How to Make Salad for a Crowd (And the Powerful Practice of Hospitality)

Welcome back to another episode of the Cooking From Scratch Podcast. I’m your host, Aliye Aydin, and today’s episode is all about a topic that’s close to the heart of every cook: what it really means to offer true hospitality.

In a world where convenience often takes precedence, cooking from scratch isn't just about the food—it’s about the love and intention behind it. 

Hospitality isn’t just serving a meal; it’s creating an experience that makes people feel welcome, valued, and cherished. It’s about crafting moments that linger long after the last bite.

The inspiration for this episode comes from my Soul of Cooking summer project, where I combined two of my passions, cooking and mindfulness, with the intention of providing you with motivation and inspiration for cooking to be a joy instead of a chore.

So, let’s dig in!

In this episode you’ll hear:

• The definition of Hospitality
• The benefits of practicing Hospitality
• Ways to practice Hospitality
• The 5 Elements of a Perfect Salad
• How to make Chicken, Nectarine, and Avocado Salad for a Crowd
• How to make Basil Vinaigrette

Looking for ways to get your time and energy back on weeknights without giving up homemade meals? In my upcoming LIVE virtual Masterclass, “6 Easy Ways to Quickly Add Variety to Your Meals”, I'll be sharing exactly how you can do that. 

Click here to save your seat in class!

Links:

• Aliye's cooking videos: Watch now on Youtube
• FREE High-Protein Meals Training

Transcript

Good morning everyone! Or whatever time it is where you're listening. Whether you're here live with me or watching the replay, I'm grateful to have you here!

I'm Aliye Aydin, and this is the 4th session of The Soul of Cooking 9-week summer program, where I'm combining two of my passions, cooking and mindfulness/spirituality, with the intention of providing you with motivation and inspiration for cooking to be a joy instead of a chore.

Now before I get started, I wanted to give a little background about this 9-week program and why I'm offering it. 

Last year I took a year-long course to receive a Certificate in Spiritual Literacy. The course is based on a book, The Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy, and was written back in the 90s by a couple in the Methodist church, Mary Ann and Frederick Brussat. Three years ago they started offering this Spiritual Literacy course. They also have an incredible resource, a website called Spirituality and Practice, full of exactly that, and offer many online courses. It's an extensive resource, so please check that out.

As part of the completion for the certificate program, we had an option to become a facilitator of the Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy, and to do what's called a Capstone project, and this 9-week program is what that is.

Now the Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy as written by the Brussats has 37 words, but for the purposes of this course, I've narrowed it down to 9 of my "favorites" or ones that I thought related most to food and cooking. Throughout this 9-week period I will be giving my reflections on the words and concepts, and how I've found they relate my motivation and inspiration for food and cooking.

My intention is for each of these Friday sessions to be about 30 minutes long. If you can't make it LIVE, I've posted a form in this group for you to fill out and receive a link for the replay, so be sure to do that! If you provided your email when you joined the group, those unfortunately did not get saved, so please find the form in this group and fill that out. 

In these sessions, I will talk about the concept of the week -- this week it's Hospitality, its relation to food and cooking, and then I will introduce a dish idea or recipe and talk about flavors, techniques, and ingredients. 

In the followup emails with the replay link I will also be sending a recap of these Friday morning sessions, along with additional contemplative and mindfulness practices for your consideration. 

Any questions so far?

So! Let's get started! This week's Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy word of the week is Hospitality.

Now the concept of Hospitality is very often thought of in relation to cooking for and feeding others, and inviting them into your space to “break bread” together.

The definition of Hospitality according to the Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy is “welcoming others, friends, foes, neighbors, strangers, and all guests with courtesy, politeness, respect, kindness, and mercy.”

By practicing Hospitality, we accept and affirm diversity,

and increase our tolerance of groups we perceive as different from us. 

Practicing Hospitality counters hostility, critical, distrustful or suspiciousness, and otherwise unwelcoming of others.

Some ways we can practice Hospitality is by engaging in inter-religious dialogue, joining others in their mode of worship, and visiting other sacred spaces besides our own.

Breaking bread with others, especially those outside of our usual circles, is a centuries’ old way of celebrating diversity, countering prejudice, hatred, bigotry, and a way of ending long standing disagreements. 

When we invite others to gather around our table, we can practice hospitable listening, by listening for others feelings and needs, behind the words that they say. 

We can practice Hospitality by being hospitable towards ourselves, by embracing the “less-liked” qualities of ourselves, and making a conscious effort to see the presence of the sacred in others. 

When we struggle with being hospitable towards those that we don’t agree with or don’t understand, we can remind ourselves that God is infinite, and so is her expression and imagination.

This infinite diversity is a means to get to know ourselves and each other and God more deeply. 

[As a reminder...I will be using the word God throughout this course...if this word doesn't sit right for you, and keeps you apart from the information I'm sharing, please feel free to substitute Universe, Creation, Goddess, or whatever other words you are comfortable with.]

One way we can practice Hospitality is by being aware of when we are reactive to another person, 

and seeing them as an “other”. This reactivity can point to an attachment in ourselves to some aspect of our identity. 

So, with that being said, we can practice Hospitality with practices that help us be conscious of our various social and political identities, as well as others’ social and political identities, as well as any labels we may associate with them.

We can practice Hospitality by being aware and present to all the ways that we can “other” each other, by ways of racism, colorism, ableism, tokenism, and many more. 

What is our responsibility when we are exposed to generalizations about a group we are unfamiliar with and recognize this “otherism” happening? For example, in the media.

Our responsibility is to use our reason to ask the following questions:

-who is making the generalization and for what purpose?

-Before we give any credibility to a generalization that we have been exposed to that we make a point of getting to know someone, an actual person in the group that is being generalized about.

And once we’ve gotten to know them as a person, invited them around our table and broken bread with them), learned who they are and what they love, once we’ve gotten to KNOW someone who is practicing that religion, then we can explore what they actually believe and practice.

It defies reason to believe something about a group that is voiced by someone who is outside that group. 

To practice Hospitality requires an awareness of others and of the systems we live in. 

Practicing true Hospitality requires us to recognize that other person or persons have experiences that are different from our own, AND we need to take appropriate action to demonstrate welcoming and care to meeting that person’s needs. This is where we practice kindness, compassion, peace, and justice. 

And sometimes taking this appropriate action requires us to check in with our own physical/mental/emotional state, which can be done through a Notice and Nurture process that I will share more about in the email. 

I will also share a self-reflection practice for you to help you contemplate what perceived differences may prompt you to see another person as an “other”. 

When our hearts are present, we can have amazing Hospitality in the face of something that initially we may not understand, until we are present in our hearts. 

As we invite people to our tables to gather and eat, we can be intentional about who we invite, and make an effort to hear a viewpoint that is different from ours, and practice hospitality in this way.

Now, since what I’m talking about is generally alluding to gathering a group of people together to eat, I wanted to talk about how to feed a group of people. That is, the best way to efficiently create a dish from scratch, knowing you’ll have enough but not too much to feed everyone. 

This dish I’d like to discuss today is the Chicken, Nectarine, and Avocado Salad with Basil Dressing that I shared in the 5 Summertime Meals document in the Soul of Cooking Group.

I chose these ingredients for a salad because they are seasonal to summer. But if you’ll notice, I didn’t give you an exact recipe, and I wanted to walk you through how to decide how much of each ingredient to buy if you wanted to make this recipe.

Let’s start with the 5 basic elements of a perfect salad. They are greens, sweetness, creaminess, crunchiness, and dressing. These are considered the elements of a “perfect” salad because they provide sensations that satisfy all of our 5 senses. 

Here is the breakdown of these 5 elements for a Chicken, Nectarine, and Avocado Salad with Basil Dressing.

Greens: While not in the title, choose a green that you like and is readily available, like lettuce or arugula. Greens provide a pleasing appearance (sight), and a slight bitterness. To calculate how much to buy, count how many people will be eating the salad, and multiply by 2.5 ounces. For example, if you’re serving 10 people this salad as a main course, you’ll need 2.5 x 10 ounces of salad, or 25 ounces, which translates into roughly 1.5 pounds.

Sweetness: Nectarine, and a bit from the basil dressing as well. To choose the amount, I picture how much of one nectarine that one serving would be. A half nectarine seems like a good amount, so with 10 people you’ll need 5 nectarines. 

Creaminess: Avocado and the basil dressing a little as well. Cheese (such as goat cheese) may also be used here in place of avocado. I personally prefer to choose one or the other, adding both makes it too creamy in my opinion. For the amount of avocado, since they are a bit more filling, I would count ¼ avocado per serving. So with 10 people, you’ll need 2.5 (let’s say 3) avocados. If you were using cheese, for salads I estimate 1 ounce per serving, so 10 oz. of cheese. 

Crunchiness: Greens. If you’re using arugula which isn’t as crunchy, you may also choose to add a sprinkle of nuts or seeds or croutons. You may also add cucumber. 

Dressing: This provides acidity, which is essential for palate satisfaction. Let’s break down the anatomy of a dressing. In its most basic form, dressing is an acid (lemon juice/vinegar) emulsified with oil in a 1:2 or 1:3 ratio, with other flavorings added. Typically you’ll need 2 Tablespoons of salad dressing per person. So to serve 10 people you’ll need 20 Tablespoons of dressing or about 1.25 cups. The most basic form of a basil vinaigrette would be flavoring with shallot and garlic, olive oil, red wine vinegar, and basil. Amounts provided below. 

Heartiness: While not essential for a “perfect” salad, if you want a hearty full-meal salad, adding a protein is a good way to do it. In this case it’s chicken. For a meal portion of chicken, I would use 3-4 oz per serving, so in this case 30-40 oz. of chicken, which is 2-2.5 pounds. 

So here’s a sample recipe to make Chicken, Nectarine, and Avocado Salad with Basil Vinaigrette for 10:

2-2.5 pound chicken, grilled or baked and shredded/cubed

5 nectarines, cut into chunks

3 avocados, cut into chunks (or 10 oz. cheese)

1.5 pounds lettuce or arugula (if using arugula consider adding nuts/seeds or croutons)

Basil Vinaigrette for 10 (Combine all ingredients in a high-powered blender, taste, and adjust for seasoning):

2 small shallots or 1 large, cut into chunks

2 cloves garlic

4 cups tightly packed basil leaves

3/4 cup olive oil

1/3 cup red wine vinegar

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (optional)

Thank you so much for being here for H is for Hospitality. May you always be the reason others feel welcome, and may your heart and mind be open to perspectives other than your own. 

I look forward to our next time together.