Variegated Radicchio

Some of the chicories I am growing are from a mixed pack of seeds, so I have quite a variety of different ones. This one that I picked a couple of days ago was a combination of cream, green and red colours, in a very striking speckly variegated pattern. The outer leaves were quite green:-



Gently prising it apart, I saw that the inner leaves were mottled cream-on-red on the outside, but plain red on the inside.

It is normal to discard the outer leaves, which can be a bit tough, but you are still left with lots of useable inner leaves.

This has to be one of the most attractive salad ingredients ever!

Here's some of the Radicchio teamed-up with Lettuce and two different types of Endive to make a really colourful plateful...

A few crispy croutons drizzled with some of my home-made chilli oil might be nice...

In retrospect, I wish now that I had had a few bright orange Nasturtium flowers to garnish this salad with, but hey-ho, it is December after all...

I know that many people wouldn't consider eating a salad without a dressing, so I'm going to recommend one that I think would go really well with this particular salad. I propose cooking some smoked bacon lardons in a frying-pan until crispy, de-glazing the pan with a generous splash of red wine vinegar, and then pouring the whole lot - lardons, rendered bacon fat, vinegar -  over the salad. And of course it needs to be eaten immediately , before the leaves wilt too much!