For more information on the GodLuck Club, visit their website
godluck.org.

For more information on Great Light Tao, visit their website
taopractice.org

"Knowing others is wisdom;
Knowing the self is enlightenment."

-Lao Tze

GodLuck Salad

Religion, Faith, Spirituality, and Philosophy were the honored guests at last night's GodLuck Club. It was my first time attending this friendly group and I was welcomed right into their lives and to their table. The goal of GodLuck is the exploration of world religions by inviting representatives from different faiths to share the concepts, philosophy, theology, rituals, and (sometimes) rules, associated with that particular practice, while providing a welcoming and open space for the group to share their own religious upbringing and spiritual journeys and most importantly, to ask questions. Oh, and I forgot to mention the FOOD! Apparently the jug of coffee I ingested this morning has not been able to clear the fog from my brain. Everyone brings a dish, providing the (pot)luck of the evening, which reflects the theme of the discussion.
Last night was Taoism (say "DOWism") and a vegetarian dish was requested for the table. So, what does this once vegetarian, vegan, macrobiotic, turned everytarian make to satisfy a group of hungry spiritual seekers?
Salad. I guess.
I wanted to be clever and put a spin on the traditional cranberry, goat cheese, nut, and greens combo that's been so overdone...so I made a leap of faith and switched it up to Blueberries, Blue Cheese, Pears, Candied Walnuts, and greens. Whoo hoo. Way to mix it up Linnea. I was inspired by the GodLuck's new logo that has blue bits of inspiration in the branches and so my intention was to follow that lead and hopefully not overdo the whole "blue" thing.

Here's my recipe:

Ingredients: Organic Baby Spring Mix Crumbled Salem Blue Cheese Candied Walnuts Dried Wild Blueberries Dianjou Pears (sliced) Champagne Pear Vinaigrette (all from Trader Joes)

This is very difficult to make. Only the truly enlightened chef can master this salad. The discipline requires patience (to rip open those stubborn bags of salad), virtue (to wash your hands after handling the bleu cheese-ew), training (to use your last clean steak knife cautiously to slice the pears), and finally curiosity as you open the bottle of salad dressing. This all takes no less than twenty seconds.

Hey Felena! That's two recipes in a row for six ingredients or less! I'm on a roll.

Savory Scallops with Polenta & Spinach

This recipe is for Felena. Busy girl that she is, she proudly announced in her kitchen to me not long ago that a recipe for her needs to be "six ingredients or less!". It was a veiled threat to all those overly complicated creations presented every so carefully and colorfully by our friends Martha, Giadda, and Jacque with the magical assistance of television. All those ingredients already chopped aren't making life easier on a Wednesday night-the person who washed, chopped, and left it out for our above beloved chefs is really the savior (or the grande saboteur depending on how you look at this).
So, to all of you who can't abide more complication in your life or to those who only have six ingredients in their entire fridge...this one's for you!

Ingredients:
1. Scallops (dust with sea salt, ground pepper, and red pepper flakes)
2. Spinach
3. Polenta (I like the prepackaged kind from Trader Joes)
4. Lime
5. Cilantro (finely chopped)
6. Tapatio

Score your fresh or thawed scallops and dust with salt and pepper to taste. Saute spinach in Olive Oil. Warm sliced polenta either in the oven or in a saute pan until lightly browned. With all that done, now saute your scallops. I used a medium heat and only for a few minutes because I like eating scallops, not white chunks of tire tread. At the very end of your cooking, squeeze lime into your scallop pan.
To plate, arrange a small flat round of spinach, then a slice of your polenta, and then place your delightfully done scallop on top. Sprinkle the creation with some cilantro and dab some tapatio on the plate to trick your family and friends into thinking this is a five star restaurant creation!

Field Salad with Garbanzos and Feta

Finally! I have my new camera. Sigh (BIG).
Sorry, folks if you were concerned that you would have to stare at poorly colored Easter Eggs for the next few months. My point and shoot digital camera died a long and painful death and it took me waaay too long to replace it's worthless 7 mega pixel carcass. But, as I've been told my whole life, be patient, and the right...(camera)....will come along. And it did. Please welcome the Nikon D60 to the table and strap on your forks, plates, and of course wine glasses because this thing is going to be stepping up the bar for Savvy Cuisine and taking shots all over the place. Actually, I think it's focusing on me first and proving that I'm a complete amateur at photography, but it does it in such a nice, convenient, and professional way that I don't even care. This camera can walk all over me and I'm still going to sing it's praises and carry it everywhere I go (sending my poor friends scattering for fear of evidence being collected against them).

So, after a few hideous and random shots of furniture and the cat for the past couple of weeks, I finally tried food yesterday. I had journeyed out to The Vegetable Stand and after an obscenely long contemplation of how to spend the $2 I had with me, I finally grabbed a delicious and fluffy head of chicory lettuce. They were so nice at the stand, they rewarded me with a juicy red strawberry and it made me forget that white Range Rover that had chased my poor Volkswagen'
s bumper all through the windy roads of Del Mar to get to this place.
So, I arrived home, starving, and still a bit chased and hot from my drive so I dove right in to preparing myself a small salad feast for my lunch.

Ingredients:
A few leaves of Chicory, torn and washed
A sprinkle of Organic* Garbanzo Beans
What I had left of the crumbled Feta Cheese (from Trader Joes)
Four basil leaves (chiffonade)
1/4 of an avocado
1/2 of a Roma tomato

Dressing:
OK. I was lazy, hot, hungry, and tired. Not trying to squelch calories, but this works if you are trying to cut back.
A drizzle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
A squeeze of a 1/4 lemon
Sprinkle of Sea Salt
Cracked Black Pepper

I topped off the feast with a glass of dry Riesling (I love working for myself), sourdough baguette and Port Salut. You could do this salad on a much bigger scale and serve it family style. I recommend NOT using the dregs of your feta cheese container like I did though.