Ham, apple and mint salad stack is a gorgeous dish full of bright colours and sharp flavours. It’s great as a side dish or even a clean spring main course. Tangy and salty, with just enough sweetness.
Recipe by Illanique van Aswegwen
Ham, apple and mint salad stack
Ingredients
Dressing
- 280g apple sauce
- 15ml (1 tbsp) wholegrain mustard
- 45ml (3 tbsp) apple cider vinegar
- 45ml (3 tbsp) olive/avocado oil
- honey, to drizzle
Salad
- 1 mini baguette
- olive oil, to brush
- 3 garlic cloves, peeled
- 4 Granny Smith apples
- 4 slices leftover gammon
- handful fresh mint leaves
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 200°C. For the dressing, whisk everything together.
For the salad, cut 8 thin, diagonal slices from the baguette. Place 8 randomly shaped stainless-steel moulds or spoons on a baking tray. Brush each slice of baguette with some olive oil and lay them on top of the moulds or spoons – they will form odd-shaped croutons while baking. Bake in the oven until golden and crisp, 8 – 10 minutes. Remove from oven and rub each crouton with a bit of garlic to add some flavour.
Use a mandoline or very sharp knife to cut each apple into paper-thin rounds. Roughly cut each piece of gammon into 4 – 5 thinner slices.
To assemble the salad, stack a few slices of apple on each plate, add a bit of gammon and then some mint leaves. Complete the stack with more apple slices, top it off with a generous drizzle of the dressing and add the croutons as a side.
Notes
Cook’s tips: Put your own spin on the croutons by using cookie cutters to cut out different shapes from the sliced bread. Simply bake them off under the grill and you have some pretty, crisp croutons.
