I love having little ‘aha’ moments and I had one of those while making this salad. Jamie said to ‘Scratch a fork down the length of the cucumber all the way round……’ before slicing and lo and behold this produces very prettily bevel-edged slices.
So that’s how they do it, aha.
The ‘Modern Greek Salad’ comes from a recipe in ‘Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals’ cookbook and this particular recipe is accompanied by ‘Spinach, Chickpea & Feta Parcels’ in the book.
I thought the salad was deliciously refreshing and if you’ve a good sharp knife then there is no need to pull out the food processor to do your slicing.
Jamie Oliver’s ‘Modern Greek Salad’ (not exact reproduction):
You will need:
1 cucumber
1 red onion
1 lemon
Handful fresh coriander
Handful fresh mint leaves
20g blanched almonds
Handful of black olives
400g tomatoes (Jamie’s recipe = 650g mixed ripe; I used Irish Flavorita)
1 romaine lettuce (not in my shop so I used 2 baby gem)
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil or rapeseed oil
Method:
Rinse the cucumber, coriander, mint, tomatoes and lettuce then use kitchen towel to roughly dry them.
‘Scratch a fork down the length of the cucumber all the way round……’ then finely slice.
Peel and finely slice the red onion.
Place the onion and cucumber into a bowl, squeeze over the juice of the lemon and season with some salt.
Finely chop the coriander and mint and add to the onion and cucumber and mix through with a fork to combine.
Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and add the almonds and black olives, leave to heat through for a couple of minutes.
Meanwhile slice the tomatoes and arrange on a serving platter.
Slice the lettuce 1cm thick and scatter over the tomatoes.
Scatter over the onion, cucumber and herb mixed followed by a drizzle of 1 tbsp of oil.
Top with the heated almonds and olives from the pan.
Enjoy.
‘Til next time, Sheila.
