This explosive little salad takes its inspiration from a favourite River Cottage cocktail, the apple mojito. Take away the rum, rustle up a simple fruit salad and it’s still a super-fresh zinger. You could serve it as a palate-cleanser, or to wrap up a hearty meal after the cheese course.
Serves 2
2 large limes
3 medium-sized, sweet dessert apples
½–1 teaspoon sugar
A handful of mint leaves
Using a sharp knife, slice off both ends of each lime. Put the limes on a board, flat end down, and carefully slice away all the peel and pith from each. Then carefully cut down between the membranes to release each segment of lime. Drop them into a bowl. Squeeze any juice left in the membrane into another bowl.
Peel the apples; set one aside for your dressing. Cut the other two into quarters, remove the core and then cut into wedges. Immediately add to the lime segments and toss to combine.
For the dressing, grate the last apple and squeeze in your hands over the bowl of lime juice to extract all the juice. Whisk the lime and apple juice together with sugar to taste.
Finely chop the mint leaves and toss with the apple and lime segments. Divide the salad between individual plates and trickle over the juicy, minty dressing.
SWAPS You can use lemon instead of lime, pear instead of apple, and lemon verbena instead of – or as well as – mint.