thursday recipe: rice noodle salad with fresh herbs and cashews

Summer is in full swing and with the festive eating over it is time for some lighter meals with fresh flavours.

This recipe is inspired by my friends Rachel and John who own Feast catering in Sorrento. Beautiful rice paper rolls with hoi sin dipping sauce are a favourite on their menu and their garden is abundant with fresh herbs for Asian cooking.

I returned home from visiting them with some Thai basil and mint, the beginning of today's salad which could easily be the filling for rice paper rolls.

I had rice paper noodles in the cupboard, cucumber, carrot, capsicum in the fridge, red onion and cashews on hand and celery from the garden. The salad was shaping up.

The highlight of any dish with such simple ingredients as this is of course the dressing, or dipping sauce in the case of rice paper rolls.

We enjoyed the salad with chicken schnitzel as you can see pictured but you can have it as is or add some chilli beef, pork, fish, tempeh or tofu, even boiled eggs would work well.

I hope you are keeping cool, or warm depending on your hemisphere and that the school holidays are going smoothly for everyone.

As one of my friends whose daughter is all grown up said to me the other day 'enjoy those boys'.
It was good reminder, school holidays and childhood are fleeting.

Embrace the fun, the squabbles and everything in between.

Happy cooking x

Rice noodle salad with fresh herbs and cashews

125g rice noodles (vermicelli) cooked
1 carrot cut into thin sticks (julienne)
1 cucumber cut into thin sticks (julienne)
1/2 red capsicum cut into thin sticks
1/2 red onion finely sliced (spring onion would work well too)
1 stick of celery finely sliced
1/2 cup finely chopped fresh mixed herbs I used Thai basil and mint because that's what I had - coriander and/or Vietnamese mint would be good too
1/2 cup roasted cashews roughly chopped

To make

Set aside 1 tablespoon of chopped herbs and 1 tablespoon cashews.
Combine all ingredients in a large salad bowl and sprinkle remaining herbs and cashews on top.

Dressing

1 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp rice vinegar
1/2 tsp raw honey
1 small garlic clove crushed

Mix all ingredients in a small bowl and let stand for 1/2 an hour to let the garlic infuse flavour.
Pour over salad and toss. Chilli lovers may like to sprinkle with fresh or dried chilli flakes.

thursday recipe: sweet and crunchy parsley, apple, capsicum salad

This salad is a classic example of my commitment to using what's in the fridge and garden to create a meal rather than heading out to buy something more or different.

We had this for a beautiful lunch last Sunday with dahl, rice, tuna and black olives. Weird sounding combo I know but that's what we had on hand so that's what we ate. In our kitchen there are two main aims: to eat really well and to waste nothing.

The salad though was so sweet, crunchy and scrumptious I wanted to share it with you.

It is super simple.

I plucked a big handful of parsley from the garden, it is nice to use herbs as a feature in a salad from time to time rather than just as a smattering or garnish. And I also like making salads where leaves aren't the dominant ingredient.

Ingredients + method

1/2 cup roughly chopped fresh parsley
1/2 crisp capsicum (must be a fresh one, soggy won't do)
royal gala apple skin on, finely chopped
1 small carrot, grated
1 small zucchini, grated
handful of cherry tomatoes cut in half
splash of apple cider vinegar

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and enjoy alongside your favorite meal. If you'd like to make dahl you can find my recipe here.

Happy cooking x

thursday recipe: fried green bean, breadcrumbs and pistachio salad by Rachel Pitts

A big thankyou to hungry girl recipe writer extraordinaire Rachel Pitts for sharing one of her salad creations with us today. Some of you may remember Rachel from the wholefood mama interview she did last year where she shared another beautiful recipe for peanut and celery salad.

Green beans are in season here in Australia and this is my all time favorite green bean salad recipe, the recipe comes from volume 2 of The Hungry Girls' Cookbook series which by the way are on sale!! (I am not an affiliate just a fan). Normally $25 the girls are taking $10 off each book. For those who don't know their story, Rachel, Leah and Katherine are a trio of talented friends who got together and created three beautiful handmade cookbooks. Rachel writes the recipes, Leah takes the beautiful photos and Katherine takes care of the design and illustration and then with a team of helpers they sit around, drink tea, eat cake and hand stitch up the books. Well, I don't know for certain if there's tea and cake involved but I'm guessing there's a good chance.

Let's get into the recipe. I am not one to stick to recipes, I tend to do a lot of substituting based on what I have on hand and what needs to be eaten. I have made this recipe many times true to Rachel's original and other times I have used different herbs or nuts such as almond or pecans, I preferred the almonds over the pecans. Sorry Rachel! I'm not messing with your recipe just want people to give it a go and not be held back if you don't have pistachios in the cupboard. (that's why there is pecans in the picture above not pistachios)

As most of you know I am big on involving kids in cooking meals rather than just including them when we bake. I made this salad recently and set Sol and River up to top and tail the beans and cut them in half, kept them quiet for almost half an hour and while they weren't keen to eat a whole bowl of the finished product they were both happy to try some beans. Encouraging children to at least try a variety of vegetables is key to raising healthy eaters and if they are involved in the cooking process this is more likely to happen.

Enjoy this recipe, it is super delicious. Thanks again Hungry Girls.

Fried Green Bean, Breadcrumbs and Pistachio Salad

"This dish came about with some stuffing leftover from Christmas and a heap of beans picked from the garden. It's packed with flavour, so serve it with something simple, like a piece of plain grilled fish and some lemon wedges. The only thing you really need to prepare in advance is the breadcrumbs."

80ml (1/3 cup) olive oil
1 large onion, finely sliced
Handful sage leaves
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
700g green beans, trimmed and cut in half on the diagonal
1/2 cup pistachios, toasted
2 cups fresh breadcrumbs
1 cup grated parmesan
1/3 bunch parsley, chopped
1/3 teaspoon salt
black pepper

Heat a large non-stick frying pan over medium heat and add the oil, onion and sage.

Fry until the onion is soft and browning at the edges.

Add the garlic and beans and turn the heat to high.

Fry, stirring regularly, for around 5 minutes, until the beans are almost cooked.

Add the pistachios, breadcrumbs, parmesan, parsley, salt and pepper.

Fry, stirring constantly, for a few more minutes until the breadcrumbs are crisp. Some will clump together with the parmesan. Keep scraping the bottom of the pan to make sure the mixture isn't burning, although a little bit of sticking makes for good crispy bits.

This salad is equally delicious hot or cold.

Serves 6

back to basics: roasted vegetable salad

Are you caught in the trap? The trap of feeling like you have to come up with something new, something different, original every day to cook for your family? Or the trap of wanting to cook things that your children will eat and resisting cooking with what you have for fear they won't eat it? Well, fear not. As with so much in our modern life we could take a whole lot of pressure off ourselves if we followed the KISS principle and Keep It Simple Sista.

You know the story, you look in the fridge or the pantry and wonder 'what am I going to cook for dinner?' When there's only a few ingredients it can be tempting to think, 'I just need a few more ingredients to cook something that the family will eat' then you go out and buy those few and ingredients plus a swag of other foods you didn't intend to buy.

If you have some vegetables, some herbs/spices and protein you can make a meal, you don't need to go shopping and if you are thinking 'hmmm but X won't eat that' just cook the meal with what you have and give it a go, I'm guessing there will be at least one element of whatever dish you serve that each member of your family will enjoy.

For dinner last night I had taken out some flathead fillets from the freezer, what to have with it? In the fridge we had carrots, leek, broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce and cabbage plus potatoes in the cupboard. A roasted vegetable salad was perfect to go with the fish.

I chopped up the veggies into chunks and roasted them in the oven in melted butter and mixed dried herbs. While they were roasting I crumbed the fish, rolling it first in gluten free plain flour, dipping it in egg and then rolling it in rice crumbs. Then washed some mixed lettuce leaves that Pete picked from a local farm. Once the veggies were done I pulled them out to cool before tossing them through the salad leaves and heating the pan to cook the fish.

Pete whipped up a salad dressing using his 'whatever we have in the fridge and pantry wants to go together' recipe. In this case it was apple cider vinegar and a dash of sesame oil.

Good food doesn't need to be fancy or complicated, from just a few ingredients you can create a really wholesome nutritious meal. By working with what you have you minimise waste, save money (& time and petrol driving to the shops) and this mama thinks that teaching our children to appreciate what we have rather than seeking more or something different all the time is a good thing.

Of course if you have menu planning down pat you'll have all this covered, but even then remember it is ok to get back to basics, keep things simple and give things a go that last month someone didn't want to eat but this month they might.

How is the dinner hour at your house? Clean plates? Fussy eaters? Are you doing handstands to get them to eat good food? Tell us in the comments.