Ashley's Sun-Dried Tomato Caesar Salad -- The Garden in a Jar, the Summer on a Plate

Week 239. Garden at peak production, canning marathon with Mason, forty jars of preserved summer

The kitchen continues its work. Every week, the stove is lit and the meals are made and the family gathers at the table — a table that now holds four people, two dogs, and the accumulated weight of six years of cooking through everything life has thrown at this family. The table holds. It always holds.

The rhythm of this life — Tom\'s morning coffee, my evening cooking, Mason\'s questions, Lily\'s horses, Hank\'s slow decline, the garden\'s steady production — is the rhythm I chose. Not the rhythm I was given. Cancer gave me a different rhythm: infusion, crash, recover, repeat. Divorce gave another: manage, endure, rebuild, repeat. But this rhythm — cook, eat, love, repeat — this one I chose. This one I built. And it plays in the kitchen every night, the same song with new verses, the same recipe with small variations, the same life getting better by degrees so small you only notice them when you look back and see how far you\'ve come.

I made food this week that reflects where I am: canned tomatoes, salsa, preserves. The food is the evidence. The food is always the evidence — of who I am, of what I\'ve survived, of the people I feed and the love I put on plates. The recipe is the record. The kitchen is the archive. And I am the cook, standing at the stove, stirring, waiting, serving, and beginning again tomorrow.

After two days of canning — forty jars lined up on the counter, Mason asking questions the whole time, the kitchen smelling of vinegar and basil and everything summer has to give — I didn’t want to cook another big meal. I wanted something that honored the tomatoes without turning on the stove again. Ashley’s Sun-Dried Tomato Caesar was exactly that: a way to keep the garden on the table, keep the season present, without another marathon. Some nights the evidence of love is forty jars. Some nights it’s just a beautiful bowl of salad.

Ashley’s Sun-Dried Tomato Caesar Salad

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 0 min | Total Time: 15 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 2 large heads romaine lettuce, chopped
• 1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes in oil, drained and roughly chopped
• 1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for serving
• 1 cup plain croutons
• 3 tablespoons oil from the sun-dried tomato jar
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Make the dressing. In a small bowl or jar, whisk together the sun-dried tomato oil, lemon juice, Dijon mustard, minced garlic, and Worcestershire sauce until emulsified. Season with salt and pepper.
2. Prep the greens. Wash and thoroughly dry the romaine lettuce. Chop into bite-sized pieces and place in a large salad bowl.
3. Add the tomatoes. Scatter the chopped sun-dried tomatoes evenly over the romaine.
4. Dress the salad. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and toss well to coat every leaf.
5. Finish and serve. Top with grated Parmesan and croutons. Add an extra crack of black pepper and serve immediately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 210 | Protein: 7g | Fat: 13g | Carbs: 17g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 390mg