Our wife has gotten herself into a real bind—a pickle, a predicament. We’re not talking about marriage. Well, perhaps, that too. Instead, she’s in a culinary catch 20-20. She’ll make something fabulous. Walking by, we’ll exclaim, “That’s gorgeous. Let’s take a photo”, which we’ll proceed to do. If the food was hot, it becomes cold. If it started cold, the meal nevertheless gets delayed. Sometime later, we’ll show her the photo, praise her for how delicious it was, and then demand that she jot down the recipe so that we can publish it. (G@H, though launched while we were single, has become a collaborative project.)

This process, which repeats on a loop within our household, displeases her. She finds it tedious, bothersome. However, our wife is an excellent wife, and more often than not, she obliges. We enjoyed this Mediterranean salad a few weeks ago. Back then, we pulled the tomatoes out of our backyard garden. Very fresh. After an early, hard freeze, that’s no longer possible.

We covet comfort food as much as the next guy. Buffalo wings. Mac and cheese. BBQ. We’ve never met a chicken fried steak that we didn’t like. That’s actually untrue. Have you ever ordered takeout chicken fried steak? We had a poor experience. The restaurant put the chicken fried steak in a Styrofoam container, poured the gravy on top of the steak, and wrapped the container in plastic wrap. Between condensation and the gravy, our chicken fried steak came out soggy, which is the opposite of crispy, which is how a chicken fried steak needs to be. We have a theory about the narrow scope of foods suitable for takeout or delivery. But that theory will wait for another day. We digress.

Despite our love of comfort food, we’ve come to appreciate how delicious and pleasing healthy food can be. This bowl full of vine-ripened, succulent tomato and fresh, crisp cucumber, bell pepper, and red onion and briny, tangy feta tossed in sumptuous olive oil and balsamic vinegar is as satisfying as any meal. That it nourishes us while not clogging our arteries serves merely as an added benefit.

We would’ve written about the salad sooner, but our wife just gave us the recipe. And, frankly, she didn’t exert a super effort. She didn’t even specify the quantity of each ingredient. That normally would create problems for us. But, this is a salad. A very quick and simple salad. It’s not rocket-science. Use the quantity and ratio of ingredients that make sense to you.