Creator and presenter Cherie Hausler is an avid advocate for mindful, sustainable eating. Her latest title, A Plant-Based Farmhouse, explores plant-based recipes with produce from her own farmhouse in barossa valley.
Purple Carrot, Fig & Pearl Barley Salad
Serves 2–4
400g purple carrots, raw or roasted
100ml extra virgin olive oil
250g pearl barley
50–80g radicchio leaves
250g fresh figs, halved down the middle
200g purple grapes, halved lengthways
2 teaspoons thyme leaves
3 teaspoons roughly chopped parsley
BALSAMIC ZA’ATAR DRESSING
40ml extra virgin olive oil
20ml balsamic vinegar
8g (2 1/2 teaspoon) za’atar spice mix
5g (1 teaspoon) salt
I would happily put fresh figs in everything when they’re in season. [...] After living in Sydney and happily paying $3 a fig just to get my fix, having them in abundance is something that never gets old for me. There’s the unmistakable taste and texture of a perfectly ripe fig, but the colour palette is also something I’m in awe of every time I split one open. So. Beautiful. This salad is as much about the visuals of all those deep purple tones coming together as it is about how deliciously the individual flavours hold hands. It might also be a chance to remember just how good pearl barley is, too — such a satisfying, spongy little grain, and often forgotten. I keep roasted carrots from my weekly roast and use them at room temperature in this salad. If you’d like a warm version of this salad, roast the carrots as instructed below and use the pearl barley warm too.
METHOD
- If you haven’t included carrots in your weekly roast, preheat your oven to 200ºC. Scrub the carrots, rather than peel them, and cut in half lengthways.
- Place in a baking dish and drizzle with the olive oil. Season with salt and black pepper, cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil, give the carrots a stir-through to coat with olive oil from the bottom of the pan, then roast, uncovered, for a further 30 minutes or until tender.
- Cook the pearl barley following the packet instructions, then drain. Either leave to cool or use warm.
- On a serving platter, layer the pearl barley, radicchio and roasted carrots. Add the fig halves, grapes and herbs.
- Whisk the dressing ingredients together, then drizzle over the salad and serve immediately.
Shaved Broccoli, Rocket, Grapefruit & Avocado Salad
Serves 4–6
GLUTEN FREE
400g broccoli
2 small radishes
1 ruby grapefruit
1 avocado, sliced
50–70g rocket (arugula) leaves
(and flowers, if possible)
50g dried pear, cut into 1cm cubes
50ml extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons Green Gomasio [below]
If there’s one thing that never fails in our winter garden, it’s broccoli — and even though we plant more seeds each year, we still never seem to have enough. When the good broccoli times are rolling, we eat like broccoli kings and pretty much have broccoli every day, so it was inevitable that I’d try it in its raw state. What a delicious revelation. Finely shaved broccoli paired with the creaminess of avocado and a little bitter edge from the grapefruit combine to make a salad that I’ll happily eat on its own. It’s also really gorgeous with grilled tofu tossed through, or piled onto a burger, or into a bagel. Think of it as a spin on coleslaw and you’ll come up with lots of ways to include raw broccoli on your plate. I think it looks really beautiful too, because it keeps that vibrant just-picked green colour that makes you feel healthier just looking at it.
METHOD
- Finely shave the broccoli and radishes using a mandoline or very sharp knife. Place in a large serving bowl.
- Holding the grapefruit over a bowl to catch any juice, cut the citrus into segments by removing the skin and cutting from the outside in towards the centre, running your knife along the inside line of membrane of each segment. This will allow you to remove a wedge of membrane-free grapefruit, and is also known as ‘supreming’. Continue working your way around the grapefruit segments, retaining the juices for the dressing.
- Add the grapefruit segments to the salad, along with the avocado, rocket and pear and gently toss together.
- In a small bowl, whisk the grapefruit juice and olive oil to emulsify. Pour the dressing over the salad ingredients and stir through thoroughly, to ensure an even coating.
- Sprinkle with the gomasio and serve immediately.
Green Gomasio
Makes about 1 kg
GLUTEN FREE
150g sunflower seeds
150g pepitas (pumpkin seeds)
150g black sesame seeds
150g white sesame seeds
200g salt
100g chia seeds
3 nori sheets, torn into 3–4cm pieces
1 tablespoon dried orange zest
I fell in love with gomasio when I first went to Japan. Although traditionally it is made from just sesame seeds and salt, when I decided to make it at home I wanted to add as many different seeds as possible. I added nori because I don’t eat enough of it, and even small amounts of nori help add most essential vitamins and minerals to your diet, as well as that unmistakable umami flavour. Orange zest went in too, because that pop of citrus against the saltiness takes this gomasio into completely new territory. Delicious territory. There’s little that doesn’t improve with the ‘gomasio treatment’. Sprinkle it on salads, over noodle bowls and soups, on sushi, popcorn, avocado on toast, and veggies before you roast them. Even more amazingly, this simple unsung hero adds seven extra plants to your diet just by being sprinkled across a meal. And if we should be aiming for 30 different plants a day to really keep our microbiome and gut health humming along, then we’re already a good way there before lunch if gomasio joins Kale on Toast [on page 27 of the book] for breakfast. This recipe makes a big batch — but any smaller and my food processor struggles to chop the seeds as there’s not enough bulk to process. You won’t have a problem getting through this amount within a few months, though, and it also makes a lovely gift if you’d like to share.
METHOD
- Preheat your oven to 180ºC.
- Mix together the sunflower seeds, pepitas and all the sesame seeds and spread out evenly on a baking tray. Bake for 5–7 minutes, or until the white sesame seeds start to colour and you can smell the toasted aroma of the other seeds.
- Remove from the oven and cool, then place the toasted seeds in a food processor with the salt, chia seeds, nori and orange zest. Blitz until roughly chopped and evenly mixed through. The final consistency should resemble bread crumbs, rather than peanut butter.
- The gomasio will keep in an airtight jar at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, for up to 3 months.
Caramel Crème Pecan Tart with Cinnamon & Maple Crust
Makes a 28cm tart
GLUTEN-FREE
CINNAMON & MAPLE CRUST
315g raw almonds, with skin on
3g (1 teaspoon) ground cinnamon
1g (1⁄4 teaspoon) salt
50g maple syrup
12g extra virgin coconut oil
CARAMEL CRÈME FILLING
450g raw cashews
200g coconut nectar syrup
150ml water
100g medjool dates, pits removed
85ml lemon juice
10g (2 teaspoons) vanilla bean paste
3g (1/2 teaspoon) salt
100g extra virgin coconut oil
TOPPING
200–250g whole pecans
Although I’ve made so many versions of this raw tart, it is still the kind of recipe that requires some concentration. No individual step is tricky, but everything needs to be done in a certain order and within a particular time frame. [...] You will definitely need a high-speed blender for this recipe; I can’t see any way around that, sorry! You’ll also need a good food processor to blend the tart base ingredients, for a different texture to the filling — as well as a non-stick tart (flan) tin with a removable base to assemble the tart in. [...] Another tip I can give is to freeze the filled tart for a couple of hours before taking it out to thaw just enough to cut through, then leave in the fridge to serve as pre-cut slices. If you’d rather just refrigerate the tart, that’s absolutely an option, but you may not get that perfect edge to the cut slices. I promise it will taste indulgent either way.
METHOD
- Cut a circle of baking paper to fit exactly in the base of a 28cm fluted, non-stick tart (flan) tin with a removable base. I trace around the tart base with a pencil onto a sheet of baking paper, then cut the circle out with scissors. Line the base of the tin with the baking paper, so you can slide the tart onto a serving plate more easily when you’re ready to eat it.
- To make the crust, place the almonds, cinnamon and salt in a food processor and blitz until the mixture resembles almond meal. You still want some texture, not almond butter! Add the maple syrup and coconut oil and blitz again. You want to make sure the crust is evenly mixed, but not overly processed, or it won’t come out of the tin later on. To test whether it has the right consistency, squeeze some of the mixture between your thumb and forefinger — if it just holds together, it’s ready. If the mixture falls apart after squeezing it, give it another quick blitz and test it again.
- Place the crust mixture in the tart tin and, using the flats of your hands, gently even the mixture out with the top of the tart tin. It won’t be compressed at this stage; this step just makes it easier to get an even thickness in the crust once you start pressing it into the tin. Using your thumb and forefinger, work your way around the side of the tart tin, pulling the mixture towards the side with your forefinger and compressing it by having your thumb exactly opposite your forefinger, but on the outside of the tart tin. Your thumb will help keep the crust in alignment with the edge of the tart tin as well — almost as though you’d already trimmed the edges if you were making a pastry base. You should end up with a compressed crust up the side of the tin, about 5–8mm thick. Be firm in pushing the crust into the flutes of the tin, so the sides of your tart don’t collapse when you remove it from the tin.
- Once the sides have been compressed, spread the remaining crust mixture evenly across the base, using the flat part of your fingertips to press the bottom of the crust evenly across the base. Make sure you compress the crust into the ‘corner edge’ of the tart tin, all the way around the base.
- Place the tart tin, complete with compressed crust, in the freezer while you make the filling.
- To make the filling, place the cashews, coconut syrup, water, dates, lemon juice, vanilla paste and salt in a high-speed blender. (Leave the coconut oil out at this stage, otherwise it will split with the heat of the motor.) Blitz until very smooth; this will take 4–6 minutes, depending on your blender. [...] You might need to stop your machine a few times to do this with a spatula if you don’t have a purpose made agitator.
- Once the mixture is very smooth, with the consistency of tahini, add the coconut oil and give a final blitz to emulsify the mixture. Don’t over-mix at this stage — it should only take 30 seconds to 1 minute to completely ‘dissolve’ the coconut oil into the filling.
- Remove the tart tin from the freezer. Pour in the filling, smoothing it out with a spatula, making sure there’s no trapped air bubbles. Decorate with the pecans.
- Refrigerate or freeze. If you freeze the tart for a few hours, then thaw it just enough to be able to cut it into slices, it will give a cleaner edge to the slices.
- Any leftover tart can be sealed in plastic wrap and stashed in the freezer for at least a month, for a sneaky dessert when the moment arises. [...] It will only take 15–20 minutes to thaw, depending on the ambient temperature in your kitchen.
