Broccoli Pearl Crunch Salad
Recipe video above. This is a meal-worthy salad designed to be eaten with a spoon: finely chopped broccoli tossed with slippery pearl couscous, plumped dried cranberries and a nutty salami fry up with red onion and garlic. The red wine vinaigrette is zesty but not too sour thanks to a smidge of honey, and finishing with parmesan is optional, but not really. :)It's a riot of textures, flavours and colours, and just a great way to use broccoli in a different way. Serve this for lunch with friends, dinner on balmy evenings, or a lazy Sunday lunch with a glass of your favourite white.
- Prep time
- 25 min
- Cook time
- 15 min
- Yield
- 4 servings
- Difficulty
- HARD
Ingredients
Quantities are shown as originally provided.
- 1 1/2 medium heads broccoli ((4 cups chopped small, spoon-eating size)(Note 1))
- 1 tbsp red wine vinegar ((Note 2))
- 1/4 tsp cooking salt / kosher salt
- 1 cup pearl couscous ((Note 3))
- 1/2 cup dried cranberries
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 100g/ 3 oz salami (, chopped into 1x1.25cm pieces (0.2 x 1/2"), or bacon (Note 4))
- 1/3 cup almonds (, unsalted, natural (or roasted), chopped into big pieces (Note 5))
- 1 red onion (, halved, finely sliced)
- 2 garlic cloves (, finely minced)
- 2 tbsp red wine vinegar ((Note 2))
- 1 tbsp honey ((sub maple, or 2 tsp sugar))
- 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tsp dijon mustard
- 1 garlic clove (, finely minced)
- 1 tsp lemon zest (, optional)
- 1/4 tsp cooking salt / kosher salt
- 1/8 tsp black pepper
- 1/4 cup+ parmesan (, finely grated (crumbled feta also lovely))
Instructions
- 1
Dressing - Shake ingredients in a jar.
- 2
Chop broccoli into small pieces - think, spoon scoop-able size. I slice wads of florets into ~1/2cm / 0.2" thick slices, spread out on the board then run the knife through, chopping like you would herbs until you have small pieces no bigger than 1.5cm / 0.6" long, suitable for scooping. Try to make the floret stem parts a bit smaller. (Note 1)
- 3
Marinated tender-crisp broccoli - Measure out 4 cups of broccoli and put in a bowl. Scrape in all the scattered little floret "confetti"! Toss with the vinegar, 1/4 tsp salt and 2 tablespoons of the Dressing. Leave for 30 minutes - softens slightly and takes the raw edge off.
- 4
Couscous and cranberries - Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil. Cook the couscous for 5 minutes, adding cranberries for last 30 seconds (they plump!). Drain well, then return to saucepan. Toss with 2 tablespoons of Dressing (while hot), then set aside for 10 minutes to cool and absorb flavour.
- 5
Nutty Salami Fry up - Heat the olive oil over medium high in a large non-stick pan. Add the salami and cook for about 1 1/2 minutes to give them a head start. Then add the almonds and onion, cook for 2 minutes, then add garlic and cook for another 1 minute until the salami is golden (it won't crisp though - Note 7) and the onion is softened. Tip it on top of the broccoli, let cool for 10 minutes.
- 6
Toss - Add couscous, all the remaining Dressing and toss well. Tumble into a serving bowl, sprinkle with parmesan then serve!