Right now, we want every meal to be a salad – crunchy and fresh, with pockets of richness and pools of acidity. I don’t care if it’s sunshine or rain; neither can reach the inner recesses of my stomach and tell me what I feel like eating.
So I have created this brilliant app entitled Salads Near Me, so that you will never be more than 100 metres from a great salad.
No I haven’t, silly. In fact, if you actually put ‘salads near me’ in your search engine, you will get bombarded with home delivery services and places like Fishbowl and Cali Press.
The app that tells you what is in your refrigerator and how to pull it together into a salad does not yet exist. But it should. Allow me to set a template for it.
YOU HAVE: AVOCADO AND A CAN OF BEANS.
Make the red bean and guacamole salad below.
YOU HAVE: SOBA, SOY AND FROZEN EDAMAME.
Make the Japanese soybean noodle salad below.
YOU HAVE: SPUDS AND PEAS.
Make the potato salad with peas galore, below.
YOU HAVE: NONE OF THE ABOVE.
You probably need to do some shopping soon.
RED BEAN AND GUACAMOLE SALAD
Red kidney beans turn the elements of guacamole into a salad - served on its major ingredient, creamy avocado.
2 ripe avocado pears
half red onion, finely sliced
for the quick pickle: 2 tbsp red wine vinegar, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp sugar
1 red capsicum, de-seeded and diced
Half cucumber, peeled and diced
2 tomatoes, diced
1 tbsp pickled jalapeno peppers, diced
400 g red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
2 tbsp coriander or parsley leaves, roughly chopped
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 tbsp lime juice
1 tsp ground cumin
sea salt and black pepper
Corn chips and limes for serving
In a bowl, mix the red onion with vinegar, salt and sugar and leave to pickle while you do the rest of the chopping.
Add the chopped capsicum, cucumber, tomatoes and jalapenos and the red kidney beans and coriander to the onion pickle, tossing well. Add olive oil, lime juice, ground cumin, sea salt and pepper, tossing well.
Cut the avocadoes in half and remove stones. Cut a small section off the base so they sit flat on the plate, and spoon the salad on top.
Serve with corn chips and lime wedges. Serves 2.
# Or just chop the avocado up and toss through the salad, duh.
# Cannot have too much lime juice. Don’t let anyone just leave the lime wedges on the plate as if they were for decoration only. Squeeze, please
# Makes a lot of vinaigrette, because you’re combining it with the vinegar from the onion pickle. Embrace it. Any leftovers, I just drink from the bowl.
JAPANESE SOYBEAN NOODLE SALAD
100 g soba noodles
100 g frozen edamame (soybeans)
handful of watercress or fresh coriander
greens of 2 spring onions, finely chopped
togarashi sprinkles
1 tsp sesame seeds, optional
Dressing:
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp rice vinegar
Dash of mirin
Half tsp sea salt
Cook the soba noodles in simmering salted water for 3 minutes or until just tender. Drain and rinse in cold water, and shake dry.
Cook the edamame in simmering salted water for 2 minutes, drain and pod ( and don’t eat the pods).
Whisk the olive oil, sesame oil, soy, rice vinegar, mirin and sea salt together.
Toss noodles, edamame and spring onions in the dressing with a good sprinkle of togarashi, drain off excess dressing, and divvy up between two bowls.
Scatter with sesame seeds and serve with watercress or coriander. Serves 2.
#Togarashi is a must-have Japanese sprinkles made of dried chilli, sesame seeds, seaweed, etc (and by the by, is brilliant on fried eggs).
#Soba noodles also love being tossed with finely chopped kim chi, Korean fermented cabbage.
# Add poached or teriyaki chicken, rare tataki beef, freshly cooked prawns or just heaps of green veggies, lightly cooked.
POTATO SALAD WITH PEAS GALORE
300 g small potatoes, skin-on
150g peas, podded
150g snow peas
150 g sugar snap peas
Handful of green beans, trimmed
4 small red-skinned radishes
1 tbsp hazelnut or olive oil
Vinaigrette:
2 brown shallots/eschalots, finely sliced
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp hazelnut or walnut oil
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
Sea salt and cracked black pepper
Cook the potatoes in simmering salted water for 20 minutes or until tender. Drain, reserving cooking water, and halve.
Return water to the boil and cook the peas, snow peas, sugar snaps and beans for 1 to 2 minutes only, then drain and refresh in ice-cold water to stop the cooking.
Whisk the vinaigrette ingredients until thickened, then whisk in a dash of water or white wine to lighten. Add the shallots and leave to soften for 10 minutes.
Finely slice the radishes.
Toss the potatoes in the vinaigrette and remove, then toss the peas and remove, then the radishes. Or toss the lot together depending on your mood.
Arrange on a big platter – in separate elements or combined - and drizzle with remaining vinaigrette. Serves 3-4.
# This would be ace with a pile of grilled spicy sausages. According to Terry.
# Also pretty ace with chunks of goat cheese or parmigiano and pistachios or walnuts, and crusty bread. Because not every salad has to come with sausages in order to be a meal.
Thanks for reading! For last week’s salad recipes, click here. And special thanks to my right-hand man, Terry Durack, for pointing out that many salads that I think are perfect in their own right would in fact be better with a grilled sausage. Nice try.
I would also like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands and waters upon which I work, live, cook and play; the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. I fully support the Uluru Statement from the Heart, and for an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice to be enshrined in Australia’s Constitution. It’s about time, folks.
So pleased I have found you again, both my sister Marilyn and I have always found your recipes easy to follow and rarely with ingredients that you wouldn’t use on a regular basis.
So good! Making the soba one tonight. Had nothing to serve with the chicken and now I do!