radicchio

burrata salad with peas

~ aplotzi ~ Leave a comment

I don’t eat a lot of cheese but when I do it is usually pecorino, Parmesan or on spesh occasions, burrata. Once you try burrata you wonder why you have never ever had it before because its one of the most delicious things in the world on every level. It’s a soft pillow of creamy, delicately flavoured gorgeousness, a mozzarella which has stepped up its game and become the beautiful twin. It has double cream in the centre of it, so when you break it open with your fingers the middle flows out of it like the sauce escaping from a hot chocolate fondant pudding. Peas are great too, so I married them off to each other and added a simple dressing with lemon. This salad should take minutes to make and makes a great starter or snack…or as a side dish with my midnight spaghetti.

Recipe

Serves 2 or one as a main course.

Ingredients: 

1 lemon juiced
1 or 2 burrata or mozzarella balls
A sprig of mint very finely chopped
A cup of thawed frozen peas (no need to cook)
Crunchy salad leaves (I use red chicory or treviso radicchio)
Salt and pepper to taste
½- 1 teaspoon of maple syrup
2 tablespoons olive oil


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pear salad

~ aplotzi ~ 2 Comments

I wanted to create a recipe that uses hard pears for salads as they are perfect in the same way as carrots and celeriac are. So I created this healthy, tasty salad and tested it on friends at dinner and they really loved it and wanted the recipe, and they are still talking about how delicious it is. The dressing is an unusual combination of flavours, like mustard and lime juice, but trust me, it works. You can use ripe pears if your pears are ripe, it’s still delicious, and it’s also amazing with shavings of pecorino. Pecorino and lime, who’d have thought? Perfect, too, if you want to try new flavours salad-wise.

Recipe

Serves 2.

Ingredients:
1 teaspoon Poppy seeds
3 firm pears cored and very thinly sliced (I leave the skin on but its up to you) they can be sliced lengthways or in discs 
A round radicchio roughly shredded or chopped chicory
A sprig of parsley finely chopped
A sprig of chives finely chopped
1 teaspoon of maple syrup
¼ teaspoon of English mustard
1 lime, zest and juice
2 tablespoons of olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

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gado gado snacks

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Don’t you love a snack? I love them and I’d be happy to live on them for the rest of my life. These are a lower carb version of a Gado Gado salad, but in a small snack form. So if you are on a lower carb regime they are perfect. Great as a canapé or starter, or just in front of Netflix with your favourite box set. They are crunchy, creamy and sweet and sour, which is, if you read this blog, my favourite  combo… blinking delish.

Serves 3-4.

Ingredients:
12 Quails eggs (£2.60 doz from Sainsbury’s)  or 4 normal size eggs
1 red pepper very finely chopped
1 head of chicory or a lettuce
1 small cucumber, julienned(I use a julienne peeler)
A handful of crispy onions (supermarket)
A small sprig of fresh coriander

The sauce:
1 clove of chopped garlic
3 tablespoons of maple syrup
5 tablespoons of peanut butter
Juice of 2 limes
1 teaspoon fish sauce
1 tablespoon of soya sauce
1 tablespoon of tamarind paste
Chilli sauce to taste (optional)

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caramelised fennel salad

~ aplotzi ~ 3 Comments

This salad is surprisingly delicious. Most salads have raw fennel in them, but roasting fennel makes it lose its liquoricey taste and it becomes a different but delicious salad ingredient, also it brings out the sweetness and it becomes quite tender and a bit crispy all at the same time. Great on its own (I like it with chips) and you can also serve it with fish, chicken or meat and you have a fab low carb meal. My friends really love it and make this a lot, plus it’s pretty healthy.

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