Darina Allen

Crudités with Garlic Mayonnaise

Preparation info

  • Difficulty

    Medium

Appears in

Darina Allen's Simply Delicious Suppers

Darina Allen's Simply Delicious Suppers

By Darina Allen

Published 2001

  • About

Crudités with Garlic Mayonnaise is one of my favourite starters. It fulfils all my criteria for a first course: small helpings of very crisp vegetables with a good garlicky home-made mayonnaise. The plates of crudités look tempting, taste delicious and, provided you keep the helpings small, are not too filling. Better still, it’s actually good for you – so you can feel very virtuous instead of feeling pangs of guilt!

Another great plus for this recipe I’ve discovered is that children love crudités. They even love garlic mayonnaise provided they don’t hear some grown-up saying how much they dislike garlic, and you can feel happy to see your children polishing off plates of raw vegetables for their supper, really quick to prepare and full of wonderful vitamins and minerals.

Crudités are a perfect first course for winter or summer, but to be really delicious you must choose very crisp and fresh vegetables. Cut the vegetables into bite-sized bits so they can be picked up easily. You don’t need knives and forks because they are usually eaten with the fingers.

Use as many of the following vegetables as are in season:

Ingredients

  • very fresh button mushrooms, quartered
  • tomatoes quartered, or left whole with the calyx on if they are freshly picked
  • purple sprouting broccoli, broken (not cut) into florettes
  • calabrese (green sprouting broccoli), broken into florettes
  • cauliflower, broken into florettes
  • French beans or mangetout
  • baby carrots, or larger carrots cut into sticks about 5cm long
  • cucumber, cut into sticks approximately 5cm long
  • tiny spring onions (scallions), trimmed
  • red cabbage, cut into strips
  • celery, cut into sticks approximately 5cm long
  • chicory, in leaves
  • red, green or yellow pepper, cut into strips about 5cm long, seeds removed
  • very fresh Brussels sprouts, cut into halves or quarters
  • whole radishes, with green tops left on
  • parsley, finely chopped
  • thyme, finely chopped
  • chives, finely chopped
  • sprigs of watercress

Method

A typical plate of crudités might include the following: 4 sticks of carrot, 2 or 3 sticks of red and green pepper, 2 or 3 sticks of celery, 2 or 3 sticks of cucumber, 1 mushroom cut into quarters, 1 whole radish with a little green leaf left on, 1 tiny tomato or 2 quarters, 1 Brussels sprout cut in quarters, and a little pile of chopped fresh herbs.

Wash and prepare the vegetables. Arrange in contrasting colours on individual white side plates, with a little bowl of garlic mayonnaise in the centre. Alternatively, do a large dish or basket for the centre of the table. Arrange little heaps of each vegetable in contrasting colours. Put a bowl of garlic mayonnaise in the centre and then guests can help themselves.

Instead of serving the garlic mayonnaise in a bowl you could make an edible container by cutting a slice off the top of a tomato and hollowing out the seeds. Alternatively, cut a 4cm round of cucumber and hollow out the centre with a melon bailer or a teaspoon. Then fill or pipe the garlic mayonnaise into the tomato or cucumber. Arrange in the centre of the plate of crudités.

© 2001 Darina Allen. All rights reserved.