Weeds & Greens Salad with Finger Lime dressing

One of the good things about having a blog is using it to keep track of your own recipes. I haven't posted anything on this blog for years but I still come into it every now and then to look up one of my recipes to make. Everytime I log on to the blog I'm amazed at how much traffic it gets even though I haven't posted on it regularly for more than 5 years. When I see that it makes me feel like getting back onto it.

My life has changed a lot. But I thought I might try and post every now and then. It's going to be a be a bit different, it's going to be more real. I don't have the energy for perfect styled photos. I got rid of most of my "styling" props when we moved because I wanted a simpler life with less stuff. You'll get quick snaps on my phone, probably with kids hands reaching in to take the stuff right off the plate.

I've got 2 kids now but this is not a "mum blog", I've never had any desire to have a blog like that.

A year ago we moved into a new place and the house was everything we hoped for, with a bonus overgrown jungle as the garden. I'm passionate about growing our own food, but I've never seen myself as a forager. However, as I cleared sensational amounts of plants and weeds away to start to form our veggie patch, I realised we were probably already growing a lot of edibles without knowing it.

I checked out this book from the library and became a weed eater. I've come to view the weeds in our garden differently, for what they can do rather than just what they are. Our veggie patch is still a work in progress, but the garden always has a bounty to offer because weeds are everywhere!

Here's a simple recipe which represents where we're at right now. It's not much of a recipe really because it's so adaptable. Finger Limes are an Australian Native Citrus, with little bubbles of citrus inside like caviar. We've got a tree growing and had a nice crop this year, so I've used it here in the dressing. It's not available that widely, so just use some lime or lemon juice instead if you can't get them (if you can though - do it!!!). I recommend you plant one though, if you're in Australia, because they're just fantastic.

Weeds & Greens Salad with Finger Lime Dressing

1-2 cups mixed edible weeds, we used dock and oxalis mainly.
1-2 cups fresh rocket (we grew ours) or baby spinach
1 finger lime
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tbsp soy sauce
Edible flowers, to garnish (we've used oxalis flowers, you can also use violas, nasturtiums or Calendula petals).

Quick note: I recommend you do your research before eating weeds so you make sure you can identify what you're eating beyond a shadow of a doubt. Also both dock and oxalis are high in oxilic acid, so I wouldn't eat this salad every day. 

To make:
1. Toss the leaves together. 
2. Squeeze all the "caviar" out of the finger lime into a small jar and add the olive oil, vinegar and soy sauce. Shake/mix well and pour over the leaves. 
3. Garnish with edible flowers and eat right away. 

African Kachumbari (Chadian Tomato & Onion Salad)

Kachumbari is a common salad eaten in various African countries including Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Congo and Chad. As part Chad Month (which was all the way back in February 2012!) I made this lovely fresh African salad (for other recipes see the links at the bottom of this post - but excuse the photos, it was right when the blog first started). I've remade it now because I really felt like eating it again, and because I thought it deserved some better photos! This time I've used a combination of red and yellow small roma tomatoes, because it just looks so pretty and these lovely yellow roma tomatoes are at my local supermarket at the moment. You can make it with a mixture of any heirloom tomatoes, cherry tomatoes or just regular tomatoes (which would be most authentic). Given that tomatoes are the hero of the dish though, I'd encourage tasty vine-ripened ones, as if you buy tomatoes which taste like nothing then your salad won't taste like much!

The main elements of the dish are tomatoes, onion and citrus juice. There are lots of variations depending on region, this version includes cucumber and fresh chilli. If you like hot, add an extra chilli or just leave the hot bits in (the placenta -which is the white bit which the seeds are attached to - is the hot part of the chilli, not the seeds).  This salad is perfect paired with the Chadian Sweet Potato Fritters (see link below) and is a light and tasty addition to any gathering, potluck or group meal.

African Kachumbari

Ingredients

1 small red onion, thinly sliced (or diced)
4 tomatoes, sliced (or diced)
1 Lebanese cucumber, sliced (or diced)
1 chilli, seeds & placenta removed and sliced
Handful of fresh coriander, chopped
The juice of two limes

How to make:

1.Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl and toss until well combined
2. Serve immediately.

Serves 3-4.

Check out our other Chadian recipes: 

Chadian Breakfast Bouille

Millet Balls with 3 dipping sauces

Chadian Sweet Potato Fritters

Chadian Irio 

African Loz 

Maharagwe 

Gin Thoke (Burmese Ginger Salad)

I came onto the blog today thinking to share another great Burmese recipe with you for Myanmar month, I was halfway through posting up my Burmese Sticky Rice cake when I realised that so soon after Christmas most people are probably well and truly dessert-ed out! So instead I'll share with you this rather special, very healthy and very fresh salad.

It's a ginger salad, yes, ginger. You might think that is a bit too strong to be a main ingredient in a salad, but this salad uses beautiful fresh ginger which you pickle yourself the night before making the salad. The pickling softens the ginger and smooths the punchy flavour and the end result is really so delicious. I served it up at my Burmese Dinner party and everyone absolutely loved it. It makes a perfect addition to a big meal because the fresh crunchy salad and zingy ginger are so refreshing and make a light and tasty accompaniment to heavier dishes.

Ingredients
1/2 cup grated fresh ginger
1/4 cup lime juice (or a mixture of lemon and lime)
1 tbsp. sesame seeds
3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
2 tbsp. peanut oil
1 small quarter green cabbage , finely shredded
2 small tomatoes, chopped
1/2 green chilli, finely chopped
1/4 cup peanuts, finely chopped
2 tbsp. light soy sauce
1 tbsp. chickpea (besan) flour

To Make
1. Combine the grated ginger and lime juice in a jar and shake well. Let sit in the fried overnight, or for about 12 hours. If possible, take it out and shake it a couple of times during the 12 hours.
2. Dry roast the sesame seeds in a pan over a low-medium heat until slightly browned. Remove and set aside to cool. Heat the peanut oil in the pan and fry the garlic slices until they start to brown and go a bit crispy. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon to cool. Keep any remaining oil from the pan in a jar or small bowl.
3. Squeeze the lime juice from the ginger and add any juice squeezed out to the jar with the cooled garlic oil. Combine the shredded cabbage, tomatoes, ginger, chilli, peanuts and chickpea flour in a large bowl and toss to combine.
4. Add the soy sauce to the jar with the garlic oil and lime juice and shake to combine. Pour over the salad and toss through. Top the salad with the fried garlic chips and serve.

Serves 4-6 as a side salad.

This month I'm featuring vegan recipes from Myanmar (Burma).

Check out my other Burmese recipe posts:

Vegan Fish Sauce

Ohn No Khao Swe with Chickpea Tofu

Burmese Tomato Salad

Burmese Sticky Rice Cake

Burmese Tomato Salad

Growing up I was always a complete tomato fanatic, and I still find it pretty hard to go past a recipe for tomato salad! This Burmese one is one of the best I've ever made, definitely. It's flavoured by the quintessentially Burmese ingredients of sesame seeds, peanuts, chickpea flour and (vegan) fish sauce. One of my favourite things about tomatoes in salads is that they really soak up the dressing and take on all the wonderful flavours.

This makes a colourful and fresh addition to a family feast, potluck or gathering. The Burmese make it with fish sauce, but I've substituted my home made vegan fish sauce instead - you can, of course, use either.

Burmese Tomato Salad

Ingredients
1 tbsp. sesame seeds
1 tbsp. chickpea (besan) flour
4 tomatoes, roughly diced
1 small onion, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1 green chilli, finely minced (remove the 'placenta' of the chilli if you want it mild)
2 tbsp. finely chopped coriander
2 tbsp. finely chopped peanuts
1 tbsp. lime juice
1 tbsp. vegan fish sauce

To Make
1. In a small frypan, dry toast the sesame seeds until just golden. Set aside cool. Then dry toast the chickpea flour unto just starting to go golden, tossing frequently to ensure even toasting. Set aside to cool. At this stage you can also toast the peanuts, if you are using peanuts that are not already roasted.
2. Combine all ingredients in a bowl and gently mix with your fingers. Serve.

Serves 4 as a side salad.

This month I'm featuring vegan recipes from Myanmar (Burma).

Check out my other Burmese recipe posts:

Vegan Fish Sauce

Ohn No Khao Swe with Chickpea Tofu

Gin Thoke (Ginger Salad)

Burmese Sticky Rice Cake

Big Fat Veggie Burger Bowl

I've decided to make November a healthy month on the blog, so I'm going to give you lots of colourful fresh healthy foods low in fat, low in carbs and low in sugar! I've been craving fresh healthy foods this month, because I did a fair bit of (wonderful) indulging last month.

I love a good veggie burger, but often I don't feel like eating the bread so it's become less common on our weekly dinners. This week I wanted a burger so I thought I'd make it into a big fat salad bowl instead. It was just as filling but minus all the bread, and I felt really great after I'd finished it (as opposed to over full and slightly ill which is how I often feel after a big fat veggie burger).

You can make this salad using any patties you like. I used chickpea and cumin patties which I bought from the supermarket, which made this a super quick and easy dinner. You can use any bought veggie or bean or lentil burgers, or you can make your own burger patties from the millions of great recipes out there on the internet :) You can also adjust the other salad ingredients to be what you like to have on your burger, I've chucked in some marinated artichoke hearts here which are not traditionally on a burger, but which I happened to have lots of in my fridge. Add or subtract what you like! If you like your burgers Aussie-Style then you might want to whack some tinned beetroot in with it (yum!).

Big Fat Veggie Burger Bowl

Ingredients
2-3 handfuls of torn iceberg lettuce (you can sub fancier stuff if you like, but for burgers I like the crunch of iceberg)
1 carrot, grated
1 large tomato, diced
2-3 marinated artichoke hearts, chopped (optional)
1 large dill pickle, thinly sliced
1 ripe avocado, sliced
2 veggie patties of your choice
Burger sauce of your choice (I used BBQ, you can use tomato, sweet chilli, mayo or anything you like)
2/3 cup hummus
Sumac or smoky paprika for sprinkling on the hummus

To Make
1. Distribute the lettuce, grated carrot, tomato, artichoke hearts, pickle slices and avocado evenly between two bowls.
2. Cook the burger patties according to the instructions on the packet - you can usually pan fry in a little oil (I like this method, as is makes the edges nice and crispy) or heat in the oven for a slightly healthier, oil-free option. Once cooked chop roughly into pieces and add to the bowl.
3. Drizzle the chopped veggie patties with your choice of burger sauce and then dollop about 1/3 cup hummus on top of each bowl (you can be more generous - of course!).
4. Sprinkle some sumac or smoky paprika on top of the hummus and you're ready to go!

Serves two.
Part of the VVLP.

Blueberry & Avocado Salad with Candied Walnuts

Living in Australia, trips to Europe are a big deal. It's the other side of the world - the flights are long, exhausting and expensive! But I was adamant to make it over there last year to visit a dear friend. I was thrilled to escape the Sydney winter and spend my time strolling around beautiful cobblestone streets in a European summer. I've already posted a few post from my travels, you can check them out here:

Sweets in Sweden - A Photographic Diary
Wild Blueberries on the Stockholm Archipelagoes
A Day in Riga - Buildings, Berries & Black Balsam

You might notice a recurring theme - loads of fresh berries! We were so spoilt for fresh berries throughout our trip. Check out these gorgeous berries piled high in stalls on the side of the streets in Riga (Latvia):

In Australia punnets of blueberries or raspberries are always an expensive treat - even when they're in season. So it's no wonder that I ate them to my hearts content and came home with a mind full of berry inspiration! Now, Northern Europe is heading into winter and sunny Sydney is almost in summer, which means blueberries here are about as cheap as they'll ever get. So I took my inspiration from these gorgeous pictures and the memories of all those yummy berries & picked up a couple of punnets of blueberries to experiment with. 

Blueberry & Avocado Salad with Candied Walnuts

Ingredients

4 tbsp brown sugar

4 tbsp water

1/2 cup walnut halves

2 cups baby spinach

1 large ripe avocado

1 punnet blueberries

1 tsp extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp soy sauce

2 tsp fresh lemon juice

2 tsp balsamic vinegar

Cracked black pepper

To Make

1. To make the candied walnuts - combine the brown sugar and water in a small saucepan and heat over a medium heat until the sugar is dissolved to form a simmering syrup. Add the walnut halves and stir continusouly while the syrup simmers. Cook for at least 5 minutes, or until the liquid has all cooked away and you are left with the coated walnuts. Transfer the walnuts to a sheet of non stick baking paper, breaking up any clumps, and place in the fridge to harden.

2. Line a salad bowl with the baby spinach leaves. Top with cubes of the avocado and then the fresh blueberries.

3. Combine the olive oil, soy sauce, lemon juice and vinegar and whisk well until combined. Drizzle over the avocado & blueberries.

4. Top with candied walnuts and a generous amount of cracked black pepper.

Serves 2-4 as a side salad or as part of a buffet.

Also featured in the Vegan Virtual Linky Potluck.

Fennel & Cabbage Tahini Slaw with Chickpeas and Cashews

I call this little creation a 'tahini slaw' - it's essentially a coleslaw but the bulk of the creamy dressing is made from delicious nutritious tahini rather than lots of gluggy and nutritionally deficient mayonnaise. It's versatile, of course, so feel free to make your own adaptations. In this recipe I've used not just cabbage but thinly sliced fennel which gives it a wonderful crisp flavour and I've added a can of chickpeas to bulk it up a bit and turn it into a main event dish rather than a side. If you're just bringing it along to a bbq then you can choose to omit the chickpeas.

This recipe makes enough for 2-3 people to have a big bowl of it for lunch or dinner, or for 4-6 people to have as a side salad.

Fennel & Cabbage Tahini Slaw with Chickpeas and Cashews

Ingredients
1/4 medium green cabbage (you can substitute purple cabbage or a mixture of both)
1/2 large fennel bulb
1 small Spanish onion
1 small granny smith apple
1 400g can of chickpeas, drained
1/2 cup roasted cashews
2 tbsp unhulled tahini
1 tsp mayonniase
1 tsp soy sauce
Juice of small 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp olive oil
Cracked pepper, to taste
1 punnet cherry tomatoes, washed and halved.

To Make
1. Very thinly slice the cabbage, fennel bulb and Spanish onion and toss together in a bowl. Cut the core out of the apple and cut into thin matchsticks. Add to the salad along with the chickpeas. Once you've added the apple, sprinkle a bit of the lemon juice over the salad to stop the apple going brown while you make the dressing.
2. Combine the tahini, mayonnaise, soy sauce, remaining lemon juice and olive oil in a small bowl or jar. Mix well to combine. It may be very thick at this stage, but don't worry it will thin out as you mix it through the salad. Season to taste with cracked pepper.
3. Add the tahini dressing to the salad and mix thoroughly until the salad is evenly coated with the dressing. Break up the cashews a bit with your hands and toss them in along with the halved cherry tomatoes. Mix well and serve garnished with extra cashews (optional).

Notes: You can use the cherry tomatoes to decorate the top instead of mixing them through if you like. 

Serves 2-3 as a main or 4-6 as a side salad.

Lobio (Georgian Kidney Bean Salad)

I've had a strange fascination with Georgia for some time. Why strange? Because really I don't know anything about the country at all! But, in 2007 they entered Eurovision for the first time with this incredible song (watch it!) by Sopho. I love the Eurovision meets Bjork style, I loved her stunning red dress (which continues it's detail on her back and arm!) and, hey, you can't go wrong when there are men dancing with swords. I loved this song so much that I immediately decided that I loved Georgia and wanted to go there. Such is the powder of Eurovision! So, Georgia has a special place in my heart - even though I know next to nothing about it except that the capital Tbilisi. Sadly, I haven't yet had the chance to travel there to find out more, but recently I got an email from a reader requesting Georgia as a featured country on my world food challenge. I couldn't have been happier, in fact I was so excited by the idea that I moved it up the list in front of some other countries which had been requested earlier (sorry, other countries but the heart wants what the heart wants!).

Just in case you've never heard of this tiny country, here is what it looks like:



So what did I learn about Georgia? Well, one thing was that finding vegetarian dishes was a piece of cake, there was loads of them. So I had a really fun and easy time putting together a savoury menu for Georgia and it was all really delicious. The sweets I found harder, I only found one or two at all on the internet so had a much more limited sweets menu. I'd love to hear from some Georgians if you have a wonderful traditional dessert that I missed!

I also learned that the cornerstone of many of their dishes was walnuts! There were walnuts in everything, sweet and savoury! There also seems to be a lot of kidney beans in the savoury dishes, so I ate my fair share of them this month.

This first recipe I'm sharing with you brings both of those ingredients together, it's a typical Georgian salad called Lobio. It makes a great cold weather salad as well as warm weather, because of the lovely cooked beans and the warming hint of chilli. It's perfect for a potluck but is also great spooned into a salad wrap or piled on your veggie burger, it's just very versatile and a great source of protein.

Lobio (Georgian Kidney Bean Salad)

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups dried kidney beans, soaked for 48 hours and drained
1/2 Spanish onion, finely diced
1 jalapeño chilli, finely minced (you can remove the insides if you want it milder)
2 garlic cloves, finely minced
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh coriander
1/3 cup walnuts, broken into small pieces
3 tbsp white wine vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

To Make
1. Place the kidney beans in a large saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil and then lower the heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes, or until the beans are just tender. Once cooked, drain and rinse with cold water. Set aside to cool and dry out.
2. While the beans are drying you can prepare all your other ingredients. Combine the Spanish onion, chilli, garlic, coriander, walnuts and kidney beans in a bowl.
3. Place the vinegar, olive oil and salt and pepper in a jar, put the lid on and shake until well combined. Pour this dressing over the bean salad and stir well to combine. Adjust seasoning to taste (add more salt, pepper, coriander or garlic to taste).
4. Serve garnished with walnuts and fresh coriander (optional).

Serves 4-6.

This month I'm featuring recipes from Georgia.

Check out my other Georgian recipe posts:

Lobiani (Kidney Bean Bread)

Nigvzis Torti (Walnut Raisin Torte)

Oyster Mushroom & Rice Pastries

Egyptian Orange Olive Salad with Cumin

I love trying new salads, and with spring well and truly here now it's the perfect time to be experimenting with them. I found this beautiful salad on (shifty eyes) wikirecipes. I know, it's not the most reliable source of information. But it was listed with the Egyptian recipes and even though I really wasn't sure if it was authentic at all, I thought it sounded delicious so I decided to make it  anyway - maybe an Egyptian reader can tell me whether it is the kind of thing that Egyptians would actually eat :)

In the end though, it didn't matter if it was authentic or not because it was really, really tasty and I will definitely make this again. It is a fresh and light salad which makes a perfect accompaniment to heavier, carby-er main dishes.

This Orange & Olive Salad is flavoured with ground cumin - which is not an exotic spice but it's not something I normally put in salads in ground form (I often do use toasted cumin seeds in salads which is delicious!), so it was nice to learn a new use for this incredible spice.

Cumin
Cumin is a cooks best friend, it has amazing flavour and enhances any curries, soups, casseroles and salads you could dream to put them in. It is believed to be indingenous to the middle east and has a strong history in Egypt.  Cumin seeds have been found in the pyramids of the pharoahs, they were used by Egyptians in their mummifying process. There is also references in the Old and New Testaments of the bible to cumin. In ancient Rome, cumin was a symbol of greed and the miserly emperor Marcus Aurelius was nicknamed "Cuminus".

Reference: Hemphill, 2006

For my month of spices I'm using Spice Notes and Recipes by Ian Hemphill as my reference tool to learn about spices and for all the information above. Thanks Ian for writing such a great and informative book! 

Orange and Olive Salad with Cumin

Ingredients
8 navel oranges, sliced and with skin and pith sliced off
1/2 cup halved marinated black olives
1 small Spanish onion, peeled and sliced
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Salt and cracked black pepper to taste

To Make
1. Combine the orange slices, olives and onion in a salad bowl.
2. Mix the lemon juice, cumin, olive oil, salt and pepper in a jar and shake well.
3. Pour the dressing over the salad and allow to sit for 20 minutes to let the flavour meld. Serve at room temperature.

Serves 6-8 as a side salad.

This month I'm featuring lots of delicious food from Egypt.

Check out my other Egyptian recipe posts:

Preserved Lemons

Limoonada (Egyptian Lemonade)

Mesa'a'ah (Spicy Eggplant)

'Ancient Egyptian Peasant' Beer Onions

Creamy Tahini Sauce

Ful Medames

Khoshaf

Spicy Chickpea Salad with Olive Hummus Dressing

This delicious salad uses four spices from my overflowing spice rack - and all of them red, giving this salad a lovely red-orange hue. Chickpeas fried in chilli and sweet and smoked paprika with a creamy olive hummus dressing and a sprinkle of middle eastern sumac.

Chilli

Well, you all know about chilli. There are hundreds of varieties of chilli and they have a long history in many countries. There is evidence that chillies were eaten by Mexican Indians as early as 7000 BCE. In modern times chilli has become a commonly used all over the world in a myriad of ways. Chillis apparently contain more Vitamin C by weight than any citrus fruit and are found in our spice racks in dried form, flakes and many powdered varieties including chilli powder, hot paprika and cayenne pepper. Chilli is also purportedly excellent for weight loss as it speeds up the metabolism (in my experience it also good in this regard because it limits the amount of food you eat - because I can't eat as big a quantity of really hot food as I can mild food!). The heat of chilli can depend on what you cook your chilli with - oils and fats can mollify the heat of a dish so adding a high fat coconut milk can tame your curry. When eating a super chilli dish it's natural to reach for a glass of water - but don't! Water will actually make it worse - the best relief will come from a spoonful of sugar, but beer is also a good accompaniment. Milky drinks using yoghout or coconut milk are also a good option.

Paprika

In the same family as chilli (Capsicum family), paprikas origins go back the same as chilli - to the Mexican Indians in 7000 BCE. However, it was the Spanish that first turned these fruits into a powder after Christopher Columbus brought them back to Europe from the new world. Paprika in it's many forms is now ubiquitous in Spanish and Hungarian cuisines in particular. But during the Turkish occupation of Hungary in the 17th Century, paprika was prohibited and it's use and trade was punishable by death! This resulted in many people growing paprika illegally and a black market for paprika evolved, keeping the spice firmly entrenched in Hungarian cuisine. Interestingly, paprika can be used to tone down a dish if you have accidentally added too much chilli.

Sumac

If you haven't spent much time eating oodles of middle eastern food, then this is a spice which may have passed you by! Sumac is made from berries which grow on a tree in the Mediterranean and Middle East. Since there were no lemons in this region during the Roman era, sumac was used as a sour flavour in many dishes. Not only was it used for flavouring, but the berries were also used for dying as they are a rich deep red. Sumac was brought to Australia by middle eastern migrants, you may have encountered it sprinkled on hummus, fleshly sliced onions or used in salads such as fattoush. When buying sumac, the colour can be a good indication of the quality - darker red sumac contains more berry and less stem and seed than lighter varieties. 

Reference: Hemphill, 2006

For my month of spices I'm using Spice Notes and Recipes by Ian Hemphill as my reference tool to learn about spices and for all the information above. Thanks Ian for writing such a great and informative book! 

Spicy Chickpea Salad with Olive Hummus Dressing

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil

1 x 400g tin of chickpeas (or 350-400g cooked chickpeas), drained well

1 tbsp sweet paprika

1 tbsp smoked paprika

1/2 tsp ground chilli (chilli powder)

3 cups baby spinach

3 tomatoes, chopped

Olive Hummus Dressing 

3 tbsp hummus

2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

4-5 kalamata olives, finely chopped

1 tbsp olive oil

Sumac

To Make

1. Heat the olive oil in a pan and add the chickpeas and spices. Fry, stirring occasionally until fragrant and the chickpeas are coated in the spices.

2. While they are cooking. Combine all the ingredients for the dressing (except the sumac) in a small bowl and mix well.

3. Remove the chickpeas from the heat and set aside while you put together the salad. Wash the baby spinach leaves and dry as much as you can. Place in a large serving bowl and sprinkle the chopped tomatoes over the top. Add the chickpeas and drizzle with the dressing. Sprinkle liberally with sumac.Toss just before serving.

Serves 2 as a main, 4 as a side.

Polish Surówka z Marchewki (Carrot and Apple Salad)

This simple Polish salad is an absolutely perfect accompaniment to the heavier and creamier dishes which I've been serving up for Polish food month(s). When you're eating Pyzy with Creamy Mushroom Sauce or delicious Golabki, you're keen to have a light, fresh and healthy salad on the side! I'll be honest, I made this salad based on a vague description of a salad on the wikipedia Polish Cuisine page, so I'm not sure how authentic it is (you can never really trust wikipedia!). Either way, it's a winner :)

Guess what I'm doing today while this post is scheduled to go up? I'll be spending a day strolling around the Art Nouveau Buildings in Riga, the capital of Latvia! I'm really excited about it.

Ingredients
4 carrots
2 green apples
4 tbsp grapeseed or sunflower oil
Juice of 1/2 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
Walnuts, to garnish

To Make
1. Coarsely grate the carrot and place in a bowl. Peel the apples and grate them too. Add to the carrot.
2. Add the oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper. Mix well.
3. Garnish with broken walnut pieces and serve.

Serves 8 as a side salad. Halve the recipe to serve 4.

This month I'm featuring lots of delicious food from Poland.

Check out my other Polish recipe posts:

Home Made Vegan Sour Cream

Pyzy (Polish Potato Dumplings)

Mizeria (Polish Cucumber Salad)

Golabki (Stuffed Cabbage Rolls)

Kluski Z Makiem (Poppyseed Pasta Dessert)

Makowiec (Poppyseed Strudel)

Vegan Mizeria (Polish Cucumber Salad)

This is my first scheduled post while I'm away overseas, I hope you'll be enjoying the things I have lined up for you while I'm travelling around! As you read this I'll be in Stockholm spending time with a near and dear friend who I haven't seen for more than three years. It'll be wonderful!

To keep you satiated in world food while I'm away, though, I thought you'd like this. It's Mizeria - a Polish cucumber salad with a creamy sour cream and dill dressing. Very simple but quite special (as simple things often are!). Fresh, creamy, crunchy and full of flavour - this vegan version uses my home made sour cream and it came up a treat.

Ingredients
3-4 cucumbers
1/2 cup vegan sour cream
1 tsp finely chopped dill
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp sugar

To Make
1. Slice cucumbers and place in a bowl.
2. Combine sour cream, dill, salt and sugar in a bowl and stir well to combine.
3. Mix the sour cream dressing through the cucumber. Chill in the fridge until ready to serve. Best served less than an hour after it has been made. Garnish with dill sprigs for prettiness just before serving.

Serves 6-8. Perfect to bring to a potluck or family gathering.

This month I'm featuring lots of delicious food from Poland.

Check out my other Polish recipe posts:

Home Made Vegan Sour Cream

Pyzy (Polish Potato Dumplings)

Golabki (Stuffed Cabbage Rolls)

Surówka Z Marchewki

Kluski Z Makiem (Poppyseed Pasta Dessert)

Makowiec (Poppyseed Strudel)

Hearts of Palm Salad with Lime Coriander Dressing

I've always wanted an excuse to try cooking with Hearts of Palm, I've read about them online and on cookbooks and I recently discovered that there is a store near (ish) me which stocks them in tins. I've often walked past them when buying other things and been sorely temped to just grab a tin. The main thing stopping me is the price - at over $5 per tin it's a little bit of a splurge, especially when I didn't have anything in particular in mind to make with them.

But.... this month I've been featuring lots of recipes inspired by Costa Rica and from my internet research it would seem that they use this ingredient quite a bit. I found Hearts of Palm Salads and Hearts of Palm Rice (Arroz Palmito) referred to on the internet. I really wanted to try both but I wasn't sure my food budget could really stretch to 2 tins so I decided on the salad, because I love salads. Want to know another exciting thing about this salad? These lovely cherry and egg tomatoes came fresh out of my garden moments before I made the salad - now that is fresh!

This salad is fairly simple, with the hearts of palm as the star and a simple but very Costa Rican dressing of lime, coriander, salt and olive oil. The hearts of palm were certainly a new experience for me. I'm not sure how they would traditionally be cooked/stored/prepared in Costa Rica, but I found the tinned ones to be very soft in texture and a bit mushy. They had a similar texture to tinned asparagus, in my opinion. I think I read on somebody else's blog that they described the hearts of palm as being 'crunchy'. In this case I can only assume that there is some other way to get them than in a tin because mine certainly weren't crunchy! The taste was pleasant and mild though, and it was great to try out an exotic new ingredient in my salad!

Hearts of Palm Salad with Lime & Coriander Dressing

Ingredients
1 x 400ml tin Hearts of Palm
2-3 handfuls of mesclun/loose lettuce leaves
2 lebanese cucumbers
1 punnet of cherry or grape tomatoes
Juice of 1/2 lime
1 tsp olive oil
1 tbsp chopped coriander
Cracked black pepper and salt

To Make
1. Drain the tin of hearts of palm and slice.
2. Slice the cucumber into sticks and halve the cherry tomatoes.
3. Arrange the mesclun on a platter and top with the cucumber, tomatoes and hearts of palm.
2. Combine all remaining ingredients in a jar and shake well to combine. Drizzle over the salad and top with more chopped coriander, to taste.

Serves 4-6 as a side salad.

This month I'm featuring lots of delicious food from Costa Rica.

Check out my other recipe posts:

Resbaladera (Rice & Barley Milk Drink)

Orange & Passion Fruit Pudding (Atol de Naranja)

Paprika de Papa (Paprika Fried Potatoes)

Chayote con Maiz (Chokoes and Corn)

Home Made Salsa Lizano 

Arroz con Leche (Rice Pudding)

Gallo Pinto (Beans and Rice)

Mushroom Ceviche

Chickpea, Apple and Cashew Salad with Tahini Dressing

My mum calls me the Salad Queen because I almost never make the same salad twice. I just love making salads - they are so easy and so versatile. A lot of people think that salad is boring which baffles me - maybe they just put lettuce, tomato and cucumber in their salads and then add some store bought sugary dressing? If that is how you view salads then I challenge you to try some of my salads.

There are so many different vegetables and fruits, beans and pulses, nuts and seeds and different dressings to use in salads! This hearty salad is perfect for people who think that salads aren't filling enough to be your whole meal. It's also deceptively healthy - the rich creamy dressing is made with tahini which already has a certain oil content so that means you don't need to add any oil to the dressing - winner! 

Ingredients

1 small or medium sized beetroot

Lettuce (as much as you want for 2 people)

2 tomatoes, chopped

2 tbsp pepitas

1 x 400ml tin of chickpeas OR 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas (soak for 24 hours, then boil for 30 minutes)

1 medium apple (see note)

1 cup unsalted cashews

Dressing

2 tbsp unhulled tahini

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 small glove garlic, crushed

Note: The variety of apple you choose will alter the flavour profile of the dish. I chose a sweet apple (like gala or pink lady) to add some crunchy sweetness to the salad. If you use a granny smith you'll have a more sour taste to the salad. Try both and see which one you prefer? :)

To Make:
1. Peel and dice the beetroot. Place in a saucepan and cover with water. Boil until tender (about 15-20 minutes - depending on how big you cut the pieces). Drain and rinse with cold water. Set aside.
2. Spread lettuce between two bowls. Chop tomatoes and layer on top of the lettuce. Then top with the cooled beetroot.
3. Lightly toast the pepitas by dry frying in a pan for about 60 seconds, tossing them regularly until they're browned and starting to pop. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
4. To make the dressing mix together all the ingredients and stir vigorously until smooth and combined.
5. In a bowl toss the cooked chickpeas, diced apple, cashews and pepitas with the dressing to coat. Distribute amongst the bowls and enjoy!

Serves 2

Cambodian Cucumber & Vermicelli Salad

I've been looking forward to sharing this salad with you since June last year! I made it originally for Cambodian Food Month, but I was so anxious to eat it's deliciousness that I quickly snapped a quick photo without bothering with good light or good styling and then I gobbled it all up. Sooooo good!

But then - I had a look back at the photo and it was pretty dreadful. The bad light made the salad look very soggy and yellow, which is a far cry from the bright fresh and crunchy salad that it is! So when I got together with friends at the end of last year to celebrate by eating some of the dishes that we had enjoyed the most from the world food challenge, I wanted to make this salad because then I could get some better pictures and because honestly it was one of my favourites. Guess what I did the exact same thing again! Anxious to eat quickly = terrible photos! See what I mean?

Attempt 1 - June 2012

Attempt 2 - December 2012

So - I had to make it again (not so much of a chore - I was happy to eat this salad three times!). What do you think? A big improvement? Either way this is such a wonderful salad that I'll be making it again and again and again. So there will be plenty of other opportunities to get more photos - if I can hold myself back from eating it for long enough!

Cambodian Cucumber and Vermicelli Salad
1 x 250g packet rice vermicelli
3 lebanese cucumbers
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
6 tbsp soy sauce
1 red chilli, finely chopped (you can remove some of the placenta if you want it less hot)
1 tsp sugar
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp sesame oil
1/2 cup chopped peanuts
2 shallots, chopped

To Make
1. Soak the rice vermicelli in cold water for 20 minutes. Drain and then soak in hot water (just tap hot water - not boiling water) for 10 minutes. Drain again and rinse in cold water. Set aside.
2. Thinly slice the lebanese cucumbers. To get these nice and thin and ribbon like I like to use a potato peeler  to do this, peeling strips off the cucumber on all four sides until you are just left with the squishy middle bit which it too soft to cut with the peeler, then I just finely slice the middle bits. If you prefer, you can just cut the cucumber as thinly as you can using a knife.
3. Combine the chopped garlic, soy sauce, chopped chilli, sugar, vinegar and sesame oil in a bowl.
4. Place the vermicelli in a big bowl and toss the shallots, peanuts, dressing and cucumber through it.
5. Top with more chopped peanuts and drizzle with extra sesame oil to taste. Eat immediately!

Serves 4 as a meal or 6-8 as a side dish.

Check out my other Cambodian recipe posts:

Hot and Sour Mushroom Soup

Kho Manor Nung To Hu (Pineapple and Tofu)

Cambodian Spiced Eggplant

Pumpkin and Sweet Potato Parfait (Borbo Skor La-Pov)

Num Chet Chien (Banana Nuggets!)

Khmer Lemongrass Vegetable Curry

Nem To-hu Sap (Vegetarian Summer Rolls)

Tirk Salouk Swai (Mango Chilli Salsa)

Salsa Verde Potato Salad (otherwise known as Green Potatoes)

Around the holiday season you find yourself often in the position of being asked to "bring a dish" to any number of events. Potato salad is a classic, but give the tired old mayonnaise dressing a miss and try out this fresh and tangy salsa verde.

Ingredients

1kg chat potatoes

1 bunch parsley

1 tbsp capers

1 dill pickle, roughly chopped

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tsp red wine vinegar

3 tbsp olive oil

2-3 shallots, chopped (scallions)

To Make

1. Bring a large pot of water to the boil and add the potatoes. Simmer for about 15 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender when pierced with a knife. Drain and set aside.

2. Combine the parsley, capers, pickle, lemon juice, vinegar and 2 tbsp olive oil in a food processor. Process until you get to your desired consistency. You can either leave it a bit chunky (like a traditional salsa verde) or continue until it's smooth. 

3. Cut any of the larger potatoes in half, if desired. Stir through the dressing. Sprinkle with chopped shallots (scallions) and drizzle with the remaining olive oil. There is no need to add salt, as the capers are quite salty already. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Serves 6.