The Good King

Good King Henry is an ancient herb apparently used by man since neolithic times. It's supposed to have been brought to northern Europe by the Romans as part of their essentials but similar plants like fat hen must have been present already and used as part of the general foraging of greens for man and beast.

And to first taste it's not terribly enticing. If you follow the link above you'll see my early attempts with it as a crop plant weren't overly successful. It lacks much in the way of distinctive flavour but makes up for it by being really rather bitter. However, over time I've come to love it, and I mean love it because there are moments when I crave nothing else...

One of of those moments came today. I picked a big bunch and went to work on Good King Henry with Bean and Tomatoes.

1 bunch of Good King Henry (or if you don't have any Callaloo (amaranth greens), mature spinach leaves or chard will make a good substitute).
1 medium onion, chopped
2 tomatoes, diced
a small handful of french bean pods, topped, tailed and chopped into short lengths
Rice miso to taste, dissolved in a little warm water to make mixing in easier.

Wash your greens, a lot of pollen will come off the flowers. Chop roughly into bite size pieces removing any really tough stems and blanch in boiling water for five minutes. Drain. If you're really worried about bitterness you can repeat this step or omit it altogether for sweeter options like spinach or chard.

Fry the onion until just beginning to brown. Add the blanched greens, the chopped beans and tomatoes with just enough water to come about half way up the panful. Simmer for 15 minutes until the beans are cooked through, then add the miso. Stir around, turn off the heat and leave for five minutes to combine the flavours. Add pepper if liked.

Serve with your favourite grain. I wanted plain bulgar but ended up with a quinoa mix because it was all there was but any simple grain like barley or brown rice would be fine.

If you find it too bitter salt and lemon will help a lot, but don't overdo it, learn to love the hardship.

The Dark Side

My guests have left. In the end catering went its usual uncontrolled way and I just cooked what I felt like when the mood took me. We had Jacket Potatoes, although with French Haricot Blancs in Sauce Tomate, a quiche, a spinach lasagne that I have yet to document here (I think!) although it's quite a family favourite, several bean stews; some with dumplings, burgers and oven chips, a curry with chapatis, the Volcano cottage pie mentioned previously, pizza and so on.

What we didn't have was any pasta or rice, well, so little rice as to make no difference, a little with the curry and I rebelled one day and made a risotto, just for me, because one of the visitor's preferences precluded it. He wasn't all that keen on pastry either although he didn't seem to mind the flat pasta hidden in the lasagne, it appears it's just the shapes that put him off.

So tonight I cleared out the fridge of various dodgy leftovers, half a cube of soft silken tofu, a few tablespoons of passata, a handful of almond stuffed olives and some tinned sweetcorn and made a pasta sauce to be served with the twisty macaronis shown above. And it was alright, in fact, the texture of the soft tofu scramble was rather good I thought and with a little more refinement in the flavourings has some potential for a more classy dish at a later time. A few more leftovers to shift and cooking will resume a more pure approach.

See you soon.

Un Volcan

It's been harder than I expected to have guests and keep up with the blogs. I feel strangely shy about making everyone wait for five, ten, fifteen minutes while I take the pictures - it sort of reminds me of making visitors say grace when they weren't expecting to.

Also, with hungry workers to feed and less time to cook I've been avoiding the innovative in favour of the tried and true so not a lot to report really.

Still, this was a small and easy success. A cottage pie made with courgettes, tomatoes and herbes de Provence topped off with potato and celeriac mash. Tasty and filling.

The Wider World

Although I'm ensconced here in Normandy, seeing no one and for the moment without even any transport to bring me to civilisation there was a general election in the UK yesterday. Food and politics don't really mix but I am disappointed that the results have turned out as they have - it was perhaps obvious that things would go as they did, particularly to anyone who has seen it all before as I have (yes, I'm that old) but I really hoped there would be a chance for real change.

Anyway, as part of my preparations for a week of living from stores I made a huge batch of Leek and Potato Soup and froze most of it to make my lunches over the week. Actually I haven't eaten that much of it but plan to use it up in curries and casseroles within the next month or so as with fingers crossed I'm anticipating the arrival of my car on Saturday.

To sustain me through the long night of election results watching I roasted a batch or pumpkin and cauliflower pieces, first served with a salad and then as company to home made sour dough rolls with yeast pate on them.

Comfort

Odd, isn't it, how often comfort food is associated with the sort of thing that is despised as junk food, empty calories, something to feel ashamed of.

A disturbed night and some emotional upheavals left me feeling in need of some easy consolation. Luckily in the house, a ready made soya burger and some potatoes.

It looks far worse than it is. The soya burger, from the Sojasun range, contains only 132 calories and 17g protein, the chips were oven cooked and had only a couple of teaspoons of extra virgin olive oil to sear their golden sides. The rather dubious sauce (which comes with the burgers) could easily have been left out and the tomato and gherkin garnish completely unobjectionable, healthy even.

I cooked some sourdough buns to go with the burger but they weren't ready in time, so they are saved for tea.

Better cooking tomorrow I hope.

For Starters

Yes, it's that time of year again. We have moved me to France, cats are installed on the bed, a few days of acclimatisation have passed and the Stripey male has taken the boat home. So naturally, on this rather cold and lonely first day by myself here comes the Savoury Rice.

It really is cold, I've been wearing a thick coat all day, indoors and out but the slow start to the growing season here means I can redeem this unwholesome and predictable initial meal for myself by some foraging for a handful of hop shoots to enliven the mix. Still to come on the forager's calendar nettles, hog weed and sorrel, but they are for another day.

Must get on and do that meal plan for next week.

Bite Sized Chunks of Deliciousness

And here I am again!

I'm back to France again tomorrow and looking forward to resuming blogging after a rather disorganised month for eating where it seems almost no pictures of food were taken at all.

These next couple of months will be different - I have house guests at the farm and I've promised them regular meals. It may even be necessary to have a plan. Still, the discipline will be good for me and with luck there will be plenty of feedback to report too.

A blog management note, I'm still receiving spamming comments from that porn site so I've had to turn on comment moderation. I really wish this wasn't necessary but that sort of thing must be stopped. I hope it won't stop you commenting if you'd like to, I will try to make sure that comments from real people, no matter what they say, will get published ASAP.

à bientôt

Happy St.Patricks Day

A picture of some green food

I didn't make anything special today to celebrate, too busy gardening in this most welcome spring weather but if you're not completely bored with good Irish food get yourself over to The Daily Spud's Paddy's Parade and marvel at the efforts of others. Great fun, a few vegan offerings, plenty of inspiration for things to veganise and not a green cupcake in sight.

The Noble Potato - part 4

Traditional Boiled Boxty



We used to have a house in Co. Cavan, Ireland, and although traditional Irish food is not usually particularly vegan friendly, we were very fond of the ready made Boxty in the local supermarket. Just a simple potato and flour pancake sold ready to fry, so when I started this series of potato related posts it was one of the first things I thought to include. I was a bit surprised whilst doing the research to discover that the form of Boxty we'd been eating, and indeed making was in fact more of a Scottish recipe than a truly traditional Irish one.

However I was pleased to discover that a more ancient and authentic sounding recipe was available here. And because The Daily Spud is having a St. Patrick's day parade this seemed like the ideal moment to make it and submit it for the show. Of course, it's described as a Hallowe'en recipe and not vegan by nature but what the hell, it's not traditional to eat virulently green cupcakes in Ireland on St. Patrick's day either and at least this is the right culinary background.



Everything seemed to be going rather well. I used some nice floury potatoes, my mash was to die for, the grated spuds were well squeezed and the dough came together with ease. It was even easy to roll out and make the little cakes, with the help of a sharp pastry cutter. I can't see how the lip of a mug would ever cut through raw grated potato even if it was recommended by the Belcoo and District Historical Centre

My boxty cakes, and there were 30 of them, although I didn't try to cook them all at once, rose to the surface of the simmering pot like little clouds and jostled for prime position in the seething waters. It was poetry to behold.



I gently lifted them out and set them to drain on a clean tea towel. They seemed a bit slimy but my heart was still high. All I had to do was split them horizontally and fry them, ready to serve with the BBQ tempeh and mushrooms prepared for our dinner. A sort of full Irish breakfast at supper time.

Such foolish optimism. Split they would not, slice they did not. I quickly rewrote the entry in my head. Make them thinner I was going to say, because cutting's not an option... (update at the end of the recipe!)



So, as you do, I fried them whole. Now, can anything fail to be improved by the addition of hot fat? I can't say these were worse for the event but the end result was by no means improved. From slimy to lightly crisped outsides the internal texture still resembled so much slightly decomposing papier maché, with a gluey and translucent appearance, rather like my oft repeated failures with Swiss Rosti. But these had been boiled for 35 minutes, they couldn't be undercooked.

With the aid of a sharp knife I did manage to divide a couple into untidy slices. Fried, they were just like their thicker brothers but thinner. Not a chance of plucking success from disaster there.

Still, doused in enough ketchup humans can make a meal of almost anything, yes gentle reader, we ate those Boxty cakes and were glad of them, but I really don't know what I'm going to do with the other 24.



1.5 kg peeled potatoes
750g plain flour + some for rolling out
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda

Put half the potatoes on to boil and then when soft, mash or put through a potato ricer.

Grate the other half of the potatoes, squeeze well to remove all the moisture (I wrung mine out in a teatowel)

Mix the mash, grated raw potato, salt, soda and flour well in a big bowl, adding just enough non-dairy milk to bring it all together in a soft dough.

Roll out portions to a thickness, well, I made mine about 1cm thick, perhaps a little thicker would be easier to divide or you could make them about 30mm thick and not bother with the splitting part.

Cut the dough into small cakes about 8-10cm across. A pastry cutter is best but you can use a mug or glass if you don't have a suitable one.

Have a large pan of boiling water ready and drop your cakes into it, one at a time. You can put in about as many as will cover the surface of the water, that was 10 or so in my big 10 litre pot. After a few minutes the cakes will rise to the surface. Allow to simmer for about 35 minutes, occasionally pushing them down to turn them in the water. If you let the water stop boiling they will sink and become (even more) soggy.

Lift them out and allow to drain and cool a bit. Slice them if you can (and need to) then fry in oil, marg or butter until golden. Serve with something well flavoured.

UPDATE - they can be cut but only after they are completely cold and all the surface moisture has dried. I recommend storing them uncovered in a fridge overnight, it seems to improve them substantially but don't whatever you do leave them on paper kitchen towels for any length of time because you'll never separate them later.

Day 28 - They think it's all over

A close encounter with Mushroom Risotto

And the final day was reached, and I broke a filling and so we ended up with soft food.

I could tell you how to make this, but then I'd have to kill you because it's a very special recipe that only the Mr. cooks. He brought it with him from the Planet Zarg when he joined us from that distant world many years ago and it's dead good. Maybe you'll get lucky and be invited round for dinner one day.

What did we make of our 28 (ish) days of healthy living? It was pretty easy and some of the stuff we tried, smaller portions, less salt, reduced (but not absent) alcohol seem like good ideas that we could keep up with. But I have to admit the first things I made when the time was up were Onion Bhajis and tonight we had roast veg with plenty of oil. Still, everything in moderation and when the first excitement is over I'm sure it'll get back to normal around here.

And the blog - it's been like doing that Month of Posting thing that I see others doing every year or so. A fun challenge but ultimately draining. It's going to be a bit quieter for a while now, but if anything really good pops up you'll hear about it here and first!