I frequently need to slice vegetables or fruit very finely, and for that I use a mandolin with fixed blade(s) into which you slide the victim. Here’s an example of the output from my mandolin yesterday:
For this you need a potato peeler. What you see here are one apple 🍎, one red beet, one golden beet and one carrot 🥕. Peel the participants first, then slice them up. Toss the stumps. Put all the matchsticks together in a bowl along with the zest and juice of one lemon 🍋 and a tablespoon of honey 🍯. Salt & pepper to taste. Put it in the refrigerator and let the favors and colors meld. For a bonus, add some golden raisins.
Btw here are a couple typical mandolins:
Above with the “matchsticks” blade shown. Take the pusher and/or glove seriously — fingertips are too valuable to lose (speaking from painful personal experience).
Now back to the colorful matchstick salad. I like to put it on a bed of green lettuce. In this case with some avocado. You get sweet, tart, crunch, creamy all together. Drizzle some olive oil on the top and you could also use a splash of balsamic vinegar. The real Italian aged stuff (right FabR?)
Slightly more complex is the tuna salad variation: mix a can of tuna with a spoonful of mayonnaise and one of sweet pickle relish. Salt & pepper and let it sit while you make a bed of torn lettuce leaves, cherry tomatoes, sweet red peppers, whatever you have. Top it with the tuna then garnish around the edges with the mixed matchsticks.
I like this with something crispy, crunchy and salty like Triscuit crackers or Fritos or corn chips.
Happy & safe slicing,
Cazalea