I look out of the window and all I see is green. The endless rainfall of the past weeks and the last few days of warmer, sunny weather have resulted in a sudden explosion of growth that threatens to bypass spring altogether and fast forward straight to summer. Racing growth everywhere. Everywhere, that is, apart from in the vegetable garden.
By this time of year I would usually expect to have planted out almost all of the tender veg – courgettes, pumpkins, sweetcorn, and bush beans – and would hope to be eating the very first broad beans, lettuces and beetroot. This spring has been so cold that my first sowings of carrots took a month to germinate. So tardy that it was only when remaking the seed drill last weekend to resow that I discovered they were just starting to emerge from their seed cases. Kohl rabi that I started in plugs in the polytunnel and planted out in March have only just started to swell and the first peas, sown in the third week of April, are only now sending out their first climbing tendrils. So, although we were able to extend the harvest season with the polytunnel this year, there has still been a yawning hungry gap that will take a few more weeks to fill.
And so my eye has started wandering. I have been sizing up the broad bean tops and the kohl rabi and beet greens. The Swiss chard (which has to be the easiest, most reliable and productive green vegetable anyone can grow) has appeared in every guise imaginable – raw in a chopped salad, creamed with stewed shallots, pureed and added to ricotta for a green sformata and the stalks braised with saffron to waste not a thing. The land cress has gone to flower, but still has enough leaves to make it worth keeping and the fat hen seedlings that were missed and have matured in the polytunnel, transform from weeds into food with a simple change of perspective. As the plants of the woods and hedgerows have been burgeoning, seemingly less affected by the chill, damp weather I have been throwing garlic mustard and wild garlic into anything and everything and adding dandelion leaves, cow parsley and cleavers to salads.
Foraged wild greens would once have been a mainstay of the British kitchen at this time of year as we bridged the hungry gap without the benefit of greenhouse or polytunnel, but now they are only seen on the menus of upmarket restaurants. In Greece they are still firmly on the menus of anywhere you choose to eat and are easily found on market stalls in city and island villages the length of the country. Horta, as they are called, can comprise any foraged greens including nettle, dandelion, purslane, wild chervil, wild sorrel, sow thistle, shepherd’s purse, chicory and other wild greens that do not grow here. Most often these are served simply boiled and dressed with olive oil and lemon juice, but a favourite way to eat them is in a pie laden with fresh herbs, bought still warm from the village bakery and eaten straight from the oil-stained paper bag.
Foraging for greens doesn’t take nearly as long as you might think. The bagful I picked for this recipe took about thirty minutes, and it is an agreeable way to pass some time, providing an opportunity to slow down and look closely at plants that normally get a cursory glance or scowl. Both nettles and wild garlic are at the very end of their season now, so don’t pick the tops of nettles if they have started showing their flowers and choose the youngest, smallest garlic leaves. The older ones will be bitter.
When foraging for any wild plants remember to only take a little from each plant, do not gather from roadsides or anywhere that dogs have access and take a good wild plant identification guide. If wild greens are hard to come by they can be bulked out with chard, kale, chicory or beet tops. It can also be made with shop bought filo pastry and, divided evenly, makes 6 turnovers with a reduced cooking time of 20 to 25 minutes.
Today, eating a warm slice for lunch with a fresh chard salad in the long-awaited sunshine, we could almost feel the heat and smell the salt spray of Greece. Soon, we said, soon.
Pastry
350g plain flour
175g unsalted butter, cold from the fridge and cubed
1 whole egg, beaten
Salt
A little cold milk
Filling
400g mixed foraged and cultivated greens – nettle tops, sorrel, dandelion, garlic mustard, wild garlic, fat hen, orache, wild chervil, wild hop shoots, broad bean tops, pea shoots, chicory, beet greens, chard, land cress, rocket
100g mixed fresh soft herbs – dill, parsley, chervil, mint, fennel, tarragon, coriander
180g shallots, leeks or spring onions, finely sliced
2 fat cloves of garlic, finely chopped
200g feta cheese
2 eggs, beaten
Olive oil
Freshly grated nutmeg
A little milk
Serves 8
Set oven to 180°C.
To make the pastry put the flour, butter and a good pinch of salt into a food processor. Process until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. With the processor running, slowly add the beaten egg and enough milk to bring the dough together. Turn off the machine, tip the dough and any remaining loose mixture onto a worktop and quickly bring it together, kneading lightly, into a ball. Wrap in greaseproof paper and refrigerate for 30 minutes to an hour.
Heat a little olive oil in a saucepan over a medium heat. Add the shallots and garlic and sweat with the lid on for 15 minutes until soft and translucent. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
Bring a large pan of water to the boil. Blanch the greens for 1 minute, then drain and immediately refresh in cold water. Drain again and then squeeze out as much liquid as possible. Chop coarsely and put into a bowl. Chop the herbs fairly finely and add to the bowl. Add the cooled onions and garlic. Crumble the feta cheese into the bowl. Season with a little salt (the feta is salty), pepper and as much nutmeg as you like. Add the beaten eggs, reserving about a tablespoonful, then mix everything together thoroughly.
Divide the pastry into two almost equal halves. Roll out the larger half to line the bottom and sides of a 30 x 20cm rectangular metal tart tin or baking dish. Spoon in the filling and smooth out evenly ensuring that it is pressed into the corners.
Roll out the second piece of pastry to fit the top of the tart tin. Mix the reserved beaten egg with two tablespoons of milk and brush onto the edges of the pastry case. Lay the second piece of pastry on top and gently press the edges together with your fingers to seal. Trim off the excess pastry with a sharp knife.
Brush the remaining egg wash over the top of the pie. Make slashes in the top to let out steam. Put the pie onto a baking sheet and put into the oven for 30 to 40 minutes until golden brown and gently bubbling.
Serve warm.
Recipe & photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 29 May 2021
We put the terracotta forcers over the crowns of ‘Timperley Early’ at the end of January and over the variety named ‘Champagne’ at the end of March, although it probably should have been a little earlier. Despite the fact that the ‘Timperley Early’ would have been good weeks ago, there has a lot been going on in life and we just haven’t had time to pick it. The stems and emerging foliage of both have now pushed the lids off the forcers and exposure to light has been threatening to undo all of the good that forcing does for vibrancy of colour and flavour. Consequently, we have a rhubarb glut and, with plenty already cooked and in the freezer, part of my recipe challenge for this week was to answer the repeating question, ‘So, what else can you do with rhubarb?’.
When I scrolled past a mouthwatering image of Diana Henry’s Luscious Lemon Bars (thickened lemon curd on a shortcake base) on Instagram last week I thought they would adapt well to the sourness of rhubarb and so compared a number of different recipes to get a feel for proportions before alighting on one which sounded simple, foolproof and delicious. I made a couple of adjustments, substituting ground almonds for some flour in the shortbread base and replaced the flour in the custard topping with cornflour. All of the other ingredients, proportions and cooking method were as per the original recipe.
On Thursday, in between ferrying aubergines, peppers and chillis to the polytunnel, watering everything in pots, and doing anything requiring the pair of hands that we’ve been missing after Dan’s hand surgery last week, I managed to get a tray of these luscious rhubarb bars into the oven. Except that is not what came out. Through the mysterious alchemy and chemistry of cooking what emerged was something completely different. A layer of buttery, crumble topping above a firm custard with a thin layer of jammy rhubarb in the middle. Though delicious they were not what I had imagined and clearly needed more work to produce what I had in mind.
In the knowledge that cooking, photographing and writing a recipe in one day is already quite a tall order, I had to come up with another rhubarb recipe overnight. I thought, ‘Keep it simple.’ and stuck with rhubarb curd instead. No baking, just measuring and stirring.
After consulting books and websites I decided to adapt a familiar recipe I have cooked many times, substituting rhubarb juice for orange in Sam & Sam Clark’s curd recipe for Seville orange tart.
I finally settled down to cooking in the late morning and immediately the contemplative focus of cooking calmed my busy mind. The simplicity of just four ingredients and one pan. The repetition and order of cracking and separating eggs, cutting butter into cubes, weighing out sugar and measuring rhubarb juice. And then the close attention required to cook it carefully to ensure that the eggs don’t curdle.
It took over half an hour for the curd to start to thicken over the lowest heat possible and as, I stood there in the warmth of the range intently stirring, completely focussed on the activity before me, my mind went into the entranced meditative freefall that cooking shares with gardening.
Makes around 2 x 200ml jars
140g caster sugar
170ml rhubarb juice (see below)*
170g unsalted butter, cubed
4 large egg yolks
2 large eggs
*The rhubarb juice in this recipe is a by-product of rhubarb poached to go into the freezer. Around 500g of rhubarb should give you enough juice for this recipe. Cut the rhubarb into short lengths. Put them into a non-reactive pan with a tight-fitting lid and put in a medium oven (about 160°C) for around half an hour until soft. Strain off most of juice. Keep in the fridge and use in place of lemon juice or vinegar. It is particularly good in spring salad dressings.
Lightly beat the egg yolks, eggs and sugar together in a medium pan. Add the rhubarb juice and butter.
Put the pan over a very low heat and stir continuously until the butter melts and the mixture starts to emulsify and becomes glossy and thick. Do not be tempted to turn up the heat or it will curdle. Once it attains the consistency of custard pour into warm, dry, sterilised jars. Seal, leave to cool and then refrigerate. Keeps in the fridge for up to two weeks.
The flavour of rhubarb is delicate, so don’t be tempted to add other flavourings to this curd or they will overwhelm it.
Delicious on warm scones, mixed with poached rhubarb and whipped cream or as a filling for a tart base.
Recipe and photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 24 April 2021
We’ve never had much luck with cauliflowers. With a reputation for being tricky customers, sensitive as they are to inconsistency during the growing cycle, they also generally require a very long growing season, thus making inconsistencies in cultivation far more likely. As the queen of vegetable growing, Joy Larkcom, succinctly states in our kitchen garden bible, Grow Your Own Vegetables, ‘The secret of success is steady growth, with plenty of moisture both at young plant stage and when maturing. Growth checks are caused by delayed transplanting, or spells of drought, resulting in deformed and small curds.’ Having had some unexpected success with the purple-headed ‘Sicilia Violetta’ two years ago, last year I was determined to break our dissatisfactory run once and for all and grow a harvest we could be proud of.
I had picked out two varieties, both from Real Seeds, ‘All The Year Round’ and ‘Autumn Giant’. The first because it promised the ease of successional sowings, and the second since it was reportedly ‘very reliable’. Both were sown in plugs on April 12th and were ready to plant out five weeks later in the middle of May. I looked after the young plants assiduously, watering them regularly and giving them a fortnightly liquid manure feed from mid-June as the plants started to grow away in earnest. Whether the feeding initiated it or not I can not be sure, but by early July it was apparent that all eight plants of ‘All The Year Round’ were on target to produce huge and beautiful, snow-white curds that would all be ready to harvest simultaneously in a matter of days. It was equally apparent that there was no way Dan and I were going to be able to eat all of them ourselves in the time available.
I chose my day carefully, reorganised the freezer, cleared the decks in the outside kitchen and assembled the equipment required for a mammoth batch of blanching. Cauliflower plants are huge, and it took some sawing and wrestling to take them all down, but eventually my catch was landed and Dan took my picture standing over them, inordinately proud. A large pasta pan with a colander insert makes blanching an easy affair, and as each batch went in I would set the timer for 3 minutes and return to preparing the next in line, removing the leaves and slicing each floret in two. Despite my apprehension of a neverending mountain of caulis the whole process of harvesting, preparing, blanching and bagging up seven of them for the freezer took around three hours. This really doesn’t seem a bad investment for the number of prep free meals they have provided this winter.
Dan posted his pictures of me on Instagram and that evening I got a message from Errol Fernandes. Errol is a Senior Gardener at Kenwood House in Hampstead and through his connection to Great Dixter we have come to know each other a little on social media, but have never met. Errol directed me to a post of his which gave his own recipe for blackened cauliflower inspired by his Goan mum’s home cooking, in the hope it might help us get through our cauliflower glut.
Knowing that we live in deepest, darkest Somerset Errol offered to send me some of the harder to come by ingredients – namely the back salt, powdered lime and mango powder. I have used dried lime and mango powder before, but never the black salt. Errol warned me, ‘It smells like bad eggs, but don’t be put off! It’s essential for the dish.’ When the little cellophane packets with hand-written labels arrived a few days later the distinctive sulphurous smell instantly transported me back to the Diwana Bhel Poori House on Drummond Street behind Euston station. When I was living in Camden in my mid 20’s I used to eat there on a weekly basis with my friends Simon and John Paul. The crisp-shelled poori, served with potatoes and chick peas and an appetising chutney that I now understood was flavoured with black salt.
Black salt (also known as kala namak) comes from volcanic salt mines in the Himalaya, and has been used in Ayurvedic medicine for centuries for its cleansing, detoxifying and digestive properties. Its pungent smell acts in a similar way to asafoetida, adding a deep, hard-to-pin-down umami richness which makes it incredibly more-ish. The powdered dried lime, mango powder, lime juice and turmeric combine to produce a deliciously astringent flavour which makes this a perfect dish to greet the changing season and wake up our slumbering taste buds and livers.
Each time I have made this dish I have taken the little cellophane packets of black salt and lime powder that Errol sent out of the spice cupboard and each time I have been reminded of his kindness at that time. We had just come out of the first lockdown and everyone was feeling raw, apprehensive and yet keen to connect. As Errol wrote to me when I asked him if I could share this recipe today, ‘I love sharing my food/culture, and I love learning about other people’s. Food is a wonderful way of connecting…’ So, as we look forward, hopefully, to a summer of renewed connections, it makes me happy to be able to share that connection with you.
1 cauliflower (around 1kg)
1 tablespoon coriander seed
1 teaspoon mango powder
1 teaspoon lime powder
1 teaspoon black mustard seed
1 teaspoon turmeric powder
1 teaspoon salt flakes
½ teaspoon cumin seed
¼ teaspoon garam masala
¼ teaspoon Kashmiri chilli powder
¼ teaspoon asafoetida
¼ teaspoon Himalayan black salt
½ large green chilli, coarsely chopped
1 large clove garlic, coarsely chopped
8 curry leaves
Juice of half a lime
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
2 tablespoons rapeseed or other unflavoured oil
Separate the cauliflower into florets and cut these in half or in quarters depending on size. Cut the core and stalk a little more thinly. Include the young tender leaves too. You want bite size pieces that all will cook evenly. Put it all into a glass or ceramic bowl.
Put all of the other ingredients into a mortar and crush slowly and gently to make a coarse sauce. You want the garlic and chilli to be bruised and broken, but for the whole spices to mostly retain their form.
Spoon all but one tablespoon of the marinade over the cauliflower and mix thoroughly. I find it is quickest and most thorough to do this with your hands, but wear gloves if you don’t want the turmeric to turn your hands yellow! Cover and leave to marinade for at least an hour.
Pre-heat an overhead grill to hot. Arrange the cauliflower pieces in a single layer on a baking sheet and put under the grill for 20 to 25 minutes. Turn the pieces every now and then until all are cooked and charred in places.
Spoon the remaining marinade over the cauliflower with a squeeze more lime juice. Garnish with fresh coriander and more finely sliced green chilli and eat piping hot.
Serves 4 as a main side dish or 6 as part of a mixed plate meal.
Recipe: Errol Fernandes | Words & photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 27 February 2021
Once upon a time I had a very sweet tooth. Each Christmas Eve, close to midnight, as my overexcited brother and I lay feigning sleep in our bunk beds, dad would come and lay something heavy at our feet. We knew exactly what it was, and it called on all our reserves of self-control and superstition to prevent ourselves from peeking until it started to get light. When we did – and my younger brother was always the first to crack – we would haul the stockings (actually dad’s nylon football socks) up the bed and start to unpack them. Always alongside this stocking was another made of net. A Cadbury’s Christmas selection pack containing the usual suspects – Mars Bars, Twix, Milky Way, Marathon. We would slowly eat our way through these on Christmas morning and still somehow have room for lunch.
As a child I was always more interested in what was for ‘afters’ than the main event and my favourites usually involved chocolate, whether it was Bird’s Angel Delight, mini rolls, steamed chocolate pudding, Viennetta ice cream or choc ices. At around the age of 9 I started baking my way through the Marguerite Patten recipe cards mum had collected and which sat in a specially made plastic box on top of the fridge freezer. Once I had become proficient with scones, jam tarts and sponges, I quickly moved on to Devil’s Food Cake, chocolate Swiss Roll, Black Forest Gateau and, eventually, eclairs and profiteroles. My pièce de résistance, however, was Marguerite’s Pots au Chocolat, which to me looked impossibly chic in the photo on the front of the card. The dark, velvet mousse in simple, white porcelain pots, decorated with elegant quills of dark chocolate. It made me feel very grown up the first time I served them. Looking back for that recipe now I find that they contained melted marshmallows. Certainly not the purist’s idea of this classic French dessert, but one that, as a child, I was more than happy to accommodate.
As the years passed my palate became more refined. I graduated from Cadbury’s Dairy Milk to Bournville, from milk to dark chocolate Bounty bars and got a taste for Fry’s Chocolate Creams from my dad. (Mint, since you ask.) At university, I discovered Swiss and Belgian chocolate before, in my mid ‘20’s, experiencing a revelation. I had moved into a house on Bonnington Square in Vauxhall and, unbeknownst to me, my new landlady was about to change my view of chocolate forever. She was Chantal Coady who, in 1983, had opened Rococo Chocolates on the King’s Road. There were four of us renting rooms there and every month Chantal would bring home a box of ‘bin ends’, broken bars and trial new products from the shop and invite us for a chocolate tasting.
This may conjure images of a craven orgy of chocolate bingeing, but quite the contrary. The room was candle lit, a fine cloth on the dining table and a small selection of wines and spirits were available to be sipped in recommended partnerships with some of the ‘sweets’. Chantal would break small pieces of chocolate onto plates and pass them round. We were instructed to place the chocolate on our tongues and to allow it to melt slowly – no chewing! – and to describe the flavours we were tasting. Chantal explained how fake vanilla, hydrogenated oils and sugar destroyed the true nature of chocolate and would get us to compare my childhood Dairy Milk to a high cocoa content milk chocolate to understand what she meant. She taught us to appreciate it like fine wine and I have never looked back.
Christmas always calls for chocolate, but as I have aged my taste for sweet things has tempered and I have decreased the amount of refined sugar I eat. I rarely order pudding in restaurants these days unless I am prepared both for the initial sugar rush and the almost immediate headachy comedown. At home, dessert usually takes the form of stewed fruit or a handful of figs or dates, rather than anything sweeter. But it’s Christmas and I want chocolate, so I worked on this dessert recipe without refined sugar.
The combination of pumpkin and dates in the filling means that it needs no further sweetening, although if using chocolate with more than 82% cocoa solids you might want to and add honey or another sweetener to taste. If possible, use a drier-fleshed variety of pumpkin, otherwise you may need to drain the flesh before using as you don’t want the filling to be too wet. The Kabocha pumpkin I use has the texture and flavour of chestnuts, which makes it particularly truffle-like.
Chantal was also a pioneer in the use of unexpected flavourings and this tart is also the perfect foil for your favourites. To my knowledge, she was the first to make cardamom flavoured chocolate, to which she introduced me and which is my habitual choice. However, you can infuse the milk and cream with any winter spice or herb you like. Bay is very good (a couple of leaves), or try a sprig or two of rosemary or thyme, a spoonful of ground fennel seeds or even some crushed juniper berries. A teaspoon of finely ground espresso coffee heightens the bitterness. Half a teaspoon of chilli powder warms the mouth and accentuates the flavour of the chocolate, while a few drops of rose or rose geranium oil add a different level of perfumed refinement. The addition of a couple of tablespoons of alcohol – rum, for instance – makes it definitely adults only. Although we have been eating it plain this week, for a truly festive plate this would be particularly good with brandy-soaked prunes or figs or pears poached in red wine. Definitely a chocolate dessert for grown-ups, not children.
Serves 12
Pastry
75g hazelnuts
150g plain flour
1.5 tablespoons honey or maple syrup
75g cold butter
1 large egg, beaten
A pinch of salt
Filling
200g cooked pumpkin
100g dates
100ml milk
250ml double cream
3 large eggs
200g dark chocolate (minimum 70% cocoa solids)
Seeds from 3 cardamom pods, finely ground or other chosen flavouring
You will need a 23cm round, fluted tart tin with a removable base.
Set the oven to 180C.
Put the hazelnuts into a small baking pan and roast in the oven for 10 minutes until lightly toasted and fragrant. Remove and allow to cool, then put into a food processor and process into a medium-fine flour. Do not over process or you will end up with nut butter.
Add the flour to the hazelnuts and pulse mix. Cut the cold butter into 1cm cubes and add to the flour and nuts. Pulse again until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. With the motor running slowly add the beaten egg and honey until the dough comes together. Stop the machine immediately and quickly remove the dough. It will be very soft. Form into a ball, wrap and put into the fridge for 30 minutes.
When the pastry has chilled, roll it out carefully on a floured surface until large enough to line the tart tin. The pastry is very short, so work quickly and carefully. However, if it falls apart just fit the pieces to the tin and press together gently to join. Remove any excess pastry from the rim, line with greaseproof paper and fill with baking beans. Bake blind for 20 minutes. Remove the baking beans and greaseproof paper and return to the oven for a further 5 minutes until it looks dry. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
To make the filling heat the milk and cream in a small pan. Grind the cardamom seeds to a fine powder in a mortar and pestle and add to the milk. As soon as the milk comes to the boil remove from the heat, add the dates put a lid on the pan and leave to stand until cool.
Chop the chocolate coarsely and put into a heatproof bowl. Put into the oven for about 10 minutes until almost melted. Remove from the oven and then beat with a fork to ensure that all of the chocolate is melted.
Put the cooled dates and cream, eggs and pumpkin into the food processor and process until smooth. Add the chocolate and mix until fully combined. Pour the mixture into the prepared pastry case and bake for 35-45 minutes until the mixture just starts to crack at the edges, but still has a little wobble in the centre.
Leave to stand for 20 minutes before removing from the tin and transferring to a serving plate. Decorate with sieved icing sugar as you wish.
Serve warm.
This reheats and freezes well.
This can easily be made suitable for vegans, using coconut oil and sugar and no egg in the pastry. For the filling substitute the milk with vegetable milk, the cream with an equal weight of silken tofu (although do not heat this with the milk). Substitute the eggs with chia ‘eggs’ (1 tbsp ground chia seed mixed with 3 tbsp cold water for each egg).
Recipe & photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 19 December 2020
As if in sympathy with the sicknesses, both physical and political, which have dominated the world since the beginning of the year, the kitchen garden got off to a half-hearted start this spring. The broad beans and peas were ravaged by mice, chard and brassicas were mildewed and slug-devoured and far too many of my first sowings germinated badly. The most concerning of these was the celeriac, which is a staple for us in the winter. We habitually plant 20 plants and eat them all.
Celeriac seed is small and notoriously erratic as it needs light and early warmth to germinate. It also has a long growing season and so needs to be started off in early spring indoors, under glass or in a heated propagator. We waited more than three weeks for ours to appear on a bright windowsill, before finally admitting that they probably weren’t going to. And so, in the knowledge that we simply couldn’t survive a winter without, I resorted to ordering some young plants from an online supplier. We hardly ever do this, but I am always grateful that they exist as you are effectively able to buy time and plug any gaps in the garden that might have appeared through misfortune or mismanagement.
However, what you do not have from mail order suppliers is control over the varieties, and I was obliged to buy ‘Giant Prague’, when our proven variety of choice for many years now has been ‘Prinz’. We have never had a problem with ‘Prinz’, which has been easy to grow and a reliably heavy cropper, with roots of a kilo or more being standard. So I have been keeping an eye on the newcomers this summer to see how they compared. I quickly noticed their different growth habit, as they are much taller, more upright and leafier and so have shaded the plants behind more than the lower growing ‘Prinz’. In late summer I also became aware that the roots were not bulking up as noticeably, despite the heavy watering that they like and regular feeding.
When I went to dig the first of the celeriac for this recipe this morning I was not impressed to find that several of the plants are bolting, and so have useless withered roots, and that the plants in the back row, in the deepest shade, have also failed to swell. Immediately the number of meals we have counted on them to provide is probably halved. Somewhat disheartening after all the effort and the ground given up for a disappointing crop of something we have taken for granted. At least it was good to know that I would be making the roots go further with the addition of chestnuts and windfall apples.
In the orchard the apple ‘Peter Lock’ has held onto its fruits the longest of all. This West Country variety has a long season of ripening, and so there are still apples on the branches that won’t fall no matter how vigorously you shake. The ripe windfalls are cushioned by the long grass of the pasture in which they grow and so, if you can get them before the mice, jackdaws and wasps do, they are seldom badly bruised or damaged. ‘Peter Lock’ is a dual-purpose eating and cooking apple with creamy white flesh. It is tart, yet sweet, and makes the most delicious golden apple puree which we always have a container of in the fridge, both for breakfast or evening dessert with yogurt or cream respectively. The large fruits also store well into the new year.
Our late spring frost on May 12th means we are without chestnuts this year, but the tree that Dan planted in memory of his dad has thrown out some good growth without the energy going into fruit so we hope, frost permitting, for a crop next year. Celeriac has an affinity with many nuts, particularly walnuts, hazelnuts and pecans. Here seasonal chestnuts enrich and thicken the soup. Wild mushrooms would be an appropriate addition. Rustic shards of bread fried in olive oil would provide textural contrast. The addition of cooked pearl barley would make it more substantial and go further. It would take well to the addition or substitution of other warming herbs and spices including rosemary, thyme, sage, winter savory, nutmeg and mace.
750g celeriac, after peeling, coarsely cubed
1 medium onion, peeled and coarsely chopped, about 200g
350g cooking or eating apple, peeled and cored and coarsely chopped
300g cooked chestnuts
2 bay leaves
8 juniper berries, crushed
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
A 2cm length of fresh ginger, peeled and finely grated
50g butter
1 litre hot vegetable or chicken stock
Heat the butter in a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan until foaming. Add the onion and stir to coat thoroughly. Put on the lid and leave on a low heat to sweat. Stir from time to time and cook until translucent and golden.
Add the celeriac, garlic, juniper, ginger and bay leaves to the pan, stir everything together, and return to a low heat with the lid on. Stir from time to time and cook for around 15 minutes, when all should smell fragrant and the celeriac is starting to become translucent at the edges.
Add the hot stock and chestnuts, stir and return the lidded pan to the heat. Cook very gently for about 40 minutes until the celeriac is soft.
Add the apple and cook for another 10 to 15 minutes until it starts to break down.
Remove from the heat and use a potato masher to roughly smash the mixture into a course soup. Season generously with salt and black pepper.
Recipe & photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 7 November 2020
This year our pride and joy (as well as provider of steep learning curve) has been the polytunnel. As soon as we decamped to Somerset before lockdown in mid-March, we started to discuss the pros and cons of finally biting the bullet and getting one, which we have discussed at length and then shelved on several occasions. The reason to defer was always the same. We weren’t here enough and, once a polytunnel is up and running, it simply can’t be left for days untended. Suddenly we were compelled to be at Hillside for the foreseeable future and, with the thought of more complete vegetable self-sufficiency firmly in the forefront of our minds, we decided to take the plunge.
Our dreams of a cornucopia of tomatoes, peppers, aubergines, chillis, cucumbers and melons haven’t been fully realised due to a shortage of seed and plug plants immediately after lockdown, and the fact that the polytunnel couldn’t be delivered until the end of May. So our initial plan for a tomato trial with three plants of ten varieties quickly increased to twelve plants of each and so this year, although we have three chilli varieties and two of cucumber, the polytunnel has been pretty much dominated by them. I will write at more length about the polytunnel at a later date, once I have some more experience under my belt, but suffice to say that growing tomatoes in grow bags has this year taught me the importance of a regular watering regimen, the effects of lack of ventilation and the dangers of not starting to apply tomato feed early or regularly enough. We lost almost all the second trusses and, due to the cool August, the third and fourth trusses are only now just starting to ripen. Everyone will be getting Green Tomato Chutney for Christmas this year.
Apart from firm favourites ‘Sungold’ and ‘Gardener’s Delight’ I was keen to trial some plum tomatoes and chose the best known and most reliable varieties, ‘San Marzano’ and ‘Roma’. These are the varieties that are almost invariably in any tin of tomatoes you might buy at the shops. They were surprisingly productive at first and the mini-glut in early August produced ten large jars of bottled whole and chopped tomatoes, as well as several litres of passata and ketchup. Although ripening is definitely slowing down now, somewhat surprisingly it is still the plum tomatoes that are providing the largest usable harvests. This I don’t mind, since I cook with tomatoes pretty often in winter and the idea of being able to use my own preserved ones and not shop-bought is very appealing.
Despite their productivity only the best plum tomatoes are good enough for bottling, so there are always plenty left over. These end up as passata or a simple tomato sauce (which I either bottle or freeze depending on available storage space) and in ketchups, salsas and chutneys. Quite often, however, they end up in our dinner and one of my daily challenges of recent weeks has been ‘What can you make with any combination of courgettes, tomatoes and runner beans ?’. After many nights of making things up as I went along I have started to run out of inspiration and so this week there has been much rifling of recipe books.
I very seldom present another cook’s recipes here, although my own are often tweaked and altered versions of dishes I have eaten or cooked from recipes in the past. However, when I came across this yesterday, it jumped out at me for the intriguing use of two of my main available ingredients in a previously completely unimagined form. What is in effect a tomato and bean pie is elevated in this recipe into a memorable dish of unctuous and exotic richness. Given the apparent humility of the primary ingredients I was unprepared for quite how delicious it is and feel that it is only right to share the original, untweaked, recipe with full credit to Maria Elia from whose excellent book of modern Greek cuisine, Smashing Plates, it is taken. As she says (and as I did myself) it is best to make the filling the day before you plan to assemble it so that the flavours can come together overnight. Of course, not everyone has access to vine-ripened plum tomatoes, so I weighed mine and they came to around 600 grams, equivalent to around two cans drained of their juice.
To balance the richness this would be good served with something fresh and bright such as a citrussy Greek cabbage and carrot coleslaw or a raw fennel, chicory, orange and watercress salad.
Serves 6-8 as a main, 8-12 as a small plate
100 ml olive oil
2 Spanish onions, halved and finely sliced
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 tsp ground cinnamon
5 tbsp tomato purée
10 vine-ripened plum tomatoes, skinned and roughly chopped
500 g runner beans, stringed and cut into 4cm lengths
A pinch of sugar
1 bunch of dill (approx. 30 g), finely chopped, or 2 tbsp dried
1 packet of filo pastry (9 sheets)
100 g melted butter
100 g Medjool dates, stoned and finely sliced
250 g feta, crumbled
6 tbsp clear honey
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy-based pan over a low heat and sauté the onion until softened and sticky; this can take up to 20 minutes. Add the garlic, cinnamon and tomato purée and cook for a further 2 minutes. Add the tomatoes and their juices and cook over a medium heat for about 8 minutes, before adding the runner beans, sugar, dill, a pinch of sea salt and 150ml water.
Reduce the heat to a simmer, cover and cook the beans for about 40 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the beans are soft and the sauce is nice and thick. Check the seasoning and cool before assembling.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4. Unfold the pastry and cover with a damp cloth to prevent it from drying out. Brush a baking tray (approximately 30 x 20cm) with melted butter. Line the tin with a sheet of filo (cut to fit if too big), brush with butter and repeat until you have a three-layer thickness.
Spread half the tomato and bean mixture over the pastry, top with half each of the dates and feta. Sandwich another three layers of filo together with melted butter and place on top. Top with the remaining tomato mixture, dates and feta. Sandwich the remaining three filo sheets together as before and place on top.
Lightly score the top, cutting into diamonds. Brush with the remaining butter and splash with a little water. Cook for 35 – 45 minutes or until golden. Leave to cool slightly before serving, drizzling each portion with a little honey.
Words & photographs: Huw Morgan | Recipe: Maria Elia
Published 12 September 2020
So this is my lunch. No, really, it is. Or I should say, was. Yesterday’s to be exact. Dan has been away for the past three days, his first trip of any length away from here since lockdown was eased, and suddenly I have found how much there is to do here when you are here alone. So time has been at a premium and yesterday the solution to not giving myself more to do than was manageable was to make my real life lunch the subject of today’s recipe.
The Kitchen Garden provides one of the main focusses of attention right now, with a tidal wave of produce rapidly gathering momentum, which needs harvesting, preparing and preserving. Every day there is a new round of beans, courgettes and tomatoes to harvest and these ingredients have featured in some way or another in most of our meals for the last couple of weeks.
The bush beans, ‘Cupidon’ and ‘Aquilon’ (the first of which we grew for the first time last year, the latter of which was new to us this year) have been providing a steady stream of fine green beans for around a month now. Although you do have to crouch to pick them it is very easy to de-top them while picking by pinching the stalk end of the bean, and it is possible to amass quite enough for dinner for two in a matter of seconds. We have probably blanched and frozen around 5kg over the past couple of weeks, and probably eaten the same amount. Although they are now on the wane and showing signs of exhaustion the first of the climbing beans are just forming, so we should have a perfect handover.
The bean recipe features the first of our polytunnel tomatoes, of which we are inordinately proud. We are still at the point where we are just keeping on top of the harvest and managing to eat them all, but plans are afoot to dry, bottle and puree the tomato deluge when it arrives. The simple tomato ‘sauce’ here can be made in bulk, flavoured with any herbs you like such as thyme or fennel, and kept in a container in the fridge or frozen to add to any number of simply cooked vegetables when you like.
The Italian way of serving summer vegetables in a sweet and sour agrodolce dressing or sauce is a favourite summer way with anything from cauliflower to mushrooms to fennel and courgette. The sharp, salty flavours are good on a hot day, but work equally well warm from the pan or at room temperature if the weather takes a colder turn.
The vinegar and honey dressing can be flavoured with anything you feel like. I might use fennel seed, bay leaf, marjoram, cumin or pink peppercorns depending on what is available. Some sliced anchovy, finely grated lemon zest and toasted pine nuts would work well too.
When time is of the essence it is best to keep things simple in the kitchen. No more ingredients or food preparation than is absolutely necessary. I use whole herbs and spices and keep cooking methods the same for multiple dishes so that things can be cooked together. This has the added benefit of reducing washing up. The method below is written to make both dishes at the same time, as I did today, so that they arrive at the table together.
You will need a large saucepan, a small saucepan, a colander, a small bowl and two medium mixing/serving bowls.
These dishes are perfectly filling alone, but can easily be augmented with a tin of sardines, a boiled egg, a slab of feta cheese or a piece of grilled halloumi.
Serves 2
Green beans & tomatoes
200g fine green beans
200g cherry tomatoes, mixed colours are good
1 large clove garlic
A small handful of small fresh basil leaves
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt
Zucchini in agrodolce
1 medium or 2 small courgettes, around 350g
5 tbsp white wine or cider vinegar
3 tbsp honey
1 fat clove of garlic
1 tbsp currants
2 tbsp extrafine capers
¼ tsp dried chili flakes
½ tsp whole coriander seed
12 black olives, stoned
A couple of stalks of flat leaved parsley, leaves removed
A small handful of small, whole mint leaves
Salt
Fill the large saucepan with water and bring to the boil.
Make the agrodolce. Put the vinegar and honey into the small saucepan with the coriander seed, chili flakes and clove of garlic which you have crushed under the blade of a knife. Put over a low heat until the honey has melted and the mixture is hot. Take off the heat and pour over the currants in a small bowl. Leave to soak.
Put the courgettes and beans into the pan of boiling water. Bring back to a simmer and cook with the lid on. Remove the beans after 10 minutes, refresh under cold water and drain. After a further 5 minutes cooking carefully remove the courgettes from the pan and leave to drain on a plate until warm enough to handle.
While the courgettes are cooling put the olive oil into the cleaned small pan and put it back on the heat. Roughly crush the second clove of garlic and fry in the hot oil until lightly browned. Tip in all of the tomatoes, put the lid on the pan and turn the heat up high. Cook hard for 2 to 3 minutes, shaking the pan frequently, until the tomatoes are breaking down, but still retain some shape. Take off the heat. Season with salt. Scatter over the mint and parsley.
While the tomatoes are cooking cut the courgettes into chunky pieces and put into one of the mixing/serving bowls. Pour over the agrodolce mixture while the courgettes are still hot, add the capers and olives and mix gently so that all the pieces are coated. Leave to stand while you finish the beans.
Put the green beans into the other serving bowl and pour the still warm tomato sauce over them. Mix gently to combine. Pour over a little more olive oil if you like. Scatter over the basil leaves.
Recipes, words and photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 8 August 2020
After endless days of low cloud cover, chill winds and drizzle, suddenly the sun blazed yesterday and again today. Last night I dreamt of Greece.
Our planned Easter break had to be cancelled, of course, and neither of us have the stomach yet for travelling that far. Like many our relationship to international travel has changed over the past months, due both to quarantine requirements and the clear proof, as if any were needed, of the contribution flying makes to climate change when emissions plummeted after lockdown. Travelling overland and by sea have become our preferred means of getting away, but it will be some time before we feel confident enough to make the 4 day journey by train and ferry to our beloved island.
When I dream of our holidays in Greece food figures strongly in my memories and there is one dish in particular that I miss more than any other. Pythia is the local name given to the chick pea fritters that are more commonly known across Greece as revithokeftedes. They are doubtless related to falafel, but are lighter and fresher tasting, although recipes vary from region to region, village to village and family to family. In fact, one of our holiday pastimes is to judge who, this year, is making the best pythia. There are a couple of regulars who mantain total consistency from meal to meal and year to year, but every year there may be a surprise newcomer.
We have never tried to grow chick peas here, since they need a long season of heat for the peas to ripen. However, I was heartened to read this growing information recently, which suggests that with a sunny, sheltered position it is possible to get a substantial crop of green peas that are good to eat fresh. We learned a lesson this year, after planting our peas on the ‘frontline’ of the kitchen garden. After a slightly false start due to mice eating some of the first sowing, they were then slow to get going and, once they did, hated the hot winds of May and the cold winds of June equally, never really hitting their stride. The short-growing petit pois ‘Charmette’ fared the better of the two we grew, but only provided for around four meals, as the pods wizened on the plants before maturing. Early this morning, whilst picking the last of the very disappointing and elderly crop of Glory of Devon peas, I was wondering what to do with them, as they were too old to simply eat boiled. With visions of Greece still floating in my head I thought that they would make a good substitute for chick peas in a fresh, green version of pythia.
Last weekend I dug up the shallots and three weeks before that the first of the summer garlic, both of which feature in this recipe, as well as the cucumber and herbs which are all from the garden.
If you can’t find chick pea flour and have a Nutribullet type blender you can make your own from dried chick peas. It can also be found at suppliers of Indian foods as gram flour. You can, of course, use frozen peas in place of fresh, or broad beans or the traditional chick peas.
Makes 12, enough for 4 as a starter
250g shelled peas
1 shallot, finely chopped, about 40g
2 fat cloves of fresh garlic
A small handful of flat-leafed parsley, stalks removed
The leaves from two stems of fresh oregano, about 2 tablespoons
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 long green chilli
The zest and juice of one lemon
8 tablespoons of chick pea flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
Ice cold fizzy water
Salt and finely ground black pepper
1 small cucumber
100ml strained Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon mint, very finely chopped
1 tablespoon dill fronds, very finely chopped
1 clove of garlic
Salt
Flavourless oil for frying such as rapeseed or rice bran
Firstly grate the cucumber finely into a sieve. Sprinkle with some salt and leave to drain over a bowl while you make the pythia mixture.
Blanch the peas in boiling water for two minutes. Drain them well in a colander then put them with the shallot, garlic, herbs, coriander, chilli, lemon zest and juice into a food processor fitted with a blade. Pulse process until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Tip the mixture into a bowl and season with salt and pepper.
Add the chick pea flour and baking powder and stir well to combine. Then add the fizzy water a little at a time until you have a mixture that is soft, but that still holds its shape on a spoon. If it looks too wet add more chick pea flour a little at a time. Leave to stand.
Put the oil into a high sided frying pan to a depth of about 2cm and heat to smoking point.
Using your hands squeeze as much liquid as possible from the cucumber. Put into a bowl with the yogurt and herbs. Grate the clove of garlic into the mixture, season with salt and stir.
When the oil is smoking test fry a small amount of the fritter mixture by gently lowering half a teaspoonful into the oil. It should sizzle and float and brown rapidly. Turn it over to brown the other side, then remove from the oil with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen towel. Allow to cool a little before tasting, then adjust the seasoning if necessary.
Bring the oil back up to temperature, then take dessertspoonfuls of the mixture and gently lower them into the oil. Do not overcrowd them or they won’t develop a crisp exterior. I use a 22cm diameter, high sided skillet and cook three at a time. Fry for approximately a minute and a half each side until a deep, golden brown, turning them gently once. Remove from the oil with a slotted spoon allowing excess oil to drain back into the pan before moving them onto a small baking tray lined with absorbent kitchen paper. Put them into a warm oven while you cook the rest of the mixture.
Put three pythia on a plate for each guest, with a spoonful of tzatziki and a slice of lemon. Eat piping hot with a glass of something cold.
Recipe & photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 18 July 2020
A tsunami of soft fruit is about to break. The gooseberries are first and so this weekend I’ll be crouched on a milking stool in the cool shade of the blackcurrant bushes picking ‘Hinnomaki Green’. As I pick, the blackcurrants brushing my shoulders will be a constant reminder that soon there will be consecutive weekends of picking. We have three varieties, each with different fruiting times to extend the season and the harvest. Last year around this time I found our dear friend Sophie (AKA Champion Picker) among the bushes at daybreak on a post heatwave misty morning, picking and breakfasting in tandem. A whole bush stripped before coffee time is par for the course for Sophie. This year it will be down to me, Dan and the lucky birds.
The gooseberry ‘Hinnomaki Red’ take a little longer to reach maturity than the green, which is a relief, since a Kilner jar full of the remainder of last year’s harvest has been judging me silently from a shelf in the pantry for a while now. We always reach this point in the year when the approaching harvest starts to throw a very different light on the frozen ends of last year’s crop in the freezer. A quick stock take this week revealed two half carrier bags full of gooseberries (green) and blackcurrants respectively, a huge Tupperware full of redcurrants and damsons. Just enough to stew for a week of breakfasts, unlike last year’s June’s freezer clearance which resulted in a memorably messy and sticky summer’s day making damson ketchup, damson chutney, damson shrub and damson fruit leather, again with Sophie, and other willing helpers.
Now that the kitchen garden is beginning to produce in earnest we are really missing our regular weekend housefuls to help harvest, prepare and cook food from the garden together, then share it at a large and usually raucous table late into the evening.
The absence of visitors in this unusual year has also meant that I have found far less reason to make puddings in recent months. When we do end a meal with something sweet it is invariably with some variety of stewed fruit and a spoonful of yogurt, sometimes cream. However, with that jar of red gooseberries on my conscience, a quick pass through the kitchen garden revealed that the whitecurrant and tayberry were dripping with jewel-like fruit, and a summer pudding of this and last summer’s fruits started to materialise. Sweetened with some elderflower cordial made last week and using up the end of a stale loaf of bread that was consigned to the freezer for breadcrumbs several weeks ago and is now taking up valuable space. Space that will very soon be filled by a new generation of soft fruit.
INGREDIENTS
750g mixed soft fruit – raspberry, blackcurrant, strawberry, gooseberry, bayberry, loganberry, redcurrant, whitecurrant
3 tablespoons elderflower cordial
3 tablespoons light honey or caster sugar
A couple of heads of elderflowers
7 slices 1cm thick of slightly stale good white bread
METHOD
Put any fruit that needs cooking (blackcurrants and gooseberries) into a lidded pan on a very low heat with two tablespoons of water and the honey or sugar. Cook until they start to burst and release their juices. Remove the pan from the heat and add the rest of the fruit. Remove the elderflowers from their umbels by dragging the tines of a fork through them over the pan of stewed fruit. Stir, return the lid and leave to stand until cool.
Cut a circle from one slice of bread to fit the bottom of a 1 litre pudding basin. Cut all but two of the remaining slices of bread into triangles of the same height as the pudding basin and use to line the inside of the basin. Fill any gaps with smaller pieces of torn bread. Once the basin is lined pour all of the stewed fruit (reserving three tablespoons) into the cavity. Press down with the back of a metal spoon and smooth level. Cut the remaining slices of bread into as few pieces as possible to make a lid that fits on top of the stewed fruit.
Take a side plate the same diameter as the top of the basin and put it on top of the pudding. Then secure the plate well. I use extra strong elastic bands or well-tied string to exert pressure on the pudding, but you can weight the plate down with a heavy jar. Stand the pudding basin in dish to catch any juice and put in the fridge overnight or for a minimum of 4 hours. Put the reserved stewed fruit into a small pan with a couple of tablespoons of water and one of honey or sugar and bring to a simmer. Press through a sieve and reserve.
When ready to turn out slide a blunt knife between the pudding and the basin until it is loosened. Take a deep serving dish and invert it over the pudding basin. Holding the basin and plate tightly together with both hands invert the whole lot and shake gently but firmly. You should hear the pudding slip out of the basin and onto the plate with a satisfying slurp. Carefully lift off the basin. Pour over the reserved fruit sauce. Decorate with more fruit if you like and serve with cold pouring cream.
Recipe and photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 27 June 2020
We have now been at Hillside for six weeks during which time we have left the village just twice. Our daily lives have settled into a regular routine, which provides the reassurance of structure. The furthest we venture from the house each day is for two dog walks, one around the valley after breakfast and the other shorter one up the lane to our top fields after we finish work. Apart from our DPD delivery man (with whom we have rapidly become much more familiar) the only people we see regularly are our immediate neighbours.
Living in a tiny community the local support network kicked in very quickly here in mid-March. Josie and Rachel, sisters who live up the lane, are in their 80’s and have lived here almost all their lives and still live to the rhythm of an earlier time. When we first moved here they told us that our top fields used to be known as the ‘hospital fields’, since they were left ungrazed for the cows to be allowed in at certain times of year to self-medicate on wildflowers. When we first got a swarm of bees they arrived, unannounced and kitted up, to see if we wanted some help learning how to manage them, as they have been beekeepers for decades.
Each evening we meet them at the gate to the hospital fields as we return from our dog walk, where they feed the two beef cattle they raise each year in the neighbouring field. We have always stopped for a quick hello in the past, but there is now an enforced closeness and intimacy in our communications. Very quickly after lockdown we started talking chickens. The fenced orchard that abuts their garden is home to a large brood and their cockerel can be heard most mornings waking the upper reaches of the village. We had thought that now, unable to leave home, might be the time to get chickens of our own. While we still haven’t committed, we rely on our now weekly delivery of eggs from the ladies up the lane.
Now that we are smack in the middle of the hungry gap, everything in the vegetable garden is up for kitchen consideration and things that may once have been a passing fancy demand a treatment that will turn them into a real meal. The sorrel, which is in its prime right now, is sending out sheaves of squeaky green leaves that just invite harvest. Due to its reputation for sourness, and the fact that, like spinach, it cooks down to nothing (whilst also turning an unappetising shade of khaki) it is not the easiest of leaves to use. However, the sorrel custard filling of this tart both extends and carries the lemony flavour of the leaves beautifully, while also disguising the somewhat murky colour since, with the yellow of the eggs, it cooks to an attractive chartreuse. Since sorrel isn’t available to everyone it could be replaced by young spinach, de-stalked chard or wild foraged greens like wild sorrel and nettle. The addition of a tablespoon or two of lemon juice will add the requisite tang.
This recipe is essentially Richard Olney’s from Simple French Food. My only adjustments are the addition of a tablespoon of fine polenta to the pastry (I like the sandy crunch it brings to savoury pie crusts) and a little less double cream. However, more than that I would not be tempted to fiddle. The plain simplicity of this recipe is its secret, particularly in these times of renewed frugality. The alchemy and pleasure of turning straightforward pantry items and produce from the garden into something memorable and delicious.
Pastry
125g plain flour
125g unsalted butter, put into the freezer for 30 minutes
1 tablespoon fine polenta
A pinch of salt
5-6 tablespoons iced water
Filling
300g sorrel leaves, weight with stalks removed
2 medium onions, about 300g
60g butter
250ml double cream
3 eggs
Ground black pepper
Sea salt
First make the pastry. Put the flour into a medium sized mixing bowl and then grate the frozen butter into it. Using a sharp knife and fast cutting motions, cut the butter into the flour, until the mixture resembles sand. Add the salt and polenta and stir to combine.
Sprinkle the iced water over the flour and butter mixture two tablespoons at a time, and use the knife to incorporate it after each addition. Then when it looks as though it is damp enough, use the very tips of your fingers to quickly pull the dough together into a ball. Wrap tightly and put in the fridge for 1 hour.
While the dough is chilling boil the kettle and put the sorrel leaves into a large saucepan. Pour the boiling water over the sorrel and stir with a wooden spoon. The leaves will turn khaki. Drain immediately and thoroughly.
Gently heat half the butter in a smallish pan. Press the sorrel leaves against the side of the colander to remove as much water as possible, then stew in the melted butter over a low heat, stirring from time to time, until you have a puree with no surplus liquid. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
While the sorrel is cooking gently heat the other 30g butter in a smallish pan. Add the onion and saute over a very low heat, with the lid on, for about 30 minutes, or until they are very soft, translucent and completely uncoloured. Allow to cool to room temperature, then add to the sorrel. Heat the oven to 180°C.
Take the pastry from the fridge and roll out very quickly on a well floured surface into a circle 28-30cm in diameter. Carefully use to line a 23cm tart or cake tin. Prick the base with a fork several times. Line with baking parchment, fill with baking beans and bake blind for 15 minutes. Remove the beans and baking parchment and return to the oven for 5 minutes or until the pastry looks dry and lightly coloured. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Beat the eggs and cream together in a bowl. Season with pepper and salt. Add to the sorrel and onions and mix thoroughly. Pour the mixture into the pastry case and bake for 40-50 minutes until firm in the middle and lightly coloured.
Serve warm with a green salad.
Recipe and photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 24 April 2020
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