On my final night in Italy I had dinner at a restaurant beside the Hotel Julia, where I always stay in Rome. I ordered saltimbocca and a fennel and blood orange salad. The saltimbocca was fairly ordinary but the salad was delicious.
I recreated it myself shortly after I arrived home…it was quite simple.
The ingredients…a fennel bulb, a blood orange, pitted olives and anchovies.
Slice the fennel finely.
Pour a little olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper on the fennel and let it sit for a while.
Peel and slice the orange.
To assemble the salad, place the olives in a dish.
Arrange the anchovies over the olives.
…then the fennel.
…and the orange slices.
I served it with some grilled Tasmanian ocean trout. The only thing missing was lovely Rome.