Autumn harvest of beans and walnuts

Wet Walnuts

Working the ground last autumn left me in no doubt that squirrels were using the badly neglected plot as a winter larder. Empty walnut shells lay scattered across the ground, crunching underfoot at almost every step.  We'd agreed to take on a nettle patch along with our existing plot.  Our heads were filled with plans for roses with scents of musk, anise-like myrrh, sherbet lemon and strong classic old rose fragrances of blackberry and damson plum.  Huge-headed peonies and fragrant, colourful sweetpea arches would feature too.  But first there were giant nettle roots to be chased, ubiquitous plastic bottles to be unearthed and ground to be levelled.

The source of the nuts, I had concluded, lay 100m metres away in one of the private gardens surrounding the allotments.  Dull green globes littered the path where its branches pierced the boundary.  I too squirrelled some away.  Back home, paring away the soft outer jacket exposed the hard brown pockmarked casing.  A nutcracker revealed the almost pliable, sweet, milky 'wet' nut within.  Be warned, that soft green jacket turns a hand-staining brown as you work - in the past this quality was harnessed for making both dye and ink - so rubber gloves are essential.  Wait long enough before harvesting and nature will peel back the green husk for you but the well-guarded kernel will be dryer and less sweet.

This autumn I took an unorthodox route onto the allotments.  There on the boundary, a mere 50 metres from my now flowering plot, I found an even more covetable walnut tree.  Small, it's true, but its boughs hung heavy with green-husked bounty, almost skimming the tall grass.  Far easier to harvest.  The squirrels and I are feasting.  Nature untended has faired better than my nurtured plot this year.  Bringing anything to the point of edibility has been challenging but right now, in this mildest of autumns, I am harvesting beans.  Borlotti and Scarlet Runners were peaking on my plot only 2 days ago.  Cropping of beans has coincided with finding a particularly delicious, nutty Ossau-Iraty, a hard sheep's milk cheese from the Pyrénées.  It was a visit to Brawn restaurant on London's Colombia Road (one of my favourite restaurants anywhere) where I ate a simple-sounding dish of fresh green and yellow French beans, dressed with a shallot vinaigrette, with sweet wet walnuts and thin shards of Ossau-Iraty.

So when I harvested Runner Beans a few days later, it was obvious what I should do with them.  No, the dish doesn't taste exactly the same, but here is my rip-off version of Brawn's beautiful dish using what I had.  Ossau-Iraty isn't essential to the recipe, a hard ewe's milk cheese like English Berkswell or Spenwood would work well.  All these cheeses have a nutty quality that goes well with the earthy beans and sweet, milky nuts.  Jane Grigson would not have approved of my beans in this dish being Scarlet Runners.  They are undoubtedly the least interesting of green beans but they are easy to grow.  She felt "early gardeners had the right idea when they kept the Scarlet Runner to decorate a trellis with its brilliant flowers ...".  I used to agree with her but found out for myself that if you pick before they get too large and slice the pods lengthways, it makes all the difference, and I note she also conceded this.  Simon Hopkinson, I think, just might eat this dish with relish (at least his Introduction to his book The Vegetarian Option leads me to hope).  Choose whichever green beans you prefer, just avoid the big stringy ones.

Runner Beans, wet walnuts and Ossau-Iraty

Salad of fresh beans, wet walnuts and sheep's milk cheese
(serves 4 for a starter or light lunch)

500g green beans, sliced lengthways if using Runner Beans (de-string if necessary)
1 good tablespoon Moscatel vinegar
3 good tablespoons walnut oil or extra-virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper
75g Ossau-Iraty (or other semi-hard sheep's milk cheese), pared into strips
10-12 shelled 'wet' walnuts, roughly broken (use matured walnuts if necessary)

Bring a pan of water to the boil, add salt and boil the beans for 3-4 minutes until tender but still with a little "bite".  Drain and plunge in a bowl of cold water before draining well again.  Combine the vinegar, oil and seasoning to an emulsion.  Toss the beans well in the vinaigrette.  Place on plates and add the cheese and walnuts. 


I hope to still be picking beans into next week, along with my ever-blooming roses and, unbelievably late-flowering sweetpeas sharing space with the squirrels' larder.  Those huge-headed peonies remain in my dreams, but next year, next year...

Birdsong and Broccoli

Broccoli - mainly purple, some white

The birdsong gets louder, and more diverse, by the day.  When that first 'crack of dawn' appears on the horizon the concert begins, progressing from adagio to crescendo in the space of a couple of hours.  I wish I could say I know this because I am experiencing these recitals first-hand but, in truth, it's a vicarious participation for me right now.  This Spring I know about the dawn chorus like I know about the beauty of the sunrise - from friends lucky enough to live by a green space, or have windows facing east.  For the lucky ones, both of the above apply.  Aspect and sound are all important when you live in a city.  Sunrise or sunset, green space or an easy commute. Compromise is certain for the vast majority.

Tweet of the Day: The Blackbird

I am a committed townie but, much as I love urban life, the absence of birdsong outside my window is a nagging loss.  I'm not a life-long Londoner, so I know what I'm missing out on.  Birdsong is out there amongst the brick and concrete but most city dwellers have to seek it out in the park, the community garden or city farm.  The lucky few find it in their own little patch of green, or for those fortunate recipients of a key, in the garden square.  The luckiest of all, in my view, find it on the allotment.  Once derided as only for the retired, now lusted after as a must-have accessory for our times; the allotment is what makes it possible for me to survive in a city of 8.3 million people.

Allotment:  A  small piece of, usually, public land rented by an individual for cultivation

Wild violets

Through the creaking oak gate I go, past the sooty-tipped Ash tree where white violets are lifting their lavender-tinted heads.  Their perfume is kept secret from anyone who's not prepared to kneel down and  nuzzle the bosky depths playing host to them.  Stepping onto my allotment is like stepping into another world.  The sound of birds singing their hearts out is almost shocking after the dull hum of the city.  It's the Blackbird, Robin, Wren, Blue Tit, Chaffinch and Wood Pigeon that are most at home here.  Happy to tolerate humans, happy to take advantage of our digging, our sloppy housekeeping, and very happy at our forgetfulness to safeguard berries and brassicas.  In return we get to hear their songs.  A more than fair exchange, I think.

A violet in the youth of primy nature,
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting,
The perfume and suppliance of a minute.
Hamlet 

Broad Bean Grando Violetto

If my allotment neighbours hadn't come to my rescue last summer there would be nothing at all to harvest right now.  In mid-Spring a carefully prepared seedbed had been sown with broccoli, cabbage and kale, watered gently and diligently, and scanned obsessively for signs of germination. Faint signs of growth had appeared, fingers were crossed that the little green spikes were brassicas rather than bedstraw.  Then the freak rainstorm hit.  Rivulets gouged pathways through the soil, fragile roots were exposed and delicate seedlings carried off like paper boats on a river.  By the time I accepted that every single one was lost, the time for starting from scratch had passed.  News of successes and failures travels fast on the allotment and, soon, spare plants were proffered and gratefully accepted.

Tweet of the Day: The Wren

Broad bean seedlings - Wizard & Grando Violetto

This year will be different. I will not put all my eggs in one basket.  An £8 propagator has already produced seedlings of broad beans, broccoli, cabbages, kale and celeriac.  This year I will have plants to spare to come to someone else's rescue. Now it's early April and we are itching to get on with the new growing season.  Broad beans, peas, spinach and early potatoes are planted but without those donations of cabbage, broccoli and kale seedlings there would be no reward for our day's labours.

Purple Sprouting Broccoli seedlings

So, what to do with my harvest?  Anchovies are an invaluable store cupboard ingredient for lifting any number of dishes from salads to roast lamb.  They're particularly good with salad leaves or green vegetables.  Italians like to use them in a sauce with puntarelle, chicory or spinach.  It's hardly original, I know, but I love them with Broccoli and I just happen to have a fantastic crop right now. I have a preference for Purple Sprouting but an anchovy sauce also works with White Sprouting and most spring greens.  Salted anchovies are wonderful but, the more widely-available, tinned ones in olive oil are fine.  Quantities here are just a guide.

Purple (or white) Sprouting Broccoli with Anchovy butter
(Serves 2)

2 good handfuls of Broccoli (or other spring greens)
60g (2oz) unsalted butter (or good olive oil if you prefer)
1 tin of anchovies (I drain the oil as I'm never happy with using it)

Steam the broccoli until just tender. 
Melt (warm through) the butter (olive oil) in a frying pan.  Add the roughly-chopped anchovies and cook, stirring, until the anchovies melt into a sauce.  Remove from the heat.
Add the steamed broccoli and toss in the sauce to coat.

Serve with crusty bread.

Tweet of the Day: The Robin 

Robin

London is blessed with its green spaces but let's hear it for more trees for cities. Meanwhile, thank goodness for 'Tweet of the Day'.

Leeks with Gruyere Cheese - Perfect Combinations

Leeks au Gratin

I know we're all waiting impatiently for the asparagus to arrive but clearly, given this long winter, it's going to be late this year.  There are a few English spears around and if you want something tasteless and expensive then you can have it.  Personally I'll bide my time and wait another 3-4 weeks.  In the meantime, I've been making the most of leeks. The French refer to leeks as "poor man's asparagus" (a term we use in the UK for the coastal Samphire), and value them at least as much as we do.  

A member of the allium family, leeks add a more subtle, less pungent note to dishes than onions or garlic.  They have an  affinity with butter, cheese, potatoes and bacon.  They also go with fish and are used in dishes such as bouillabaisse.  Sliced thinly and deep fried they make a lovely crispy foil for soft scallops.  I like them finely sliced with mussels instead of shallots in Moules Marinière.  Leeks can also carry off starring roles.  Their sweet, slippery softness is perfect in soups such as Vichyssoise; a dish of Leeks Gribiche makes a perfect, healthy lunch; match leeks with pastry and cream for a less virtuous but wholly delicious Flamiche.  

Growing slowly through the winter, leeks are smaller than normal this year but have been tasting fantastic over the past couple of weeks.  Soon after the warm weather eventually arrives they will start to develop a hard core and their time will be over.  Many recipes direct you to discard the green tops.  I urge you to use all but the tough topmost parts, unless it would spoil the recipe.  Green is good and you can always add it to soups or stocks.

Leeks au Gratin
straight from the oven

Today, with skies leaden and Spring a promise away, I offer you a simple dish of Leeks in a sauce Mornay (a simple Bechamel with added cheese).  The French would call it Leeks au Gratin and as we adopted their sauces Bechamel and Mornay, so shall I.  A buttered dish of leeks topped with a cheese sauce and baked until it's nicely browned and the smell of molten gruyere cheese drives you to distraction.  I could have topped the dish with breadcrumbs but personally I prefer to mop up the sauce with crusty bread.  If I want to make the dish more substantial I wrap the leeks in slices of cooked ham. 

This is a great bad-weather dish.  Next week, when we're on a promise of warmer weather, I will bake my leeks with stock and cream for a lighter dish.  Whilst the leeks are as good as this I really can wait for that asparagus.

Leeks au Gratin

(serves 4)

8 medium or 12 small leeks

50g unsalted butter + a little extra to butter the baking dish

50g plain flour

500ml milk

150g grated gruyere

Salt & pepper

Pinch or two of cayenne pepper

Preheat oven to 200C (Fan 180C).

Lightly trim the leeks, top and bottom and remove one outer layer.  Slice half way down from the top and wash thoroughly.  Drop the leeks into boiling salted water for 3-4 minutes, drain and lay them in a shallow, buttered oven-proof dish.

Melt the butter in a small heavy-based pan.  On a gentle heat, add the flour and stir for 3 minutes to cook off.  Pour in the milk all at once and whisk well.  Cook over a low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon until the sauce has thickened - about 7-8 minutes.  Take off the heat and add half the grated gruyere.  Taste and season with salt and pepper.  Pour the sauce over the leeks and scatter the remaining gruyere and the cayenne pepper on top.  Bake for 25-30 minutes until bubbling and lightly browned.

When I haven't been able to harvest from my allotment, I've been buying organic leeks in London from Kent grower Chegworth Valley Farm.  Although better known for their excellent fruit juices, their fruit and vegetables are very good quality and value.

Onion Tart with Lancashire Cheese - Perfect combinations

Slice of Onion Tart with Lancashire Cheese

I was saving this recipe for the the day I managed to plant this year's onion sets but, with the unrelenting cold we've been experiencing, I've decided this undeniably rich tart is exactly right for now.  I like to tell  myself a helping of watercress off-sets the richness!

Last year's store of onions have long gone and the onion sets I planted to overwinter are nowhere to be seen.  Some November-planted garlic clings on tenaciously but the leeks, which usually grow so well, are stunted.  A mixture of clay soil, copious rain and prolonged, numbing, cold has taken its toll.  My bio-dynamic planting calendar tells me it will be mid-April before I can start my Spring planting - assuming winter releases its icy grip.

Onion Tart with Lancashire Cheese

So, while I wait impatiently to get planting, I'm grateful to Simon Hopkinson for reminding me what a joyous combination cheese and onion make.  This recipe is adapted from his Onion Tart in Roast Chicken and Other Stories in which he mentions his mother's love of mixing a little Lancashire cheese into the filling. It's certainly a winning combination, though I prefer to scatter the Lancashire on the top just before baking.  A version of this tart is sometimes on the menu at 40 Maltby Street where an oat pastry is used.  Though more difficult to work with, it works as a great counter-balance to the richness of the filling.  Making this dish does leave you with a lot of egg whites, but that just gives you the excuse for a batch of meringues or macarons.

Onion Tart with Lancashire Cheese 
(Serves 4-6)

Shortcrust pastry:
100g (4oz) plain flour
50g (2oz) cold butter, diced
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon cold water
Pinch of salt

Filling:
75g (3oz) butter
4 medium-large onions, thinly sliced
4 egg yolks
300ml (1/2 pint) double cream
Salt & pepper
75g (3oz) Lancashire cheese

Lightly butter a 20cm (8 inch), 3cm deep loose-bottomed tart tin and chill.  To make the pastry, sift flour, add salt and rub in the butter.  Add egg yolk and water and stir with a knife until the mixture comes together.  Use your hands to form it into a smooth ball, working the pastry as little as possible.  Wrap and chill for 30 minutes.

Melt the butter for the filling in a frying- or sauce-pan with a lid.  Add the onions and a little salt and pepper, stirring to coat the onions in the butter.  Cover with the lid and cook very gently, without browning, until the onions are soft (about 40 minutes).  The mixture will be very wet.  Remove the lid and cook down on a low heat for a further 15-20 minutes until the moisture has mostly disappeared.  Transfer to a bowl and leave to cool.

Pre-heat the oven to 200C (fan oven 180C).  Roll out the pastry as thinly as possible and line the prepared tart tin with it.  Prick the base of the pastry and chill for 15 minutes.  Line with greaseproof paper and fill with baking beans to bake blind in the oven for 10 minutes.  Remove the paper and beans and return the tart to the oven for a further 5 minutes or so to cook the base thoroughly.  Remove from the oven and turn down to 180C (fan oven 160C).  

Lightly beat the egg yolks with the cream.  Mix in the onions and season with salt and pepper.  Place the tart tin on a baking tray and pour the mixture into the tart case as high as you dare before crumbling the cheese on top.  Bake for around 35 minutes until the filling is set and lightly browned.

Peppery watercress goes very well with this tart.