Avacado, Date and Sun Dried Tomato Salad w/ Grapefruit Balsamic Reduction

Well folks, it's salad time again. I have a bit of a sweet tooth so I enjoy sweet bits in my salad. I was having a late-night refrigerator raid last night when I stumbled upon some medjool dates that I completely forgot that I had. Happiness set in quite rapidly when I decided to create a salad today with those delicious little morsels of sweet-tooth heaven. For the past week I've had the hankering to create a funky balsamic reduction as well. So I did... and now I present it to you. I wanted to incorporate the full spectrum of tastes in this dish. There are sweet, bitter, sour, salty and savoury elements to this salad. I hope you enjoy it. Serves 2-3 people.

Ingredients

Balsamic Reduction:

1 cup Balsamic Vinegar of Modena

1 cup juice of ruby red grapefruit (freshly squeezed)

1 tablespoon of sugar (don't like sweet reductions? then don't add sugar)

Salad:

1 head of Green or Red leaf lettuce (Romaine would work as well)

1 ripe avacado

6-7 strips of sun dried tomato

2 medjool dates

salt and pepper

2 tsp lemon juice

2 tsp olive oil

Directions

Balsamic Reduction:

1) Put balsamic vinegar, grapefruit juice, and sugar in a medium saucepan. Whisk ingredients together and bring to a boil. Immediately turn to medium heat and whisk frequently. (Warning: do not put your head over the pot to inhale the vinegary fumes, I learned the hard way. Made my eyes bulge and start watering).

2) Reduce the mixture by about 75% or until it coats the back of a spoon like a light syrup. Take off heat, transfer to bowl, let cool to room temperature and then refrigerate until needed.

Salad:

1) If using dry sun-dried tomatoes, reconstitute them by soaking them in a bowl with warm water for 20-30 minutes before salad preparation. If using jarred sun-dried tomatoes in oil or brine, simply rinse the pieces.
 
2) Pit and cut up the avocado into 1/8 inch cubes and put into bowl. Pit and cut up the medjool dates into thin slices and put into bowl. Finely chop the pieces of sun-dried tomatoes and put into bowl. Add 1 tsp of lemon juice and a pinch of salt and mix well. Set aside.

3) Using a salad spinner, tear lettuce into bite size pieces, rinse and spin dry (if you don't dry the lettuce, the dressing will not stick to it). Put into bowl.

4) In another small bowl, whisk together olive oil and 3 tablespoons of the balsamic reduction. Pour over the salad, season with salt and pepper, and toss.Try a piece, if it's not flavoured enough, drizzle on more balsamic reduction and toss again. Plate the dressed lettuce.

5) After another quick mix of the avocado mixture, top the lettuce with it. If you'd like, drizzle a small amount of the reduction over top of the whole thing.

6) Enjoy!!



So, there you have it. My avocado, date and sun-dried tomato salad. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the medjool dates tasted a bit like candied pecans. I personally don't care much for the crunchy pecans in salads but I do like the flavour so this worked beautifully. I hope somebody who reads this will try to make it and give me some feedback. I liked it but I felt as if there could have been 1 more element added that would have made it a bit more well-rounded. If someone does try it out, please let me know your thoughts. 

Cheers!!