Broad bean and blood orange salad

October 8, 2009

Whenever I see fresh broad beans at the market, I like to make the most of them. While I enjoy them as a hot vegetable, I really love them in a salad.

It is always worth the effort to double-pod the beans. This involves removing the outside pods and cooking the beans just long enough for the skins to soften but for the beans to remain bright green.

The outside pod can be easily removed if you run down the seam on one side with a potato peeler. When it comes to time to remove the skins, it’s easy to pinch a little hole in the one end of the skin and squeeze out the inner bean.

I made today’s salad with blood oranges but these aren’t always easy to come by and ordinary oranges will do just as well.

This is a colourful salad that goes well with grilled chicken. You can make it on a bed of rocket or mesclun greens if you want a more substantial dish.

Broad bean and blood orange salad

1 kg fresh broad beans
2 blood oranges
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon dried red pepper flakes
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
Juice of 1 1/2 limes
fresh coriander (optional)

Remove the broad beans from the pod. Bring a pot of lightly salted water to the boil then add the broad beans and simmer for three minutes. Remove from the heat, drain and refresh the beans in a bowl of iced water.

When they are cool, pinch a little of the skin off the end of each bean and squeeze out the bean.

Wash the oranges and remove some fine strips of the peel with a zester and set aside for garnish.

Cut the remaining peel and pith from the oranges, using a serrated knife and removing the outer skin from the segments as you go. Do this over a bowl so you can collect any juice. Now cut down between the inner skin of each segment and the flesh. Continue in this fashion until you have effectively skinned each segment. Drain in a sieve over the bowl you are using to collect the juice.

Add the lime juice to the orange juice then the salt, pepper flakes, mustard and olive oil and whisk well.

Cut each orange segment into two or three pieces. Place the double podded beans in a serving dish and top with the oranges. Pour over the citrus dressing and garnish with the strips of orange zest, and fresh coriander sprigs if you wish.

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