Almost nothing at lunch is hot enough to hurt hemp oil, which makes this the meal it was built for. One ratio does most of the work.
Learn this once and you never look one up again. It works with any oil; hemp brings a grassy, slightly peppery note that suits bitter leaves and grain bowls.
Add a teaspoon of honey. Chicory, radicchio and rocket all want something sweet against the hemp.
Swap half the acid for the brine from a jar of capers or pickles. Salt and acid at once, and nothing wasted.
Crush a garlic clove into it and leave it twenty minutes. Hemp oil takes garlic better than olive does.
Shake it in a jar rather than whisking. The mustard is not for flavour — it is an emulsifier, and without it the dressing splits on the plate within a minute.
Four slots. Fill one from each and lunch assembles itself out of whatever is in the fridge.
Grain, leaves, or both. Cooked and cooled grains take a dressing far better than warm ones, which is why yesterday's rice makes a better bowl than today's.
Roughly a fistBeans, egg, cheese, fish, leftover roast anything. Hemp seed adds to this rather than replacing it — three tablespoons is about a third of what a lunch wants.
Roughly a palmToasted whole hemp seed, seeds and nuts, raw fennel, radish, croutons. The part people leave out and then wonder why the bowl is dull.
Roughly a small handfulFrom above, and more of it than you think. A bowl needs about two tablespoons; most people use one and call the result healthy.
Roughly 2 tbspAvocado, roasted squash, a soft cheese, hummus. Optional, but it is what makes a bowl feel like a meal instead of a side.
OptionalWhole leaves rather than chopped. Parsley, mint, dill and coriander all sit well against hemp's grassiness because they are pulling in the same direction.
More than a garnishProtein is the number people are usually chasing at lunch, and the honest version is that hemp contributes to it rather than covering it.
Nobody needs to hit a number at every meal, and the daily total is what matters. The reason to put hemp in a lunch is that it is doing several jobs at once — protein, fat, magnesium and crunch — from one jar.
A few days in the fridge, in a jar. It will thicken and separate when cold — take it out twenty minutes before, or run the jar under a warm tap and shake. Do not warm it in a pan.
Yes, and it is very good, but use it as half the oil rather than all of it. Neat hemp mayonnaise is a strikingly green and strikingly assertive thing that not everyone at the table signed up for.
Hulled seed softens in a dressed bowl within an hour or two, which is fine but loses the texture. If it matters, carry the seeds separately and add them at the desk — the same trick that keeps croutons worth having.
Not by any traditional definition, and it is better not to pretend. Hemp seed in place of pine nuts makes something greener and earthier that is worth eating on its own terms.