P142-145
Butter bean,roast fennel,pepper and rocket
salad in a garlic and lemon dressing
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This bean salad has a lovely combination of sweet vegetables and spicy rocket. As the peppers roast in the oven they become shrivelled and jammy and their natural sweetness is intensified. Roasted, the anise-flavoured raw fennel mellows into mild, juicy wedges, beautifully golden brown, and tinged with caramel. The garlic pays a visit to the oven too and, when it re-emerges, its pungent sharpness is transformed into a deep, nutty, almost creamy flavour, central to the dressing.
To counterbalance the sweet peppers, caramelised fennel and roast garlic, there is a generous quantity of fresh, crispy rocket, which, as a member of the mustard family, is packed with peppery punch. Rocket has enjoyed its time in the spotlight over the past decade — it experienced a rapid rise from relative obscurity to culinary centre-stage in the 1990s, when its pungent tang was extolled by excited foodies. But as soon as every self-respecting restaurant and gourmet foodhall integrated rocket into its menu, it was branded trendy and over-used by some high-brow critics, who found its mass availability rather vulgar.
Nevertheless, flash-in-the-pan popularity and the inevitable price hike that ensued do not change the fact that rocket is a great ingredient, combining the fresh crispness of lettuce with the spicy tanginess of a herb. These are perfect qualities for use in a bean salad, as beans, not being the most aromatic or textured of ingredients, are greatly enhanced by a flavourful and crunchy side-kick such as rocket.
If you are cooking your own butter beans for this salad, be sure to drain them as soon as they are soft, and before they get in any way mushy, otherwise the salad risks becoming soggy and starchy. One hour should be plenty for butter beans, but check them regularly throughout cooking, as each batch varies slightly.
When used as a raw ingredient in salad, fennel should be chopped into thin, delicate slices. To do this, trim the stalks, chop the fennel in half through the root, discard the core, then, cut-side down, slice it thinly.
However, for roasting fennel, as it is soft and juicy, larger wedges are preferable. Chop the bulb in half and leave the core intact. Place flat side down and cut each half into 6-8 wedges, being sure to slice through the core each time, leaving some of it attached to each wedge to hold it together.
2 red peppers
2 yellow peppers
4 small/3 large bulbs of fennel
2x400g tins of butter beans
(standard tins) or 200g dry beans soaked overnight & cooked as per page 38
200g rocket — rinsed & drained if not pre-washed
Extra-virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper
Roast garlic & lemon dressing
100ml extra-virgin olive oil
Juice of 2 lemons
2 bulbs of garlic
Salt and pepper
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Chop the fennel into wedges and the peppers into medium strips. Keeping the peppers separate from the fennel, toss the vegetables in a little olive oil, salt and pepper and transfer to two baking trays. Chop the top off the two bulbs of garlic, toss them in olive oil and place them, open top up, in the corner of the baking tray with the fennel. Pour a little extra olive oil into the centre of each bulb. Roast all the vegetables until tender, turning occasionally. The peppers will take about 20 minutes and the fennel and garlic 30-40 minutes. Set aside to cool.
When the garlic is cool, hold it at the uncut end of the bulbs and squeeze the soft flesh out through the cut end. Using a stick blender, or in a food processor, blend together the olive oil, garlic and lemon juice. Season lightly with salt and pepper, bearing in mind that the roasted vegetables have already been seasoned.
Drain and rinse the butter beans and place them in a bowl with the roasted fennel and peppers. Pour over the dressing and combine gently. Just before serving, chop the rocket roughly and add it to the salad, so that it stays nice and crisp.
Again many thanks to both the author and her publisher for allowing me to give you all just a small glimpse of the contents of her wonderful. Please be sure to look for it next time your in a bookstore. I believe it is also available on line at Amazon.
