My latest recipe is a simple, healthy salad where Japanese daikon is the star turn. (Daikon translates simply as "big root" in English) although you may know it as white radish, mouli, luobo or my personal favourite, icicle radish. Daikon is good for you - a 15cm / 6 inch daikon provides nearly 150% of your daily Vitamin C requirement plus folate, calcium, magnesium and copper. Daikon is also very easy to grow in your garden if you fancy doing something a little green fingered in the spring months.
But back to the recipe. As I said above, this is very simple to make - it's just a mixture of daikon peeled into long strips and some chopped rocket leaves. The daikon strips are mixed with salt and rested for 10 minutes to draw out the bitterness and some of the water content. A few good squeezes and you'll be surprised how much liquid you can drain out of the strips, leaving a lovely light, crunchy plate of goodness. Once the daikon has been squeezed, in goes the rocket. Then, seasoning is composed of a heaped teaspoon of Japanese dashi stock granules, two teaspoons of lemon juice and about 1/2 a teaspoon of sugar. Everything gets a good miz and voila - it's ready. I garnish with a little white sesame for extra flavour and a rather nice decoartive effect and that's it. I think you'll agree, a healthy, tasty salad doesn't get much easier than that!
If this is something that you would like to try, you can find the Youtube tutorial by clicking Daikon Ribbon salad or scroll to the bottom of the page. As always, you can find the written recipe just below.
Happy squeezing! Kurumi XXXX.
ingredients:
(makes 2 generous side servings)
20cm / 8 inches (approx. 450g) daikon / white radish
1 tsp salt
1 heaped spoon of Japanese dashi stock granules
2 tsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp sugar
a handful of rocket leaves, rinsed
1 tsp toasted sesame seeds
how to:
first peel the daikon skin, making sure you remove all the skin down to the white inner flesh. next, cut the daikon in half lengthways. take on 1/2 and and slice into ribbons using a peeler
when you have peeled as much daikon as you can, use a knife to cut the last piece into slivers. repeat with the other 1/2.
place your daikon ribbons in a bowl and sprinkle over the salt. use your hand to give the ribbons a gentle mix so the salt is well distributed. leave for at least 10 minutes
meanwhile, roughly chop the rocket and set aside
when the 10 minutes is up, use your hand to squeeze any excess water from the daikon and drain the liquid into another bowl of into your sink. repeat a couple of times - you will be surprised how much liquid you can draw off the daikon ribbons - this will give the salad a nice crunchy texture
next, add the Japanese dashi granules, lemon juice, sugar and chopped rocket leaves to the bowl. mix everything together gently and transfer to a serving dish
last, sprinkle with the white sesame
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