Slice the Fennel on a mandoline, or with a knife to a Julienne.
You can use all of the fennel, but I generally skip the last bit of the woody stem and just use it as a handle so I don’t have to use a hand guard on the mandoline.
Slice the blueberries finely and distribute them throughout the fennel salad.
slice the cornichon – i use a mandolin to get an extra fine slice. Add them to the salad.
Zest half a lemon over the salad
Roast the pepitas in a small frying pan (here I’m using a single fried egg pan) until they just start to make crackings sounds – add them to the salad and distribute well.
Into a clean jar squeeze the half lemon (I mix most of my salad dressings in old Vegemite jars).
As a rough measure I generally use twice as much Oil to Acid when making my dressings – in this case Hazelnut oil pairs nicely with lemon juice. You can also use other nut oils like Almond, Macadamia or Walnut oil.
This step is optional and a bit controversial – I add artificial sweetener to temper the sharpness of the lemon. Here I am just pulverizing a tab of Splenda between two spoons. I’ll also add a tsp of seeded mustard to the dressing and then screw on the lid and shake the dressing until the oils are emulsified.