Grilled Veggie Salad

I got to know that recently a Kannada cookery show aired an episode featuring Oats in good old Akki Rotti. Ah! So good job Quaker and agriculture department of Australia.
It looks like there are pouring tonnes of money on promoting the 'healthfulness' of oats and our people are readily buying it. So we are abandoning our native grains which our forefather ate, thrived well on and lived long healthy lives, for grains that were grown and consumed in very different climates by people with very different lifestyle, habits and of course genes. We so very well buy the argument of loud MNCs than look at our own backyards. There is a saying in Kannada, 'Hittala gida maddalla'. Your backyard herb cannot be a medicine! indeed.

I know we are a generation living on instant gratification and depth of sensual experience. But our common sense is not something that should take a back seat. 'I was never thus, but keep going on...' goes a poem. Yes I was never thus. But as more candles pile on my birthday cake my point of view changes. Now when I look back at all the years trying to  'live healthy' eating 'canola oil' I cannot stop but think 'what the hell was I thinking?'.
Now it is all about eating sensibly. No hard rules. But I am not going to buy ten different of things, just because a recipe calls for it,or it so 'oh!god so healthy'. So if I have peanuts instead of peanut butter I just go ahead crush some and toss it. I am not buying raw peanuts, peanut butter and salted peanuts. I am also not going on a missionary quest for some strange vegetable that I read about or the miracle food that has kept some Amazonian tribe youthful into their eighties.  

The mantra now is what is available locally and seasonally. The best part of summers in this part of the world is the bounty of vegetables. Keeping in mind my current approach to food, I just grilled a few fresh vegetables and served it with minimal dressing. It was yummy. The dressing also was do-with-whatever-is-in-your-fridge, but very creamy and tasty.

We will need,

Zucchini  2 medium cut into length wise and diced into half moons about 1/4"thick
Peppers   4 medium cut into 2" squares
Red Onions 2 medium cut into quarters and separated
Lettuce as needed
Oil as needed

for the dressing,
Yogurt/sour cream 2-3 tbsp
Ginger grated 1 tsp
Garlic 1 clove
Green chilli 1 minced
Coriander a handful
Salt to taste
Juice of lemon to taste

Method:

• Heat a griddle on high heat. Brush the griddle with some oil and dump the Zucchini, peppers and onions. Sprinkle salt. Grill till the vegetables and nice and charred on the edges. Remove and keep it warm. If the griddle is small, do the vegetables in batches as we do not want them steam. Also the vegetables can be done one at a time because the cooking time varies for the vegetables. My griddle is fairly big so I could accommodate all of them at once.
• Crush the garlic and ginger. Push the mixture through a sieve and collect the juice in big serving bowl. Discard the ginger garlic fibers. 
• Toss in the lemon juice, green chillies, chopped coriander and yogurt/sour cream. Adjust salt. 
• Toss in all the grill vegetables. Serve warm on a bed of lettuce. We had it for lunch and this was the only dish that day. We just grated some cheese on top.  It was yummy.