Two Low-Carb Festive dips: Red Pepper & Cumin Dip, and Avocado, Crème Fraîche & Coriander Dip

 Chermoula-style Red Pepper & Cumin Dip, and
Avocado, Crème Fraîche & Coriander Dip

Two lovely low-carb festive dips: one cool, pale and creamy; the other a zippy rust-red zing of garlic, cumin and red pepper. Served together, they make a good contrasting pair, with finely chopped fresh coriander singing out as a common ingredient.

Something else these dips have in common: both recipes are the work of my two younger sisters, who magicked them, independently, from their kitchens during a week of feasting. (For the first time in three years my entire family - my mum, my three sisters, my three brothers-in-law, and many cousins - is assembled in Hout Bay, Cape Town, and we have spent the last few days happily shuttling between houses, shuffling cousins between beds, and filling ourselves with festive cheer).

I liked these dips so much that I disgraced myself by licking out the bowls. Then I went home and made them myself, but they were demolished by my teens before my tongue got within slurping distance.

Every flavour my tastebuds crave - the zing of lemon, the sting of garlic, the sweet smokiness of the roasted peppers, the stealthy warmth of cumin - is contained in these recipes, and I can't help being intrigued that all three of my sisters adore the same flavours. Is this genetic, I wonder? It can't be that we were raised in the same household: in the 60s and 70s, when we were kids, coriander, raw garlic and cumin and other newfangleds were neither available nor on the family menu.

The first recipe, which is reminiscent of a Moroccan chermoula mixture, uses Peppadews, which are small, mild-tasting bottled peppers. If you can't get these, use bottled red chillies, or any similar heat-producing agent, such as Tabasco sauce or cayenne pepper, in quantities to suit your personal heat-meter. Please use very fresh powdered cumin and paprika (both spices start to taste dusty as they age) and remove all the stalks from the herbs before you chop them.

My sister served this in dollops over a bowl of creamy cold crème fraîche. (She says this paste is lovely with fresh fillets of fish: smear the paste on the skinless side of the fish and bake in a moderate oven until the fish is done and the topping just bubbling.)

The second dip is similar to a guacamole but fresher, lighter, zingier and made utterly delicious by a lot of crunchy fresh coriander.  It came about, says my (other) sister, because she had only one usable avocado to mix with a lot of crème fraîche and coriander. (I don't know what is going on with South Africa's usually bountiful avocado crop right now, but I can tell you that they cost a staggering R12 each right now, and that they are downright puny.)

Red Pepper, Cumin and Garlic Dip

6 ripe red peppers [capsicums or bell peppers]
2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
3 bottled Peppadews, drained and sliced (or a bottled chilli pepper, or Tabasco sauce, to taste)
2½ tsp (12.5 ml) powdered cumin
1 tsp (5 ml) paprika
1/3 cup (80 ml) olive oil
the juice of a lemon
the finely grated zest of half a lemon
½ cup (125 ml) finely chopped fresh coriander leaves [cilantro]
½ cup (125 ml) finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oven to 180°C. Place the peppers, whole, on a baking sheet covered with a piece of tin foil. Bake for 45 to 60 minutes, or until they have collapsed and blistered. Turn off the heat and let them cool completely in the oven.

Bake the peppers until they're blistered and soft.

Remove the tray from the oven, slip the skins off the peppers, and remove the stalks and any seeds. Place the flesh in the bowl of a food processor or liquidiser.

Add the garlic, Peppadews, cumin, paprika, olive oil and lemon juice, and whizz to a paste. If the mixture is too thick to turn the blades, add a little water or lemon juice.

Now add the lemon zest and finely chopped coriander and parsley, and press the pulse button once or twice so that the mixture is just combined (the herbs should retain a crunch). Season with salt and pepper and decant into a pretty bowl.

Serves 6-8, as a snack 

Avocado, Crème Fraîche & Coriander Dip

1 large avocado
250 g (1 tub) crème fraîche
the juice of 1 small lemon
2/3 cup (125 ml) very finely chopped fresh coriander leaves [cilantro]
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Halve the avocado, remove the pip and scoop out the flesh. Place in a food processor fitted with a metal blade and add the crème fraîche and lemon juice.  Whizz to a smooth paste. Tip in the coriander leaves and pulse once or twice, or until the herbs are finely minced.  Season with salt and pepper and decant into a bowl.

Serve these dips with a bowl of olives, iced celery sticks, cucumber discs and feta cheese, if you're low-carbing, or with hot pita bread or toasted baguettes if you're not.

Serves 6-8, as a snack 

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Spring Salad of Edamame Beans, Fennel, Avocado and Pancetta

I was intrigued to pick up a packet of edamame beans at my local Woolworths yesterday and, never having seen such a bean sold in the snowy tundras of South Africa, let alone tasted one, I bought them, chomped on them on the way home in the car, and hurried to my desk to Google them.

To my surprise, Google couldn't product a single decent description of them, until I realised I was ignorantly searching for 'endamame' with an N.

Once I'd amended my keyword to 'edamame', I learned that this beautiful jade-green beanlet is a green soybean, picked young in its pod.

The Woolworths package label told me that the beans are delicious quickly sautéed in butter, but I really liked the taste of them raw, so I made them into this salad, which has fennel for an aniseed crunch, avocado for silkiness, and a crumbling of frizzled pancetta for salty crispiness. If you can't find edamame beans, try this salad with shelled fresh peas. (And if you can't find pancetta, use streaky bacon instead.)

You can dress this salad with anything you like, but a light dressing of lemon juice and olive oil with a little garlic and a whisper of soy sauce was just right for me.

At the last minute I added a handful of young mustard greens (grown, tenderly, from seed, by my daughter in her little vegetable patch). Have you tried growing your own mustard greens? They sprout like weeds, mature quickly and have a lovely mustardy zing. The ones in the picture are the Florida Broadleaf variety.

This salad is delicious, but very filling, and very fart-producing: if you're serving this to friends, give them just a teacup each.

Spring Salad of Edamame Beans, Fennel, Avocado and Pancetta, with Lemon and Garlic Dressing

6 rashers of pancetta (or streaky bacon)
2 young bulbs of fresh fennel, plus a few of the feathery fennel leaves
1½ cups (375 ml) edamame beans (or fresh peas from the pod)
2 spring onions, white parts only, finely sliced
a handful of flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
1 perfectly ripe, firm avocado
mustard greens [optional]

For the dressing:1 clove fresh garlic, peeled and crushed
3 Tbsp (45 ml) fresh lemon juice
1 Tbsp (15 ml) white wine vinegar
1 tsp (5 ml) Kikkoman soy sauce
100 ml olive oil
a pinch of white sugar
salt and freshly ground black pepper

First prepare the pancetta. Heat a non-stick frying pan over a high flame. When the pan is really hot, add a lick of oil and add the pancetta or bacon strips. Allow them to fry, undisturbed, until brown on the underneath. Flip them over, and cook for another minute or so, until they are brown and crisp. Remove from the pan, drain on a piece of kitchen paper, crumble into pieces and set aside.

Now make the dressing: whisk all the dressing ingredients together and set aside while you make the salad.

For the salad: Slice the fennel bulbs away from their stalks and peel off the tough outer leaves. Slice the bulbs in half, lengthways, and chip out the fibrous core, if there is one. Slice finely, as if you are slicing a leek. Finely chop one or two of the feathery fennel fronds. Put the fennel slices and chopped leaves into a bowl and add the edamame beans, chopped spring onions and chopped parsley.

Peel the avocado, remove the pip and peel, slice into neat cubes and add to the bowl along with the mustard greens. Tip over just enough dressing to coat all the ingredients and toss gently to combine. Sprinkle over the crumbled pancetta and add the mustard greens. Check the seasoning (this salad needs more salt than you would imagine).

Serve immediately.

Serves 4, as a starter or side dish.


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Wasabi and Avocado Potato Salad with Seared Sesame Tuna Steaks

Nose-nuking wasabi paste and gentle, buttery avocado are unlikely bedfellows, I admit. But when combined in a creamy dressing and poured over freshly boiled and cubed spuds, they... well, I suppose they come together. With fireworks and a celestial choir.

I am a devoted fan of potato salad: not the yellow, greasy Sixties version, but a lighter, brighter breed of salad, made with unskinned boiled baby potatoes and dressed with a mixture of thick white yoghurt, good mayonnaise, lemon juice, mint, parsley, chives, onion and the slightest twang of garlic.

Because I was planning to serve some lovely fresh tuna steaks for supper, I thought I'd add wasabi paste to the dressing. It tasted stingingly good, but the dressing wasn't the very pale pistachio-green I'd hoped for , so I stirred in the finely mashed flesh of a ripe and voluptuous avocado. To my surprise, the delicate taste of avocado gave the aggressive wasabi flavour a good punch on the nose - and the result was a tie.

The ingredients for the dressing should be whisked together just minutes before you serve this dish. The first time I made this salad, I concocted the dressing before I put the potatoes on to boil, and 45 minutes later I found it had turned from a creamy wobble into a thin, bubbly liquid. Why the mixture liquefied, I don't know, but it had something to do with the wasabi and the avocado. Maybe their knees just turned to water?

Wasabi and Avocado Potato Salad with Seared Sesame Tuna Steaks

18 small new potatoes (or 8 waxy, thin-skinned young potatoes)
1 T (15 ml) salt
2 ripe avocados

For the dressing:
1/2 an onion, peeled and very finely chopped or grated
the juice of 1 lemon
3/4 cup (180 ml) good mayonnaise (such as Hellman's, or home-made)
3/4 cup (180 ml) thick plain white yoghurt
1 clove fresh garlic, peeled and crushed
1 - 2 t (5- 10 ml) wasabi paste, to taste
1 ripe avocado
a dash of Tabasco sauce (optional)
a handful of finely snipped fresh chives
salt and freshly milled black pepper

For the tuna steaks:

4 fresh tuna steaks
6 T white sesame seeds (or a combination of sesame and shelled pumpkin seeds)
3 T (45 ml) olive oil or vegetable oil
salt and milled black pepper

Put the potatoes into a big pot and cover with water. Add the salt and bring to the boil. Boil for about 30 minutes (depending on the size of the spuds) or until they are quite tender, but not splitting.

While the potatoes are cooking, combine the grated onion and the lemon juice in a small bowl, and set aside (the lemon juice will take the sting out of the onions).

Sprinkle the sesame seeds onto a plate. Press the tuna steaks, top and bottom, into the sesame seeds, so that both sides are well coated. Put the steaks onto a big plate, in a single layer, cover with tightly with cling-film, and press down with the palm of your hand so that the seeds adhere to the surface of the steaks. Place in the fridge.

Remove the potatoes from the heat, drain in a colander and set aside to cool while you make the dressing and cook the tuna steaks.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan and, when it's very hot, add the tuna steaks. You may need to do this in two batches, if the steaks are bigger than the palm of your hand. Cook for 2-3 minutes on one side (you'll see, by observing the edges of the steaks, the flesh turning opaque as it comes into contact with the heat). When the opacity has crept two or three millimetres up, flip the steaks over and cook for a few more minutes. I like tuna with a lovely rare, rosy centre - that is, virtually raw inside - but feel free to cook the tuna right through if you'd like it that way. Remove the tuna steaks from the heat and set aside to rest.

Cut the warm cooked potatoes into chunks (or leave them whole if they're tiny baby ones). Skin the avocados, cut them into cubes, and sprinkle with a little fresh lemon juice to prevent them browning.

Now make the dressing. Put the onion and lemon-juice mixture into a big bowl. Using a wire whisk, beat in all the remaining ingredients, except for the chives. (Wasabi paste comes in various degrees of nose-blasting fierceness, so I suggest you add a teaspoon to start, and add more to taste). Check the seasoning, adding more salt and pepper if necessary, and then tip the potato and avocado cubes into the dressing. Toss very lightly to combine. Tip into a salad bowl and scatter with the finely snipped chives.

Using a very sharp knife, cut the tuna steaks into slices, and arrange around the edges of the potato salad.

Serve immediately.

Serves 4-6 Print Friendly

Avocado, Feta and Garlic Whip

What is it with pears? Have you noticed that avocados and pears stay stubbornly hard for days and days, then all ripen simultaneously, stay ripe for precisely 15 minutes and then go vrot? I bought a whole box of avos that did this, and to prevent a terrible waste of R45, turned them into this zingly, garlicky all-purpose avocado dip/sauce/baked-potato topping.

Avocado, Feta and Garlic Whip
8 big ripe avocados
6 cloves garlic, chopped
juice of 4 lemons
100 ml olive oil
1/2 cup thick white yoghurt
2 tsp Tabasco sauce (a green chilli would be nice too)
2 big handfuls fresh coriander, chopped
2 discs feta cheese
salt and milled black pepper

Put all the ingredients except the feta and half the coriander into the bowl of a food processor. Whizz to a very smooth, soft, whippy texture. Check seasoning. Crumble in the feta and the remaining coriander and press the pulse button again so that the cheese and coriander stays a bit chunky.

A thin film of oil poured over the top of the dish, or clingfilm pressed directly onto its surface, will keep it nice and green for days. Print Friendly