A Few Salads To Ease Us Into Summer – Mexican Slaw, Cauliflower & Capers, Easy Beans & Peas

I posted in September that I had written a few recipes for Nourish magazine and promised to post all of the recipes on my blog once the issue had been released, well here they are finally. It’s been a busy week of work, cooking classes organising a Blogger dinner event and bathroom renovations, any spare time has been spent with a hammer or paint brush in my hand.  I have to confess, I have many recipes and photos sitting on my Mac that never make it onto the blog, I always have time to cook and eat and love to photograph but finding the time to sit down and write them up is a little harder to find. It certainly comes in handy though for weeks like this.

Mexican seems to be all the craze at the moment and this Slaw the perfect way to spice up your summer burgers, whether fish, chicken or beef. If the weather is not quite warm enough at your ‘neck of the woods’ to get into leafy salads, try the warm cauliflower salad or the bean & pea salad.

Mexican Style Slaw
Ingredients
Serves 8 burgers easily
1/2 white cabbage (or 1/4 of each red and white), outer leaves and core removed
6-8 large radish
small bunch fresh coriander, finely chopped
3 spring onions, root removed
50ml sour cream
Juice and zest of 1 lime
1 medium hot chili
pinch salt
Method
Slice the cabbage and radish as thin as possible, almost paper thin! I use a mandolin. Place in a large bowl.
Finely slice the spring onions and chili, remove chili seeds if they are too hot (they are the hottest part of the chili). Add to the bowl with the cabbage and radish.
Add the chopped coriander to the bowl.
In a separate bowl place the sour cream, lime juice, zest and salt, mix together.
Add the sour cream dressing to the coleslaw just before serving so it doesn’t go too soft.

Vibrant Bean Salad with Cumin Seeds & herbs

Ingredients
300g frozen, garden peas
200g frozen broad beans
300g green beans, stalk removed
large handful of parsley and fresh coriander
1 tsp cumin seeds
Juice of 1 lemon
3 Tbsp olive oil
1 small clove garlic
Salt & Pepper
Method

Defrost both the garden peas and broad beans.

Remove the outer shell of the broad beans (they can be chewy).

Thoroughly drain the peas and podded broad beans then place them in a large bowl.

In a large pan of boiling water blanch the green beans for 2 minutes then drain and plunge into a bowl of ice cold water, this will stop further cooking and keep them bright green.

Drain the green beans and add to the rest of the beans & peas.

Blend together the olive oil, lemon juice, cumin seeds, coriander, parsley and garlic to a smooth salad dressing.

Mix the dressing through the beans and serve.

Optional: you could serve with some crumbled feta cheese.

Warm Cauliflower, Caper & Anchovy Salad

Ingredients

1 Cauliflower divided into florets

1 Tbsp capers

2 anchovy fillets

1 clove garlic

Large handful parsley

juice of 1 lemon

60ml olive oil

salt& pepper

Method

Steam cauliflower for 2-3 minutes, you want it still to have a little crunchiness to it.

Place all the other ingredients into a blender and whiz together to make the dressing and season to taste with black pepper & salt.

Place the cooked cauliflower onto a serving platter and drizzle with dressing.

Serve immediately.