watercress

MORE FRUIT AND VEG Part 3: Salads - WATERCRESS, FENNEL AND ORANGE SALAD Part 2: Salads

MORE FRUIT AND VEG
Part 2: Salads
WATERCRESS, FENNEL AND ORANGE SALAD

There is no denying that salad is the most obvious way of getting some veggies and fruit in your diet. Unfortunately there is this idea of utter torture associated with salads. In many people’s minds dieting equals torture and dieting equals salads.

There are some horrid salads out there, the other day I was served such a salad, alongside my veggie burger in a restaurant. It consisted of big pieces of ice berg lettuce, thickly sliced white onion and one thick slice of tomato...That was it. I was not impressed and will not be visiting that restaurant again.

Growing up in Czech Republic the salad option was very limited when I was a child (things have improved now...), we had a cucumber salad, lettuce salad, tomato salad usually dressed with vinegar/water/salt/sugar or kefir. There were also lots of mayonnaise heavy salads and my Dad still likes to dress his veggies that way. Nostalgically I still make the sweet and sour cucumber salad but I have widened my horizons substantially.

Talking about progress I remember when my grandma returned from visiting her brother once, his daughter married a Frenchman and influenced (somewhat) my aunt’s salad preparation. My grandmother was horrified when she saw my aunt placing lettuce leaves into a tea towel and swinging the bundle furiously over her head like a lasso, creating an impromptu salad spinner. Also the shock horror when she dressed it with oil, mustard and vinegar!!! My granny was not impressed...I was intrigued.

I admit not all salads I make are an amazing culinary experience, sometimes I just pile lettuce leaves on my plate alongside a portion of my main dish. I am happy with that. Great sweet lettuce doesn’t even need dressing on it at times. Other times I want something a bit more exciting. Something that will wake up my taste buds. Like this watercress, fennel and orange salad.

WATERCRESS, FENNEL AND ORANGE SALAD
If yo want to make this salad ahead keep the watercress separate from the rest and combine just before serving. The orange juice will cause the delicate watercress leaves to wilt quite quickly.

ingredients
1 medium fennel
1 half of a medium red onion
1 pack of watercress, any thick stalks removed
3 oranges
1 Tbs olive oil

watercressorangesalad

method
  1. First, prepare your fennel, remove the thick outer layer, cut the bulb in half and cut out the hard core at the base. Slice the fennel as thinly as you can, I used my mandolin for that job.
  2. Slice the onion in the same fashion.
  3. Using a sharp knife ( a large bread knife works great too) to remove the orange peel and pith of 2 oranges. You can either segment the orange, or just cut into pieces. My orange segments looked rather small so I decided to cut the orange up, segmenting just wouldn’t work.
  4. To make the dressing juice the third orange (mine was small, you may only need half an orange if it is large), add salt pepper and the spoon of olive oil. Stir well.
  5. Combine the watercress, onion, oranges and fennel together, dress with the dressing and serve.
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