Skordalia is the Greek version of the French ‘aïoli’ and the Spanish, ‘allïoli, and is a luscious garlic mayonnaise, sauce, or dip. It is usually based on potato and flavoured with garlic, olive oil, lemon juice and parsley. Elizabeth David in her ‘Book of Mediterranean Food’ gives her recipe with egg yolks, ground almonds and no potato. For my Low Carb Healthy Fat Program, I changed the recipe again, substituting steamed cauliflower for the potato, and macadamia nuts for the almonds – it was a great success! It has a great texture and fresh lemony flavour. Here is my low carb and healthy fat recipe – my favourite from now on. It is marvellous as a dip with crudités, or as a condiment to accompany any meat, chicken or even fish.
This is my Cooking on the Bay Skordalia with cauliflower and macadamia nuts
Ingredients:
150g cauliflowers florets, chopped, steamed
4 garlic cloves, peeled, roughly chopped
2 tsp grated lemon zest
Up to 65ml lemon juice, about 2 lemons
150g macadamia nuts
125ml extra virgin olive oil
¾ tsp sea salt
2 tbsp crème fraîche
Garnish
2 tsp finely chopped chives
A drizzle of extra virgin olive oil
Crudités of your choice, such as carrot and celery sticks, finely sliced radishes, extra raw, tiny cauliflower florets, spring onions
Method:
Steam the chopped cauliflower florets in a steamer basket, placed in a wok over about 300ml of water; steam until tender. Set aside to cool. Reserve the cauliflower steaming liquor.
While steaming the cauliflower, mince the garlic to a fine paste and put one tablespoon of it into a small bowl, and add the lemon juice. Reserve the remainder for another use. Allow to sit for 10 minutes. This process of steeping the garlic with lemon juice, ‘tempers’ the garlic. This is steeping the minced garlic for 10 minutes in lemon removes the bite from the garlic. The acid in the lemon juice deactivates the alliianase, which is the enzyme that creates the garlic harsh ‘notes’.
Process, with a stick blender, the steeped garlic mixture with the lemon zest, macadamia nuts, extra virgin olive oil, 125 ml of reserved cauliflower water and sea salt, until very smooth.
Add the crème fraiche to the cooled steamed cauliflower, and add the garlic mixture. Again process until very smooth. Taste for seasoning and adjust as needed.
When ready to serve, transfer to a serving bowl and drizzle with a thread of extra virgin olive oil and finely chopped chives.
Serve with crudités of your choice. You can also serve skordalia warm with vegetables, meat, chicken and fish.
This skordalia will store refrigerated, for up to 3 or 4 days.
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