Oui! J’aime Mandy’s Gourmet Salads!

Mandy’s Gourmet Salads by Mandy Wolfe, Rebecca Wolfe and Meredith Erickson

Cookbook Type: Healthy, Salad, Quebecois

Favourite Recipe: Tumeric Tahini Dressing (pg 157) and Fancy Pants Niçoise Salad (pg 72-73)

Favourite Page: Montreal Travel Tip (pg 136)

Favourite Quote: “when you have more than you need, you build a longer table, not a higher fence” (pg 47)

Rating: 4/5 Larousse Gastronomiques (📕📕📕)

My biggest pet peeve - when Canadian books use American spelling. It’s COLOUR. Le sigh.

But let’s get over that. I had my first Mandy’s salad during my sisters bachelorette party, mid-summer, during a hotter than hot day (we stood in the shade of the neighbouring store’s alcove while we waited) last year. And it was fabulous. But I owned the cookbook before I ever tasted that marvellous dressing and eloquently mixed combo of crunch and freshness and umami and lusciousness that you crave in a salad but so rarely get. However, having that book early meant I had delved into some of the Mandy recipes already, so I had high expectations.

When I say that a cookbook tells a story, this is what I am talking about. Through the pages of Mandy’s Gourmet Salads we learn about the Wolfe Family, and the lives they have touched. We learn about the unique Quebecois culture. We feel European influence. But it’s also just a lot of fun! The salads are gourmet and they are plentiful. The dressings are rich and yet super simple.

This is a cookbook that inspires readers to just go off and make a salad with whatever is in the kitchen, and it emboldens us to be our creative selves as we toss, dress, and devour.

Get your copy of Mandy’s Gourmet Salads here.