dandelion fritters – give these a try!

Inspired by out adventures with Fergus last week on our last trip to the allotment The Man and I were on the look out for anything edible that we had previously considered a weed! It’s been a real eye opener, and I feel I can justify my lazy attitude now, I’m just growing alternative crops, not encouraging weeds! We grow dandelions almost as well as we grow nettles, and at least they have the advantage of being pretty! Shallow? Me?

Pretty yes, and tasty too! Dandelion leaves are edible, we tasted them when we were out foraging,  they were too bitter for me, but I’d encourage you to try them and see. The flowers and stems are also edible. We ate the flower petals scattered over a salad, but Fergus also suggested a savoury tempura treatment and many web sites suggest adding honey or maple syrup which is where this idea came from.

First pick your flowers; legally you need permission from the land owner before you pick anything, as ours came from our allotment they are fair game. Also you need to be careful not to pick too close to roads, anywhere that has been sprayed with chemicals or peed on by dogs etc! Boring maybe, but I felt I should say it.  When picking, leave enough of the stem to act as a handle when cooking and eating, think of them as a floral lolly pop.

For the batter I used a drop scone batter; you will have some left over, but you can make pancakes the next day which is no bad thing.

Ingredients

As many dandelion flowers as you wish.

125 g self-raising flour, 2 tsp caster sugar, 1 egg beaten, 1 tbsp melted butter, 150 ml milk, 4 tbsp sunflower oil. Other batters will also work just as well.

Runny honey, maple syrup, golden syrup *sauce of your choice.

Dunk the blooms in the batter and shallow fry in hot oil until browned and crisp. Serve together, the stems will act as a handle. I think they look incredibly pretty too!

Dip in chosen sauce or syrup and enjoy!

You should experience a range of tastes and textures, sweet syrup, crispy batter, soft petals and then a slight bitter finish. The Man and I ate them up with relish and they are certainly and accessible and tasty way to begin experimenting with foraged food. Also, like the nettle pesto, I find a certain satisfaction in finding a use for something I’d otherwise consider a nuisance.

really wild food : foraging with Fergus Drennan

When society crumbles and supermarket shelves are bare, Fergus Drennan is going to be a very popular man! He used to supply restaurants with foraged foods and now runs foraging courses for small groups in the Kent countryside, he has experimented with living for a year on foraged food and has written widely on the subject, so really knows his stuff.

The Man booked us a day’s foraging course for my birthday last year but we waited for longer days and for things to really start growing. I was really looking forward to it, but I didn’t realise quite how much fun we would have, how much I would learn and what great food we would be eating. At 9am sharp a group of us assembled outside The Goods Shed in Canterbury, then just after 9 Fergus screeched into the car park, apologising for being late, but he had spotted some St Georges Mushrooms and he wanted to pick them for our dinner; you can’t really argue with that! We bundled into Fergus’s car and hurtled off to the first destination, behind an un remarkable suburban cul-de-sac for some river bank foraging.

Fergus was an incredibly enthusiastic teacher, covering the basics of foraging before leading us off, stopping every 30 seconds or so to point out edible morsels or cautioning about what to avoid. The hogweed above was gorgeous (asparagusy) fried with butter, lemon and pepper but the sap can cause burns if it gets on you skin before cooking so you need to be careful! River bank forage complete we were whisked off to the woods to learn how to turn these,

into this;

a chocolate coated, sloe gin infused wood ear mushrooms (incredibly sweet and tasty actually)!

As time went on Fergus was worrying that we were running late and it felt like he was having to force himself to move on the next area. After a quick stop to pick up so super hot Dittander leaves we headed back to his parents house at about 3.30 to make lunch. By this point I was so hungry I could have eaten the cat, but we quickly rustled up a three course lunch of some of the prettiest, most unusual food I’ve ever eaten; most of which I had helped gather that morning.

wild leaf soup with added nettles.

mixed wild leaf salad with feta and radish mushrooms

wild mushroom tart with rye and acorn flour

vanilla panna cotta with carageen, wood avon root flavoured apple and blackberry star

I think we all felt a little guilty leaving so much washing up behind but Fergus was in Mad Hatter “I’m late” mode, he assured us it would be fine, and we still had vodka to infuse, dinner to cook and a whole seashore to explore, so we had better get a move on! Off to the sea-side we went, again at high-speed, Fergus’s eyes always scanning the hedgerows. We picked gorse flowers to infuse vodka, fun but painfully prickly!

Afterwards we moved on to learn about Alexanders ( herbal, celery ish), Sea Beet (salty spinach), salt made from Sea Purslane and the many types of edible seaweed. Always having an eye for a high value item I was thrilled to find a native oyster.

Less impressed to have to leave it, but it was the only one so it wouldn’t have been fair really. Dinner felt like it was the thing we had been building towards for most of the day, although lunch was so huge we thought we might struggle fortunately we all found room. As the light was fading we built fires on the beach, adding to the prehistoric hunter gatherer feel, there is something very ulifting about preparing and cooking a meal together.

We deep-fried seaweed (and nearly Fergus too), it was so much tastier than anything I have ordered from a takeaway, lots of umami and a dash of iodine!

That was just a taster for the main event; sea bass (not foraged) with wild fennel wrapped in laver seaweed, nutty burdock roots and those lovely St Georges mushrooms fried with Alexander stems.

It was very tasty, I think almost anything cooked on a fire has a head start, but the flavours were incredibly clean and contemporary tasting. For pudding we knocked up a crumble from Japanese Knot Weed, (a hideously invasive plant which could see you have your mortgage refused if it’s growing in your garden); but which tastes very similar to rhubarb without the very sharp tang. It was lovely, and exceeded my expectations but to be honest I think we were all struggling to fit anymore food in by this point.

We both finished the day exhausted, with heads too full of information to remember any of it and immensely grateful to Fergus for dropping us back at our hotel. The whole day was a full on, slightly mad cap immersion in foraging that has given us both a different perspective on food. A brilliant birthday present and an experience I’d definitely recommend.

spring pavlova

I’ve always admired pavlovas as a pudding, they look gorgeous, huge billowy meringues, topped with lashings of cream and fruit, but have always been scared of making meringue myself. However, having been inspired by the brilliant Supper Club by Kerstin Rodgers’ and been asked to bring a pudding to a friends barbecue I decided to have a go.

I will confess now I didn’t make the meringue from scratch I used a packet of Pavlova Magic that had been kicking around in our cupboards for ages. In hindsight next time I will just make pavlova from scratch, given the time it takes to whisk everything together I wasn’t convinced it saved that much time or that the results were that much better (not that it was bad). I started cooking quite late so left the meringue to cool in the oven over night and topped it the following day with a carton of double cream whipped until firm and topped with mixed berries, our own stewed rhubarb, and Sea Salted Caramel from Supper Club.

It went down really well, but pavlova usually looks beautiful, and it tasted pretty good too. There was a bit too much soft meringue in the middle for my taste, but that doesn’t mean I had any problem eating a lot of it. Next time though I promise I will fight my fear and actually make one from scratch! Honest.

up cycled olives

This recipe can be used to jazz up cheap olives into something party worthy with minimum effort. I used to hate olives when I was younger and then developed a taste for them almost overnight. However, like my cheese habit, my love of olives can be a costly one. Recently I was asked to bring olives as nibbles to a party but wasn’t sure how may people were going to be there so I thought I’d have a shot a marinating my own. Starting with cheap olives and adding herbs and flavours to disguise their true origin.

Ingredients

1 jar of green olives & 1 jar of black olives from a well-known budget supermarket.

1 clove garlic finely chopped

1 sprig of rosemary and same of thyme finely chopped

1 tsp crushed

1 red chilli finely chopped

zest of 1 lemon in strips of finely grated.

Olive oil to cover

Method

Drain the olives and place in a large tub or jar, chop garlic, herbs and chilli and crush fennel seeds with a pestle and mortar and the back of a spoon. Add to the olives. Cover with olive oil and leave in the fridge to infuse for at least 48 hours. If the oil still covers the olives these could be kept in the fridge for a few weeks if needed, or feed a lot of people in one go. These olives are especially good with a little lemon juice squeezed over them, and the oil can be kept and used as a dressing or in other dishes.

gardener’s revenge – nettle pesto

I one thing we have always grown really well on the allotment are nettles! It really isn’t intentional, but we seem to grow a super strength variety. One caught me today, stinging me through a glove and I spent a good five minutes, nearly crying, trying to find a doc leaf to rub on the sting. It still hurts now 3 hours later; they really are weapons grade nettles!

I made loads of this, some to freeze and some to eat straight away.

125g blanched nettles ( about 1/4 carrier bag)

2 garlic cloves chopped

50g pine nuts

60g grated parmesan ( or other hard cheese)

80 ml extra olive oil

1tbsp lemon juice.

First blanche the nettles in boiling water to de sting them. Drain the nettles, and leave to cool. When cold, combine with other ingredients and blend until smooth. This recipe makes a very thick pesto, so you can add more oil as you wish but it is easier to get into ice-cube trays ( my prefered method of freezing) and add more oil or other ingredients when you come to use it.

To be honest I didn’t detect a particularly nettley taste, the cheese and garlic take centre stage, but it is a fantastic green colour; and knowing I had made something tasty out something that pains me on a regular basis made it all the tastier!

Disclaimer. Wear gloves when picking nettles. Only pick from an area you know has not been sprayed with weed killer or other nasties. Just the top leaves will do, please pick responsibly! Remember to rinse the nettles before cooking to remove any bugs, grit, etc.

happy friday

The rest of the world seemed to be in one beer garden or another as I cycled to the allotment, but it has been a lovely day and gorgeous evening. The pear and apple blossom is out on the allotment and looks beautiful.

This is our dwarf pear tree, we have had it for over two years and haven’t had a single pear ripen on it, they fall off or the birds eat them; but it’s impossible not to feel positive on an evening like this!

experimental food society

A bit of a diversion from the usual theme of the blog, last week The Man and I went along to a The Past and Future of Food and Experimentation an interactive talk at the V&A by The Experimental Food Society. The evening combined a talk on the past of food experimentation by the chef Simon Smith and the food historian Professor Roland Rotherham who took the audience for a swift canter through the history of British food and it’s influences; they certainly make an entertaining double act. The recipes such as Columella Salad and Hen with Capers were tasty and very modern in flavour. The only real exception were the pork and marzipan balls, which I thought was a meat and sweet combination too far; but that might just be personal preference.

Next up was Dr Morgaine Gaye, Food Futurologist (what an amazing job title), looking at 15 food trends for the next 12 to 18 months.  Whilst I’m not sure many people will be growing meat in tanks at home that soon; but do watch out for South American foods,  expect to eat less meat and more insects, bacon in many forms and watch out for packaging which plays on your sense of smell to name a few! The Man was most excited by 3D food printing and I’m off to make some alfajores (trend number 12).

The event was fun, interesting and a great way to spend an evening, with drinks and canapes afterwards in the gallery giving a chance to talk in more depth to the speakers and appreciate being in the museum after hours. Have we had a glimpse into the future? We’ll have to wait and see.

geitost round two

This is only a partly formed recipe, no measurements as yet, but I wanted to post it as a thank you to Johannes who encouraged me to give geitost another chance.  You can read the discussion here but is seems I underestimated its uses. As we had a lot of the ingredients Johannes mentioned and a lot of cheese left I had a go at putting something together.

I part cooked some venison sausages in a frying pan them put in the oven to continue cooking and then in the same pan gently cooked some mushrooms. When these were part cooked I de glazed the pan with stock, (but white wine or cider would also work really well) and allowed everything to simmer of a bit (not very specific I know) until the sausages were cooked. Just before serving I stirred in the grated cheese, some spinach, cooked squash (I’d had to defrost the freezer earlier in the day) and a tablespoon of creme fraiche.

As well as being a massive amount of food for two people, (probably because I busked the recipe), it was incredibly tasty. The sweetness of the cheese worked with the sweetness of the squash and whilst the sauce did have a lactic tang it didn’t seem out-of-place and if anything it helped cut through the richness of the sausages. The mushrooms and stock also added a deeply savoury flavour and a good punch of umami along with the cheese. It was very filling, a real winter warmer, and really I don’t think it needed the squash, but it needed using up and next time I will pay more attention to the quantity I’m making, but it was a pretty impressive result for something I had written off as not for me. Thanks Johannes!