7. Persian inspired Shirazi salad - tangy herbaceous chopped salad

Shirazi salad is ‘the iconic’ salad in Persian/Iranian cuisine. I had a Shirazi salad for the first time at at a friend’s home. This flavour in this salad from just one forkful was unlike anything I had tasted before. Packed full of fresh herbs and finely diced vegetables I assumed it had to have a special vinaigrette to marry all the delicious flavours. The beauty of this salad is in its simplicity. The recipe I am using uses finely chopped fresh herbs and a few carefully diced vegetables with lemon juice, olive oil and a bit of salt and pepper - that’s it! The key to this salad is to dice all the vegetable elements the same size and the smaller the better!

This inspired version of a classic Shirazi salad can be made on the fly and in a time pinch with just some chopping. It is light and flavourful, the ideal accompaniment to most proteins. Make it once and you will add it to your salad roster forever. This recipe serves 4 - 5 as side salads.

Ingredients

3 small Persian cucumbers or one English cucumber unpeeled

3 ripe Roma or vine-ripe tomatoes

1/4 of a medium Red onion

Fresh Herbs (1/3 cup combined total) Cilantro, Parsley, Mint, Dill - If you don’t like cilantro leave it out.

1 Lemon ( approx. 3 Tbsp of juice is required)

1/4 cup Olive oil

salt and pepper

Method

This is the most important step (take your time here as the smaller your dicing the better the mouthful). All the ingredients are placed it a single bowl.

1. Carefully dice the cucumbers, tomatoes and red onion - try to dice them all the same size. Add to a bowl.

2. Finely chop all your herbs so that the combined yield is a generous 1/3 cup. Add to the vegetable bowl.

3. Juice the lemon (1/3 cup) and add 1/3 tsp of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper. Add the 1/4 of olive oil - Adjust to taste. When I remember, I add some fresh lemon zest for that extra layer of citrus!

Combine all the ingredients by gently mixing. This salad is best served immediately.

Serve and enjoy!