People have asked me to share my weight loss secrets. And, I must reply, the secret is simple. Wanna lose weight? Simply eat less and exercise more.

Well, for me it has not been THAT simple. Reasons for my success are more nuanced. Eating less is not that difficult when you're not around a lot of extra food and business partners who were notorious over-indulgers. Not eating those daily Panera lunches with soup, sandwiches AND cookies; not eating dinner at Bacco with cocktails AND flan for dessert; not eating the candy, chips, and baked goods that were ever present at the office--avoiding those extra calories makes a difference.

Further, being out of work has given me motivation to improve my appearance. I don't want to look like a slob on job interviews! And, exercising five hours a week is truly possible when you can visit the gym any time you want, not just before 8 a.m. or after 7 p.m. Monday through Friday.

So eat less and excericse more AND feel motivated to make a change. That's about it.

Well, there's a little more--like trying to eat more healthy foods. We've been more vigilant these past months to include fruits and vegetables in every meal we eat. And the typical repository for these vegetables has been our daily dinner salad.

If I'm eating salads, I want to encourage my readers to improve their diets, too. In fact, as an extra piece of encouragement to you, today I'm giving away my perfected dinner salad recipe.

Without a doubt I make the best dinner salad in the world, which has been confirmed by many who have dined in my house. My dinner salad is not difficult to make nor does it include exotic ingredients, so all the readers of this blog should be able to make this salad as well. It does, however, require some effort. No, you can't just open a bag, pour it into a bowl, drench the greens in dressing and eat. It takes care--which I believe accentuates its deliciousness.

I learned long ago that to be truly delicious, food must appeal both to the eye and to the taste buds. How your food looks and is presented is just as important as how it tastes. Therefore, my salad should be made in a salad bowl and eaten off of a plate, with metal utensils. It won't taste the same on paper or foam plates or eaten with plastic. I'm getting ahead of myself--we haven't even made the salad yet! So, here's my recipe for Kevin's delicious dinner salad:

First, pick fresh greens. You can use field greens, leaf lettuce or romaine lettuce as your main ingredient. Raw spinach, endive, and arugula can also be included to supplement, but should not be your main green. Do not use iceberg lettuce or cabbage in this salad. Sorry.

Once you've selected the greens, thoroughly wash them. I don't care if the bag says "ready to use", at my house every raw ingredient gets washed by me in my sink. Once washed, the greens go into a salad spinner and I spin away. You must get as much excess water off the greens as possible, otherwise your salad will get soggy, not to mention forget any possibility of leftovers. If your greens are too large, tear them into bite-sized pieces. Do not chop your greens. However, if you use romaine as your primary green, please cut out the thick stem that runs through the middle of each leaf. That should be done with a knife.

Once your greens are washed, spun and reduced to their desire size, dump them into your salad bowl. Make sure the bowl is a large one. Since my salads include lots of ingredients I like a large bowl so those ingredients don't fly on the table when I'm tossing them.

My favorite fresh salad ingredients besides greens are onions, red peppers, carrots, cucumbers and celery. Onions should be thinly sliced rings from a sweet red onion, or one or two chopped scallions (green onions). Red peppers should be roasted. This is a trick I learned from my wife. Cut the pepper in half, remove the seeds, then set the halves (skin side down) on top of the burners of my gas stove. Turn the burners on high flame and roast the peppers. As soon on the skin is black all over, take the halves off the burners and wash under cold water in the sink. The burnt skin will wash right off. Chop the roasted peppers into strips and throw into the salad bowl. Roasted red peppers are far tastier than raw ones.

Carrots should be grated, not sliced--and don't use more than one full-sized carrot in the salad. As far as the cucumbers, peal them, then run a dinner fork lengthwise across the outside. Your slices will be "scored" on the outside, kind of like a coin. I don't know why, but scored cucumber slices taste better to me. Finally, celery should be thinly chopped.

As far as non-fresh ingredients, keep them at a minimum. As much as I like croutons and pita chips in my salads (think fatoush), they invariably get soggy, so I typically don't use. Not big on nuts, seeds, or dried fruits in my salad either. Oh yes, and please no sprouts. But cheese, go for it! You can never have too much cheese in your diet.

I prefer cubes of goat cheese (feta is fine) or the baby mozzarella balls that are packed in olive oil--those will work in my salads. But I won't use grated cheddar, reminds me too much of tacos.

I also like marintated veggies in my salads for extra flavor. These could include sundried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, chopped hearts of palm, and even chopped olives (black or green). Finally, a chopped hard boiled egg is also welcome.

Once you have thrown all the ingredients into the salad bowl, time for the dressing. I have a homemade dressing that I make almost every day. We call it "Lemony Snicket", like the silly children's books. The ingredients are simple--one part fresh lemon juice (can substitute lime juice or bottled lemon juice), two parts extra virgin olive oil, kosher salt, ground black pepper and garlic powder to taste. I usually substitute Adobo (which is a Latin American spice found in most supermarkets) for the pepper, garlic powder and some of the salt. Mix those ingredients well. Fiddle with the amount of the ingredients you use in your dressing until you like the taste and the amount is sufficient for the size of your salad. Dress the salad immediately before eating. Otherwise the dish might get soggy, which for me is the undoing of an otherwise delicious salad.

I never tire of eating this dinner salad. And, while I can't say the salad has promoted my weight loss, I can say it is consistently voted one of the favorite dishes at dinner time in the Piecuch home, which, if you've eaten a meal with us, is saying a lot.

Bon Appetit!