Kale and Brussels Sprouts Salad with Tahini-Maple Dressing

The summer reading program wraps up across all six branches this week. Total completion: 1,312 children finished the challenge, which is a 23% increase over last year and which I reported to the county commissioners with the particular satisfaction of a woman who has data and knows how to use it. Libraries are not luxuries. They are factories of literate citizens. The data proves it. The commissioners nodded and wrote notes. Whether the notes will translate to budget increases remains to be seen, but the arguing is the thing, and the arguing I do well.

James starts his senior year in two weeks. The college applications are ready to submit — College of Charleston, USC, and Emory. He is leaning toward staying in Charleston, which Robert interprets as lack of ambition and which I interpret as self-knowledge. James knows who he is. He is a Lowcountry boy, a reader, a debater, a person whose roots run deep into this soil. Leaving would uproot him, and some people transplant beautifully and some don't. I left Beaufort for Charleston, which is a thirty-mile transplant, and it was enough to make me who I am. James may need more distance. He may need less. The decision is his.

Carrie is preparing for her sophomore year with the focused intensity she brings to everything. She has already read the assigned books for her English class and has opinions about all of them, which she shared with me at the kitchen table on Tuesday with the rapid-fire delivery of someone who has been composing arguments in her head all summer and has finally found an audience.

I drove to Beaufort on Saturday. The visit was difficult. Mama had left the stove on overnight — the burner on low, under an empty pot. The pot was scorched but the house was fine. I found it when I arrived Saturday morning. Mama didn't know it had been on. Joy was in the living room watching television, unaware. I turned off the burner and stood in the kitchen and felt the cold terror of what could have happened — a fire, an injury, the parsonage that held my childhood going up in flames — and I told myself: this is no longer a someday conversation. This is a now conversation.

I sat with Mama at the kitchen table and told her we needed to talk about Charleston. About moving. She said, "Not yet." I said, "Mama, the stove was on all night." She looked at the scorched pot and the empty burner and her face did something I'd never seen: it crumpled. Not with confusion but with recognition. She knew. She knew what the stove meant, and the knowing was worse than the forgetting, because the knowing carried shame, and Carolyn Simmons has never in her life been ashamed of anything that happened in her kitchen.

I held her hand and said, "After the holidays. We'll figure it out after the holidays." She nodded. I drove home and called Robert and said, "We need to make the guest room ready. Mama and Joy are coming to Charleston." He said, "When?" I said, "Soon."

I drove back to Charleston on Saturday evening and I did not cook dinner. I could not look at a burner. That scorched pot — empty, blackened, sitting on a cold stove that had been left on all night — had burned itself into my eyes in a way that had nothing to do with the pot and everything to do with what it meant, and what it meant was that time had shifted on me without my permission. So instead I stood at the cutting board and I shaved and I sliced and I massaged and I dressed, and I made this salad, which asks nothing of fire and gives back something steady and green and good, which was exactly what the evening required.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 20 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 large bunch lacinato (dinosaur) kale, stems removed, leaves very thinly sliced
12 oz Brussels sprouts, trimmed and shaved thin on a mandoline or with a sharp knife
1/3 cup dried cranberries
1/3 cup toasted sliced almonds
1/4 cup finely shaved Parmesan (optional)
1/4 tsp kosher salt, for massaging
For the dressing:
3 tbsp tahini
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice (about 1 large lemon)
1 tbsp pure maple syrup
1 small garlic clove, finely grated
2 tbsp olive oil
2–3 tbsp warm water, to thin
1/4 tsp kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Instructions

Massage the kale. Place sliced kale in a large bowl. Sprinkle with 1/4 tsp kosher salt and use your hands to massage firmly for 2–3 minutes until the leaves soften, darken, and reduce in volume by about half. This removes bitterness and makes the kale tender enough to eat raw.
Shave the Brussels sprouts. Using a sharp chef’s knife or mandoline, shave Brussels sprouts as thinly as possible. Add directly to the bowl with the massaged kale.
Make the dressing. In a small bowl or jar, whisk together tahini, lemon juice, maple syrup, grated garlic, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Add warm water one tablespoon at a time, whisking until the dressing is smooth and pourable — it should coat the back of a spoon but not be stiff.
Dress the salad. Pour dressing over the kale and Brussels sprouts and toss thoroughly to coat every leaf. Taste and adjust salt, lemon, or maple to your preference.
Add toppings and serve. Scatter cranberries, toasted almonds, and Parmesan (if using) over the top. Serve immediately, or let the salad sit for up to 30 minutes — it only gets better as the dressing soaks in.

Nutrition (per serving)

Kale and Brussels Sprouts Salad with Tahini-Maple Dressing — The Week I Couldn’t Face the Stove