"Burrata is the sort of cheese you can make a meal out of, which makes it extremely useful as well as being utterly delicious. Creamy and delicate, but also rich and filling, it forms an impressive lily-white globe in the centre of a plate around which you can arrange all kinds of ingredients, all of which benefit from being doused in sweet and grassy cream once the burrata is burst into with a knife. Marinated (bell) peppers, slow-cooked courgettes (zucchini), fresh spring vegetables and roasted aubergines (eggplants) all happily form a flavoursome foundation to be crowned by a creamy ball of burrata. You can then play with various toppings and dressings. Pistachio pesto works beautifully, and in this instance enhances the verdant green of the surrounding spring vegetables, but a quick olive tapenade, fresh chilli oil or anchovy dressing would be equally delicious.
Allow half a burrata per person as a starter (appetiser) or a one per person as a main with some other salads. This is one of my favourite ways to celebrate the abundance of spring vegetables. The pesto I chop by hand as I like it chunky, but if you want to use a food processor, by all means do." Letitia Clark.
INGREDIENTS (Serves 2)
- A large handful of fresh peas, podded
- A few spears of asparagus (optional), chopped into short lengths
- A large handful of fresh young broad (fava) beans
- Zest and juice of 1 large lemon
- Sea salt
- Extra virgin olive oil, for drizzling
- A large handful of rocket (arugula)
- A good handful of herbs, roughly chopped (I use mint, basil and parsley, but tarragon, dill, chervil and wild fennel would all work well)
- 1–2 balls of burrata
FOR THE PESTO:
- 60 g (2 oz) shelled pistachios
- ½ garlic clove, very finely chopped
- Sea salt
- A handful of mint leaves
- A handful of basil leaves
- 20 g (¾ oz) Parmesan or pecorino, finely grated
- Zest and juice of ½ lemon
- 50 ml (1²/³ fl oz/3 ½ tablespoons) olive oil
METHOD
- Arrange all the fresh vegetables on a platter and scatter over the lemon zest. Squeeze over the juice, season well with salt, then drizzle over a good amount of your best oil. Mix gently, then scatter over the rocket leaves and fresh herbs.
- Place the burrata in the middle of the dish, drizzle with more oil and sprinkle with some salt.
- To make the pesto, roughly chop the pistachios with the garlic, salt and herbs to form a rough paste on your chopping board, then scrape into a bowl and add the grated cheese and the lemon zest. Drizzle in the olive oil and a squeeze of lemon juice until it becomes a dolloping consistency. Taste for seasoning and add more lemon or salt as required. Dollop over the burrata and salad and serve.
- If you would like, serve this with some bruschetta.
