I imagine it's like scoring 100% on your math test but then coming home to an empty house and a fridge with no more magnet space. Or tearing open an acceptance letter in front of nobody. Finding out you've won anything in the middle of nowhere. It's like when I artfully put together a a salad so delicious but no one is home to taste it, ugh!, I want to run outside with no shoes on and yell up and down the block for anyone - "You, walking that dog!" - to get inside, sit down, and take a plate. While I have no problem taking myself out to dinner and eating whatever the handsome bartender tells me to order, I could care less if someone is there to enjoy it with me. But when I'm home on a Tuesday night, alone, sighing and throwing together what I think might not be such a great dinner but then all of a sudden is the greatest dinner, I actually catch myself wishing my parents weren't in New Orleans just so they could be home on Sackett Street eating this salad.

This salad. This salad is for the books.

It's a poppy seed dressing without the poppy seeds if that makes any sense. Everything but. We've got some oil, lemon juice, honey, dijon, and a shallot. My only advice is to go easy on the honey because this goo got sweet fast. Two tablespoons honey and you're good. The salad part is chopped iceberg, chopped pear, chopped pecans, dried cranberries, broken pita chips, and some avocado.

Mix it altogether and whaddya get? Ding dong, hot dog?

No. You get salad. Really. good. salad.