Hederman's hot smoked salmon summer rolls
Claire McQuillan
Serves 2
| Vietnamese
| Starter, or light lunch
Prep Time: 30 mins mins
| Cooking Time: 30 mins mins
These are inspired by the classic Vietnamese style rolls full of herbs and fresh bright flavours which balance beautifully with the smoky, salty richness of the salmon. Summer rolls are one of my favourite ways to use really crunchy, fresh seasonal vegetables and the ingredients can be changed up depending on what is available. These ones are inspired by my organic vegetable box which had beautiful yellow courgette and cucumber but use your favourite crunchy vegetables to fill this up – carrots, red cabbage, scallions, asparagus. A nice way to make these for a crowd is to chop all the ingredients in advance and have everyone build their own customised version. Flowers are essential for that final flourish and I like to use any wild flowers I can find. I also think it makes a lovely seasonal addition to this recipe too. If you are collecting flowers make sure you pick some from places that don’t spray herbicides or pesticides and be aware of other pollution. I find it easiest to pick familiar flowers from my own garden – dandelion, daisies, violets all work beautifully.
Flowers are tricky in autumn time, but there should be clover, nasturtium, maybe some dandelion, mahonia, bush vetch, and possibly calendula, if you live in Ireland!
Ingredients
100g Hederman’s Hot Smoked Salmon
1 tsp Hederman’s Smoked Chilli Flakes
6 rice paper sheets (can be purchased online or at an Asian Supermarket)
80g vermicelli rice noodles
1 yellow courgette
1 quarter small iceberg lettuce
1 half cucumber
1 half red onion or scallion
Fresh mint and/or coriander
Selection of wild flower petals – cornflowers, dandelion, daisies, herb robert, violets, nasturtiums
40ml tablespoons of rice vinegar
½ tsp sugar
1 half clove garlic
Methodology
TO MAKE THE DIPPING SAUCEMix together the vinegar, sugar, garlic and chilli with a pinch of salt.
TO PREPARE THE FILLING
Pour boiling water over the vermicelli noodles and allow to soak for 10 minutes or until soft. Drain and cut into manageable lengths with a pair of scissors.
Slice the courgette into thin batons, the lettuce into a fine shred and the onion into very thin slices. Slice the cucumber into very thin rounds. Slice and flake up the salmon into small pieces.
Once you have everything assembled then you can roll!
TO ASSEMBLE THE ROLLS
Arrange a clean board and a tray bigger than your rice paper sheets filled with water.
Dip the sheets into the water and allow to soften for around a minute and remove and flatten on to the board when soft.
This make take a few goes if you haven’t used this ingredient before.
With the sheet in front of you arrange the fillings in a line starting with the lettuce, then the noodles, herbs, courgette, onions and salmon.
On the side away from the vegetables arrange the flowers – they should stick to the sheet and then place the cucumber on top in a neat pattern on top of each other.
Gather the edge of the rice paper sheet that is closest to you and bring it over the top of the salmon and noodle mix.
Fold in the sides to seal in this mix and then roll this over the top of the cucumber slices and flowers and roll round to the other edge of the sheet.
You should be left with a nice pattern on the outside of the roll.
Mix the flowers up or arrange them really neatly for different effects.
Serve immediately with the dipping sauce.
