I thought I would start things off with a nice and easy (healthy) summer salad recipe, I’ve called it ‘traffic light salad’ but the point is not just the fact that it’s pleasingly colourful, but that it is satisfying, gloriously tasty and contains at least six different fruit and veg. The recipe below makes enough for 1-2.
Take a couple of big handfuls of mixed leaves – personally I like baby spinach (a must), rocket, red chard and watercress but you could use any combination you like. I’m also not going to give you exact amounts of what goes in your salad, it’s up to you if you put in 5 or 6 baby radishes…
Layer up with:
- a few baby radishes (finely sliced or chopped if you like more of a crunch)
- one third of a cucumber (chopped)
- a clutch of golden plum cherry tomatoes (halved)
- some baby beetroot (not in vinegar if you can avoid it) (chopped)
- a couple of ripe figs (quartered)
- a good chunk of soft goats cheese (I like the crumbly kind – crumbled)
Throw it all into a bowl, arranging the figs and goats cheese artfully on the top.
The salad in all it's kitchen table glory!
I drizzled a bit of extra virgin olive oil and coupled it with a soupcon of Roman vinegar as rediscovered by Alan Coxon and which I bought at Blenheim Palace food and craft fair (http://www.alancoxon.com/roman.html). This works well because the Roman vinegar is sweetened with honey and has lovely warm undertones that go very well with the goats cheese and fig.
If you don’t have access to Chef Coxon’s fabulous vinegar, you can make honey vinaigrette:
- extra virgin olive oil (a good slug)
- good quality cider vinegar (or white wine vinegar if not) (a smaller slug)
- runny honey (a dollop)
- lemon juice (a squeeze)
- mustard powder (just a sprinkle)
- salt & pepper (to taste)
Enjoy!
