Recipes: Roasted red pepper and bulgur salad | Grape and toasted almond rice salad with slightly curried chive dressing

I DREAD potato salad, that ubiquitous dish of summer entertaining, as it can be so deadly dull. Yet there is a need for starch in our diets, and it can be provided in a number of delicious ways.

Rice is excellent in a salad, and an ingredient to keep in mind when you know that one of your guests is gluten-intolerant. Couscous, rice and bulgur wheat all require a good contrasting texture when used in a salad – nuts or crispy bacon are favourite ingredients. For my taste, pasta is unappealing when cold, therefore its salad potential is zero as far as I’m concerned.

However, beans are delicious in salads and my bean of choice would always 
be cannellini.

Roasted red pepper and bulgur salad

Serves 6

I much prefer bulgur to couscous. It has more flavour and substance.

4 red peppers, each halved, seeds removed, and the peppers sliced into strips both ways, yielding dice 
approximately thumbnail in size

2 red onions, each skinned, halved and finely sliced

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 teaspoon salt, about 15 grinds of black pepper

8oz/226g bulgur wheat

1½ pints/852ml stock, this can be either chicken or vegetable stock

pared rind of ½ lemon

Lay a sheet of baking parchment on a roasting tin and put the prepared red peppers and red onions on this. Add the olive oil, salt and black pepper and, with your hands, mix the oil thoroughly through the sliced onions and diced red peppers. It will seem a large amount – but as the vegetables roast, they wilt down.

Roast in a hot oven, 400F/200C/Gas Mark 6, for 20 minutes, then shuffle around the contents of the roasting tin, smooth evenly once more and continue to roast for a further 20-25 minutes – the onions should be completely soft and just turning golden brown at the edges.

Measure the bulgur into a large saucepan and add the boiling stock and pared lemon rind. Stir until the stock simmers once more, cover the pan with its lid and simmer the contents very gently – for 15-20 minutes. The bulgur should have absorbed the stock.

Combine the cooked bulgur – throwing away the lemon rinds – and the roasted red onions and red peppers. Serve warm, or cooled.

Grape and toasted almond rice salad with slightly curried chive dressing

Serves 6

12oz/340g Basmati rice

For the dressing;

2 teaspoons runny honey

1 rounded teaspoon medium strength curry powder

3 tablespoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon salt, about 10 grinds of black pepper

6 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons very finely chopped chives

2 pared strips of lemon rind

In a bowl work the runny honey and curry powder together, gradually adding the lemon juice. Mix in the salt and black pepper, and the olive oil, a tablespoon at a time. Lastly, mix in the chopped chives.

Boil a large pan of salted water containing 2 strips of lemon rind. Add the rice, and let the water come back to a gentle simmer. Cook the rice for 6-7 minutes, then drain it through a sieve, running cold water through it. Drain well, tip the rice into a bowl and immediately mix the dressing through the rice.

8oz/226g seedless red or black grapes, each cut in half

3oz/75g flaked almonds, dry fried to toast

Lastly, mix the halved grapes and toasted flaked almonds through the dressed rice. Cover the bowl, and store in the fridge till 30 minutes before serving.

This rice salad must be made the same day that it is to be eaten – but the grapes can be halved, the almonds toasted and the dressing made the day before.

Cannellini bean 
green salad

Serves 6

3 tablespoons olive oil

12 spring onions trimmed at either end and sliced into 1cm lengths

8oz/226g sugar-
snap peas, each trimmed at either end and sliced finely on the diagonal

1 teaspoon salt, about 15 grinds of black pepper

finely grated rind of 2 limes, juice of 1

2oz/56g coriander, chopped but not finely

contents of 2 tins of cannellini beans, rinsed thoroughly under running cold water

2oz/56g peashoots

Heat the olive oil over a moderate heat in a sauté pan, and fry the sliced spring onions and the finely sliced sugarsnaps, with the salt and black pepper, stirring occasionally, for 2-3 minutes. Take the pan off the heat, and stir in the finely grated lime rinds, the juice of 1 lime, the chopped coriander and the rinsed cannellini beans. Mix together thoroughly, then tip into a serving dish, and scatter the peashoots over 
the surface.

TOP TIP: Lemon juice gives an extra acidic kick, making your salad all the more mouth-watering. If you 
don’t fancy lemon, choose 
from a wide range of 
oils and vinegars in 
stores to pep up 
your dish