ottlenghi's chargrilled asparagus, courgettes and halloumi

This is one of those salad-y dishes I've been desperate to try it every time we make the recipe opposite it, roast chicken and three-rice salad, which as you know we have loads...

So with a fridge full of angiosperms and the inevitable four half-eaten punnets of cherry tomatoes, and without the usual eye-rolling accompaniment from Mrs Barnes, tonight is the night it gets its debut. I don't get Ana's attitude to this - halloumi, courgette, cherry tomatoes, salad - these are all key food groups of the McCarthy. We've also had plenty of amazing Ottolenghi dishes whether we've cooked them or supplied variously by Kendra Kats and Miss Smither, but she's strangely resistant to it's charms:

Two smokey, hellish hours later, I'm firmly in the HATE camp. It's not that it's difficult per se and it's not that it doesn't taste delish, it does. It's the multiple levels of admittedly-easy stages that essentially I'm going to boil down to 'blanch and grill the lot in one go' if, God-forbid I ever make it again. Add to that I simply don't have enough bowls to take various part-boiled, part-grilled marinading veg. It is nice though...

Wine Time
Should The Yummington Mummington ever take shape, and I get a chef to cook it rather than having me weeping in frustration in the kitchen, this has "Lunch" or "Light Bite" all over it, and it also has Sauvignon Blanc. And not just because it's the default fuel of all Yummy Mummies, but because it's perfect for this dish. The thing with Sauvs is there are loads of varieties you can choose from, you can go all classy with a Sancerre with it's mineral bite that'll cleanse your palate of the creamy halloumi, a lemony Bordeaux or Aussie number to match the dressing, or even go wild and crazy with an herbaceous Kiwi wonder to harmonise with the asparagus. You pays your money, you takes your choice.

sources
chargrilled asparagus, courgettes and halloumi - Yotam Ottolenghi, Delicious July 2008, p64, from Ottolenghi: The Cookbook.