Raw Canapés anyone ~Mangetout and Cucumber Mélange~

Canapé comes from the French word for a couch or an open sofa, and in culinary terms the couch would be a base of bread or pastry over which spreads, toppings and flavoured butters are slapped on. Well that is how it is usually, but I had bookmarked a recipe in one of my mum’s recipe books, it had mangetout/snap peas and cucumber as a base for a topping which contained something aquatic. This recipe is fresh, and cool, and very subtly combines crisp green vegetables with an incredibly light and flavourful filling.

Ingredients for the Mangetout Canapés

15 mangetout
3 tablespoon labneh/hung curd
2 pieces sun dried tomatoes, drained from oil and chopped very finely
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
a pinch of salt (optional)

Method

1. Wash and top and tail the mangetout, and string them if required.
2. Blanch them for 30 seconds in boiling water. Rinse in a bowl of icy cold water, drain, pat dry, and store in the refrigerator.
3. To make the filling, whisk together, labneh, chopped sundried tomatoes, salt and pepper, refrigerate.
4. To assemble, With a sharp, pointed knife, split the mangetout vertically, along its curved outer edge. Pipe the filling into the mangetout.

Both the vegetables and the filling can be fixed several hours in advance, and the canapés can be assembled an hour before serving. I was just reading in the book that the mangetout are regarded as a “greater delicacy than the insignificant pea”. Feeling bad for the insignificant pea, but such is the world of the culinary snobs.

Ingredients for Cucumber Canapés

1 cucumber
1/2 cup labneh/hung curd
2 walnuts, chopped very fine
1 garlic, grated
Juice of half a lemon
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
salt to taste
few fronds of dill

Method

1. Score the cucumber lengthways with a fork and cut them into slices of quarter inch thickness. Mix with lemon juice and set aside. After 15 minutes, drain and refrigerate until needed.
2. For the spread, whisk together, labneh, garlic, salt, pepper, and chopped walnuts, set aside in the refrigerator until needed.
3. To assemble, put a dollop of the spread on each slice of cucumber, top with a small frond of dillweed.

Sending these delicious canapés to February’s Monthly Mingle hosted by Paulchen’s FoodBlog.

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