Fresh Greens are In

Veggies as lushly green as the Malayan rain forest.

Before my family converted to Christianity, we’d frequent the Chinese temples for ancestral worship. And that was culminated by a vegetarian lunch on temple grounds. And I was always amazed by the variations of vegetarian mock meats on the nuns’ menu. Delicious though they were, I’ve always had a preference for the honesty of a traditional vegetable dish.

So in my kitchen, I ensure the dominant green showcases its dominant taste. This is one principle I apply to all my fresh and cooked salads. Hence, the anchovies play a secondary role seasoning my cauliflower dish, as the slivers of almonds do in the way I dish out my broccoli.

In a raw apple slaw, the spritely green koo chye serves only to enhance the flavours of the finely chopped cabbage. And the spring onions are only added into a serve of Asian greens for the sole purpose of highlighting the contrasting crunch of the blanched snow peas swimming daintily in a sprinkling of fragrantly light soy sauce.

Even when King Island blue cheese is added to a refreshing rocket and Peckham pear salad, its prime presence is to sharply define their abundance of distinct flavours, when dress with extra virgin olive oil and coyly aged balsamic vinegar.

And that is the crux of this message: the authentic flavours of garden fresh greens deserve to be showcased. Over powering them with too many added ingredients does them a grave injustice, for the fresh greens are in.