Rainbow Plate Part 1

I've viewed a lot of food blog posts lately that use hefty doses of color to mouth-watering effect. Since reprioritizing the geographic origins of my ingredients, presentation has taken a backseat. And that sucks. Particularly on this blog.

So this evening I chose to serve a dish incorporating every color of the rainbow.

I won't waste your time with the recipe- really, it's just a few separate very conventional recipes thrown together. The components are as follows: first I laid a bed of raw spinach (green) on the serving platter (blue). Next came the breaded and baked sweet potato wedges (orange). Then, in the center of the fanned-out sweet potatoes, a couple servings' worth of curried lentils and rice (supposed to be yellow, but turned out more brown). Then the chopped sauteed bell peppers (red) and onions (violet). And finally, because my curry didn't turn out as yellow as I wanted it, that lonely bite of pineapple as a garnish. (Okay, I cheated a little bit, but who cares about indigo anyway?)

Ta-da! The Chickenless Kitchen's very first rainbow plate. I'll probably do more of them, since this exercise is simple enough and produces automatically attractive food. It would be nice to present at a party; but as we had no guests, hubby and I just dug in.

Quick critical note to self: no more red bell peppers with curry. I don't know why. After all, plenty of other sweet veggies tend to work out great. Does anyone have a scientific explanation (one involving the layout of the taste buds, perhaps)? I dunno, maybe I just ruined it by drinking Newcastle with it. In any case, tomatoes would have made a fine substitute.

Should you decide to make a rainbow plate of your own, feel free to email me pics and recipes. I would love to see what you come up with!

Beat the eggs. Whip the cream. Show no mercy.