Best In Season - August- written by Chef Consultant, Celia Brooks
Lettuce play
In the realm of green leafy veg fighting to be top dog in the health race and gourmet stakes, good old lettuce is not to be forgotten. Lettuce ranks high in nutrient density, and it’s easy to consume it in large quantities too, since it’s mostly water. So by all means, chow down on lettuce at every opportunity - it does you more good than you might realise.
It’s easy to grasp the hidden potency of lettuce’s inner workings when you consider that it can be used as a psychoactive drug. If lettuce is left to over-grow, its watery juices turn milky and bitter, becoming “lettuce opium”, which has been used since the time of the ancient Greeks as a sleep inducing medicine.
There are about as many lettuce varieties as stars in the sky, but to me, the best lettuce has varied textures of leaf and crunch, and expels a fresh sweetness from its watery contents. For this I usually reach for Romaine lettuce and its baby sisters, little gems. The Average Joe of lettuces, iceberg, delivers in the crunch department, but has virtually no flavour - it’s like eating tap water. Despite being bland, even iceberg offers an abundance of nutrients, but in general, lettuces with darker open leaves, such as oak leaf and lollo rosso, have more pigmented surfaces exposed to sunlight, which they photosynthesise into available nutrients and flavour to boot.
Lettuce is not just for salad, folks! Here are some of my favourite non-salad uses for lettuce. And below, a recipe for a show-stopping main course salad where lettuce really is the star.
Chilled lettuce soup: Refreshing on a hot day. In a food processor or blender, whizz together 250g lettuce, 250g plain yoghurt, a crushed garlic clove, a teaspoon of finely grated ginger, sea salt, a handful of mint leaves, the juice of half a lemon and about 150 - 200ml water to get the desired consistency. Chill before serving and garnish with chopped walnuts, torn mint leaves, and freshly ground black pepper.
Lettuce on the barbie: Brief, fierce cooking brings all the lettuce juices to the fore. Cut hearts of Romaine in half lengthways, brush with olive oil and flash on a hot barbecue or cook on a scorching char-grill pan for 1-2 minutes each side. Serve with a mustardy vinaigrette poured over, and Parmesan shavings.
Peas cooked in lettuce: The juices of the lettuce act to steam peas or fresh broad beans and impart an incredibly clean, sweet flavour. Line a small, lidded saucepan with lettuce leaves. Add a knob of salted butter. Wet your hand and sprinkle a few drops of water in. Add a few handfuls of fresh peas or broad beans, cover the pan and place over a moderate heat until the lettuce is wilted and the peas / beans are just tender, about 3 minutes. Eat the buttery cooked lettuce and all.
Gado Gado Wedge Salad
From “SuperVeg” by Celia Brooks
The “wedge salad” is an American classic consisting of iceberg lettuce quarters usually smothered in blue cheese dressing, bacon and tomatoes. It’s one way to make an iceberg appetising, but Romaine or gem lettuce is a richer foundation for a salad where the lettuce is the star ingredient. Here I’ve smothered it in a spicy peanut-coconut sauce and added a few classic Indonesian gado gado accompaniments including egg, cucumber and tomato. Here’s how to turn a lettuce into a main course with ease, plus it looks rather spectacular.
Serves 4-6
Ingredients
For the gado gado dressing:
125g salted roasted peanuts
1 small garlic clove, halved
1 tablespoon runny honey
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons dark soy sauce or tamari
2 teaspoons chilli sauce such as Sriracha
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper, or to taste
200ml coconut milk
For the salad:
3 little gem lettuces, quartered lengthways
4 eggs, hard-boiled, peeled and chopped
3 medium tomatoes, chopped
½ cucumber, chopped
2 spring onions, sliced diagonally
a handful of coriander leaves
To serve:
1 tablespoon crushed roasted peanuts or toasted sesame seeds (optional)
a few slices of fresh red chilli (optional)
OPTION:
Substitute egg with small cubes of fried tofu or tempeh
Method
1) Place all the sauce ingredients in a blender and whizz until completely smooth. Taste for seasoning, adding a little more soy sauce, vinegar, honey or cayenne to get a good balance of flavour if necessary.
2) Arrange the lettuce cut-side up on a platter or individual plates. Pour the dressing over and around the lettuce, then scatter the rest of the ingredients on top and serve right away.
