Food & Drink

Laoise Casey recipe: Pickled Red Cabbage and Carrot ‘slaw with Caraway, Coriander and Toasted Almonds

Laoise Casey's pickled red cabbage and carrot 'slaw

Pickled Red Cabbage and Carrot ‘slaw with Caraway, Coriander and Toasted Almonds

Serves 4 as a side dish

Pickling is an excellent method for preserving vegetables as well as adding extra flavours and textures.

Try making a big batch of the basic pickle liquor given below and adding various aromatics like black peppercorns, coriander seeds, juniper berries or star anise.

Experiment with different vinegars like cider vinegar, malt vinegar or red wine vinegar.

This quick ‘slaw is a great side dish or can be used as a wrap or sandwich filler.

The pickled cabbage keeps in the fridge for up to a week.

Ingredients

1 small red cabbage

1 tsp. caraway seeds

1 tsp. coriander seeds

2 tbsp. flaked almonds

3 medium carrots, topped and tailed and peeled

3 medium carrots

Extra virgin olive oil

Sea salt, cracked black pepper to season

For the pickle liquor

300ml white wine vinegar

500ml water

75g sugar

10g salt

Method

Make the pickle liquor by dissolving the sugar and salt in the water over a medium heat in a saucepan.

Take the pan off the heat and add the white wine vinegar to avoid filling the kitchen with vinegar fumes, this has the added benefit of cooling your liquor also.

Slice the cabbage in half and finely shred. Pour the pickle liquor over the cabbage in a large bowl and leave to sit until pickled to your liking.

I like the cabbage to still have a crunch so I generally leave it for 15 minutes and then drain. A few tablespoons of the leftover pickle liquor can be whisked with extra virgin olive oil to make a quick dressing.

Toast the caraway seeds in a pan, remove and grind in a pestle and mortar. Toast the almond flakes until golden brown in a warm oven (160C for 10 minutes).

While the almonds are toasting peel and coarsely grate the carrots (alternatively you can peel into strips with a peeler).

Mix the cabbage with the rest of the ingredients as close as possible to serving to avoid turning the cabbage pink.

Finish by seasoning well and with an extra glug of olive oil and the caraway seeds.

To bulk up this dish add some chunks of feta.

About the chef…

Laoise Casey is a chef and writer from Dublin now living in East London. In her former life she was a human resources manager.

After completing a diploma at Leiths School of Food and Wine, Laoise worked at The Dairy in Clapham for two years and now works at Paradise Garage in Bethnal Green.

She also works as a freelance food stylist and writer, including a regular column for the Evening Standard. Laoise writes for various publications including The Irish Post, The Irish Times and The Independent. She has been featured by The Guardian and Hot Dinners.

She has recently launched a Kitchen Essentials series with the YouTube channel, Wild Dish, which features step by step videos to basic cooking techniques including how to make a vegetable stock, sweat onions and make yoghurt.

In 2017 she will be teaching at Leiths School of Food and Wine.

Keep an eye out for Laoise on RTÉ One’s Nationwide in a special edition, which will be aired in January, about the Irish in London.