It's time for salad, I thought, during all the warmth. Hurrah salad! I made plans, I shopped, and now it's raining at me ungratefully. Next week's fish order for quick, no-cook seafood salads looks particularly apt. Yay.
But this week's salads are good ones, and recommended. It's veggie week, which in summer as here tends to mean a cheese fest at my place.
Salad of peaches and the odd apricot (it's a bit early, they are a smidge crunchy, but I can't resist it), with whatever greens you have (tarragon is especially good, random spinach is fine), dressed with lemon mainly.
This is good in general, but fabulous with halloumi saganaki (slices dunked in eggwash, dunked in flour mixed with sesame seeds, fried 2 mins on either side), drizzled with runny honey and a bit more lemon. This is *so* good, I will be making it many times more this summer so long as I can get more halloumi. It would be fine with just a green salad but some stone fruit makes for extra joy.
Meanwhile, in the slightly less indulgent but still good side, but also the side I forgot to take a photo of...
French beans roasted (or griddled) with dill and lemon, originally designed to go with feta, and I'm sure that would be good. But this week they went with another recipe from the same book (The Art of the Larder this time), for marinated mozzarella.
Ideal for stretching limited cheese, and also good if you're feeling
unenthused by bouncy supermarket mozz. Marinade is creme fraiche,
garlic, lemon zest, a little oil, and either mint or oregano to add at
the end. It's a delicious thing to have in its own right, and makes a
couple of mozzarella slices into a whole meal. I wasn't sure why you would bother with the marinading when I first tried it, but I am 100% converted. It's not something to make every week, but I may find an excuse to repeat before summer's end too.
I am really just cooking at the moment to pretend it's summer, and to hide from a whole world of difficult thoughts about current events that are keeping me awake and disrupting helpful things like yoga. I can tediously confirm both these dishes work fine if you're suffering spinning anxiety vertigo and don't really want to do fiddly cooking. Yay.
The marinade sounds good and squeaky cheese always is!
ReplyDeleteI gave up buying apricots in England years ago through disappointment - crunchy or dusty or flavourless or all three - mostly I blame a holiday in the Charente in June when I was 10. Fresh apricots have never tasted so good! (I also fell in love with langoustines, roche fort and vsop cognac that holiday...)
That sounds like a very expensive but excellent holiday.
DeleteI always leave apricots for ages before eating; think I've had these a week and they are almost there. But I also have a brilliant recipe for baking iffy ones (red vermouth, butter, vanilla, sugar if they are really sharp). So there's always an upside!
I've avoided halluomi for years because it just didn't appeal, but your version of it sounds really interesting. You may have converted me. :)
ReplyDeleteLove halloumi - it's making me crave our local Greek restaurant who do a fab halloumi salad with rocket, olives, sundried tomatoes and lots of lemon. Might make it myself if the sun ever shines again...
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