Colourful beet salad

 

These baby beets (and a couple of baby purple carrots) were boiled and then peeled (the skin comes off easily) and dressed with olive oil and salt, plus a sprinkle of fennel leaves. I added onion weed, borage and calendula petals to complete the salad. Very yummy, and pretty! 

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Banana blossom and carrot salad

 

I usually just have the banana blossom 'heart' for salads, but this time I have included a few of the little flowers that are found under the Petals. Cut the banana blossom from the bunch of bananas (leave them on the tree if they are still green) and peel off the outer pink petals, collecting the little blossoms and dropping them in cold water and lemon juice (I added some to the sink). 

Prepare another bowl with water and lemon juice and cut the banana 'heart' into small slices, dropping them quickly into the lemon water so that they don't brown. If you want to add the flowers you will need to remove the style and stigma, and the papery outer part of the flower. This takes a long time and this is why I only do it for a few of the most tender flowers. The more central flowers, which are completely white (no pink) can be eaten whole.

Rinse well and drain, then place in a bowl and add lemon or lime juice, about 2 tbsp, soy sauce, about 1 tbsp, and half a tsp of grated ginger. Press down with a plate or a second bowl and place a weigh on top (you can find an image in this recipe here). Leave overnight, or even a couple of days (like I did, it was perfectly fine!), then rinse under cold water, shake well and place in a clean bowl. Grate one large carrot and dress with lemon juice, salt and olive oil, then fold in the banana flowers. Mix well, taste for salt, and scoop into the banana petals for serving. I also decorated mine with Vietnamese mint flowers. 

It was very good, but next time, if I have the patience and time to clean all the little flowers, I'll tray to cook them. The 'heart' is definitely much nicer! 

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Broccolo Romanesco and chickpea salad

Broccolo Romanesco is a beautiful vegetable, but if you cannot find it you can substitute here with a cauliflower. Cut the florets and drop them in salted boiling water, then cook them until soft but not mushy. Cool in cold water and drain, then dress with white wine vinegar or white balsamic (about one tbsp). Drain one can of chick peas (keep the chickpea water - aquafaba, to make vegan meringues or other vegan recipes) and add to the Broccolo. Add olive oil (about 2 tbsp) and salt to taste. To finish add some olives (ascolane olives are the best, otherwise used other marinated olives). Mix well and serve at room temperature.

Photo and Recipe by Alessandra Zecchini ©

How to make food and meals more colourful, naturally (including using edible flowers)

In the past two month I have been taking lots of photos of my dishes, but posted very few recipes on the blog. Lack of time, yes, but I do cook every day, and not always new things, so it would be silly to repeat recipes. But one thing I can do is to change the appearance of food, especially in Summer, when fruit, vegetables and flowers abound. So here a few tips to make food more colourful!

Start easy, with desserts

Desserts are the easiest things to colour, naturally. Pictured above some creamy puddings, chocolate with ground pistachio, lemon or vanilla pudding with a drop of berry or cherry syrup and a strawberry, and blueberry pudding made by adding blueberry freeze dried powder to the vanilla puddings. Add edible flowers like dianthus or violets.

These desserts can be vegan or vegetarian, two vegan chocolate recipes are here or here 

And here you can find two vegetarian recipes for lemon and raspberry puddings (for blueberry follow the same method but add blueberry powder instead of raspberry powder).

Vanilla puddings are even easier, and you can start with a vanilla pudding and then move on and add other ingredients (like chocolate or fruit) and save time. Here is the recipe. 

Of course you can also layer the different flavours!

Cannot make dessert? Try fruit platters and edible flowers

In summer I do make the most of the edible flowers I grow in the garden, and these can be also used to add a special touch to fruit platters, like this (where I used verbena and dianthus with watermelon, nectarines, peaches, cherries, apricots, blueberries and pomegranate), and even if you cannot make desserts, or have no time, or are on a diet, you will always be able to impress guests with a fruit platter.

Here I used rock melon, nectarines, peaches, plums, cherries, pomegranate, calendula and violets.

For this one watermelon, nectarines, pink and purply plums, blueberries, cherries, pomegranate and verbena flowers.

And even if you don't have the time to cut fruit, presentation is all you need: here some plums presented with some cornflowers (also edible, btw).

Also effective to use the watermelon shell as a container for fruit salad, and serve on banana leaves, perhaps with banana flower petals, if you have them). Other leaves work well too, just wash them well first.  

Just looking at the colours of fruit makes everyone happy, and if you are so pressed for time that you cannot even cut a fruit salad, a basket or two of fruit on the table will always make a good impression.

A touch of red or pink catches the eye

Next tip: make full use of colourful vegetables, radishes, for example, can be grated and used to decorate and flavour food. I had some hinari tofu pockets filled with rice and topped with mushrooms and greens, and a couple of radishes just added interest and colour.

The avocado sashimi is already colourful, but adding just one (always edible) flower brought out the green even more.

And a few petals (of impatiens) made this vegetarian sushi platter look less 'monocrome' - impatiens are good with savoury food, as they taste a little like rocket salad.

Flowers suit the style of Japanese cuisine, but if you don't have edible flowers at hand, or prefer not to use them, just cut a carrot slice like a flower: it will make all the difference.

Just one carrot slice can change the look of a dish, and in winter colourful Japanese pickles (plus your carrot slice) can brighten up boring white/beige food. Sorry about the bad photo though, it was evening and quite dark...

White brings out the other colours

White also helps: mozzarella, feta and other white cheeses bring out the colours in other vegetables. If you are in doubt of what to make, a caprese salad is always a good idea, here a two examples, a classic one and then one with different types of tomatoes, bocconcini, and different herbs (fresh oregano and thyme). More ideas can be found here.

Green herbs do magic

Do you remember when all the food coming out of restaurants had a sprinkle of parsley? Well, that may had been OTT at times, but in some ways it does make sense. Fresh herbs are a life saver for brown food, and to give you an example (without parsley) I add chopped coriander to all my Mexican dishes. (fortunately I love it)! In the photo below, clockwise from top left: refried beans, jack fruit, tortillas, vegan chili (sans carne) and guacamole.  Then you just need to add a green salads and tomatoes to assemble the tortillas, and you are done!

And then, every now and then I do something a bit more colourful (like the chili corn, capsicum and quorn dish below), just for the fun of having added colour, but this is for summer, when corn and capsicums are in season.

And of course for the guacamole you can also add a flower ...

 ... or several flowers! And cherry tomatoes too!

A few more ideas

Protein, even vegetarian protein, tend to be white/beige/brown, take almonds and other nuts for example (except for the green pistachio nuts), but with a little fruit powder, or berry juice, you can create a colourful display even with a single base ingredient (almond, in this case). Check out the recipe for this easy marzipan here. And of course colourful paper cases help too!

Below I have a brown lentil salad, placed on a bead of mixed green leaves, and decorated with edible flowers, so easy, full of protein, plus it is vegan and gluten free, for the recipe just click here, where you can also find a lot of other recipes using edible flowers.

The flower blog is Cooking with Flowers and, although some of the recipes are raw, it mostly deals with actually using flowers in the kitchen and as important ingredients, not just as simple decorations.  Click here to view.

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Oakune Carrot and Beetroot Salad with Feta, Thyme and Edible Flowers

Ohakune is a small town in the North Island of New Zealand, situated 215 kilometres north of Wellington and 292 kilometres south of Auckland. It is located in the Tongariro National Park, at the food of the active volcano Mount Ruapehu. It is also New Zealand’s ‘carrot capital' so after a ski trip there we always get carrots, and other produce (potatoes, beetroots, swedes). 

Recipe: Wash the carrots and beetroots and boil in water (together) until soft but not too much (not mushy!!!). Then rinse under cold water and remove the skins with your fingers (from the carrots too). Cut into bite size pieces. Dress with olive oil, salt and lemon juice, add cubed feta and stir. Place on a plate and add fresh thyme, onion weed flowers and broccolini or friarielli flowers (they are edible and have a lovely peppery taste). Add plenty! These are not decorations, these are to be eaten! And now a few photo of life in the garden!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Potato salad with Fresh As Tarragon, capers and Friarielli flowers, plus focaccia with Fresh As herbs

I have been trying a few freeze dried herbs from Fresh As and this potato salad is definitely a winner.

Boil the potatoes and peel, then cut and mix with mayo and capers. Sprinkle with Fresh As French Tarragon. I also added some edible flowers from my friarielli (cime di rapa) plants.

The friarielli seeds come for Italian Seeds Pronto, such a great winter crop! Eat the leaves, tips and flowers!

I also tried other Fresh As powders: chili, garlic, oregano, basil and rosemary (plus the French Tarragon) on focaccia. I used letter stencils before adding the powders, just to record what went where. FYI, the garlic becomes orange after baking.

Delicious, and also pretty in a bread basket!

And on some fried eggplants (added after frying, with salt).

 Flowers from my garden

 Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Baby perlas potatoes two ways: hot 'in padella', and salad with flowers

I received a few potatoes to try from Potatoes New Zealand to celebrate November Means New Potatoes, and here are my first creations.

  I started with baby perlas, which I knew already. These little new potatoes are cute and a real little treat, so they deserve special attention!

I boiled them first (no mint... just cannot bear minted potatoes, sorry Kiwis!) and then I divided them: half I used for salad, I picked the 'bigger' ones and cut them into two pieces, then I mix them with mayonnaise, chopped onion weed bulbs and stalks, nasturtium buds and petals, and Impatiens' petals. 

Keep a few flowers aside for decorations, and onion weed flowers too, if you like. I think that a lot of people now are comfortable with eating nasturtium flowers and buds (I left some buds for decoration too, and for you to see). Buds taste a little like capers. Young tender leaves are nice too (see soup below). Not so many people would eat Impatiens though, or know about them. They taste a little like rocket, and I prefer the red ones, although I always add a few pink ones just because the colour is so pretty. My preference for red ones may be just because I observed the chickens eating all the red ones while leaving behind the other colours, but maybe they are just colour blind? Anyway, I tasted all the colours and decided that the chicken were right... Of course don't eat the flowers if you spray your garden with chemicals!

As for the smaller potatoes, I just heated it some garlic with olive oil in a skillet and then tossed the potatoes around, with an extra good pinch of salt, until hot. Then turned the heat off and added some fresh thyme, another toss, and ecco fatto! Patatine novelle in padella al timo!

I also tried some more potatoes, a variety called Carrera, which I used to make one of my classic spring soup, with asparagus and onion weed and flowers (yes, using lots of onion weeds and flowers, my Spring staples!), and you can find the recipe here, just substitute the agria potato for the Carrera potatoes and you are done!

Photos and recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©