Today is Mother’s Day and I would like to extend my best wishes to my mother, all mothers, grandmothers and mom’s to be. You rock, you make the world go round and I send this dish out to you.
My love affair with Halloumi cheese continues. This slightly briny, semi-firm sheep’s milk cheese hails from Cyprus and I like it in the morning with some toast, fried and especially grilled. Halloumi holds up very well to heat and that’s why I like grilling it and adding it to so many appetizers, mezes and salads.
The inspiration for this dish can be found at my friend Janet’s blog with her orange and radish salad. I still have some radishes in the fridge (just realized this year that I fact love eating radishes), I always have red onions, got oranges (perhaps worried about scurvy?), the mint in the garden has sprouted anew and then there’s Halloumi cheese.
This is a simple salad for two with your hardest tasks being segmenting the orange and grilling the Halloumi cheese. This is an exqusite salad…orange segments busting in your mouth, hints of olive oil and mint, hint of lemon zest and the contrast of crisp slices of radishes and buttery Halloumi cheese.
Grilled Halloumi and Orange Salad
(served two)
2 Tbsp. of thinly slices red onions
4 radishes, thinly sliced
1 orange, peel removed and segmented
2 slices of Hallouni cheese
drizzle of extra virgin olive oil
squeeze of orange juice from leftover segmented orange
1/2 tsp. of lemon zest
sprinkle of fleur de sel (afrini in Greek)
1 Tbsp. of chopped fresh mint
- Rinse your radishes and thinly slice them. Arrange in a circular overlapping pattern in the center of a round plate. Sliced your onions thinly and set aside.
- Slice the top and bottom of your orange and discard. Now remove the outer skin (and pith) of your orange with a knife and discard. Using a pairing knife, remove the orange segments by making a cut between each membrane and remove the orange segment. Reserve the segments in a bowl plus the remaining hull of the orange.
- Pre-heat your grill. Ensure the surface has been brushed and clean from any residue. You want a medium high heat (count to five when you place your hand over the grill). Brush the grill surface well with a towel dipped in vegetable oil.
- Place your slices of Halloumi cheese on the grill and sear for a 1 1/2 on each side.
- Cut your cheese in half to make 2 triangles. Arrange alternating pieces of Halloumi and orange segments around and over the slices of radishes.
- Top with your onion slices, chopped fresh mint, squeeze the remaining orange juice in the reserved hull of the orange, sprinkle the lemon zest, and drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil. Sprinkle with some fleur de sel and some fresh ground pepper. Serve immediately as a first course/appetizer.
If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at https://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.
© 2007-2010 Peter Minakis
36 Responses
This is very creative and colorful. I just had to say so! GREG
This is an awesome looking salad Peter! Love the presentation. It’s so composed without being fussy or overcomplicated.
Brilliant
Hi Peter,
I love this idea. I think salty ingredients go perfectly with the sweetness of the orange. I make this with salt cod, a traditional Spanish recipe, but I´ve never tried it with halloumi. I think I´ll make this some time this week.
Greetings from Gibraltar.
Brian
This is beautiful! Your mom is lucky :)
Goodness I can only imagine how bursting with flavor this salad it. Sounds about perfect- oranges absolutely no problem here in California, now I just need to run and find some good Halloumi worthy of this creation.
Peter,
What a beautiful post! This salad looks amazing…. the fresh ingredients, the flavors….I enjoy reading your blog. Thank you for sharing!
Very nice, Peter. I am bookmarking it for later use. I have decided that I will try making haloumi at home. If I succeed, I’ll make this salad to celebrate.
Ω! ΥπÎÏοχη και Ï€Ïωτότυπη!
Yummy yummy Peter… Ï€ÏÎπει να είναι νοστιμότατη …
What a gorgeous looking salad Peter and perfect for my new block of halloumi I just got!!
what a gorgeous salad. the colors, the taste, perfect peter. i still have not tried grilled halloumi.
So pretty, colorful and tempting! A scrummy salad!
Cheers,
Rosa
This is one of the most wonderful salads that I have ever seen. So colorful! I am sold on Halloumi cheese!
I have never eaten halloumi cheese but in honor of all the nice things you said about mothers, I’m going to make it a point this week to search it out and make this salad. It looks terrific.
I have all but the oranges to replicate this salad right now Peter. I would need to get off my butt and head to the store…there is always tomorrow. Happy Mother’s Day to all the special women in your life.
Thank you Peter for the Mothers Day wishes. You are the reason I buy halloumi. Seriously, I wouldn’t know how to prepare it if it weren’t for you. So thank you, big time! Now, I’m off to make this salad!
It looks delicious! And as I completed my first batch of home-made halloumi on the weekend, I am in a very good position to try this!
I also realized this year that I like radishes myself! I’m adding them to all of my green salads. Haloumi is one of the cheeses from Cyprus or Greece that I can find easily in Holland so I use it quite often in different kinds of dishes. Your salad looks really so tasty and colorful.
Magda
Thank you for the wishes Peter. I love grilled haloumi cheese so much, I never make it at home as I usually eta much more than I should…I like the combination of tart, salty and juicy in this salad.
A beautiful tasty salad!!
beeeeautiful! what a lovely medley of colors and flavors. your obsession with halloumi is one i can definitely support. :)
What a perfect salad!! Citrus & haloumi go so well together. Delish!
Gah! You took it over the top, Peter! I LOVE this! I feel so, so *special*….{{smile}} I am just gonna have to make this again, Peter style!
Love the Jedna! She is an inspiration. :)
Beautiful salad, almost too pretty to eat:)
What a colourful dish! i am o big fun of haloumi of course
I love the salty-meets-citrus-meets crunch-meets freshness-etc. in this dish.
Beautiful salad. I love the flavors of oranges and red onions together. Never have tasted the cheese, but any cheese that can be grilled can’t be bad. ;)
Yammi, yammi!!
A tasty dish full of colours:))
Have a nice week Peter!!
Can i use yum for OK? this is yum yum yum yum!!!!!! Great idea! Never saw the two paired before!
Wow, I never would have thought about radish or orange with Halloumi but I am really glad you did. This looks like something I need to try this week! Lovely, really lovely.
The fish looks sooo fresh and I love the salad that it’s served with. You never fail to bring out the best in your seafood.
Oh what a beautiful, fresh salad! My brother couldn’t stop raving about Halloumi when he was in Greece and Cyprus but we didn’t try any while we were there (lame, I know!) Where do you get yours? I’ve heard you can make it but I’m not that brave!
Your site is delicious and beautiful as usual Peter- keep up the great work!
Now that grilling season is finally here I really want to pick up some of these cheese.
What a beautiful salad! I am excited because I can finally get haloumi again at my local store!