Meera Sodha’s vegetarian recipe for Beijing-style courgette pancakes with hot honey cucumbers | Meera Sodha recipes

A spicy, umami-rich salad provides sweetness and crunch alongside these simple Chinese-style courgette pancakes This week marks nine years since I started writing this column, and here’s something I’m excited by: that we’ve only just scratched the surface when it comes to our collective knowledge about Asian cuisine. When it comes to Chinese food, for example, we might know a fair bit about, for example, Cantonese or Sichuan food, but what about Fujian or Hunanese? There are still so many riches to discover and excellent meals to be had. Today’s offering is a small token in that vein: a simple vegetable pancake made with courgette, known as hutazi and straight from the homes of Beijing. I’ve taken the liberty of embellishing it with some hot and sweet cucumbers. Sambal oelek is one of my favourite ingredients – it’s a bright chilli condiment made from chillies and salt (and sometimes vinegar) that originates in Indonesia, and I use it a lot – see here and here and here for just a few examples. It’s available in some larger supermarkets, in Asian food stores and online. For the pancakes2 courgettes (about 550g), coarsely grated1¼ tsp fine sea salt 4 medium eggs 12