By Week 384. Summer 2023. I am 40 years old and standing in my kitchen — the Bench house kitchen, the one that held cancer and divorce and cinnamon rolls — and the stove is on and something is cooking and the house smells like grilled food and garden herbs and this is my life. This is the life I built.
The garden is producing wildly, tomatoes by the pound, and I stood in it this week and thought about dirt and time and the way both of them turn nothing into something if you're patient enough.
Mason is 12 and reading everything he can find and examining the world under a microscope with the intensity of a tenured researcher.
Lily is 10 and riding horses with the fearlessness of someone who has never considered the possibility of falling.
I made caprese salad this week. The food continues. The food always continues. It is the thread that connects every week to every other week, every year to every other year, every version of me to every other version — the woman on the kitchen floor, the woman at the chemo recliner, the woman at the grill, the woman at the outdoor table under the string lights. All of them, connected by the food they made with their hands. All of them, me.
The garden kept giving tomatoes, and I kept finding ways to use them — but this week the simplest preparation felt like the most honest one. Israeli salad asks almost nothing of you: a sharp knife, good produce, a little olive oil, and the patience to let fresh things be fresh. After 384 weeks of cooking through every hard and beautiful thing this life has handed me, I think I’ve earned the right to keep it simple sometimes.
Israeli Salad
Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 0 min | Total Time: 15 min | Servings: 4
Ingredients
- 4 medium ripe tomatoes, diced small (about 2 cups)
- 2 Persian cucumbers or 1 English cucumber, diced small
- 1/2 small red onion, finely diced
- 1/4 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Dice the vegetables. Cut tomatoes, cucumbers, and red onion into small, uniform pieces — roughly 1/4-inch dice. Uniformity matters here; it makes every bite balanced.
- Combine. Add the diced tomatoes, cucumbers, and red onion to a large bowl. Add the chopped parsley and toss gently to distribute.
- Dress. Drizzle the olive oil and lemon juice over the vegetables. Season with salt and pepper. Toss until everything is evenly coated.
- Taste and rest. Adjust salt or lemon to your liking. Let the salad sit for 5 minutes before serving so the flavors come together. Serve at room temperature.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 115 | Protein: 1g | Fat: 10g | Carbs: 7g | Fiber: 2g | Sodium: 295mg