Wholesome salad with feta and walnuts

Any salad goes from being average to incredible with these two additions: feta and garlic. Feta cheese is my most favourite cooking/baking ingredient because it turns something routine into something exotic, something edible into something finger-lickin good. Its my weekly indulgence (when I can get my hands on it; we know its not easy to find in small Indian towns/cities) and I just love the way it sticks to my fingers when I'm working with it, so I have the perverse pleasure of licking it off my hands! 

And garlic, well, its the next best thing. If you follow my recipes, you know that I use garlic generously. It could be raw, cooked, roasted, pickled or caramelised, as in this case. For caramelised garlic, see my post and recipe here.

I enjoy making and eating salads (just as much as I enjoy eating pizzas and fried chicken, so no brownie points there)! And if you know me (or have seen me), you can tell that I definitely don't live on soups and salads, but I most definitely appreciate a soup-and-salad day in winters and on rainy days. In our own way, Indian homes always have some version of a salad on the everyday menu- whether it is in a raita form or a simple homely salad with Indian spices. However, introducing new flavours with salads always lends an element of surprise to the usual vegetables and helps make the experience an enjoyable one. Here, I have to borrow the tagline from 'Maggi'; "taste bhi, health bhi" although I would not say that Maggi lives up to its tagline. My salads, however, do.

Ingredients

1 red onion, cubed

1 large tomato, cubed/50 g cherry tomatoes, halved

1 small cucumber, half mooned with peel

1 red bell pepper, cubed

4-5 black olives, pitted and sliced

8-10 fresh basil leaves

3-4 walnuts, roughly broken

1 tsp roaseted and powdered flax seed

6-10 black raisins/sultanas

50 g feta cheese, cubed

1 tsp white wine vinegar (for a change, use Worcestershire sauce)

3-4 caramelised garlic cloves 

A sprinkling of dried chives

Salt and pepper to taste

Method

Toss all ingredients together and enjoy a complete, wholesome, delightful meal.