Fun Summer "Roulades" - an Ascension Kitchen Recipe (vegan & gluten-free)

It's August, the height of summer, and temperatures around Europe keep trying to reach - or exceed - average body temperatures. Those are the days when you want to eat something fresh and light ~ and here is the perfect recipe: fresh, light, crunchy, easy to make, and fun to eat:

Fun Summer Roulades ~ carrots, lettuce, tomatoes, and stab 'em

The Fun Summer "Roulades", a Kitchen Adventure that turned out perfectly.

Here's what you need to make them:

1 head of iceberg lettuce

3 - 4 carrots (depending on size)

big chunk of ginger

200g cooked chickpeas

two handfuls of mini tomatoes, e.g. plum tomatoes

two handfuls of (chopped) walnuts

oil, e.g. sesame

vinegar, e.g. apple cider

salt & pepper

And this is how you make them:

Step One:

If you use chickpeas from a jar or can, drain and rinse them first, then set them aside to drip dry a bit.

Step Two:

Finely grate carrots into a nice big mixing bowl.

Step Three:

Wash your tomatoes, chop them into chickpea-sized pieces, and mix with the carrots.

Step Four:

Peel your ginger ~ how much you use is up to you, really, and how ginger-y you want the whole thing to be. Mine was about 2.5 cm (roughly 1.5 inches, I believe).

Finely grate ginger, either directly into the mixing bowl, or onto a small plate & then mix mix with carrots later.

Step Five:

Chop your walnuts or break them into chickpea-sized pieces. Add to bowl.

Step Six:

Add chickpeas and mix all together.

Step Seven:

Add oil and vinegar directly into the bow - about 5 tablespoons oil and 2 1/2 tablespoons vinegar. Of course, that depends on how much carrot you have - you want the whole salad nicely coated, but not swimming in oil (or vinegar).

Season with salt & pepper to taste.

Step Eight:

Carefully peel off a few leaves from the lettuce and wash them. Shake or pat them try with a towel.

Step Nine:

The fun begins! Put a leaf on a plate; it will likely want to curl up in some way. That's great! In the bowl of the curl, put 2 - 3 tablespoons of the carrot salad, then carefully roll / wrap the leaf around the salad.

Bear in mind, we're not going for pretty or aesthetic here. You want a nice little wrapped bundle, that keeps the salad inside. That's all!

Step Ten:

Stap it. Erm, I mean, put a toothpick through the lettuce to keep your little roulade closed. Works best if you can place the toothpick through the crunchy leaf-stem first - that adds stability - before you go through the other layers.

Repeat with as many leaves as you want to eat in one go. I found three the perfect meal size for one person.

And yeah, that's it, really. Repeat it the next day, for your next meal ~ or use up all lettuce and salad and put your roulades in a container in the fridge.

Depending on how juicy your salad is, that might soak the lettuce a bit. So it won't be as crunchy and a little more messy to eat. Up to you!

This keeps well in the fridge for a few days - like, for example, a weekend, where you're doing an online Ascension Summit from Friday to Sunday and want something like and quick to eat during breaks.

Eat with your fingers and yes, depending on how securely you stabbed your roulade, this can get a bit messy. But it's summer, so messy must be allowed.

(Sure, you can eat them with fork and knife. But come on! Where's the fun in that?)

Also, eating with your fingers? Beautiful excercise in mindful eating ~ otherwise you will stab yourself in the nose with the end of the toothpick! 😆

Enjoy and have a little bit of creative summer fun (adventures in the kitchen)! ❤️