With more time spent inside and fewer opportunities for exercise, the hotter weather marks a good moment to delete those takeaway numbers and overhaul your attitude to the kitchen.
Recipes: The National Eats
Last Updated: June 19th, 2011 UAE
From cool summer salads and soups through to delicious deserts, here is our extensive recipe collection.
This is not the time of year for rich, hearty meals that leave you feeling sleepy and sluggish. Light, healthy, refreshing dishes, bursting with zingy flavours, are the order of the day.
Cold soups are perfect for this type of thing. When hot, soups soothe and comfort. By contrast, their chilled counterparts are refreshing and rehydrating. Spanish gazpacho is probably the best-known and most often encountered of all the cold soups, and with good reason. When it is prepared using ripe ingredients, at the very peak of their season, this salad in a soup is a summery delight that spills over with juicy, sun-drenched flavours.
Vichyssoise is another perennial favourite. This chilled potato-and-leek soup is thought to have been invented by the French chef Louis Diat at the Ritz-Carlton in 1917. Vichyssoise is rather more refined than the gutsy gazpacho, but it is no less enjoyable; this is a classy, creamy soup that makes for an elegant light lunch.
The list goes on: Bulgarian tarator is particularly soothing, thanks to the yoghurt element; ajo blanco (made from garlic and almonds and often served with grapes, which provide pops of sweetness) is another much-loved Spanish soup; and chilled pea soup (made from frozen petit pois) is a tasty fallback dish that takes minutes to prepare.
The chilled beetroot soup detailed here has a wonderful pink hue and is a real celebration of bright colours and bold earthy flavours. For best results, make sure you chill the serving bowls properly and don't take the soup out of the fridge until just before you are ready to eat.
Now is the time to experiment with different types of salad. Forget about limp lettuce and stringy celery and opt for something altogether more substantial and experimental. Why not try chilli roasted butternut squash, sun dried tomatoes and crumbled feta; grilled courgettes tossed with toasted pine nuts, freshly blanched peas and slithers of mint-specked halloumi cheese; king prawns tossed with smoked paprika and served with slices of mango and avocado or boiled baby potatoes dressed with good quality olive oil and doused with spring onions and sea salt.
All these dishes pack a real flavour punch and can be put together with the minimum of fuss - all you need is a little time and inspiration.
For further refreshment, nothing beats a frozen treat. Although diehard double-scoop fans might be quick to disagree, when the sun is really raging, it can feel too warm even for ice cream (something to do with the creamy richness, I think). Granita, on the other hand really hits the spot. This Italian dessert is essentially just a partly frozen mixture of water, sugar and a chosen flavouring. It is incredibly light, very refreshing and is particularly good when served in shot glasses or little dishes as a palate-cleanser at the end of a meal. There is a recipe for kiwi and apple granita on this page, but feel free to experiment with flavours: coffee, red berries, watermelon and lemon or lime all work really well.
As we all know, at this time of year it is particularly important to drink plenty of water and stay hydrated. To liven things up, experiment by making your own iced tea or homemade cordial, or try the lemonade recipe below. Couldn't be simpler, but when served in a tall glass it both looks and tastes good.
The recipes that follow all serve four and preparing them won't cause you to break out in a sweat.
Apple and kiwi granita
Ingredients
6 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and diced
juice of lemon
4 kiwis
100g caster sugar
300ml water
Method
Pour the water and sugar into a saucepan, place over a medium heat and stir until the sugar dissolves. Remove the pan from the heat and leave to cool completely.
Put the apples into a blender, food processor or juicer, squeeze over the lemon juice and blend to a purée. Add the kiwi and the cooled sugar syrup and blend thoroughly. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve into a container.
Place on a flat surface in the freezer and leave for 30 minutes or until semi-frozen. Use a fork to stir the mixture and break up any ice particles that have started to form. Return to the freezer and repeat this process every half-hour for three hours. Just before you are ready to serve, use a fork to scrape the surface of the granita to create shavings of ice.
Lemonade
Ingredients
1.5 litres water
200g caster sugar
5 lemons
Method
Using a vegetable peeler, peel the zest from two of the lemons. Add to a saucepan with the sugar and 500ml of water and place over a medium heat. Stir until the sugar dissolves, bring to the boil and then simmer for five minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and leave to cool to room temperature.
Squeeze the juice from all of the lemons and add to the cooled sugar syrup, along with the remaining cold water. Stir well and strain through a fine sieve. Chill until needed.
Chilled beetroot soup
Ingredients
Serves 4
500g raw beetroot
2 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp water
few sprigs thyme
2 onions, peeled and finely chopped
10g butter
800ml-1 litre chicken or vegetable stock
To garnish:
50g soft goat's cheese
75ml sour cream
2 tbsp very finely chopped chives
drizzle of olive oil
salt and black pepper
Method
Preheat the oven to 200°C/fan 180°C/ gas 6. Trim the beetroot and scrub well to remove any dirt. Place in a roasting tin, drizzle over the olive oil, thyme leaves and water and season with salt and black pepper. Cover tightly with a foil lid. Bake for 45 minutes to one hour, until tender when pierced with a knife.
Peel the beetroots (the skin should slide away easily) and roughly chop the flesh.
Heat the butter in a deep saucepan, add the onions and cook slowly for 8-10 minutes until softened but not coloured.
Add the chopped beetroot to the pan and stir well. After 2-3 minutes pour over the stock and bring the mixture to the boil. Season, then reduce the heat and leave to simmer for 10-15 minutes or until the beetroot can easily be crushed with the back of a spoon. Remove from the heat and leave to cool slightly before blending to a smooth purée. Add more water or stock if the consistency seems too thick.
Transfer to the fridge to cool for at least four hours.
Crumble the goat's cheese into small pieces and place in a bowl. Add the sour cream and spring onions and season with salt and black pepper.
Stir well to combine. Garnish the soup with swirls of the sour cream mixture or place the bowl in the middle of the table for people to help themselves.
