Do you like black pudding? I love the stuff. If it’s on a restaurant menu, I’m pretty much guaranteed to order it (Black pudding Scotch egg? Yes please!) My favourite is Clonakilty, but I think that’s mostly because it reminds me of good times in Ireland.

A friend of mine recently brought some of the good stuff back for me from Ireland and I set about thinking of ways to use it up. One of my ideas was salad – so I set about googling ideas and most of them were laughable. Seriously: black pudding, croutons and a few salad leaves does not a salad make, it’s basically a sandwich arranged slightly differently on the plate!

So I came up with my own. First up roasted slices of sweet potatoes because they’re delicious, healthy and filling. Plus the sweetness is really good with the intense meatiness of the black pudding. While the black pudding and sweet potatoes were roasting, I made a simple vinaigrette and let the sliced onions sit in it to take off raw edge. Add a few rocket leaves and you’re done. I love the colours of this salad – so pretty!

You could definitely add a poached egg on top (we did) or add in some beans to make it more filling. Obviously, this would be dee-licious with pumpkin or butternut squash (the season’s just about to start). If you’re really squeamish about the black pudding, you could use sausages instead, but the black pudding is really worth a try.

250g black pudding, sliced
600g sweet potatoes , sliced widthways into 1cm slices
1 tbsp olive oil
1 packet rocket
For the dressing
5 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
1 chilli, finely chopped
1 red onion , thinly sliced

• Preheat the oven to 200C.
• Arrange the sweet potato slices on a baking tray, drizzle with the oil, season and roast for 15 minutes.
• Turn the sweet potato slices over and add the black pudding to the tray. Roast for another 15 minutes, or until the black pudding and potatoes are cooked through.
• Meanwhile, mix all the dressing ingredients together in a bowl and set aside to macerate whilst the potatoes are cooking.
• Carefully mix the sweet potatoes, black pudding, dressing and rocket leaves together in a bowl, then arrange the salad on plates.

serves 4

Tags: black pudding, butternut squash, pumpkin, sweet potato

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