The Extreme Salad, inspired by Stephen Barstow, is becoming a new family meal time tradition.

Stephen Barstow

Stephen Barstow is the world record holder for making a salad with the most different varieties of plants. 537 different varieties of plants, all in one salad!!! That is inspiring. And, he lives in Norway near the arctic circle, and he grew nearly all 537 varieties of plants in his own garden!

Look here for more about Stephen Barstow.

The Extreme Salad

We are half through the year, and I am not yet at 537 different varieties of plants. But, I think that making an extreme salad each day for lunch or dinner could help us get there. Barstow’s Extreme Salad had 537 varieties. It seems however that according to Barstow, a salad can qualify as an extreme salad when it has 30 or more ingredients.

My extreme salad: 31 varieties included.

I started out cutting up some radishes to make a radish slaw for my mini radish challenge. Watermelon radishes and chinese green luobo radishes were freshly harvested from the garden and ready to go.

And then I got to thinking, about extreme salads and Stephen Barstow’s world record. If he could do 537 varieties, I could surely do 30. So very quickly half my radish salad was kept for lunch and the other half turned into radishes and beets and onions.

It took a trip out to the garden, and a little wild foraging to reach 31 varieties, but we got to 31.

The ingredient list

Following is a list of everything that made it’s way into our first extreme salad. With radishes and beets as a base, everything mixed in well to make a really tasty salad.

Sparkler radish, french breakfast radish, chinese green luobo radish, watermelon radish, yellow spanish onion, cilantro, chioggia beet, golden beet, carrots, brussels sprouts, lime juice, lemon thyme, lemon thyme blossoms, thyme, thyme blossoms, elenas rojo amaranth, common amaranth, bachelors buttons blossoms (white, blue and pink), lacinato kale, jagallo kale, italian flat leaf parsley, lemon balm, oregano, oregano blossoms, garden purslane, white english lavender blossoms, nasturtium leaves, sage leaves, orange mint, peppermint, utah tall celery, queen annes lace greens, wild grape leaves, horseradish greens.

What’s next?

Well, there was my first documented extreme salad. I look forward to many more to come. What’s next?

I bought a bunch of different melons at the store today. Maybe an extreme fruit salad is coming up soon?