You will need 1 can, around 16oz of ready to eat sweetcorn, the same amount of canned, ready to eat, kidney beans. Drain, and mix these together in a bowl. Add to these half a large red onion and half a red bell pepper, both chopped.

For the dressing mix together half a cup of apple cider vinegar, 3 tablespoons of clear honey, a good handful of chopped fresh parlsey and a garlic clove, minced. Season to taste with salt and black pepper.

Pour the dressing over the corn, kidney beans, onion and pepper and leave to marinade for at least 15 minutes before serving. A nice garnish would be a few lime wedges.

Enjoy!

To begin, slice some strawberries and lay them on a plate, next make the dressing, mix together a good tablespoon of brown sugar together with about a table spoon of Balsamic vinegar and a little black pepper. Drizzle this over the strawberries and leave in the fridge while you prepare the rest of the salad.

You need to peel and remove the pit from a ripe avocado, then chop the flesh into bitesize pieces. If you are not sure if the avocado is ripe, this Avocado and Cream Cheese recipe will guide you.

On a serving plate or suitable bowl make a bed of Rocket leaves, on top of this place the sliced strawberries and chopped avocado. Finally sprinkle a few whole almonds around.

Enjoy!

Ok so here we go with the 100th killer salad post – a deep fried salad. The salad is wrapped in a filo pastry basket and then deep fried, so you need to choose your fillings carefully, lettuce doesn’t really work but watercress, spinach and rocket do work well if you want to add a bit of green. For this salad I chose to use watercress, pear, pancetta and walnuts.

Begin by frying the pancetta until crispy, add the chopped walnuts and pear to the pan for the final few minutes to brown, then drain everything well on kitchen paper and leave to one side while you prepare the filo basket.

Filo pastry is quite delicate and has to treated gently. You need 3, 9″ square pieces of filo pastry for each basket. Begin by laying one sheet on a clean dry surface and brush all over with melted butter, then place another sheet on top, again brush with melted butter, repeat the process again for the third sheet. You should end up with something like this….

Now you need to add the filling, I began with a layer of watercress, then added the pancetta, pear and walnuts, I finished with another layer of watercress…

Now you need to gather up the corners of the filo pastry and gather the pastry around the filling to make the basket. Press the edges together gently around the top of the basket to make sure they stay in place while cooking. Brush the whole basket with beaten egg and sprinkle poppy seeds over.

The next thing to do is deep fry, use clean hot oil which is deep enough to cover the filo pastry basket. Fry only for a few moments, until the pastry looks golden brown, then remove and drain well on kitchen paper.

The deep fried salad is now ready to eat, I served mine with a side salad made from watercress, tomato, red onion, chopped basil and a little olive oil.

Enjoy!

I had the lemon salad dressing for this salad ready made, but if you don’t follow the link, it’s an easy salad dressing and takes no time at all to make.

For the salad you need a cooked beetroot, I used ready cooked beetroot from the supermarket. Chop the beetroot into small chunks, about 1cm square. Then take 1 pear, I used a Comice pear, peel, core and chop into 1cm squares. Next, take some cheese, I used a piece of Edam cheese about the same size as the beetroot and cut it into 1cm squares. Put the pear, beetroot and cheese into a bowl together.

Finally take a good handful of watercress, rougly chopped, and a couple of spring (green) onions, finely chopped, and add to the pear, beetroot and cheese. Mix all the ingredients together with about 2 tablespoons of the lemon salad dressing.

Enjoy!

For the vinaigrette start by placing a teaspoon each of sea salt and black peppercorns in a mortar, use the pestle to crush them. Then add 1 clove of garlic and use the pestle again to crush with the salt and pepper. Next add a teaspoon of mustard powder and a teaspoon of fresh chopped basil, and work them into the garlic, salt and pepper using a mini whisk. Now you need to add 2 tablespoons of Balsamic vinegar and using a mini whisk work it into the other ingredients. the last step is to add 4 tablespoons of olive oil, add slowly using the mini whisk all the time to blend the oil with the other ingredients. You now have a perfect vinaigrette!

The salad itself consists of cherry tomatoes, cut into halves, chopped celery and chopped red onion. Mix these together in a bowl then pour the vinaigrette over them, toss gently to ensure all the tomatoes, celery and onion are all coated with the vinaigrette. The salad is now ready to eat. I like to have this salad with white crusty bread.

Enjoy!

Start by pre-heating the oven to 180C (350F, Gas 4). Take a ciabatta loaf and cut into bite-sizes pieces, place in a bowl and to it add, about 100g of pine nuts, a crushed clove of garlic, and two tablespoons of olive oil. Mix well then place on a baking tray and toast in the oven for about 10 minutes, turn the pieces over half way through cooking. The bread should be golden and crisp.

While the bread is toasting, in a bowl mix together a punnet of cherry tomatoes, chopped in half, a small red onion, finely sliced, and a handful of black olives. Once the bread is toasted add to the bowl and toss gently with the other ingredients.

For the dressing mix together 4 tablespoons of olive oil, 1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix thoroughly and pour over the salad, toss gently to ensure an even coating of the dressing. Finally, top with a few basil leaves.

Enjoy!

It took about 10 minutes to make and was very satisfying. I used a couple of cheats, those being a can of flaked tuna in spring water and a small can of mixed beans containing haricot beans, red kidney beans, green beans, blackeye beans and borlotti beans. There was also some chick peas, sweetcorn and red pepper in the mix.

The first thing I did was to make the lemon vinaigrette, using the recipe from the link. Then it was simply a case of draining the flaked tuna and mixed beans, putting them in a bowl with approx 25g of pea shoots, about two handfuls. Poured over the lemon vinaigrette and mixed so that all the ingredients got covered with the vinaigrette.

This salad is so simple to make and is very tasty, I had it as later dinner, almost a supper but it would also make a great lunch, and prepared the night before it would be ideal to take out in a lunchbox when you have an early start the next day.

Enjoy!

To begin with peel the pears, I used approx 2 comice pears per person. Use a melon baller to scoop out the flesh of the pears, and add to it about one handful, per person, of walnuts. You could just chop the pears if you wish. Fry the pear balls and walnuts in butter for a few minutes, just enough to warm them through and the pears begin to colour.

Place half a bag of pea shoots, per person, on a plate and top with the pear balls and walnuts.

Garnish with a sprinkling of Stilton Cheese, to taste.

This salad is so easy to make and tastes really good. It was the first time I had made this for my family and everyone wants it again.

I started by boiling the eggs for about 10 minutes, then placed them in ice cold water to cool before removing the shells. Once the shells were removed I cut each egg into half and removed the yolk.

To the yolks I added 1 teaspoon of Dijon mustard, black pepper to taste and just enough mayonnaise to make a smooth paste, blending all the ingredients together. This makes the devilled part. I then placed this mixture into a piping bag and piped it back into the egg whites. To finish I sprinkled paprika over the top.

I then served the devilled eggs on a bed of salatrio, chopped tomato and celery, and garnished with my homegrown basil micro leaves.

Enjoy!

The salatrio (the clue is in the name) provides 3 different types of lettuce from one root ball, which I think is quite cool. Now this isn’t a lettuce produced from a magic bean, it is simply three different lettuce varieties grown together in one plug, still the concept is kinda cool because it means you can have a fresh lettuce mix without having to buy three separate lettuce heads. Some thought has also gone into the choice of lettuce used, because what salatrio offers is a colourful mix of red and green leaves, which is great for any wanna be chef out there who wants to impress friends and family with a colourful salad.

From the producers website…

Salatrio is the name for a concept of three different, young, fresh lettuce types in one bag. The advantage is that the user doesn’t need to buy three different heads of lettuce of pre-cut letttuce mixes to make a colourful and tasty salad.

Salatrio won the Innovation of the year award 2008, at the Fresh Awards, during a gala dinner at the Marriott Hotel in London, England.

The producers, Deliscious, say that the salatrio is best kept inside its plastic wrap with the root ball intact. I think this is a good idea, obviously because a root ball means soil, which although is compacted, as you can see from the picture below, can still be quite messy especially in a fridge.

So, I’m going to use my trio of lettuce leaves today, but not all, I do want to see if the salatrio does indeed last longer than a regular head of lettuce.

The salatrio did cost more than a regular head of lettuce, the one I bought cost £1.20 from my local supermarket, but it did cost less that buying 3 separate lettuce, so depending on taste and longevity it may be something I buy regularly.