Fern Verrow - A year of recipes from a farm and its kitchen

Fern Verrow - A year of recipes
from a farm and its kitchen

Let me say from the outset that I know the authors of this book, in as much as I've bought produce grown on their farm ever since they started to load up a van and bring it down to London for sale most Saturdays.  Last Saturday they slipped some copies of the book on the back of the van so I was able to buy a copy a few days before publication date.  I grow some of my own fruit and veg so I know a little bit about where this book is coming from. I'm an enthusiast, but that's not the reason I found this book difficult to put down.   The Fern Verrow land is farmed  biodynamically, but this is not a book only for those of us who embrace the methods of Rudolf Steiner.  If you care about how your food is grown and how it's cooked you'll love how this book draws you in with its rhythmic prose and page after page of recipes for simple seasonal food that honours the ingredients.  This is food that you really want to eat.

'Verrow' comes from an old French term for a split in the land around which water flows.  It describes perfectly the lie-of-the-land on the Herefordshire border with Wales in which the farm, Fern Verrow, sits.  Lindsay Sekulowicz's hand-drawn map at the front of the book gives the reader a wonderful orientation to the land being described.  Here is the acreage where Jane Scotter and Harry Astley raised a family while turning the land into the farm of their dreams.  Here, in one of the most unspoiled areas of England, they have laboured long and hard, learning "to adapt and to live with the rhythms and cycles of the year" working in "partnership" with the land.  This book concentrates on how they work and cook from "the engine room of the farm", the kitchen, where every day starts and ends and where they always find time for cooking.  Many books of recipes claim to be 'seasonal'.  The writers of this book know the true meaning of the word.  In their words, this book "is a place to pass on our recipes, as well as the understanding of food and its cultivation that we have developed over the years.  It is a celebration of what nature provides.  It encourages imagination and consideration in the kitchen, and the pleasures of cooking well, with an appreciation of the different vegetables, fruit and meat as they arrive at our tables throughout the course of the year."

Fern Verrow, the book, like the farm is tied to the 4 seasons, here represented by the classical elements of Earth - Winter, where everything starts, from the ground up; Water - Spring, bringing the sprouting of life; Air - Summer, light and flowering; and Fire -Autumn, fruiting and transformation.  The book gives you insights into 'Working with the soil' "our most valuable resource"; 'Working with the sun', which dictates the pattern of the day; 'Working with the moon', whose effects on water and tides and on reproductive cycles is well known, and 'Building fertility' of the soil.  There's just enough about biodynamics to spark your interest, and there's a Further Reading section at the back if you want to know more.

Fern Verrow
Working with the soil

Winter, for Jane and Harry is a time to think and plan for the coming twelve months.  Recipes for this time include Braised chicory and bacon enriched with double cream, Beef stew with parsley dumplings, to make the most of what is around and counter the season's icy blasts.  There's Apple and lemon crumble, Carrot and almond cake and Parsnip and hazelnut oat biscuits.  Spring brings birdsong, light and colour, along with new life in the greenhouse, the barn, the fields and the woodlands.  For those of us who grow it also brings the 'hungry gap' when winter brassicas have gone to seed and 'spring' veg is slow to get going.  But there are herbs, foraged leaves and flowers. There's wild garlic, dandelion, Jack-by-the-hedge and buttercup - heat and pungency, needing only a simple dressing to make a bowlful sing.  Here are recipes for Lovage and potato soup, Spring fritters with wild garlic mayonnaise, Herb butters and Rhubarb puddings.  For later in Spring there's Fried duck egg with asparagus, sage and parmesan and then Elderflower cake.

Early Summer on the farm brings cultivated salad leaves and the first of the soft fruit in the form of gooseberries.  These are swiftly followed by currants, strawberries, raspberries, jostaberries and more.  The bees are busy and the farm is looking its best.  Weather becomes an obsession - too hot, too wet, too something - and can make for testing times.  The table is laid with Fresh pea and mint soup, Barbecued chicken with sweetcorn and lime leaf relish, a Blackcurrant pie or a spectacular Summer fruit trifle.  Come Autumn outward growth slows and activities turn more often to preserving late berries, plums, apples, pears and quince.  Then the kitchen table bears Borlotti bean, chorizo and tomato stew, Red Florence onion Tatin, and Braised rabbit with juniper berries. Desserts are fragrant Quince and ginger upside-down cake and Steamed greengage pudding.

And, all too soon, the twelve month cycle is over.

"Our relationship with the farm continues to feed us, 

the work never ceases, our lives are played out on this plot of land".  

... "The gifts of the year have come full circle, 

transforming the  past into the seeds of the future".  

Jane Scotter and Harry Astley

The book benefits hugely from the stunning photography of Tessa Traeger.  But, most of all, it's the pictures painted by the prose that stay with you.  I found the book difficult to put down.  Some of us paddle around the edges of biodynamics, never fully getting our feet wet - it's not for the faint-hearted.  A few hard working people, like Jane Scotter and Harry Astley, live the life.  Caution -  reading this book may make you want to go in search of your own acreage.

As is my way with book reviews, I had to try at least one recipe.  It had to be seasonal, of course, and, having pulled some sticks of rhubarb this morning, I chose Rhubarb and custard fool.  Silky, creamy custard and sweet/tart fruit.  Ringing the changes with a little fresh ginger root or orange zest is suggested.  I added a little rosewater to the rhubarb at the end of cooking.  A perfect Spring recipe.  If you want to see it beautifully styled and photographed, go to page 124.  Meanwhile, here's a serving:

Rhubarb and custard fool
from a recipe in
Fern Verrow - A year of recipes from a farm and its kitchen

Fern Verrow - A year of recipes from a farm and its kitchen by Jane Scotter and Harry Astley
First published by Quadrille 21 May 2015

Brawn for lunch (or dinner)

A glass of VdF "Moussamoussettes" Dne Moshe
at Brawn

Everyone knows Columbia Road for its Sunday morning flower market where traders line the Road specialising in bulbs, herbs, cut flowers or potted plants.  It's quite a sight but if you suffer from claustrophobia, get there early or you'll find yourself shuffling along toe to heel with what feels like half of London.  There are some good individual shops on the Road, though many of them are only open from late in the week to catch the busy weekend trade.  This means, early in the week, Columbia Road is quiet and leafy and, well, a bit of a haven of peace really.  The draw at this time is lunch or dinner at Brawn.

Torta Fritta, Parma Ham
at Brawn

Occupying a corner site in what was a wood-turning workshop, it's a lovely light-filled space furnished with reclaimed tables and chairs.  Brawn opened not long before I wrote about it here in early 2011.  The restaurant garnered a host of positive reviews then quietly got on with its job as the perfect neighbourhood restaurant in a largely residential area of Bethnal Green.  Being part of the much admired 'Terroirs' small group of restaurants, the food and wine at Brawn were, reliably good.  So, why am I writing about it again now?  Because in this notable restaurant things just went up a few notches.  A re-think amongst the original owners of the Group has resulted in chef/owner, Ed Wilson, splitting off Brawn and taking over in the kitchen.  Those of us who loved the Green Man and French Horn on St Martin's Lane knew Ed Wilson's skill.  We briefly mourned the closure of the Green Man  earlier this year in the restructuring of the Terroirs Group. Now we are re-acquainted with Ed's skills.

Raw Scallop, Celery & Bottarga
at Brawn

Lunch on a perfect Spring day this week began with glasses of gently fizzed, palest Loire rosé VdF "Moussamoussettes" Dne Moshe.  A plate of Torta Fritta with Parma Ham was the perfect appetite stimulator.  The literal translation of 'fried cake' is not particularly helpful.  Think, at least in this case, featherlight crispy dough pillows draped with slices of the very best Parma ham.  A starter of Salt Cod Salad "Esquiexada", the classic Catalan dish, was here executed with seasonal Marinda tomatoes, sweet Tropea onions and small purple olives, possibly Andalucian coquilles nicoises.  The cod was salted in-house and made for a juicy and aromatic plateful. Raw Scallop, Celery and Bottarga, came in a shallow pool of fish broth made from the scallop skirt and dressed with good olive oil.  A perfect balance of sweet seafood and bitter celery leaf and olive oil, it tasted of the sea and had us fighting for the last morsel.

Black Pudding, Squid & Erbette
at Brawn

When we thought it couldn't get any better, out came Black Pudding, Squid & Erbette.  'Surf n Turf' is really not my thing but I would have happily eaten all of this.  Soft, sweet blood cake, tender cephalopod and earthy leaf-beet, the whole simply dressed with a vinaigrette.  A glass of Saumur Champigny Piak from Bobinet was suggested and was a good match.  My perfectly cooked fillet of Turbot came with sweet, fat mussels and a helping of still crunchy Monk's Beard in a clear fish broth along with the suggested well-judged glass of mineral Soave.  

Turbot, Monk's Beard & Mussels
at Brawn

We really didn't need it but managed to share a portion of Dark Chocolate, Olive Oil, Sea Salt & Orange.  As top-notch as it looks.  Expect to pay £40 per head including a couple of glasses of wine and service.

Dark Chocolate, Olive Oil, Sea Salt & Orange
at Brawn

Brawn is a relaxing kind of place.  The staff know their stuff and you can expect a genuinely warm welcome.  The food and drink are seriously good and the restaurant draws on some of the best suppliers in London.  Cooking is seasonal and, as they put it themselves, "The food is honest and simple with a respect for tradition".  Most of the wines are natural, sourced from small growers who work sustainably, organically or bio-dynamically.  There are a few seats at the small bar if you only want to pop in for a drink and a small plate.

If you do want to brave Columbia Road flower market and its surrounding shops on a Sunday and combine it with lunch at Brawn, the restaurant offers Sunday lunch for £28 a head, but you'd probably be well-advised to book.

Brawn
49 Columbia Road
Bethnal Green
London E2 7RG

Taking the sting out of Nettles

Urtica dioica - common nettle

The nettle spread from Eurasia and now it's a weed common throughout the Northern hemisphere.  But, as Jane Grigson observed, nettles are "not to be despised, especially at a season of the year when greenery is scarce".  Revered by today's foragers, nettles have long been considered of value to "purify the blood" when eaten in April-May.  Nettles are stocked with a cocktail of irritant chemicals, including histamine.  Their tiny hairs act as effective needles to deliver a sting to unprotected flesh.

Grigson suggests topping a slice of fried bread with nettles and a poached egg or egg mollet, or pairing them with brains and a creamy sauce.  Her suggestion of a take on that comforting dish, Champ, certainly appeals as does her nettle soup and nettle broth.  If you exclude early season European imports, right now "greenery" is still scarce in the UK. Broccoli, the last of Spring's greens, is now rapidly going to flower, spinach and chard are hardly getting going and asparagus has all but come to a stop in the return to cool weather.  I can see why the earthy mineral, quality of nettles was so valued.  Last week I harvested the remainder of my sprouting broccoli, pulled some spectacular rhubarb and then looked around for what else was available.  The strawberry patch was being over-run by a thick carpet of nettles so the answer was clear.  A bag of weeds it was.  Somewhere in the depths of my memory I remembered a recommendation to take only the top 6 leaves of the plant and these were duly, and respectfully, plucked with gloved hands.

In Honey from a Weed, Patience Gray mentions the Southern Italian taste for nettles in a dish of Pasta colle Ortiche, though it's a recipe for Nettle Soup she chose to share.  Soup is an excellent way to harness all the goodness this "weed" has to offer.  It's good plainly served, just thickened with potato, or enriched with a little cream.  The addition of a salty contrast of bacon or meaty snail is a good idea for the carnivore.

Arriving home, top of my agenda was the need to preserve the plant before it lost all rigour, so I decided on a nettle butter. This way I could buy some time to decide on a recipe.  Half the resultant verdant butter went into the fridge and the other half in the freezer.   With all of these influences floating around in my head and with little time, I decided on a pairing of potato, egg and nettle butter and created a lunch dish that worked a treat.

Baked potato, nettle butter, poached egg

Baked Potato with Nettle Butter & Poached Egg
(Serves 4)

110g (4oz) unsalted butter, softened
2 good (gloved!) handfuls of nettle tops
4 eggs
2 large (or 4 small) baking potatoes
A little olive oil
Salt and pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 180C (fan 160C)/Gas mark 4.
Wash the nettles carefully.  Cook in a covered pan with a splash of water and a pinch of salt for 2 minutes.  Drain the blanched leaves, squeeze out excess water, dry well on kitchen paper and chop roughly.  Mix the chopped nettles into the softened butter.  Turn out onto greaseproof paper and roll the nettle butter into a sausage.  Keep in the fridge until ready to use (or freeze it for another day).
Rub the potatoes with a little olive oil and salt and bake in the oven for about 45-60 minutes.
Poach the eggs and whilst they are cooking, split the potatoes and spread with the nettle butter before topping with the eggs

Nettle butter

Getting a little more up-to-date, and rather more refined, Giorgio Locatelli in his doorstop of a book, Made in Italy, offers a Risotto alle Ortiche.  In One, Florence Knight favours a Nettle Gnudi, describing Gnudi as a "stripped-back gnocchi".  Both recipes will definitely be getting an outing in this house soon.  I never thought I'd be looking forward to harvesting nettles from the allotment.