Fennel and orange salad is a crunchy, fresh, and light salad to be served as a side dish or as a starter.
The main ingredients are fennel and oranges, but you can add pomegranate seeds or black olives to make it even more delicious.
The best season to do this salad is autumn and winter, when the oranges are sweet and the fennel fresh and crunchy.
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What is a fennel and orange salad?
Fennel and orange salad is a simple but delicious winter salad that is very popular in Sicily, where oranges are sweet, juicy and delicious, and widely available throughout fall and winter.
This is a simple recipe, that you can make in a few minutes with few ingredients.
There is, however, a simple trick to make this salad exeptional: the orange needs to be peeled with a knife, and its flesh should be bare from the white parts of the orange. No worries, I'll show you how to do that.
I like to season this salad with a simple dressing of "orangette", which is basically some of the juice from the oranges combined with olive oil, salt, and pepper.
I also like to add pomegranate seeds or black olives. They both complement the orange and the fennel perfectly.
Ingredients & Substitutions
- Fennel: pick a large, fresh fennel with plenty of fronds. The fronds are the green leafy ends of the fennels. They taste great and look pretty in the salad.
- Oranges: get some juicy ones.
- Pine nuts: you can replace them with walnuts. They are optional.
- Olives or pomegranate: pick either black olives, or pomegranate seeds.
- Olive oil: best if extra virgin. Since there are a few ingredients in this salad, it would be best to use good quality ones.
- Salt and pepper
How to make fennel and orange salad
Step 1: cut the fennel
Wash the fennel, then cut off the stalks and the woody bottom part. Separate the fronds (the green leafy part) from the stalks, chop them thinly, and set them aside.
We use them later to garnish the salad.
Cut the fennel in half, then cut each half again. You should have 4 pieces of fennel. Now cut each piece of fennel into thin slices, then transfer them to a salad bowl.
Step 2: cut the orange
Peel the orange with a knife. For best results, you should remove the white flesh under the peel of the orange.
Then with a small sharp knife, carve out orange wedges. You can watch our video to learn the technique.
When you cut out all the wedges, add them to the bowl with the fennel. Save the core of the orange that you have left over, we are going to use it to make the dressing.
Step 3: make the orangette dressing
With your hands, squeeze the juice out of the core of the orange that you have leftover. Let the juice drip into a bowl.
Add olive oil, salt and pepper, and stir well with a fork or with a whisk. This is your orangette dressing.
To finish the fennel and orange salad, add pomegranate seeds to the bowl with the salad bowl, then drizzle with the orangette dressing, and mix.
Before serving, sprinkle the salad with the finely chopped fennel fronds and some pine nuts or chopped walnuts.
Variations
You can replace the pomegranate in this fennel and orange salad with black olives. In this case, just cut the olives in half before adding them to the salad (and remove their bone if they have any).
Storage
Store the leftover salad in the refrigerator for up to 24 hours.
Dinner Ideas
Did you know that we develop our recipes to go together for a complete dinner meal plan? Serve this fennel and orange salad as a side dish with:
Vegan creamy pasta - Boscaiola style - as a main course
Wine cookies - Super easy Italian recipe - as a dessert
For many more salad ideas, check out our salads category page.
Recipe
Fennel and orange salad
Ingredients
- 1 fennel + fennel fronds
- 2 oranges
- ½ cup pomegranate seeds or black olives
- 2 tablespoons pine nuts or walnuts
- 1 tablespoon olive oil extra virgin
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Wash the fennel, then cut off the stalks and the woody bottom part. Separate the fronds (the green leafy part) from the stalks, chop them thinly, and set them aside.
- Cut the fennel in half, then cut each half again. You should have 4 pieces of fennel. Now cut each piece of fennel into thin slices, then transfer them to a salad bowl.
- Peel the orange with a knife. For best results, you should remove the white flesh under the peel of the orange.
- Then with a small sharp knife, carve out orange wedges. You can watch our video to learn the technique.
- When you cut out all the wedges, add them to the bowl with the fennel. Save the core of the orange that you have left over, we are going to use it to make the dressing.
- With your hands, squeeze the juice out of the core of the orange that you have leftover. Let the juice drip into a bowl.
- Add olive oil, salt and pepper, and stir well with a fork or with a whisk. This is your orangette dressing.
- To finish the salad, add pomegranate seeds to the bowl with the salad bowl, then drizzle with the orangette dressing, and mix.
- Before serving, sprinkle the salad with the finely chopped fennel fronds and some pine nuts or chopped walnuts.
Video Recipe
Nutritional Values
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