Charm City Cook’s Strawberry Salad with Mustardy Vinaigrette

by Kerry Flanagan, Manager of Community Engagement and Support, TasteWise Kids

This contributor to our #NationalSaladMonth needs no introduction, but we’ll try anyway…

Amy Langrehr of Charm City Cook always has her finger on the pulse of the food, farm and restaurant world in the greater Baltimore area – and if that wasn’t enough, she also creates delicious recipes in her own kitchen, including this one in celebration of #NationalSaladMonth!

Fresh strawberries and lots of delicious textures and components from the market to please young and mature palates alike – fruit in salad is almost sure to be hit with kiddos more likely to tend towards sweet things, and fresh peas are such a new treat for those that have likely only have frozen.

Says Amy of her Farmers Market/Ina Garten inspired salad:

Spring and summer are prime time for salads with fresh, local ingredients. That first weekend when you spy rows of boxes filled with ripe, red strawberries, it’s the best. You can’t help but buy some – and if you’re like me, they’re gone before you know it. And, as fantastic as eating strawberries on their own is, if you want a really delicious salad with a little bit of sweetness, save a few! Also be sure to store them properly, too. In an airtight container with a flat bottom, add a paper (or cloth) towel and gently place the berries in a single layer in the container. Important bit: do not wash your strawberries until you plan to use/eat them.

Now, this kind of salad lets you be creative and also use ingredients you like to make it your own. On the day I bought my strawberries, it was also the first week of fresh peas at the market. Farmer Tom McCarthy (at Waverly on Saturday and JFX on Sunday) is famous for his fresh shelled peas – just look for the long line and get in that long line. It’s worth a short wait. And, his strawberries are always fantastic, too, so get those from him, too. Needless to say, I bought a few pounds of peas, thinking they’d go nicely in my salad and also in pasta with asparagus and mint, sautéed with butter and more.

For this salad, I also added some red skinned peanuts for texture and thinly sliced radishes for a little bite.

Thanks so much for sharing Amy – we can’t wait to try this farmers market fresh salad in our own kitchens!

Throughout the month of May, we are hoping to spread the salad love, and are raising funds for our salad kit program, an integral piece of our Days of Taste program which allows students to bring their newfound food and nutrition learning home to their families. Give a salad kit to a student and their family here.