Acidity and sourness

You can also get acidity and sourness from other ingredients, my favourites being pomegranate molasses, verjus (made from unfermented grapes, this needs to be kept in the fridge once opened or it will go off), tamarind (you can extract the sourness yourself by soaking and squashing the pulp of the fruit in warm water, then passing it through a sieve – or buy a generally less potent pre-made paste) and the juice of citrus fruit – from lemons through to grapefruit, oranges, yuzu and limes. Remember, too, that it’s not just the juice from citrus fruit that will give flavour to a salad – the finely grated zest, the colourful outer layer of the skin, will also add character. Buy unwaxed fruit in preference to waxed if available. However, the modern world being what it is, the chances are that the fruit you buy will have had a fine layer of wax sprayed onto it to help preserve it and you’ll need to rub this off with a warm cloth or paper towel before grating the zest.