v:gourmet

This is a new slaw recipe to add to the others on v:gourmet: traditional slaw and stinging nettle slaw. One can’t have too much slaw in one’s life. This one is from River Cottage Veg by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. If you don’t have this cookbook, it’s well worth a trip to your local bookstore. It’s got fantastic recipes, and his philosophy is bang-on. As Fearnley-Whittingstall says of his new approach to food and cooking, “The object of the exercise is, unambiguously, to persuade you to eat more vegetables. Many more vegetables. Perhaps even to make veg the mainstay of your daily cooking. And therefore, by implication, to eat less meat, maybe a lot less meat, and maybe a bit less fish too. Why? We need to eat more vegtatbles and less flesh because vegetables are the foods that do us the most good and our plaent the least harm. Do I need to spell out in detail the arguments to support that assertion? Is there anyone who seriously doubts it to be true? Just ask yourself if you, or anyone you know, might be in danger of eating too many vegetables. Or if you think the world might be a better, cleaner, greener, place with a few more factory chicken or pig farms or intensive cattle feedlots scattered about the countryside. Surely it’s close to being a no-brainer.” Well said Hugh. Bring on the slaw.

1 bunch of green onions, trimmed and sliced

4 carrots, peeled

1 small green cabbage

For the dressing

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar or rice vinegar

2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 tablespoon clear honey

1 tablespoon finely chopped ginger

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

A handful of cilantro, coarsely torn

Lime juice

Put the sliced green onions into a large bowl. Cut the carrots into fine julienne with a mandolne or grate them coarsely and add to the bowl. Remove any blemished outer leaves from the cabbage, then quarter and cut away the core. Shred the leaves as finely as you can and combine with the green onions and carrots

For the dressing, whisk together all the ingredients, making sure the honey is dissolved. Pour the dressing over the vegetables and toss thoroughly. Leave for 10-20 minutes to soften and “relax.” Serve the coleslaw scattered with cilantro and sprinkled with lime juice.