Jicama (He-ca-ma).

I recently saw jicama described as a cross between an apple and a potato. I’m not sure that makes it sound appetizing, but it does have the texture of something like that. The flavor is a bit reminiscent of mild apple. Bottom line, it is sweet and crunchy.

In 1985, California Pizza Kitchen’s first location opened in Beverly Hills. I think it was a bit later as they rapidly opened other locations, that I had my first CPK pizza. I don’t know that they were the first place to offer wood-fired specialty pizzas, but it was certainly my first experience and I was hooked. I can’t remember my favorite but somewhere along the line I had their Barbeque Chicken Chopped Salad and that was that.

Although I wasn’t making near as much from scratch as I do now, I had discovered the pleasure of good ingredients and of experimenting with the variety of fresh fruit and vegetables available in California markets. The menu noted that jicama was in the salad and by process of elimination, I knew it to be the small, white cubes of sweet crunchiness.

I relied on CPK visits to meet my cravings for Barbeque Chicken Chopped Salad until I left California.

I think I’ve made a version of the salad off and on but nothing like this weekend’s which was a rousing success!

From the tortilla strips made from my own homemade tortillas to a homemade barbecue sauce based on Simply Scratch’s Homemade Barbecue Sauce Recipe to my own homemade mayonnaise & buttermilk herb dressing…

Everything fresh.

The original recipe uses a mix of romaine and iceberg, but I had “just out of the ground” spring lettuces from the Bigfork Farmer’s Market.

My salad looks a lot greener than CPK’s, but taste-wise I had no complaints and had to stop myself from a THIRD helping!

It was an excellent salad. It was better than my memory of the CPK version. It will be made again!

And contrary to the forecasts, our weather has been more blue sky and sunny than cool and rainy.

They keep saying this will change and typically it is cool and rainy for Memorial Day. But until it does, Bob, Bear and I have been outside whenever possible.