Salmon Tartare with Rye Crackers and Fennel & Citrus Salad

I don't know how things are in your household, but in mine we live on a pretty tight budget.  When you have a passion for food and "luxury" ingredients, that can be a bit challenging at times.  It doesn't mean, I believe, that you need to go without, you just need to be a bit creative about the ways in which you use those things.  In many ways this goes right to the heart of my whole philosophy about food.

Case in point ... chicken.  We only eat free range, organic chicken in our house - not just for ethical reasons, but because it also tastes a whole lot better than your average battery farmed chicken.  A free range chook will however set you back about twice as much as a cage raised bird.  With a little planning, however, we can usually manage to get three to four meals out of a chicken, and a batch of soup out of the carcass, which works out pretty budget friendly in the end.

This salmon tartare is another great way of making a luxury ingredient go a long way.  A small salmon fillet, which would normally be a single serving as a main meal, becomes a sumptuous lunch for two, or even an appetiser for four.

It's Pot Luck week at I Heart Cooking Clubs, and we have the choice too cook with any one of our eleven IHCC chefs.  However, I'm still in the honeymoon phase of my relationship with our latest chef, Diana Henry, so I turned to Diana's book A Change of Appetite, where her Scandinavian inspired dish of Salmon Tartare with Pickled Cucumbers and Rye Crackers really caught my attention.

Salmon tartare is one of my favourite dishes, and I didn't make a great deal of changes to the recipe other than adding a slosh of vodka to the marinating salmon, because ... well ... just because, and leaving out the shallots as I didn't want anything to overwhelm the delicate flavour of the salmon.  A few snipped chives, had I had them, might have been nice.  In addition to the rye crackers, Diana serves this salmon tartare with a sweet and sour, pickled cucumber salad and dilled yoghurt.  I chose to make a refreshing fennel and citrus salad instead.

As far as the rye crackers go, I didn't make any changes to the recipe whatsoever, so I'm not going to reproduce the recipe in detail here for you - you'll just have to go get the book, and trust me when I tell you it is totally worth it.

These crackers are so easy to make, and so delicious, you will wonder why you've ever bought crackers in your life.  Not only that, whipping up a batch of these will run out to a fraction of the cost of buying crackers.

Rye flour, along with a little salt, sugar and baking powder are mixed with a little chilled butter until the mixture resembles damp sand, then mixed with milk to form a soft dough - using the food processor makes fast and easy work of this.

Break off golf ball sized chunks, roll in a light dusting of extra rye flour, and then roll out as thin as you possibly can into something vaguely resembling a circle.

Place crackers on a large baking sheet lined with baking parchment, prick all over with a fork, and bake in a hot oven for up to 10 minutes, until crisp and golden.  Cool on a wire rack.

These crackers are a wonderful accompaniment to the salmon, in both flavour and texture, and I think next time a little sprinkling of fennel seeds and sea salt over the crackers before baking might be a nice touch to echo the flavours in the salad.  These crackers also make a great vehicle for a variety of cheeses and chutneys.  A batch of these in your store cupboard won't last long I can promise you.

What tips do you have for stretching the budget to accommodate luxury ingredients?

Salmon Tartare Recipe
Adapted from recipe by Diana Henry
from A Change of Appetite
Click here for the free recipe card

250g (8 oz) salmon, skin and bones removed
1 tablespoon capers, drained and rinsed
juice of 1x lemon
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon vodka
freshly ground black pepper
generous handful of flat leaf parsley, finely chopped

Cut salmon into tiny dice, about .5cm (1/4 inch) in size, and place in a small bowl with the remaining ingredients.  Mix together gently, and chill while you make the crackers and salad, or for up to two hours.  Before serving, taste and adjust any of the seasonings according to your palate.

Fennel & Citrus Salad Recipe

1x orange, peel and all white pith removed
1x grapefruit, peel and all white pith removed
(if you can get pink grapefruit so much the better)
1x lemon, peel and all white pith removed
1x lime, peel and all white pith removed
1x fennel bulb
generous handful of fennel fronds, finely chopped
extra virgin olive oil
flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

Place a sieve over a medium sized bowl.  Hold the peeled orange over the sieve to catch any pips and, using a sharp knife, cut down between the membrane and segment of fruit on each side to separate the fruit entirely from the membrane, and let the fruit segments fall into the bowl.  Squeeze the membrane over the bowl, extracting as much juice from it as you can.  Repeat with the grapefruit, the lemon and the lime, in each case also squeezing all of the juice out of the membrane.

Remove the tough outer "leaves" from the fennel bulb.  Cut it into quarters lengthwise and slice the fennel as thinly as you possibly can - a mandoline is the ideal tool for this job if you have one.

Add the shaved fennel to the citrus segments, along with the fennel fronds.  Season generously with flaky sea salt, freshly ground pepper and a good drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Chill until you are ready to serve.

If you would like to get to know Diana Henry a little better, and to see what everyone else has cooked up this week, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and check out the links (who knows, you might even want to join the journey and cook along with us) ...

... or check out A Change of Appetite and Diana's many other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK, or Fishpond NZ.

Chorizo & Calamari Salad with Black Olives & Pomegranate

On a stormy night a couple of weeks ago a friend and I ventured out to dinner at The Boat Shed, an iconic Nelson restaurant, perched on the edge of the harbour. We decided to Trust The Chef, and as we oooohed and aaaaahed and OMGd our way through the following six or seven dishes, my mind was somewhat relieved from worrying about the rain which was bucketing in through my dining room ceiling back home.  A couple of hours in a "dry place" savouring some heavenly food was just the distraction I needed.

One dish that really delighted us both, and which has been on my mind ever since, was a zingy squid, chorizo and chilli salad.  It reminded me a little of a seafood, fennel and lime salad from Ottolenghi The Cookbook that I'd had bookmarked for ages.

Since it's Pot Luck week this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs, it seemed like a good time to spend a little time with Ottolenghi and conjure up my own version of this salad, which is a little bit Ottolenghi and a little bit Boat Shed.

This made a great dish for a light lunch.  It was quick and simple to put together, and is definitely a dish I will be making again.  Had it been a nice sunny day, this would have been lovely to enjoy al fresco, but on a wintery Sunday warmed by the heat pump it still brought back memories of squid salads in the Greek islands.

Chorizo & Calamari Salad with Black Olives & Pomegranate Recipe
Inspired by The Boat Shed and Yotam Ottolenghi
Serves 2
Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

2 small fennel bulbs
generous handful of coriander
1x mild red chilli, deseeded & finely sliced
handful of black olives
extra virgin olive oil
freshly squeezed lemon juice
flaky sea salt
1x chorizo sausage, thinly sliced
400g (14 oz) cleaned calamari tubes
pomegranate seeds to finish

Trim the bases and tops off the fennel bulbs, reserving a few of the feathery fronds.  Cut the fennel in half lengthwise, and then slice them as thinly as you can - a mandolin is the ideal tool if you have one - and place in a large bowl.  Finely chop the reserved fennel fronds and add them to the bowl.  Add the roughly chopped coriander, chilli and black olives.  Drizzle over extra virgin olive oil and lemon juice to taste, and season with a little flaky sea salt, again to taste.  Set aside.

Heat a little olive oil (you won't need much) in a small pan over medium heat, and saute the chorizo sausage until browned on both sides.  Remove from heat.

Meanwhile, cut the calamari tubes into pieces about 5cm (2 inches) square, and score lightly with a sharp knife.  Toss with a little olive oil and a generous pinch of flaky sea salt.  Heat a chargrill pan over high heat (cast iron is perfect for the job) until smoking.  Grill the calamari in small batches until just done - about 1 minute on each side.  Remove from heat.

Add the calamari and chorizo to the salad.  Toss until well combined and serve immediately, garnished with a sprinkling of pomegranate seeds.

If you would like to get to know Yotam Ottolenghi a little better or any one of our other IHCC chefs, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and see what they've all cooked up for Pot Luck week ...

... or check out Ottolenghi The Cookbook and Ottolenghi's other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK or Fishpond NZ.

I'll also be sharing this post at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the lovely, and very amusing, Michelle at Ms. enPlace, at Souper (Soup, Salad & Sammie) Sundays hosted by my lovely friend Deb at Kahakai Kitchen, at Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads, and at Foodie Friday hosted by Designs by Gollam.

              

Caramelised Fennel with Goat Cheese

When I first saw this recipe in Yotam Ottolenghi's wonderful book Plenty, I was a little skeptical.  It looked gorgeous, but the idea of sweetening fennel with sugar somehow sounded a bit off to me.  But then after the lovely Joanne at Eats Well With Others made it a while back, and raved about it, it had to go on my "must make" list.

I'm sure it comes as no surprise that it's a very long list indeed, but just to prove that things on the list do eventually get made, when I saw beautiful little fresh fennel bulbs at the local farmers market the other day, I knew the time had arrived to move this dish off the list and on to a plate.  What's more this seemed like the perfect dish to share for our Pot Luck theme this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs.

I made a couple of small changes to the original recipe.  I left out butter since I am on a "no dairy" kick at the moment.  Now, I'm sure it would taste fantastic with the butter - of course, anything sizzled in butter does.  Heck, you could probably caramelise a piece of boot leather in butter and it would taste great.  But seriously, this dish was great without it, and I didn't miss it at all.  I also replaced sugar with honey.  And, when it came to serving time, I tossed in a little thinly sliced preserved lemon and a handful of olives, and called it dinner.  I think a handful of toasted pine nuts or hazelnuts would also make a good addition if you felt so inclined.

The honeyed fennel is definitely a surprising combination, but a delightful surprise and I'll certainly be making it again.  The sweetness with the aniseed flavour of the fennel somehow really works and, partnered with the crunch of fennel seeds and the slight saltiness of the goat cheese, Ottolenghi has come up with another winning combination of tastes and textures.

Caremelised Fennel with Goat Cheese Recipe

Adapted (slightly) from recipe by Yotam Ottolenghi

from Plenty

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

4x small fennel bulbs

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoon honey

1 teaspoon fennel seeds

1 clove garlic, crushed

flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

goat cheese, as much as you like

extra virgin olive oil to finish

Remove any tough outer leaves, and a little bit of the woody stem from the base of the fennel bulbs.  Remove the fronds from the tops, and reserve a generous handful of the fronds.  Cut the fennel bulbs lengthwise into 1cm (1/2 in) slices.

Heat olive oil in a large frying pan set over medium heat.  Add slices of fennel in a single layer to the pan, and cook until lightly golden on both sides.  You will probably have to do this in a couple of batches.  Remove cooked fennel slices to a plate.

Add honey to the pan, along with the fennel seeds, garlic, a generous pinch of flaky sea salt, and plenty of freshly ground black pepper.  Stir to dissolve the honey.  Then return the fennel to the pan, and toss gently for a few minutes to ensure every piece is coated in the honey sauce, and the fennel is cooked through to tender, but still retaining a little bite.

Remove to a serving platter, and allow to cool a little before sprinkling over some of the crumbled goat cheese, and a good handful of the roughly chopped reserved fennel fronds.  Finish with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Equally delicious served still warm or at room temperature.

If you would like to get to know Yotam Ottolenghi a little better, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and see what they've all cooked up ...

... or check out Plenty and Ottolenghi's other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK or Fishpond NZ.

         

I'm also sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the lovely Michelle at Ms. enPlace, at Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads, at My Meatless Mondays hosted by Chaya at My Sweet and Savory, and Foodie Fridays hosted by Designs by Gollam.

              

Pasta with Sardines

This week is Pot Luck week at I Heart Cooking Clubs, and this means that we get carte blanche to choose any recipe we like either from our current chef, who as I'm sure you know by now, happens to be the incredibly inspiring Yotam Ottolenghi, or any one of the seven other chefs we have previously featured at IHCC.

I actually had an Ottolenghi dish picked out weeks ago that I was going to make for this week's challenge, but somehow that didn't come to pass and I decided that today was the day to get this post out of draft.  This dish is ever so slightly adapted from a Mark Bitman recipe, and is one of my favourite pasta dishes.  Mark Bitman was actually the featured chef when I first joined the IHCC community, and I loved cooking his dishes.  This recipe was one that I made way back then, with all good intentions for publishing it as my "Farewell to Bitman" post.  Somehow, that didn't happen, and although I've made this dish several times since, the post has continued to languish in draft.  Time for that to change.

This is one of those great "pantry raid" dishes, perfect for using up a few of those store cupboard ingredients - pasta, raisins (original recipe uses currants, but I prefer raisins), pine nuts and tinned sardines.  On the subject of sardines, I actually prefer to use fresh, and I have included a video from YouTube here which shows just how easy they are to clean - I promise that it is totally worth the little bit of effort if you are able to get them fresh.  However, the original recipe calls for tinned sardines, and they will work perfectly well if you either can't lay your hands on fresh ones or can't be bothered to clean them.

Other changes I like to make to this dish, are replacing onion with fennel - I think the "aniseed" flavour is a great complement to the fish and the raisins, and I also like to add in some chopped preserved lemon for its intensely lemony-salty hit.

This dish is incredibly quick to make - once you've prepared the fish (which is itself the work of moments), the rest of the dish pretty much comes together in the amount of time it takes to boil pasta, making it perfect for a quick, mid-week dinner.

Add to this the fact that, from both an ethical point of view and a healthy one, sardines are a great choice, and you have a win:win dish.  Hope you'll try it.

Pasta with Sardines Recipe

Adapted from a recipe by Mark Bitman from

How to Cook Everything iPhone App

Makes 2 generous servings

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

6x fresh sardines

1/4 cup flour

flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

olive oil

250g pasta ( I used De Cecco casareccia)

salt

handful of raisins, soaked in warm water while you prepare the sardines

handful of pine nuts, lightly toasted

olive oil

1x fennel bulb, thinly sliced

1/2 a preserved lemon (discard the flesh, and slice the skin thinly)

grated zest of 1x lemon

large handful fresh parsley leaves, coarsely chopped

freshly ground black pepper

Put a large pot of water over high heat and bring to the boil.

Meanwhile, prepare the sardines as per the video above.  Wash thoroughly and use a paper towel to pat completely dry.

Spread flour, seasoned with flaky sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, on a plate.  Dredge the sardines in the flour, shaking off any excess, and set aside.

Heat a tablespoon or so of olive oil in a shallow frying pan over medium heat.  As soon as the oil is hot, add the sardines to the pan, and continue to cook until the fish is golden brown and almost cooked through.  Remove from pan to a plate lined with a paper towel to absorb any surplus oil.  Break into slightly bigger than bite-sized pieces.

Now liberally salt the boiling water, and add the pasta to the water.  Cook according to the packet instructions until al dente.

Meanwhile, heat another tablespoon or two of olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.  When hot, add the sliced fennel and saute until the fennel has softened - about 6 to 8 minutes.  Add the drained raisins, most of the pine nuts, preserved lemon skin, sardines, and a generous grind of black pepper.  (Because the preserved lemon is salty, you may find that you don't need any additional salt.)  Stirring gently, combine everything well, and cook until everything is heated through and fish is cooked through.

Drain the pasta, reserving a cup of the cooking water.  Add the pasta to the pan containing the fish, and add most of the chopped parsely.  Toss carefully to combine and add a little of the reserved pasta water if necessary.  Taste and adjust seasoning to your liking

Transfer to a warm serving bowl, and sprinkle over the remaining pine nuts and parsley, and the grated lemon zest.

Delicious served immediately or at room temperature. 

If you would like to get to know Mark Bitman a little better, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and see what they've all cooked up ...

or check out some of these great Mark Bitman cookbooks:

     

Available from Amazon, Book Depository UK, and Fishpond NZ

I'm also sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo, hosted by the very lovely Michelle at Ms. enPlace.

Lamb-stuffed Quince with Coriander & Pomegranate

At last the moment I've been telling you about for the last couple of weeks has arrived - yes, we begin our six month journey at I Heart Cooking Clubs with Yotam Ottolenghi.  Yotam is a new chef to many in our group, and I know that everyone has been pretty excited about getting to know him and his food.  On the other hand, he is no stranger to me - I first discovered his books a couple of years ago and have been cooking from them on a regular basis.  This is a little sampling of some of the dishes I've made and posted from his books Ottolenghi, The Cookbook and Plenty, and with his latest book, Jerusalem, now added to my collection, I'm looking forward to making Ottolenghi a weekly guest in my kitchen.

Since this is the beginning of a new journey, it seemed only fitting that I should choose a recipe from the new book, Jerusalem.  I had several dishes bookmarked to try, but when I picked up these beauties at the market last week, it seemed like the decision was made for me.

The recipe for Lamb-stuffed Quince with Coriander and Pomegranate was one that had enticed me from the moment I picked up this book.  This is a Persian inspired dish and everything about it seems exotic and celebratory to me.  In fact, as I was preparing this, channeling my "inner Persian housewife" it occurred to me that although this would not be an "every day" kind of dish, the use of such exotic ingredients as coriander, pomegranate molasses, pomegranate seeds, allspice, cardamom would nevertheless be commonplace store cupboard ingredients in your typical Middle Eastern household.  Although, all of these ingredients are now readily available in specialty stores here, and will have found their way into the pantries of many an adventurous cook, they are still about as far removed from the standard fare of your average Kiwi cook as you could get.

This turned out to be a wonderful dish, but it's definitely a labour of love.  Quince are very "hard" fleshed, and scooping out the flesh is difficult work.  Trust me when I tell you that you don't want to make this dish for someone unless you care for them a great deal.  In the introduction to the recipe Ottolenghi does say, that you can take the easier route, and simply dice the quince flesh and turn the lamb into meatballs, cooking them together in the sauce.  I think I would definitely go this route next time around.

The lamb is spicy and aromatic with the allspice and chilli.  The sauce has that delicious sweet-sour-tangy thing going on with the pomegranate molasses, and the indescribable flavour of the quince.  I thought long and hard about how to describe the flavour of quince, but I'm at a loss.  To say it tastes like a cross between an apple and a pear does not do it justice, and to me it seems that the flavour is as much tied up in the fragrance as just the taste.   You just have to try it for yourself - just don't make the mistake of trying to eat them raw.  They are pretty much inedible and must be cooked.

For a special occasion dish, this is a great one to try, and the perfect use for those quince which make such a brief appearance each year.

A couple of notes about the recipe.  Firstly, the recipe calls for simmering the stuffed quince on the stove-top - I think that in future I would bake them in the oven.   Secondly, the recipe called for simmering them for about 30 minutes.  Having had the experience before of cooking them long and slow, I was actually skeptical that they would cook in that short space of time so didn't bother checking them.   As it turned out, by that time they were a little overcooked, so I would check them after 20 minutes or so.  The original recipe included onions, which I replaced with fennel;  I reduced the number of cardamom pods to four, as cardamom is a strong flavour and the eight originally called for seemed a little excessive to me.  Lastly, you may wonder where I got pomegranate seeds at this time of year - I usually buy a few pomegranates when they're available, remove the seeds and stash them in the freezer, ready to sprinkle through salads and other dishes at any time.

Lamb-stuffed Quince with Coriander & Pomegranate Recipe

Adapted from a recipe by Yotam Ottolenghi from

Jerusalem

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

500g minced lamb

1x clove garlic, finely chopped

1x hot red chilli, deseeded (optional) & finely chopped

large handful fresh coriander, roughly chopped

(plus extra for garnish)

1 cup fresh breadcrumbs (I used panko)

1 teaspoon ground allspice

4cm (1-1/2 in.) piece ginger, grated

1x large fennel bulb

1x large free-range egg, lightly beaten

1 large juicy lemon

3 or 4 quince, depending on size

3 tablespoons olive oil

4x cardamom pods

2 teaspoons pomegranate molasses

2 teaspoons brown sugar

500ml (1 pint) chicken or vegetable stock

seeds of 1/2 a pomegranate

flaky sea salt

freshly ground black pepper

Discard the tough outer "leaves" of the fennel bulb, and cut the bulb in half.  Cut one half into very small dice (in the same way that you would an onion), and slice the other half as thinly as you can (a mandoline is ideal for this if you have one).

Put the lamb in a medium sized mixing bowl.  Add the finely chopped garlic and chilli, coriander, breadcrumbs, ground allspice, half of the grated ginger, the diced fennel, the egg, a generous pinch of flaky sea salt and a good grind of black pepper.  Mix everything together until well combined (your hands are the best tools for this job), and set aside.

Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice from both halves - don't discard the shells.  Reserve one tablespoon of the juice, and add the rest to a medium sized bowl filled with cold water.  Cut the quince in half lengthwise - keeping any pieces you are not working with in the acidulated water.  Using a small spoon (or melon baller if you have one) scoop out the seeds and discard.  Now continue to scoop out more of the flesh, leaving a shell approximately 1cm (1/3 in) thick - the flesh is very hard and this is not easy - I found using a small, sharp knife and "chiseling" it out worked best. As you work, keep rubbing the cut surface of the quince with the squeezed-out lemon shells.  Don't discard the quince flesh that you scoop out - drop that into the bowl of acidulated water too.

Now drain the hollowed-out quince shells briefly and pat dry with a paper towel.  Fill the shells with the lamb mixture, using your hands to press it in quite firmly.

Drain the remaining quince flesh from the water and put into the food processor.  Blitz until quite finely chopped.

Heat the olive oil in a large frypan over medium heat.  Add the minced up quince flesh, remaining ginger and sliced fennel, and cardamom pods.  Saute until the fennel has softened completely - about 5-10 minutes.  Now add the pomegranate molasses, sugar, the reserved tablespoon of lemon juice, stock, another generous pinch of flaky sea salt, and a good grind of black pepper.

Now, nestle the quince halves in amongst the sauce, with the stuffed side uppermost.   Reduce the heat to a simmer, cover and cook for about 30 minutes (check after 20 minutes), until the meat is cooked through, the quince soft and the sauce reduced.  If necessary, remove the stuffed quince from the sauce and increase the heat in order to reduce the sauce further.

Best served warm rather than hot, so allow it to cool a little before serving.  Garnish with extra chopped coriander and a sprinkling of pomegranate seeds.

If you would like to get to know Yotam Ottolenghi a little better, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and see what they've all cooked up ...

... or check out Jerusalem and Ottolenghi's other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK or Fishpond NZ.

           

I'm also sharing this post at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the lovely Michelle at Ms. enPlace.

Rocket, Fennel & Mozzarella Salad & NZFBA Conference Day 2

You may recall that I left you last week at the end of the first day of our NZ Food Bloggers conference.  But things didn't end there.  There is much more to share with you and, in usual fashion, if you keep reading, I promise you food - a wonderful Rocket, Fennel & Mozzarella Salad to be exact.

So, day one of our conference wound up with all of our participants being whisked off to a secret location, which turned out to be Floyds in Island Bay, for a pop-up dinner and wine matching event.  The evening began with a cocktail making mini master class with Justin McKenzie of Liquid Winks, who served us up a gorgeous cocktail that definitely whetted the appetite.

And then the food, prepared by chef Ben Barton of Pop Dining, began to roll out and it just kept coming - course, after course, after delicious course, with wines matched to the food by James Pederson of Floriditas.

As you might expect from any gathering of food bloggers around a dinner table, there were more iPhones on the table than cutlery, and as each course rolled out cameras flashed and tweeters tweeted.  There were sighs of satisfactions and delight;  wonderful and stimulating conversations took place as we got to know new bloggers and reconnected with others already known to us;  and, of course, there was huge amounts of laughter.  It was a great night, and the last cab load of us to leave rolled home very satisfied and more than a little weary.

Day two of our conference began, like day one, with chocolate.  Our first event of the day being a mini master class and chocolate tasting with Jo Coffey from L'Affaire au Chocolat.  Jo shared with us a wealth of information and knowledge about everything from bean to block, and although I've always had a love affair with chocolate, I certainly have a new found appreciation for it.

Next up was Rachel Taulelei of Yellow Brick Road talking to us about Sustainable Fishing and Seafood.  Rachel is a very engaging speaker, clearly passionate about her business of sourcing and supplying responsibly caught seafood to the restaurant industry.  Ethical eating and sourcing of the food we put on our tables each day is a subject which is dear to my heart, so Rachel's session was definitely one of the highlights of the conference for me.  Setting aside the fact that Rachel could actually talk about two flies crawling up a wall and make it sound interesting and funny, her message really resonated with me.

Time then to break for morning tea, prepared by the Le Cordon Bleu pastry chefs, accompanied by some treats from The Collective Dairy.  The cheese scones were divine, but you had to be quick to get to them before Mairi, and the Collective Dairy treats were particularly welcomed by those of us who had skipped breakfast.  Love that mango yoghurt drink.

Next we moved on to a soda tasting with Joseph Slater of the Six Barrel Soda Co. Six Barrel Soda Co make small batch soda syrups using fresh fruit, spices and nuts.  Their flavours include:  lemon, ginger and kola nut, all of which we got to sample, as well as cherry & pomegranate, raspberry & lemon, lime, and vanilla cream.  Personally, I've never been much of a cola fan, but was surprised to discover that I loved the kola nut - deliciously spicy and not overly sweet - in fact it was my favourite of the three that we sampled.  Can't wait for someone to start stocking this in Nelson so I can get my hands on some.

With the sun almost over the yard arm, it was time to turn our thoughts to wine and an address on the State of the Vines from Chris Archer of Archer McRae.  Just to make sure it wasn't a dry argument, we sampled their surprising new product - Ritzling Bottled Happiness.  I say surprising, because I was quite prepared not to like this - Ritzling is in fact a sparkling riesling and (perhaps unreasonably) I fully expected it to be unpleasantly sweet.  However, accompanied by a wedge of lime, I found it to be an absolute delight, and it fully delivered on its promise of being bottled happiness.  I foresee consuming quite a few bottles of this over the forthcoming summer.

After suitable libation, it was time to move onto a mini master class and lunch, courtesy of the lovely ladies from Little Penang.  The master class was both fun and informative and the lunch sublime.  I love Asian flavours at the best of times, but the Nonya curry really rocked my boat - definitely one of the stand-out meals of the weekend for me.  These photos do not even come close to doing that beautiful meal justice.

After lunch we were treated to another wonderful mini master class, this time with the Queen of Dumplings, Vicky Ha from The Dumpling House.  This was a great workshop - we all had a chance to make our own dumplings, some savoury, some sweet.  Vicky was good enough to share some of her recipes with us and I can't wait to give these a try at home - job for a wet Saturday afternoon I think.  That's my dumpling in the foreground of the photo below, and Alessandra Zecchini's behind it - a couple of very good attempts I thought.

From there we had another one of our breakout sessions, and while some chose to do a pastry making class with the Le Cordon Bleu Head Patisserie Tutor, I opted for making mozzarella in under an hour with Alli Pirrie-Mawer.  I loved this workshop.  Alli is a great teacher, and she definitely made mozzarella seem easy.  So much so, that I couldn't wait to try it again when I got home, and it is my own home-made mozzarella which makes an appearance in the recipe I'm sharing with you today.  Alli teaches these classes regularly at her Auckland cooking school, The Gourmet Gannet, so if you live up there or are passing through I highly recommend taking a class with her if you can.

Our last session of the day was a Tea Tasting & Food Match with John van Forp of t Leaf T.  We tried three different teas - Jasmine Dragon Pearls, Kawakawa Fire, and New Zealand Breakfast, with samples of all three turning up in our goodie bags.  I especially loved the Jasmine Dragon Pearls and the Kawakawa Fire, which you may recall I used in the upside down pineapple cake I shared with you last week.

And so, all good things must come to end.  It was a fantastic couple of days, and I have no doubt that every single person agreed that Shirleen, of Sugar & Spice ... and All Things Nice, and Alli, of Pease Pudding, did a fantastic job of organising everything to a highly professional standard, and they now have a job for life organising future Food Bloggers Conferences.  Of course, such an event would not have been possible without the support of so many extraordinary sponsors - incredible people who gave of their time and fabulous products to ensure that we not only had a great conference but went home with bags full of wonderful goodies to try.  Please check out this page to see all the incredible people and companies who helped to made this such a fantastic event, and if you get the opportunity do try some of their amazing products.  I'm not just saying that because they gave us free stuff - yes, they did, but having now munched and sampled my way through two big goodie bags, I can also tell you with absolute sincerity that this free stuff also happens to be the really good stuff.  Keep watching this space for more recipes using some of these great products.  Lastly, if you happen to be a New Zealand food blogger (whether you are living in New Zealand or abroad), and if after reading this you feel inspired to join up, then head over here - it will cost you nothing and I promise you won't regret it.

And now, as your reward, for being so patient and reading so far, I give you salad.  The jumping off point for this salad came from using the home-made mozzarella I was inspired to make after doing Alli's master class at the conference.  Of course, if you're not up for making your own mozzarella, you could use whatever you can get your hands on - buffalo would be ideal.  I had some rocket (that's arugula to some of you) and fennel in the fridge, which seemed like they would be good mates with the mozzarella, and I wanted to team them all up with some of the gorgeous Moon Over Martinborough extra virgin olive oil that was in our conference goodie bags.  The quantity given below was perfect for me as a main meal, but it would also make a great side to just about anything and as such would serve two to three.  This salad is light, crisp, fresh ... all the things a spring salad should be.

Rocket, Fennel & Mozzarella Salad Recipe

Serves 1 person as a meal or

Serves 2-3 persons as a side dish

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

(Note:  I think of this dish as being "vegetarian-enough" for me, but look for vegetarian mozzarella if you want to make it strictly so)

1x ball buffalo mozzarella

(I used about 4 small balls of home-made mozzarella)

1x lemon, zest & juice

extra virgin olive oil, best quality you can afford

(I used Moon Over Martinborough's Crescent Moon Blend)

flaky sea salt

freshly ground pepper

2-3 large handfuls of baby rocket (arugula)

1/2 large fennel bulb (or 1 small one)

dash of maple syrup

Cut mozzarella into slices about 1cm (1/3 inch) thick and place into a small bowl.  Add the grated zest of half the lemon, and juice of the whole lemon, along with a generous slosh of olive oil (about a tablespoon).  Season with flaky sea salt and freshly ground pepper.  Season well to combine and set aside to marinate for a couple of hours.

To prepare the fennel, remove the fronds if there are any and set them aside to garnish your finished salad with.  Cut off the woody stalks protruding from the bulb, and remove the thick outer "leaves" - discard.  Cut the bulb in half and remove the woody core, which you should also discard.  Then slice as thinly as you possibly can - a mandoline is especially useful for this job if you have one.

To assemble the salad, arrange the rocket and fennel over a serving platter.  Remove mozzarella from its marinade, reserving the marinade, and arrange over the salad.

The marinade is now about to become the dressing for your salad.  Add another generous slosh of olive oil and a dash of maple syrup to balance out the tartness of the lemon, and whisk to a vinaigrette consistency.  Taste and adjust any of the seasonings to suit your palate. 

Drizzle the dressing over the salad and, if you have any fennel fronds, strew them over the top.

I hope you enjoy this salad.  I'm no expert on food and wine matching, but I'm guessing that a drop or two of that Ritzling Bottled Happiness would be good company with this ... if only I'd kept mine long enough to find out.  Still now that I know where to get it in Nelson, you can bet that I will be able to confirm this recommendation in the near future.