All posts filed under: Salads

white bean salad recipe

Holiday White Bean Salad

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It’s certainly been a while! How have you all been? My family and I travelled to France at the end of June for two weeks and after we came back to Berlin, I still felt like I needed a little bit more time to settle into our new way of life, so I took another three weeks off, hardly any activity on social media either. I am feeling great after this long break and am immensely grateful that we could get out of our apartment after being ‘home-bounded’ for many months, a change of scenery surely helped us eliminated some of the anxiety and uncertainty that were built up in the past few months. We feel a lot better than a month ago and we certainly have found a new rhythm for our everyday life. Although our lives will still be affected by Coronavirus for some times to come, but we are learning everyday to better adapt to this unfortunate situation, hopefully to restore some sort of normalities. That said, our lives will never be the same …

Roasted Beetroot Blood Orange and Feta Cheese Salad recipe

Roasted Beetroot, Blood Orange, Snow Pea Shoots and Feta Cheese Salad

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I am always fond of beetroot, one of the few root vegetables I cook regularly. I don’t like so much the ready cooked type which mostly wrapped in plastic vacuum bag, although my first taste of beetroot was one of those cooked one soaked in vinegar, packed in plastic; laying somewhat out of place among other fresh vegetables on the supermarket shelves. But in the past years I have learned how to cook it from raw and I have never looked back since. I prefer to buy the one that still has its greens intact as it is more flavourful (usually can be found in farmer market). The beet greens are surprisingly delicious and only requires minimum cooking. My favourite way to cook them is add them to a skillet with crispy chorizo, fry for a few minutes and then drench the mixture with beaten egg, good pinch of salt and pepper then baked in the oven until the egg is set. Serve the frittata with crumbled feta and chopped fresh parsley, an amazingly tasty …

Miso Tahini Dressing recipe and Styling Project

Miso Tahini Dressing and My Food Styling Projects

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Happy New Year my dear readers!! Hopefully this year will be an exciting one for everyone! It will certainly be one for me! I have been so eager to tell you about the food styling project I worked on for the last couples of months, until now, I can finally show you what I have done and what I have achieved so far! This styling project was for an advertising campaign of a well known Japanese food company – Ajinomoto, who specialises in frozen ready made Japanese food products, seasoning and Asian cooking sauces. So far I was involved in two of their projects entailed recipes writing and food styling using their products, in this case a selection of their frozen gyoza. The first one was a video project in which I created a few recipes for their campaign – a salad dressing recipe (which features here) and a selection of dipping sauces for their gyoza. Then I was responsible to style the scenes and demonstrate the recipes in videos. There are three videos in …

Grilled shrimps, figs and summer squash salad recipe

Grilled Prawn, Fig and Summer Squash Salad in Harrisa Yogurt Dressing

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I love the feeling of my teeth sink into a cold, plump fig from the fridge every late summer morning, the chill does a better job of waking me up than my strong Oolong tea. Beside that I feel especially nurtured eating them first thing in the morning, nothing too overwhelming for the empty stomach, just a hint of sweetness with the most delicate texture, and most importantly, it is packed with nutrients and a good source of fibre. I also love to add a few slices in my yogurt with honey and toasted coconut, or on my crispy toast with a spread of salty goat cheese and a drizzle of honey; bake them in buttery puff pastry with berries jam, or lay them on top of cake batter, bake until they turn dark burgundy and bursting with heavenly sweetness. I especially fond of adding them to salad, with torn mozzarella cheese and dry-cured ham, or with crumbled goat cheese and peppery rocket. So here it is for today, a humble experiment turns into a wonderful salad recipe. The fig provides a subtle sweetness for …

Roasted za'atar carrot with goat cheese, pistachio and promagranate dressing recipe

Roasted Za’atar and Sumac Carrots Salad

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These carrots are roasted to perfection, flavoured with za’atar and sumac; a combined taste of tangy sweet and yet earthy and savory. Za’atar is a spice blend that originates in Middle East countries, such as Lebanon, Israel, Jordon, Palestine and Saudi Arabia; and also popular in some north African countries such as Morocco and Tunisia. Every country has their own blend of spices. The one I have (and I use here) is from Israel, it is a blend of dried oregano, white sesame, thyme, sumac, dill and salt, it has an intense earthy flavour with a hint of licorice note. It gives a wonderful taste to almost anything, I love to sprinkle it on egg of all kinds, or rub the spice on chicken and lamb then put straight onto the grill; scatter it on homemade hummus and baked pitta bread, to say the few examples. The other spice I use here is called Sumac, it is also native to the Middle East; a red coarse powder made from ground sumac berries. It has a floral …

Wakame Salad with Toasted Sesame Dressing recipe

Wakame Avocado Salad with Toasted Sesame Dressing

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Sesame sauce is hugely popular in Asian countries, I grew up eating steamed wobbly rice rolls topped with flavoursome sesame sauce for breakfast, one of my absolute childhood favorites. The other of my beloved dish is hand-torn chicken and julienned cucumber served with silky, sweet sesame sauce. In fact, I love everything with a toasted sesame flavour, so sesame oil becomes my definite pantry item, a drizzle here and a drizzle there, a natural flavour enhancer. I was at my daughter’s school summer fair the other day and I was helping out at one of the food stalls. A fellow mother made summer rolls with a sesame dipping sauce which were so delicious that they sold out almost within just an hour. I was definitely spellbound by the smooth, delectable sauce that I didn’t hesitate to ask her for the recipe. She has given me the list of ingredients but I have to work out the quantities myself. So here is my version of the sesame sauce which I serve here as a salad dressing, and I hope you will like it and will make …

Thai Steak Salad Recipe

Memory of The Significance (with a recipe)

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I remember vividly when Patsy opened the black lacquer painted door when we (my Korean friend and I) were standing in front of her tall Georgian terrace house in London Islington fifteen years ago. She had a big smile on her face. My then future landlady is tall with fair skin and thick blond hair, she has a friendly face with a confident voice, “come on in!” she said. We walked into the light drenched hallway where a massive golden framed mirror hung on one side, and at the end of the hallway, a small potted palm tree stood at the bottom of the stairs. We were immediately leading up the stairs laid with dark blue carpet, all the way to the top of the house. We went into a room to the left of the landing which was small but flooded with light. There were a bed, a desk, a wardrobe stood next to a wooden shelf all arranged neatly inside the room. An unusually large sash window (in relation to the room) next to the bed, overlooking to the back garden and the …

roasted asparagus, lemon, chorizo and feta recipe

Macau – Food Journal Part II (with recipe)

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Although it was only in the beginning of March, the evening was warm but exceptionally pleasant. We (group of eleven people) were gathering in the front of a high-rise building, where we were going to have dinner at a supper club runs by a Macanese lady, Maria Couto at her home in the old part of Macau city, not far from my parent’s apartment where I grew up. She is a native Macanese whose mother is Cantonese and father is Portuguese. She is a home cook specialises in traditional Macanese cooking. Karen and my other sister Lily had been to Maria’s private dinner and they both impressed by her cooking. So they thought it would be special for us to enjoy some ‘home cooking’ instead of going to a restaurant as usual. Like many other who heard of Maria, who was also featured in editorial in several local newspapers and magazines regarding her supper club, would reserve an evening there, dining privately with splendid homemade Macanese food. Mixed feelings flooded in when I stepped into that very building where I used to frequent as …

roasted root veggies, avo and buckwheat salad recipe

Roasted Root Vegetables, Avocado and Buckwheat Salad served with Pistou

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The first time I encountered buckwheat was about 2 years ago when I decided to take on a wheat-free diet. Since then I learned so much about cooking with gluten free ingredients, in fact so many ingredients especially whole food, are naturally gluten-free. At home, we eat a lot of brown rice, lentils, rice and bean noodles as oppose to bread and pasta. I won’t lie to you that I don’t miss having a pizza or a crusty sandwich, I do, and whenever I walk pass a bakery particularly when I am hungry, I wish I could get a straight-out-of-the-oven, feather-light buttery croissant and devour it right there and then. But I learned to adapt to a new eating habit which has improved my health remarkably. All these bloating, stomaches, eczema symptom have gone and I am thrilled that one relatively small decision I made had opened up a whole new world of new ingredients for me, and to have the chance to explore and experiment with these wonderful alternatives, not only in general cooking, but also in …

grilled portobello mushroom, blood orange and kale salad recipe

Grilled Portobello Mushroom, Blood Orange and Kale Salad with a Carrot, Miso, Ginger Dressing

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There is another longer post I have been working on since a week which is a round up of what I did for a catering job last week with a couple of recipes I would like to share. But my hope of publishing the said post online today isn’t possible as I have been caught up with several work commitments and couldn’t manage to do so. Yesterday, a craving of mushroom and salad led me to writing this post incidentally, and the salad was so good that I must share this recipe with you today instead. More about the post I have been working on later. Whenever I see Portobello mushroom in the market, I will end up bringing home a big bagful. I love the giant button shape, the earthy colour and pattern of Portobello. It is heavy, it feels substantial to the touch. When cooked, it holds its shape beautifully. Some say it tastes like beef, it doesn’t in any way in my opinion, but the lovely texture and the earthy, with an almost sweet undertone taste are enough reasons to …