Sugar Snap Pea Salad with Radishes, Mint and Ricotta Salata

Planning out our menus around our CSA produce can get a little exhausting.  First of all, there is always at least one crucial ingredient for every recipe that we are missing, which requires a trip to the grocery store.  We have so much produce, but as we are trying not to buy anymore produce from the grocery store we are inevitably missing a crucial herb or something else.  For instance, we had everything for this recipe - the radishes, the mint, and the sugar snap peas were all from the CSA - except for the ricotta salata.  We probably have 10 types of cheese in the fridge right now, just not ricotta salata.  Bummer.  But considering this recipe is using up so much of our CSA produce I can't complain too much.

We served our Sugar Snap Pea Salad with some wild king salmon that we prepared using Tyler Florence's Salt and Pepper Salmon recipe - which incidentally is one of my absolute favorite ways to simply prepare a nice piece of salmon.  And it was a fabulous meal.  I loved the salad - it was so fresh and seasonal - and it paired wonderfully with the salmon.  I always like sugar snap peas, but the combination of the sugar snap peas, radishes, mint and ricotta salata just blew me away.  What a wonderful summer dinner.

Recipe after the jump!

Sugar Snap Pea Salad With Radishes, Mint and Ricotta Salata

NY Times

INGREDIENTS:

3/4 cup sliced radishes

4 ounces sugar snap peas, sliced (about 1 1/4 cups)

4 ounces ricotta salata, crumbled (about 1 cup)

1/2 bunch mint leaves, torn (about 1/3 cup)

1 clove garlic, minced

Pinch kosher salt, more to taste

1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Freshly ground black pepper to taste.

In a large bowl, toss together the radishes, peas, ricotta and mint. Using a knife or a mortar and pestle, make a paste of the garlic and salt. Place in a small bowl and add the lemon juice and balsamic vinegar and stir well to combine. Drizzle in the olive oil, stirring constantly, and add pepper to taste. Pour dressing over salad and toss well to combine. Taste and add more salt and pepper if necessary.

Serve.