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Cucumber Salad a la Xi’an Impression
Xi’an Impression is a tiny restaurant around the back of Arsenal football stadium.
It’s tremendously popular with Ottolenghi chefs for its big flavours based on a brazenly liberal use of chillies, vinegar, soy sauce and oil.
Its cucumber salad, which always appears first on the table, is the loose inspiration for this dish.
The dressing can be made up to a week ahead and kept refrigerated – just stir again to loosen it, adding a little water, if need be.
Prep 10 min
Cook 10 min
Marinate 2 hr
Serves 4 as a side
700g cucumbers (ie, roughly 2 large cucumbers), quartered lengthways
2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
2 tsp rice-wine vinegar
3 tbsp lime juice
3 tsp flaked sea salt
3 tbsp sunflower oil
2 spring onions, trimmed and finely sliced on an angle
1/2 tbsp black sesame seeds
For the dressing
60g tahini
2 tbsp soy sauce (or tamari, to make the dish gluten-free)
1 1/2 tbsp mirin
1 1/2 tbsp rice-wine vinegar
Scoop out and discard the watery centre and seeds from the cucumber quarters, then cut the flesh widthways into chunky, 2cm-thick pieces.
Put the cucumber in a bowl with the garlic, vinegar, lime juice and three teaspoons of flaked sea salt, then mix with your hands, lightly crushing the cucumber pieces as you do so.
Gently heat the oil in a small saucepan until warm – about two minutes – then pour over the cucumber and leave to marinate for two hours.
Whisk all the dressing ingredients and two tablespoons of water until you end up with a very smooth sauce (it will seize up a bit to start with, but persevere and it will come together smoothly).
Pour the tahini mixture on to a large plate with a lip, so it naturally pools into a circle in the middle.
Drain the cucumbers very well, discarding the liquid, then pile on top of the sauce.
Scatter over the sliced spring onion and the sesame seeds, and serve at once.
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