Agrodolce Salads

The other day i tried yet another recipe from Chef Lucinda Scala Quinn's book, namely Carrot   Agrodolce and Zucchini Agrodolce.  Agrodolce is a traditional sweet and sour sauce in Italian cuisine. Its name comes from "agro" which means sour and "dolce" which means sweet.  As the chef mentions in the introduction,   this recipe involves a technique of cooking  in which the  sweet and sour taste  is achieved through the use of sugar and vinegar.  its very simple to cook and has a refreshing flavors just the kind you would want in your salads. 

in the introduction the chef mentions that she often serves them as an antipasti. however we here enjoyed both carrot and zucchini agrodolce as part of our salads with some additional ingredients. while the carrot agrodolce with its  radiance of orange stood out in appearance, both were appealing in taste. in fact it dawned on me later that zucchini aggrodolce would go very well as a filling inside crepes. but i am yet to try that..so can't give you a feedback on that right away... now over to the recipes..

Carrot Agrodolce Salad

1 pound baby carrots, sliced  into matchsticks
1 tablespoon extra-virgin oil

salt to taste

2 tablespoons finely chopped onion

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 teaspoon of ground black pepper

2 teaspoons of dried parsley

2 teaspoons of dried coriander

1 small apple, sliced into matchsticks

4 tablespoons of grated Parmesan cheese 

what i did

as directed in the book, i placed the carrots, olive oil, salt and 1/3 cup water in a large saucepan over high heat and brought it to boil and cook until the water evaporated.

then i stirred in the onions and cooked for about a minute, added the sugar and mixed, added the vinegar and pepper  and tasted to see how much more salt was required to balance out the sour of the vinegar. i added the salt accordingly and stirred until the carrots got a glaze coating. at this point the the recipe recommended stirring in some mint. since i did not have it i added in the parsley and coriander and stirred them in just before removing my carrot agrodolce from the heat.

now that the carrot agrodolce was ready, i tasted it and felt the need to add something more to strike the right note. you know what i mean.. and then i thought of apples and grated parmesan... and yes. as soon as i added the apples and Parmesan i knew i was ready with a fresh salad for the day... Apple Carrot Agrodolce.... for the Zucchini Agrodolce, i used the same basic ingredients replacing carrots with zucchini. and as the book said, i  followed the exact same procedure of preparation except for sauteing the zucchini in olive oil instead of boiling it in water and then proceeded to  step 2. then as before I added in a matchstick slices of a small apples, some finely shredded lettuce and 1/4 cup of grated Parmesan. and taDaa.... yet another tasty salad was ready...

note: 
the recipe had said red wine vinegar. i however used apple cider vinegar because that is what i had. however you might want to stick to the original recipe. 

p.s : you can find all the recipes from Lucinda's Rustic Italian kitchen here. however you might want to lend the book from the library for the introduction. i kind of have a thing for those :)

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