Indian Style Salad Recipe Inspired By Meera Sodha

I turned 40 a week ago, and I was given a present of Fresh India so on the day I spent a good long while going through it and made an indian style salad based on Meera Sodha’s Station Hill Salad. Read through for the recipe. 

There is only one secret to this simple indian style salad and it’s how you cut the veggies. You must cut them in tiny pieces, think a quarter of your thumb nail. The more you cut the juicier the salad gets. It is a lot of work and I recommend owning a good knife but honestly it’s worth it. The crunch remains and the juices mingle freely. It also means you get an even dose of each ingredient in each bite. As they are well balanced and match this indian style salad is a pleasure.

The original called for a yoghurt dressing but my dude isn’t mad into those so I did my own thing with a dressing.  I’ll try it as intended by the author for myself at a later date. 

As this salad takes a fair bit of time to prepare, set aside at least 30 min of solid chopping. Even better sit around the table with your friends or family and work together. Many hands make for light work and all that. 

Ingredients: 

• 1 bulb of fennel (medium)
• 1 tomato (large)
• 1 pepper (red, orange or yello)
• 1 red pepper
• 1 cucumber
• 1 red onion
• 1 handful of dill and a few mint leaves
• 1/2 pomegranate
• 1 table spoon of nigella seeds
• 1 lime
• 1 table spoon of pomegranate molasses
• olive oil
• salt flakes and freshed crushed pepper

Method: 

• Top and tail the fennel and remove the outer layer. Deseed your tomato and your pepper. Remove the watery middle from the cucumber.
• Chop everything very small. You want something that’s the size of a small child’s nail. Make the effort it will stand by you. 
• Mix the pomegranate molasses with the lime juice. 
• Pour the mixture over the salad. Shred the herbs, sprinkle with the nigella seeds and toss. Add the oil to taste and season.