Veggie Chopped Salad

The routine bloodwork came back this week, and the doctor sat me down with the face that doctors get when they have news you're not going to like. Dr. Patterson is a good man — young, thorough, the kind of doctor who looks you in the eye when he delivers bad news because he believes you deserve to see his face when he says it. He said it: type 2 diabetes.

The numbers are not terrible. They're not great, but they're not terrible. The A1C is 7.2, which is above the threshold but not dramatically above. The fasting glucose is elevated. The doctor says it's been developing for years — the blood pressure, the weight, the family history (Daddy had it too, though we didn't call it diabetes in his day, we called it "sugar" and treated it with willpower and prayer, neither of which is an FDA-approved medication).

I am furious. Not at the diagnosis — at myself. I spent six years cooking heart-healthy for Earl. I cut his salt. I hid vegetables in his cornbread. I reduced the butter (or told him I did). I monitored his diet with the precision of a NASA engineer. And in all that time, I never applied the same discipline to myself. I fed him the healthy food and I ate the regular food and I put butter in my grits and lard in my greens and sugar in my tea and I told myself I was fine because I was the one doing the cooking, and the cook never gets sick. The cook is invincible. The cook is the one who feeds everyone else and somehow doesn't need to feed herself carefully.

The cook is wrong. The cook has diabetes.

Kayla, naturally, has already mobilized. She came over the same evening with a blood glucose monitor, a pamphlet on diabetic nutrition (which I read and which made me want to cry because it suggests reducing butter and sugar and white rice and cornbread, which is basically suggesting I stop being Dot Henderson), and a plan. The plan involves: monitoring my blood sugar daily, adjusting my recipes, increasing vegetables, reducing simple carbohydrates, and taking metformin, which is a pill that Dr. Patterson prescribed and which I will take because I am not going to fight both the doctor and the granddaughter who is a charge nurse. I will fight one or the other, but not both at the same time.

Made dinner tonight: grilled chicken with roasted vegetables and brown rice. Not white rice. Brown rice. The rice that tastes like cardboard that went to college and got a health degree. I ate it. I did not enjoy it. I will learn to enjoy it. I will learn because I have a great-grandchild on the way and I intend to be alive to feed him, and if that means brown rice, then brown rice it is. But I am not happy about it, and the brown rice should know that.

Now go on and feed somebody. Healthy. Feed them healthy.

If I’m going to do this — and I am going to do this, because Kayla will not let me not do this, and because there is a great-grandchild on the way who deserves a living great-grandmother — then I’m going to do it with food that at least has the decency to be colorful. This Veggie Chopped Salad is the kind of thing I would have served alongside something less virtuous in a former life, but right now it’s earning a place at the center of the plate: crunchy, fresh, full of fiber, and honest in a way I haven’t always been with myself. The cook is learning. The cook is eating her vegetables.

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 0 min | Total Time: 20 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 small head romaine lettuce, chopped
1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
1 cup cucumber, diced (about 1 medium cucumber)
1 cup canned chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup red bell pepper, diced
1/2 cup yellow bell pepper, diced
1/2 cup red onion, finely diced
1/2 cup Kalamata olives, halved
1/3 cup crumbled feta cheese
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 small garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
Salt and black pepper to taste

Instructions

Make the dressing. In a small bowl or jar, whisk together the olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, minced garlic, oregano, salt, and pepper until well combined. Set aside.
Prep the vegetables. Chop the romaine, dice the cucumbers and bell peppers, halve the cherry tomatoes and olives, and finely dice the red onion. Rinse and drain the chickpeas thoroughly.
Combine the salad. In a large bowl, combine the romaine, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, chickpeas, red and yellow bell pepper, red onion, and olives. Toss gently to distribute evenly.
Dress and finish. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss well to coat. Top with crumbled feta and fresh parsley. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.
Serve. Serve immediately as a main or alongside grilled chicken. The salad holds well for up to one day if dressing is stored separately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Veggie Chopped Salad — Learning to Feed Myself Right