Food Fight: Esme vs Goat Cheese Salad

Esme and goat cheese used to be tight. Like a daily lunch date tight. BFF’s. Then one day it was over. She kicked goat cheese to the curb and it did not look back. As for salad – “green stuff” in her own words – well, it’s always been a non-starter. Which really kills me as there are so many meals I’d be making right now that are salad based if I knew Esme would just try a bit of lettuce. So, when I proposed a lunch of salad with goat cheese as kind of a challenge to see if we could make friends with these ingredients I thought Esme would turn me down cold. But for whatever reason, she was game. I thought it would help to sweeten the deal by adding a favourite to the meal, so I also made grilled cheese with a side of ketchup.

Get ready to rumble!

In this corner, weighing 32 pounds, The Terror of Trinity Bellwoods, Esme “The Beast” Rahn!

And in this corner, weighing, Gosh, I don’t know, maybe 200 grams, The Green Goddess, a simple green salad with tomatoes, cucumber, avocado and the dreaded goat cheese!

Mixed in with the chopped Campari tomatoes from the grocery store were a few cherry tomatoes from Esme’s plant on our deck. I made a big deal of asking her to collect some for lunch, oohing and ahhing over how they were really going to make the salad great. I made a vinagrette with olive oil, red wine vinegar, a bit of dijon mustard and I also put out a nice store bought yogurt Ranch dressing we have. Esme would touch neither.

Round 1 belonged to Esme. Although she admitted that her lunch looked very pretty, she bobbed and weaved around her opponent by drinking most of her milk and digging into her grilled cheese (not the crusts, of course). The ref – that’s me – stepped in and reminded her there was a popsicle waiting in the freezer for anyone who ate their salad.

Round 2 went to lettuce! I realized I should have torn the lettuce into smaller pieces for her. Because she’s not a salad eater she didn’t quite know how to manage getting it on her fork. Once the pieces were cut up she got some in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully. I can’t say she ate it with relish but there were no faces, no spitting it out, no “yucks”. Success!

Round 3 was all Esme. Even a speck of goat cheese touching a chunk of avocado meant she wouldn’t eat it. When some did get onto a bit of tomato it got ejected with a wail of, “I DON’T LIKE GOAT CHEESE!”

Although it was a points win for Esme, I feel like the fact that lettuce can make it’s way back to our table was a knock out.