Nigella’s Forever Summer watermelon and feta salad

Nigella Lawson’s watermelon and feta salad is the perfect summer salad, the ingredients may seem a strange mix but doesn’t it look delicious!

I thought I would share this salad recipe which comes from Nigella Lawson’s Forever Summer book. This is one of those recipes that on paper looked very bizarre and borderline unappetising, but when I tried it I was totally blown away. Who would have thought watermelon and parsley would be such a great combo! On their own maybe not but it’s really the combination of all the ingredients that make this salad work, though there is scope for tweaking in the quantities of each for sure if you are short of anything.

Please try this over the summer, it is just so incredibly refreshing, and easy to make! I have linked to the original recipe here.

Serves 4

Ingredients (I’ve roughly halved Nigella’s official recipe here)

• ½  small red onion

• 2 limes

• 800g watermelon (sweet and ripe)

• 125g feta cheese

• 1 bunch fresh flatleaf parsley

• 1 bunch fresh mint (chopped)

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

• 50g pitted black olives

• A crack of black pepper

Instructions

1. Thinly slice the red onion and steep in the lime juice. What you will find is that this turns the onions a bright pink colour and the raw onion flavour mellows out yet becomes zingy with lime.

2. Remove the rind and pips from the watermelon and then cut the watermelon in chunky triangular bitesize pieces and add to a large salad bowl.

3. Cut the feta in to similar or slightly smaller pieces and add to the bowl.

4. Roughly chop or tear the parsley and roughly chop the mint then add to the bowl.

5. Add the olives.

6. Add the onions along with the lime juice that the onions were steeping in.

7. Add the olive oil and a grind of black pepper, gently mix the salad together then serve.