Avocado recipe from Julia Sherman’s new cookbook, ‘Salad for President’

Salad lovers, Julia Sherman shares your obsession.

The NYC artist runs Salad for President, a website where she posts recipes for salads made in collaboration with musicians, writers, artists and others under the rubric of “creative types,” accompanied by interviews and photographs.

A cookbook was ripe for the making, and it’s almost here. “Salad for President” (out May 16, $35) features more than 75 recipes for salads by Sherman, as well as contributions from and interviews with the likes of Laurie Anderson, Alice Waters and William Wegman.

Among Sherman’s own creations is an entree salad: baby avocados with Meyer lemon gremolata and pickled red onions.

“Gremolata is a fresh herb-and-citrus condiment typically used in Italian cooking to offset heavy meat-based dishes,” Sherman writes. “But here the decadence is in the offering of an entire avocado to each guest.”

If you can’t find baby avocados (usually found in Latin markets, she notes), Sherman recommends looking for the smallest ones you can find.

Baby avocados with Meyer lemon gremolata and pickled red onions

Serves 6 to 8

2 Meyer lemons

1 large clove garlic, minced

1⁄2 cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley

1 tbsp. plus 1 tsp. minced fresh thyme leaves

Flaky sea salt and cracked white pepper

6 to 8 ripe baby Hass avocados (1 for each guest)

About 1 cup drained pickled red onions (see recipe)

3 tbsp. high-quality extra-virgin olive oil

Pickled red onions

Makes 1 qt.

2 small red onions (about 1 lb.), peeled and thinly sliced

1 1⁄2 cups red wine or white wine vinegar

1 1⁄2 tsp. sugar

1 1⁄2 tsp. kosher salt

Put the onions in a large bowl, pour the vinegar over them, and sprinkle with the sugar and salt. Press the onions down with your fingertips to submerge them in the liquid. Let stand for 10 minutes, then use or transfer to a nonreactive container (a quart/liter jar or two pint/ half-liter jars, for example), cover and refrigerate for up to two weeks.

1. Zest the lemons into a small bowl (be sure to stop when you start to see the white pith; you want only the yellow outer peel).

2. Supreme the lemons: Cut off each end of a lemon and set the lemon upright on the cutting board. Using a sharp knife, slice off the pith, following the contours of the fruit, moving from top to bottom, cutting as little of the flesh away as possible. Rotate the lemon 90 degrees and cut next to each strip of membrane to cut out the sections. Repeat with the other lemon.

3. Roughly chop the lemon flesh and add it to the bowl with the zest. Add the garlic, parsley, and thyme, and season generously with salt and white pepper. Toss the gremolata well to combine.

4. Halve the avocados lengthwise, remove the pits and fill each cavity with about 1 tbsp. of the gremolata. Arrange them on a platter or individual plates.

5. Top each half with 1 or 2 slivers of pickled onion, drizzle generously with oil, sprinkle with flaky salt, and serve.