Middle Eastern Salad

Me and Lester are trying to cut back on carbs at dinner time (baking is *kinda* excluded from this rule), so you will probably see quite a few salad recipes on this blog. This is a fave of ours, mainly thanks to the Dukkah encrusted chicken and the sweet salty Haloumi. This also makes good use of Pomegranate Molasses and Tahini, two essential Middle Eastern ingredients that I'm always looking for new recipes for.

This may look quite complicated, but it's all pretty simple really - you can take out some ingredients and steps if you need this in a hurry. I never cut corners if it's going to make it taste better, but that's me...and this salad tastes amazing.

Middle Eastern Salad

For the Salad (Serves 2)

2 boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into bit sized pieces (lamb would be great here)

Dukkah (I use Alexandra's Bazaar brand, they have a few different varieties)

Lettuce/mesculun

Watercress

Fresh mint

Half a block of Haloumi, cut into slices

1 piece Rye Mountain bread, torn into strips

Salt

Pepper

EVOO (I used Al Brown's Lemon & Fennel infused oil)

1/4 Telegraph Cucumber, peeled and cut into small chunks

1 Capsicum, cut into strips

Cranberries

Microgreens (optional - radish, sorrel, pea shoots)

Baby or normal carrots (2 normal or 4 baby)

Ground Cumin

Honey

Dressing

2 teaspoons Tahini (Sesame seed paste)

3 Tablespoons Greek Yoghurt

1 clove garlic, crushed or microplaned

1 tablespoon Pomegranate Molasses

Juice of 1/2 a lemon

Rind of 1/2 a lemon

Salt and Pepper

1 Tablespoon EVOO

1 Tablespoon water

Preheat your oven to fan bake, 180 degrees.

Drizzle the chicken with olive oil, season with salt and pepper and add about 3 tablespoons of Dukkah and mix well to coat the chicken. Place chicken pieces on a baking paper lined tray and fan-bake until cooked and golden.

Cut the baby carrots into quarters lengthwise, drizzle with EVOO, a little bit of honey, a dusting of ground Cumin, Salt and Pepper, and add to chicken tray about half way through.

Drizzle Mountain Bread strips with EVOO, season, and add to chicken tray when chicken and carrots are almost cooked.

For the dressing, mix together all ingredients in a small bowl until smooth. Season to taste.

When your chicken is cooked and starting to colour, your carrots are tender-crisp and the mountain bread golden, remove from oven and let cool a little.

Fry the haloumi in a medium pan with EVOO until golden on both sides.

Assemble your salad with the lettuce, mint, capsicum, cucumber, and cranberries, adding the hot ingredients last and drizzling the dressing generously over. Top with microgreens, then lasty the hot Haloumi straight from the pan (give it a quick squeeze with a lemon first, it really makes the Haloumi sing)

Chicken, Mountain Bread and Yellow Carrots roasting up nicely

mmmm....can't beat Haloumi