Saturday 2 September 2017

You can make friends with salad

Growing up I didn't really like to eat salad, and I quoted Homer Simpson quite often "You don't make friends with salad", and I loved to sing Bart's "You don't make friends with salad" song. What I discovered a little later in life though, is that what I didn't like, was your average boring, garden variety salads and I especially hated french salad dressing or any really that had a strong vinegar taste. Now, I eat lots of salads, but I always make my own dressing to go on them so I know exactly what I am eating, and infuse the dressings with flavours I love and flavours that complement each other. Today I will be sharing my new salad recipe with you, which will indeed make you friends 😉


Early Spring time Salad

Salad Dressing

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup of olive oil
  • 1 clove of garlic
  • 1 tsp of grated ginger
  • 1 tsp of grated galangal
  • 1 tsp of cook pro stock paste
  • 1/4 maple syrup
  • Juice of 1 orange 

Method

  1. Heat oil in pan on medium heat.
  2. Add the garlic, ginger, galangal and stock paste to the oil and simmer for 5 min
  3. Add the maple syrup and orange juice and simmer for 5 min.
  4. Turn off heat and let cool for 15min.
  5. Using a fine strainer, filter the dressing to remove any solids.

Salad

Ingredients

  • 1 large sweet potato
  • 2 capsicums
  • 1 onion
  • 1 Tbsp of olive oil
  • 1 can (425g) chickpeas
  • 1 carrot
  • 3 cabbage leaves
  • 60g of dried cranberries
  • 100g of mixed lettuce leaves
  • 1/2 cup of cooked quinoa.

Method

  • Pre-heat the oven 180 degree Celsius.
  • Peel and diced sweet potato, slice capsicum into strips and cut onion into wedges. Place sweet potato capsicum onion and chickpeas on oven tray. Coat in olive oil, and bake in oven for 15-20min or until slightly golden.
  • Julienne the carrot and slice the cabbage thinly.
  • Once the vegetables are cooked, place all ingredients into a bowl and toss. Pour over salad dressing and serve.
This salad is great at the start of spring with its fresh citrus flavours. It can be served warm on the cooler days or be served cold on the warmer days. The cooked ingredients can be kept separate from the fresh ingredients and be tossed through just before serving, making it perfect to take to a weekend bbq, picnic or make extras for work lunches throughout the week.
Happy cooking!

Love Mandy M

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