Blood Orange Salad

This is a delightful, colourful and refreshing salad. This recipe is for a starter for 4 and I made each salad on a plate as opposed to putting it all in a bowl to be tossed and served but you could try that in which case I would stick to wedge or cube shapes for the orange, beet and avocado. If you have the time and patience it does look great beautifully laid out on a plate.

Dressing: Make sure you taste the mixture of the first 3 ingredients while your cooking it down as some blood oranges are more sour then others, if you feel like it is way too tart then add a little more maple syrup but don’t forget that you are adding oil when it cools

1/2 cup of blood orange juice
2 tablespoons maple syrup
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
Put all ingredients in a saucepan and reduce of a low heat (warm enough that you can see vapour rising) for about 5 minutes

Let this cool in then add 1 tablespoon of rapeseed oil

Salad:Layer up the ingredients starting with the orange, beet and avocado. Then add the dill and crumbled feta and top with the pistachio and Pangrattato. Drizzle a little of the dressing over each plate and put the rest in a small jug on the table. Don’t feel like you have to use all of the Pangrattato or feta on each plate, any leftovers make a great topping for and easy pasta dish.

3 blood oranges – cut the skin off with a knife and cut out each segment or make slices (or both depending on how you want to present it)

1 pack of cooked sweet beetroot (not pickled) cut into wedges or flat slices (or both depending on how you want to present it)

1 avocado – cut in half and remove the stone and holding each half in your hand cut slices lengthways with a butter knife then carefully scoop out each half with a large serving spoon.

1 block of feta crumbled

1 handful of pistachios – roast and then smash in a postal and mortar

Dill – pick leaves away from thick stem and place around salad or sprinkle on top

Pangrattato- this is the Italian name for grated bread, just take 2 bread ends and break them up into a food processor and turn into crumbs. Add a tablespoon of oil (any) and toss the crumbs in the oil till well coated. Let them sit on a medium heat and don’t turn them too often so they crisp up nicely, add a sprinkling of salt too. Set to the side when nicely browned.