Cucumber Salad – Ilaria nabs a bargain

Ilaria spied a bargain – cheap cucumbers – and was in. This recipe is not rocket science, hardly even a recipe of ‘this or that’, but it is sublime none the less.

Take a good telegraph (tender-skinned) cucumber, and by good, I mean, one that is not showing any signs of softening, peel and slice thinly, put it on a plate and sprinkle with a little flaky sea salt if it takes your fancy. Next, add some dollops of unsweetened yoghurt (check the ingredients on the back of the pack and buy the brand with the least additives included).

Then get yourself a handful of fresh kaffir lime leaves. My kaffir lime tree is in a broken pot shoved in a corner of the drive and gets very little love and not much sun, but it is in exceptional health. As long as I hose off any infestation of ants or sticky insects which have a go at it from time to time, it seems to truck along really well and produces several bursts of new growth a year. It’s one of those weird things – if I re-pot it, I’ll probably upset it … so it might stay in the broken pot for another year.

Anyway, lay the leaves flat and cut out the spines, then roughly chop the leaves. Transfer to a spice or coffee grinder and grind to a sort of furry-looking dust. It has to be really fine. Then sprinkle the lime leaf dust over the cucumber and serve. The lime scent is magnificent! Serve with fish, barbecued, baked or pan-fried.

If you don’t have lime leaves, you could use lemon leaves, choosing tender leaves and preparing them in the same way. Cucumber and yoghurt is also great with dill, coriander (cilantro) and mint.