Three of the Best - Salad Days # 9, 10 & 11

Out there in blogland I often hear some of you talk about dishes in your "regular rotation", but I seriously don't have any kind of regular rotation going on in my household.  I sometimes think it might make life a little bit easier if I did, but I just don't.  Truth is, even though I often say things like "this was so great, I'll definitely be making this again" - I usually don't.  I get seduced by some new idea and seldom make the same thing twice.

That said, there is a small selection of salads in my repertoire that I really have made several times because they were that good, and so I thought that it bears reintroducing them to you.

Roasted Eggplant, Mango & Soba Noodle Salad

This is a salad, unsurprisingly, from my food hero - Yotam Ottolenghi - and with mangoes (albeit imported ones) and eggplant being in abundance right now, this is a great time for this salad.  Because we don't grow mangoes in New Zealand, they are one of the few imported items in the fruit and veggie department in which I allow myself to indulge over summer, and I really make a feast of it.  Lush, juicy mangoes alongside smokey, roasted aubergines is not a combination I would have ever thought of, but it really works.

Green Tea Soba Noodles with Soy Roasted Salmon & Broad Bean-Radish Salad

Adapted from a recipe by Donna Hay, this is probably one of my favourite dishes I've posted of all time, and one I really have repeated numerous times.  Try this once, and I'm sure it will become one of your regulars too.  A visually stunning dish, packed with great punch of flavour from the wasabi-ginger dressing, and yet quick and easy to prepare.  This is the perfect maximum impact - minimum effort dish.

Baby Spinach Salad with Dates & Almonds

When we had our time over at I Heart Cooking Clubs cooking with Ottolenghi, this was one of my favourite dishes I made.  I know several of my fellow participants, and several of my friends in the Tasting Jerusalem group also loved, so don't just take my word for it - this is a salad you definitely need to have in your "rotation".

This is salad numbers 9, 10, and 11 in my Salad Days, 28 days of salad project.   What's that you ask?  Well,  I've said it here a dozen times or more ... I love salads.  A big bowl, substantial salad is hands down my favourite meal any time of the year.  Such is my love of salad, that I'm challenging myself to come up with a different salad every day for the month of February - that's 28 days of salads - and I plan to share as many of them as I can with you.  I'll also be doing some flashbacks to some of my favourite salads I've shared in the past.

What's more, I'm giving you the opportunity to share some of your favourite salads with me too.  Have a favourite salad you'd like to share?  Simply link up your salad recipe using the linky tool at the bottom of this post.  The linky will be open all month, and you can join in any day or every day, and link as many recipes as you like.  Feel free to grab the Salad Days badge from the sidebar to include in your post if you'd like to.  There's really no rules around linking up, other than please, use your manners and link your post back to this one.  Linking old posts is fine too, just please edit them to include the back link.  Thanks for sharing your favourite salad with us.

Burmese Chilli Prawns with Hot & Sour Asian Slaw - Salad Days # 8

This week at I Heart Cooking Clubs we're exploring the theme "East Meets West", choosing Diana Henry fusion dishes with a global influence.

Living here in New Zealand, I'm no stranger to fusion food - I'm sure the same can be said for most of my "neighbours" on the Pacific Rim.  It has always fascinated me, in just about any country, the influence that its immigrants has on the local food culture.  When I was growing up, Chicken Chop Suey at the local Chinese restaurant was about as exotic as it got.  In the last 20 years, however, increasing numbers of Asian immigrants has had a huge influence on the New Zealand culinary landscape.  Previously unheard of ingredients are now readily available;  Thai, Vietnamese, Indian, Malaysian, Burmese, Bangladeshi, and Indonesian restaurants abound;  and even the pantries of this nation's most unadventurous cooks would boast a bottle of soy sauce at the very least.

Looking through Diana Henry'd book A Change of Appetite, I thought her Burmese Chilli Fish with Hot & Sour Salad was the perfect dish to fit the brief.  The hot and sour salad, which is essentially an Asian take on a classic cole slaw seemed like the epitome of fusion food to me.  I made quite a few changes to the recipe ... For a start I replaced the fish with prawns, and tweaked the curry paste a little.  And I rang a few changes to the salad as well - adding in some red cabbage along with the white, and adding carrot, green papaya, cherry tomatoes, mint and peanuts to the slaw, and as I did with the curry paste I tweaked the dressing a bit.

This dish definitely had the wow factor - an absolute explosion of flavours and textures, and just enough heat to leave my lips tingling at the end of it ... in a good way.  If you like Asian flavours, I urge you to give this a try the next time you have cole slaw on your mind.

Burmese Chilli Prawns with Hot & Sour Asian Slaw Recipe
Inspired by recipe from Diana Henry
from A Change of Appetite
Serves 2 as a substantial meal

For the Burmese Chilli Prawns:
300g raw prawns, shells removed and deveined
1x clove garlic, roughly chopped
generous pinch of salt
piece of fresh ginger about the size of your thumb, grated
1/2 red chilli, roughly chopped (deseed if you like less heat)
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 teaspoon lime juice

For the Hot & Sour Asian Slaw:
1x cup finely shredded white cabbage
1x cup finely shredded red cabbage (plus extra leaves for serving)
1x carrot finely shredded (a julienne peeler is ideal)
1x cup finely shredded green papaya
2x radishes, thinly sliced (a mandoline works perfectly if you have one)
12x cherry tomatoes, halved (use different colours if you can)
generous handful of mint leaves, roughly chopped
large handful of roasted peanuts, roughly chopped
1/2 red chilli, roughly chopped (deseed if you like less heat)

For the dressing:
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 teaspoon lime juice

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

Place garlic, salt, ginger, chilli, turmeric, olive oil, sesame oil and lime juice in a mortar and pestle, and grind to a paste.  Add paste to the prawns, and toss until all the prawns are well coated in the paste.  Put prawns in a single layer in an ovenproof dish, and bake in the preheated oven until cooked through - depending on the size of your prawns this will take between 5 and 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, place the dressing ingredients in a small jar and shake vigorously until well combined.  Taste and then adjust to your liking - you want a good balance of sweet-sour-salty, so play around with the ingredients until you get the flavour just right.

Place all the slaw ingredients in a large bowl, drizzle liberally with the dressing, and toss gently until everything is well combined.

Serve immediately piled into red cabbage leaves, and arrange prawns on the side.

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.

I'm also sharing this at Souper (Soup, Salad & Sammie) Sundays, hosted by my very lovely friend Deb at Kahakai Kitchen, and at Weekend Cooking, hosted by the lovely Beth at Beth Fish Reads.

This is salad number 8 in my Salad Days, 28 days of salad project.   What's that you ask?  Well,  I've said it here a dozen times or more ... I love salads.  A big bowl, substantial salad is hands down my favourite meal any time of the year.  Such is my love of salad, that I'm challenging myself to come up with a different salad every day for the month of February - that's 28 days of salads - and I plan to share as many of them as I can with you.  I'll also be doing some flashbacks to some of my favourite salads I've shared in the past.

What's more, I'm giving you the opportunity to share some of your favourite salads with me too.  Have a favourite salad you'd like to share?  Simply link up your salad recipe using the linky tool at the bottom of this post.  The linky will be open all month, and you can join in any day or every day, and link as many recipes as you like.  Feel free to grab the Salad Days badge from the sidebar to include in your post if you'd like to.  There's really no rules around linking up, other than please, use your manners and link your post back to this one.  Linking old posts is fine too, just please edit them to include the back link.  Thanks for sharing your favourite salad with us.

Quick Pickled Vegetables

I don't know about you, but I have a fair bit of angst when it comes to working week lunches.  Of course if you happen to be one of those super-organised, super-human people who prepares their lunch the day before, you probably don't understand my quandry.  I am not one of those people.  Getting lunch together is usually that thing that happens in the five minutes between getting dressed and rushing out the door, and usually with my toothbrush hanging out of the corner of my mouth while I'm doing it.  Not a pretty picture.

There's no doubt that a sandwich is the ultimate transportable meal, but I try not to eat too much bread, and in all honesty no sandwich really tastes as good after four or five hours at the bottom of your lunch bag as it does when freshly made.  Last night's leftovers too are great lunchtime fodder, but without the facilities to reheat anything at my workplace, I find I'm less than enthusiastic about the previous night's cold mac 'n' cheese.

Most weeks in our house we make a big pot of soup, and occasionally I have time in the morning to reheat some to take to work in a thermos.  Sometimes I will make a big batch of hummus and take that along to work with a bag of assorted vegetables, and that will provide me with lunch for three or four days.  But more often that not, I will make do with just grabbing a couple of pieces of fruit or an avocado out of the bowl as I rush out the door.

A salad is great for lunch, but a salad which is made the night before is seldom a thing of glory, and who has time in the morning for chopping ingredients, putting them in separate little containers, mixing a dressing, etc?!  Definitely not this girl.

And now, that clever Nigel Slater has got me out of a pickle with some inspiration which will see me enjoying delicious work-day lunches for at least the next week.  You see, this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs our theme is "In Quite A Pickle", making our own pickles or a dish using pickled ingredients.

Looking through my Nigel Slater cookbooks, I couldn't find anything that was quite right or which used ingredients that are in season here right now, but online I found Nigel's recipe for Salmon Tartare with Quick Pickled Cauliflower.

With a whole head of cauliflower sitting in my veggie drawer and needing to be used up, this definitely piqued my interest, and although I wasn't considering making the salmon tartare today, it got me thinking.  For a start, why just stop at cauliflower?  I had other vegetables on hand that surely could get the quick pickling treatment too ... radishes, carrots, beetroot, and if these were going to be a good accompaniment to salmon, then why not with a variety of smoked fish?

Seriously, these could not be simpler to make.  About 20 minutes of work this afternoon, and I now have four jars of assorted pickled vegetables with which I can stock the fridge at work.  I'll take along a couple of pieces of smoked mackerel as well, a bag of salad leaves and a packet of crackers, and I have a whole week's worth of sensational (and healthy) lunches to look forward to.

Quick Pickled Vegetables Recipe
Adapted from recipe by Nigel Slater
Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

You don't need to be too concerned about quantities here - just use what you have

1x small cauliflower, cut into small florets
coriander seeds

1x carrot
caraway seeds

4 to 5x radishes
fennel seeds

1 to 2x beetroot, depending on size
dill or caraway seeds

2-1/2 cups cider vinegar
2-1/2 cups water
200g (7 oz) sugar

4x washed & sterilised jars

Bring a small pot of water to the boil.  Add cauliflower, and cook for about 5 minutes, until just barely tender, but still crisp.  Drain and refresh in cold water.  Pack the cauliflower into one jar, sprinkling coriander seeds over each layer as you go.

Using a vegetable peeler, cut the carrot into long, thin ribbons, and pack into another jar, sprinkling caraway seeds over each layer as you go.

Cut radish into rings as thinly as you possibly can - a mandoline is ideal.  Layer in a jar with fennel seeds.

Cut beetroot in half, and then into thin slices - again a mandoline is ideal.  Layer in a jar with dill or caraway seeds.

Put vinegar, water and sugar in a small pot, and set over medium heat.  Stir constantly until sugar is dissolved, then bring to the boil.  Remove from heat and immediately pour over the bottled vegetables.

Leave to cool to room temperature, then store in the fridge.  Allow to stand, in the fridge, at least four hours before using.  After a few hours in the fridge, they are really crispy, and beginning to take on the flavours from the spices they've been packed with.  If you can bear to wait till the next day, even better.

This is a quick pickle, so don't expect a long-term preserve, but they should keep a good week or two in the fridge.

Enjoy - I know I can hardly wait for lunch time tomorrow to come around.

If you would like to get to know Nigel Slater 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 ...

I'll also be sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the delightful Michelle at Ms. enPlace, at Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads, and at Foodie Fridays hosted by Designs by Gollum.

         

Crispy-Skin Miso-Glazed Salmon with Radish & Rocket Salad

They say that pride comes before a fall, and I have to say that I'm forced to agree after a recent bout of illness completely knocked me for six, despite my usual smug declarations that "I never get sick".  It was a humbling reminder that even I can succumb when I let what I like to think of as a healthy "work-life balance" get out of balance ... not enough time spent on the yoga mat, too much work and not enough relaxation, and a little too much over-indulgence in "festive fare".  It all took its toll and I hit the wall in a big way.

Thankfully I'm now on the mend, and while a week (or even a day) at the spa would be a wonderful treat right now, that's realistically not an option.  I can however give myself the spa treatment at home - plenty of restorative yoga, a good night's sleep on a regular basis, and plenty of fresh healthy food.

As luck would have it our theme this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs is "Suitable for the Spa!" - Donna Hay dishes which are light and lovely, and healthy too.  In Fast, Fresh, Simple I came across a recipe for Crispy Skin Trout with Watercress & Radish Salad and on the Donna Hay website a recipe for Miso Salmon with Sesame Salt.  Miso and salmon are two of my absolute favourite healthy foods and, with both having the immune system fortifying properties I need right now, I decided on a dish which was a "mix-up" of both recipes.

This was healthy and delicious, and made me feel better just looking at it.  I hope you'll give it a try.

Crispy-Skin Miso-Glazed Salmon

with Radish & Rocket Salad

Adapted from recipes by Donna Hay

Serves 2

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

500g salmon fillet, skin on, pin bones removed, & cut into "fingers"

1 tablespoon miso paste (I used locally grown Urban Hippie miso)

1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar

sesame seeds

1 tablespoon olive oil

For salad:

large handful (or two) of rocket leaves (arugula)

6x radishes, sliced very thinly (I used a mandoline)

handful of pomegranate seeds

For dressing:

2 tablespoons lemon juice

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 tablespoon mirin

2cm (3/4 inch) piece of fresh ginger, finely grated

In a shallow dish, mix together the miso paste and rice wine vinegar.  Add the salmon, turning to coat well with the marinade.

Set aside to marinate for a few minutes while you prepare the salad dressing.  Whisk together all the dressing ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

Heat oil in frying pan set over medium heat.  Add salmon to the pan, skin side down, and cook for several minutes until the skin is golden and crispy.  Turn and cook for a further minute or two until cooked to your liking.  Remove from the pan and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

While salmon is cooking combine salad ingredients and arrange on serving plates.

Place cooked salmon on plates beside the salad, and drizzle dressing over both salad and fish.  Serve immediately.

If you would like to get to know Donna Hay a little better, and to see all the wonderful "spa treatment" food my friends have been cooking up, then do go visit I Heart Cooking Clubs and check out the links.

I'll also be sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the lovely Michelle at Ms. enPlace, Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth at Beth Fish Reads, and at Foodie Fridays hosted by Designs by Gollam.

          

Green Tea Soba Noodles with Soy-Roasted Salmon and Broad Bean & Radish Salad

"In Season" is our theme this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs, where we continue our journey with Donna Hay, the queen of wonderfully quick and simple, yet sensationally flavoured food.  This is our opportunity to prepare a dish which represents the best of local, seasonal produce, wherever in the world you might live.

I have to confess this leaves me feeling a little smug, because right now in my part of the world it's spring.  Now I know that there is almost no limit to the wonderful and imaginative things that those of you living in the northern hemisphere can do with a pumpkin and pot roast, but really is there anything more exciting than fresh, crisp, green spring produce.  To me the joy of spring food lies not only in all its glory in its own right, but somehow also as the harbinger of what's to come in the summer ahead.  Quintessential spring food in my part of the world includes asparagus, broad beans, radishes, new potatoes, juicy Nelson scallops and West Coast whitebait.  If you were a keen fisherman that might also include salmon, the season beginning in spring and running through to autumn.

After picking up a well-priced side of salmon at the fishmonger's the other day, and some new season broad beans at the market, I knew my dish would have to include these two ingredients.  After searching through my copy of Donna Hay's "Fast, Fresh, Simple", I came across a recipe for Salmon & Soy Bean Noodle Salad with Wasabi Dressing.  In the latest issue of Donna Hay magazine I also came across a recipe for Green Tea Noodle and Smoked Salmon Salad with Pickled Ginger Dressing.  Both looked wonderful, and what I finally decided on was something of a marriage of the two.  In one recipe Donna used raw, sashimi-style salmon, in the other smoked salmon - I went with my own favourite way of preparing salmon, oven-roasted in a soy marinade.  I also mixed together a dressing which included the pickled ginger from one of Donna's recipe and the wasabi from the other.  The final dressing packed a real flavour punch.

This dish was the perfect combination of fresh spring ingredients, put together in a light and healthy way, and best of all ... preparation was quick and simple - whole thing on the table in less than 30 minutes.  I'll definitely be making this again a few times before spring passes into summer.

Soy-Roasted Salmon Recipe

A Couscous & Consciousness original

Serves 2

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

2x pieces of salmon fillet (skin on, pin bones removed)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon light soy sauce

freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

While oven is heating, mix oil, and soy together in a shallow, ovenproof dish which is big enough to hold both pieces of fish in a single layer.  Add salmon to the dish and turn it over in the oil and soy mixture several times, until it is thoroughly coated on all sides.  Add a liberal grinding of black pepper over the top, and set aside to "marinate" until the oven is hot.

Once oven is ready, put the dish of salmon into the oven, reduce heat to 160 degrees C (320 degrees F), and cook for around 8 minutes or until done to your liking.

Green Tea Soba Noodles and

Broad Bean & Radish Salad with

Wasabi Ginger Dressing Recipe

Adapted from recipe by Donna Hay

from Fast, Fresh, Simple

Serves 2

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

100g (3-1/2 oz) green tea soba noodles

1x cup broad beans, blanched, refreshed & skins removed

2x medium-sized radishes, very thinly sliced

generous handful of peppery salad greens & edible flowers

black sesame seeds (optional)

Dressing:

2 tablespoons sunflower oil

1 teaspoon sesame oil

2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar

1 teaspoon honey

1 teaspoon light soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon wasabi paste

1 tablespoon finely chopped pickled ginger

Set a medium sized pan of water over high heat and bring to the boil.  Once boiling add the soba noodles to the water, and cook according to packet directions (usually around 5 minutes).

Note:  This would also be the ideal time to put the salmon in the oven.

While noodles and salmon are cooking, prepare dressing by simply whisking all ingredients together in a small jug.

Once noodles are cooked (like pasta, they should be al dente), remove from the heat, drain and refresh under cold running water.  Drain well and toss noodles with half of the dressing.

To serve arrange noodles in a serving bowl or platter, and strew liberally with broad beans, radishes and salad greens.  Add salmon, pour over the remaining dressing, and finish with a sprinkle of black sesame seeds (if using).

If you would like to get to know Donna Hay a little better, and to see all the wonderful seasonally inspired dishes my friends have come up with, then do go visit I Heart Cooking Clubs and check out the links.

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

                    

Chicken Shish Tawook with Radish Tzatziki

 

When we lived in Christchurch our favourite haunt for Middle Eastern food was Sami's Cafe in Riccarton - always chicken shish tawook for my partner and falafel for me.  You may say that we are creatures of habit, but I like to think that when you find something that seems as close to perfection as you can get, why would you choose anything else?  And believe me when I tell you that Sami's falafel really are perfection - in fact if anyone knows where you can get better I'd like to hear about it.  Not only is the food here great, but Sami himself is an absolute delight - it is so obvious when you watch him working  that he pours so much love and pride into every single souvlaki he prepares - perhaps that's why they taste so good.  Needless to say, whenever we revisit Christchurch these days, a meal at Sami's is always on the agenda.  On one such recent visit Sami gave me a selection of their Sami's Kitchen range of spice blends to trial, and I'm enjoying experimenting with these (see note at the end of this post).  There are four different blends in the range, each one prepared according to recipes that have been handed down through several generations of Sami's family, and all blends are free of gluten, wheat, MSG, and other fillers.

 

The first blend that I tried was the Shish Tawook, which I used to marinate some chicken pieces, which were then skewered and barbequed, and served with a peppery radish tzatziki and Chickpea, Feta & Coriander Salad which I shared with you a couple of weeks ago.  This blend of spices includes, garlic, paprika, pimento, nutmeg, cinnamon and thyme, and the resulting kebabs (according to my partner) tasted just like the shish tawook that he enjoys at Sami's.  The chicken once it came out of its marinade-bath was incredibly tender and the end result, although wonderfully flavourful, was not overtly spicy.  It is likely therefore to appeal to a variety of palates, even those that might ordinarily eschew spicy foods or be wary of trying dishes that may be foreign to them.  I think this could also work very well with a variety of seafood, especially shrimp, or as a rub to change up that Sunday evening roast chicken.

Hope you'll give this a try, and keep watching this space as I try out some of the other spice blends.

Chicken Shish Tawook with Radish Tzatziki Recipe

Makes 6 large kebabs

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

For the marinade:

2 tablespoons Shish Tawook spice blend

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

juice of 1/2 lemon

1 garlic clove, finely minced

flaky sea salt

For the kebabs:

500g chicken thighs

6 button mushrooms

1 red pepper, deseeded and cut into 2.5 cm (1 inch) squares

6 bay leaves, fresh

For the tzatziki:

2 cups Greek yoghurt (see note below)

2 cloves garlic, finely minced

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

juice of 1/2 lemon

4-6 medium radish (depending on size), finely grated

handful of fresh mint leaves, finely chopped

flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

Begin with the marinade.  In a medium sized bowl, mix together the spices, olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, and sea salt.

Cut the chicken thighs into 2.5 cm (1 inch) cubes, and add to the marinade.  Mix well until all the chicken pieces are thoroughly coated.  Refrigerate at least 3-4 hours, preferably overnight.

Thread onto skewers as follows:  begin with a piece of red pepper, then 3 or 4 cubes of chicken, mushroom, 3 or 4 more cubes of chicken, another piece of red pepper, and lastly a bay leaf (folded in half).

Barbeque or grill until the chicken is completely cooked through - about 15 minutes.

While the chicken is marinating, prepare the tzatziki.  Put the yoghurt into a bowl;  stir in the garlic, olive oil and lemon, and blend well.  Add the grated radish, fresh mint, a generous pinch of flaky sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.  Mix well, taste and adjust seasoning as necessary.

Note:  If you are lucky enough to live in a place where you can get Greek yoghurt, then use it.  Unfortunately, here in New Zealand, although there are a number of yoghurts on the market now labelled as "Greek-style", they are still not like a true Greek yoghurt.  I find the best way to approximate it is to put the yoghurt into a sieve lined with a paper towel, place the sieve over a bowl, and refrigerate for several hours to allow the whey to drain off.

 

Important note:  Although I was given the Sami's Kitchen spice blends to trial, I have in no way been paid to endorse this product.  The opinions given are my own, and you can be sure that if I wasn't happy with the product I would not be telling you about it here.

Sauteed Chicken with Green Olives and White Wine

Let me begin by telling you that this is probably one of the best chicken dishes I have ever made, and one that I can absolutely guarantee I will be making again many times over.  This dish has plenty of flavour, colour, texture;  it's a doddle to make in a very short period of time;  requires minimal preparation;  and would be a great dish to make for a crowd.

So let me tell you how I happily stumbled on this one.  At I Heart Cooking Clubs we continue cooking up a storm with Mark Bittman, and our theme for the week was Pantry Raid.  The challenge - to use up a few of those ingredients languishing on the pantry shelf - what a happy project for me.  There is always plenty to choose from on my pantry shelves - I buy pantry items like most other women buy shoes and handbags (though I have been known to indulge in a few of those as well).  I go away on holiday and come back with bags full of food - I could well be the Imelda Marcos of the pantry.

But I digress, back to the challenge.  This was great timing.  Saturday afternoon I usually like to go to the Mediterranean Food Warehouse to stock up on a few necessities - okay so it's questionable whether or not roasted artichoke hearts and pomegranate molasses are actual "necessities", but in my world they're positively essential!  So mid-week was the perfect time to check the pantry shelves to see what I needed, and what could be used up on this challenge.

My search uncovered 1/3rd of a jar of green olives - great I wanted to use those up, so I could get some of those gorgeous looking Sicilian green olives I'd noticed last week.  An almost finished jar of balsamic vinegar - would be good to use that up too and get a new jar.  Also noticed a small handful of walnuts - I always buy those in very small quantities and don't like to keep them hanging around too long.

So, next step, a search through some of Mark Bittman's recipes to see what I could come up with that needed green olives, balsamic vinegar and walnuts.  I expected to find some kind of salad recipe, but was delighted to come across this chicken recipe that also required a few other things I was keen to use up from the fridge and freezer.  In short I didn't have to got out for a single thing.

Mark's recipe called for a 3-4 pound chicken (that's 1.4-1.8kg in our language) to serve 4 people.  I happened to have a 1kg bag of organic chicken pieces, which made three very generous servings - in fact probably could have fed four people with smaller appetites than us, or if you were serving this as part of a multi-course meal.  I also needed some white wine - check, half bottle, opened last weekend, still in the fridge;  a lemon - yes, one lemon left in the fruit bowl;  and freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley or tarragon - I happened to have both of those so used a combination of the two.

I also rustled up some basmati rice from the pantry to serve with it.

Sauteed Chicken With Green Olives & White Wine Recipe

Adapted from Mark Bittman's

How to Cook Everything:  Bittman Takes on America's Chefs

Serves 3-4

Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

1kg organic chicken pieces

2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

salt & pepper

2 cups white wine

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

1 cup green olives, unpitted

1 lemon, sliced thinly

1/2 cup chopped walnuts, lightly toasted

1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley or tarragon

First of all prepare the olives.  Tip them out onto a board, and press each one lightly with the flat blade of a knife (or you could use the bottom of a glass or cup) until the flesh just breaks.  Set aside.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.  Add the chicken to the hot oil, skin side down, and cook until golden brown, turning as necessary, and seasoning with salt and pepper as you go.  This will take about 10 minutes. You may have to do this in batches - take care not to overcrowd the pan at this stage.

Once you have cooked all your chicken, return all pieces to the pan, skin side up, pour the wine and balsamic vinegar around the chicken, and add the olives to the pan.  Simmer vigorously until the chicken is nearly cooked through - about 10-15 minutes.

At this stage add the lemon slices to the pan and continue to cook for the final few minutes until the chicken is done.

Remove the chicken from the pan and arrange it, along with the lemon slices, on a serving platter.

Add the walnuts to the sauce, adjust the seasoning to taste, pour the sauce over the chicken.  Sprinkle the fresh herbs over the top.  Serve immediately.

Now I was on a roll, cooking without leaving the house.  What else could I come up with?  I discovered some radishes in the fridge that needed to be used up;  half a preserved lemon - the last one from the batch I made last year, and its time now to make more;  and half a bag of broad beans in the freezer.  So the finishing touch to the meal was turning this little assortment into a Radish & Broad Bean Salad from the Ottolenghi cookbook.

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