Lemony Chickpea and Herb Salad

Put the sliced onion in a small bowl with 2 tbsp of the lemon juice.

Leave it there while you cook the chickpeas, at least 10 minutes, until the slices have gone slack and stained pink. This is the short version of the quick pickled red onions in this collection, which take the same slices further in a vinegar brine and keep for weeks.

Warm the chickpeas in a pan over medium heat with 1 tbsp of the olive oil for 3-4 minutes, shaking the pan now and then, until they are hot right through and the skins have tightened.

Whisk the remaining lemon juice, the lemon zest, the rest of the olive oil, the grated garlic, the fine salt and the ground peppercorns together in a large bowl.

Note that this is sharper than the everyday vinaigrette in this collection, closer to equal parts oil and acid than three to one, because the chickpeas take up a great deal of it as they cool.

Tip the hot chickpeas straight into the dressing.

Turn them through the dressing until every one is coated.

Leave them for 10 minutes, stirring once or twice, until they have cooled to warm and the dressing has visibly thinned as they take it up. Dressing them warm is the whole point of the recipe: a chickpea straight from the tin is cold and closed, it sits in the dressing without drawing any of it in, and the salad ends up tasting of the bowl rather than the beans.

Chop the herbs coarsely while the chickpeas soak, in big pieces rather than fine. They are a salad ingredient here, not a garnish, and a fine chop bruises them to a dark paste that bleeds into the dressing.

Add the parsley, mint and dill to the bowl by the handful, so the finished salad looks more green than beige.

Tip in the onion along with every drop of the lemon juice it has been sitting in.

Turn everything over with a wide spoon, lifting from the base, until the herbs are evenly through.

Taste it while it is still warm and correct the salt then. Cold flattens lemon and salt alike, so a bowl seasoned to taste at fridge temperature is always under-seasoned once it comes back up.

Serve at room temperature, within an hour or two, while the herbs are still bright.

Take it out of the fridge 30 minutes before serving if it has been made ahead, so the olive oil comes back from its dull, waxy film.

It stands up well next to the roasted cauliflower with tahini, which wants something sharp beside it.