Canalside herbs as ingredients | Canalside Community Food - Part 7

As you may well still have your Black Spanish Radish from this week’s share, here are some recipes from Rebecca that have been waiting in the wings for the BSR’s first appearance of 2019!

These are fierce! They need some sweetness to balance their peppery bite. A dressing with honey and sherry vinegar does the trick. Combined with dried fruit and nuts in a salad, this will temper the outspoken radish.

Another option is to braise them. They emerge from a bath in butter and white wine softened, like a turnip’s more assertive older brother. Toss them with parsley and serve with roast chicken.

Green salad with Spanish black radish, pistachios and fig
Serves 2

Ingredients
dressing
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
Juice and zest from 1 lime
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon runny honey
1/4 teaspoon salt
Black pepper

salad
150g salad mix
1 black Spanish radish, peeled and grated coarsely
1 big handful pistachio nuts, toasted in a dry pan and coarsely chopped
4 dried figs, cut into 6 pieces each

Preparation
(Leave the grated radish in a sieve to allow any liquid to drain off while you prepare the dressing.)

Put the dressing, put the ingredients into a jar with a lid and shake vigorously until the ingredients are combined. Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary by adding a little more salt, or honey, etc., to balance the flavours.

Place salad ingredients in a serving bowl, and toss with the dressing. Serve.

Braised Carrot and Black Radish with Parsley
Serves 4

Ingredients
100g onions
350g carrots
2 black radishes
2 tablespoons olive oil
150ml white wine or vermouth
3 bay leaves
6 pepper corns
Salt to taste
2 tablespoons butter
25g parsley, chopped

Preparation
Peel the onions and cut into chunks. Peel the carrots and cut into batons.

Peel the black radishes and cut into batons of roughly the same size as the carrots.

Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions and sauté for a few minutes until they start to brown. Add the carrots and onions and toss everything together.

Pour over the white wine or vermouth, and add the bay leaves and pepper corns. Bring to a gentle boil, reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer until the vegetables are tender, about 45 minutes. (This will depend on the size of your batons.) Check it occasionally to ensure it’s not sticking. If it seems dry add some water, stock or more wine.

Once the vegetables are tender, stir in the butter and give the vegetables a good toss. Add salt to taste, mix in the parsley, and serve.

‘Wow—that looks delicious!’, exclaimed a friend as we unpacked our lunches yesterday. It was. The ribbons of orange squash soften in lime juice spiked with the sweet spiciness of pink peppercorns. (These are essential; substituting black pepper will not work.). You can make this well in advance if you like.

Anna Jones recommends serving with tofu crisped in a pan with honey and soy, and brown rice, to make a dinner.

Squash and Pink Peppercorn Salad
Serves 2

Ingredients
500g pumpkin or squash, peeled and deseeded
1 lime
1 tablespoon pink peppercorns
1 teaspoon salt
Big handful of mint, dill, parsley or coriander, roughly chopped

Preparation
Shave the squash into thin ribbons, using a vegetable peeler or whatever specialist gear you happen to have. Place the ribbons in a bowl.
Zest the lime over the ribbons, squeeze in the juice, and toss together with the salt.
Put the pink peppercorns in a mortar and crush them roughly before adding to the salad.
Stir in the herbs and serve.

Recipe adapted from Anna Jones, The Modern Cook’s Year (2017).

My friend Sharon gave me a copy of Diana Henry’s beautiful new cookbook. It consists of a series of menus. This magnificent recipe is from the menu called ‘Midnight at the Oasis’. She recommends serving it alongside some pickled vegetables with other nibbles, semolina bread with orange and aniseed, olive oil braised leeks with harissa and dill, roast sprouting broccoli with chile, feta and preserved lemon yoghurt . . . well, I’ll stop there but it’s a pretty mesmerising list of dishes, no?

This particular dish combines the buttery crunch of barley with the melting texture of roast pumpkin, all topped with very spicy red shatta. (I’d not heard of it either, but it’s apparently a first cousin of zhug.) It turns out to be a thick, chile-hot blend of fresh green herbs with tomato and cumin. It’s very good.

I have no idea where you get black barley, so I used ordinary pearl (not instant) barley, and it was delicious.

Pumpkin with shatta and black barley
Serves 4

Ingredients

For the pumpkin
3 tablespoons olive oil
10g butter
1.5kg pumpkin
1 teaspoon fennel seeds, roughly crushed in a mortar
3cm ginger, peeled and grated
3 garlic cloves, finely sliced

For the barley
10g butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 small onions or shallots
250g barley
5 tablespoons dry white vermouth
700ml water or stock
2 bay leaves
Salt and pepper, to taste

For the shatta
5 red chiles, 4 de-seeded and all roughly chopped
3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
50ml olive oil
50ml water
50g tomato purée
1 teaspoon ground cumin
Juice of ½ a small lemon
30g coriander and parsley in any proportion

Preparation
To make the pumpkin, preheat the oven to 190C. Put the olive oil and butter into a roasting pan large enough to allow the pumpkin to lie in a single layer, and melt in the oven while you prepare the pumpkin. Halve the pumpkin and remove the seeds. You can peel it or not as you prefer. Cut it into slices about 3cm thick.

Toss the pumpkin in the melted butter and oil, and roast for 20 minutes.
Add the fennel, ginger and garlic, toss, and roast for another 20 minutes or so, or until the pumpkin is tender and begins to caramelise on the edges. Set aside.

To make the barley, heat the butter and olive oil in a large saucepan and sauté the onions (or shallots) until they are soft but not coloured. Add the barley and stir it about for about 2 minutes so that it gets coated with butter. Add the vermouth and cook until about half of it has evaporated. Add the water or stock, bay leaves, and season with a bit of salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Cook, with the lid on, for about 40 minutes, or until the barley is al dente. The liquid should be absorbed but check a bit beforehand and if it’s still very liquidly, take off the cover and raise the heat a bit so that some of the liquid can evaporate.

To make the shatta, purée everything except the herbs in a blender and pulse into a chunky purée. Add the herbs and pulse it again so that you have a red purée flecked with green—don’t over-blend this. Set aside

To serve, arrange the barley on a big platter and set the pumpkin on top. Spoon some of the shatta over the top, and serve the rest on the side, in a little bowl.

From Diana Henry, How To Eat A Peach (2018).

Carrots simmered in warm spices with dried fruit, topped with pistachio nuts and salty yoghurt. You will enjoy this. I served it with a surprisingly complex beetroot salad dressed with balsamic vinegar and maple syrup, mixed with shredded daikon radish, a root-vegetable hat trick, but that’s for another day.

The recipe calls for 1 tablespoon of barberries, which, amazingly, I happened to have. I think you can leave it out. You could also serve this over pasta, or in a pita with a shredded hard-cooked egg.

Uzbeki Carrots
Serves 2-3.

Ingredients
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, thinly sliced
2 tomatoes, cut into thin wedges (or several tinned tomatoes)
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
½ Canalside chile, seeded and shredded (or to taste)
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground cumin
salt and black pepper
500g carrots, peeled and cut into batons
75g currants
1 tablespoon dried barberries (entirely optional)
¼ teaspoon saffron
350ml water (or use some of the tomato juice from the tin if you’ve used tinned tomatoes)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 teaspoons honey, or to taste

To serve:
2-3 tablespoons shelled unsalted pistachios, coarsely chopped
Salted yoghurt
Fresh coriander, chopped
4 spring onions, sliced

Preparation
Heat the oil in a large saucepan and sauté the onion over medium heat until golden brown, then add the tomatoes and cook until they begin to soften. Add the garlic and chile and cook for another minute, then the cinnamon and cumin and cook for another minute. Add a couple pinches of salt and pepper, and then add everything else, except garnishes. Bring to a gentle boil.

Reduce the heat and simmer the carrots until completely tender, 20-25 minutes. The mixture should remain moist but not be swimming in juice. If it gets too dry, add a little more water. If it is too sloppy, turn up the heat and boil off some of the liquid. Taste for seasoning and balance; the mixture should be sweet and savoury.

Serve topped with a generous dollop of yogurt, pistachios, coriander, and spring onion.

Recipe adapted from Diana Henry, A Change of Appetite: Where Healthy Meets Delicious (2014).

Cooked slowly at a very low temperature, salmon becomes meltingly tender and immensely flavourful. It’s the complete opposite of the dry, overcooked fish one so often encounters. The fish is rubbed with a mixture of North-African spices and baked for nearly an hour. A coriander-packed herb salsa provides the perfect foil. Serve this with plain, boiled potatoes and a green salad for a spectacular meal.

The recipe is extremely easy—just make sure to allow an hour or two for the salmon to absorb the flavours of the spice rub before you cook it. This is a very good way of serving fish at a dinner party, since it doesn’t require any last-minute cooking.

Slow-roasted Spiced Salmon with Herb Salsa
Serves 6

Ingredients
For the salmon
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
2 tsp coriander seeds
2 tsp fennel seeds
3 cloves
½ tsp cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon turmeric
1 generous pinch salt
900g salmon fillet, skinned. Ask the fishmonger to pin-bone it.
Salt
1 tablespoon olive oil

For the salsa
2 medium shallots, finely diced
6 tablespoon lime juice
20g coriander leaves and tender stems, very finely chopped
2 tablespoon minced chile pepper. Remove the seeds if you don’t want this to be too hot
4 tablespoon spring onions, very finely chopped (green and white parts)
110ml neutral oil
Salt

Preparation
Toast the seeds and cloves in a dry frying pan over a medium-high heat and then grind finely with a pestle and mortar or a spice grinder. Transfer to a small bowl. Add the cayenne pepper, turmeric and salt.

Rub the spice mixture on both sides of the salmon, and refrigerate, covered, for one to two hours.

Heat the oven to 110C. Bring the salmon to room temperature while the oven is heating.

Drizzle the olive oil over the salmon and rub it in evenly with your hands. Roast in a baking dish for 40 to 50 minutes, until it begins to flake in the thickest part of the fillet when you poke it with a knife or your finger. Samin Nosrat notes that ‘because this method is so gentle on its proteins, the fish will appear translucent even when it’s cooked’.

While the fish is cooking make the salsa: In a small bowl, combine the shallot and lime juice and set aside for 15 minutes to macerate. In a separate small bowl, combine the coriander, jalapeño, spring onions, oil, and a generous pinch of salt. Add the shallots and lime juice, and more salt to taste.

Once the salmon is cooked, transfer it to a serving platter, spoon the herb salsa on top in generous amounts and serve.

Recipe adapted from Samin Nosrat, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat (2017).

This is pretty addictive. It delivers a big dose of umami and makes an outstanding dressing for robust vegetables. I’ve been eating it on a salad of finely shredded red or white cabbage, grated carrot, and chopped coriander. It would be good on grilled tofu or fish, or roasted butternut squash. Or use it as a dip for whole potatoes—the little ones we’re getting in our shares—roasted at 200C for 30 minutes.

Miso-Tahini Dressing
Serves 2

Ingredients
1 tablespoon miso paste
1 tablespoon tahini
1 tablespoon soya sauce
1 tablespoon cider vinegar

Preparation
Combine the ingredients and blend well, using a fork. Taste to see if it would benefit from a little more vinegar. The mahogany-dark dressing is now ready to use. This makes enough for half a small cabbage, shredded, together with several grated carrots.

Crispy chickpea and carrot pancakes make a quick and tasty base for a variety of toppings. The chickpea flour creates a rich and moist interior that’s satisfying without being heavy. We ate these with spinach and avocado dressed with lemon and olive oil, and some grated goat cheese. You could also try roasted tomatoes topped with basil and a fried egg.
If you use two frying pans you can make two pancakes simultaneously, and the whole thing will take under 15 minutes.

Chickpea and Carrot Pancakes
Serves 2

Ingredients
125g chickpea flour (aka gram flour)
125g carrots, grated
175ml milk or oat milk
1 tsp roasted ground cumin, or coriander, or caraway, or fennel or mustard seed, as you prefer
Salt and pepper, to taste
1-2 tablespoons olive or rapeseed oil, for frying

Preparation
Mix the pancake ingredients aside from the oil in a blender—I used a Nutribullet—and blend until the mixture is smooth.

Heat two frying pans over medium heat and add the oil. Swirl the oil around to coat the bottom of each pan and let the oil get hot. Once it’s hot (test by adding a drop of water and seeing if it sizzles), pour half the batter into each pan and cook for 2 minutes. As it sets the colour will darken a bit and some bubbles will begin to appear on the top. Adjust the heat if you think it’s starting to get too brown on the bottom. Using a fish slice turn each pancake over and cook for an additional 1-2 minutes on the other side, until it looks firm.

Remove each pancake from the pan, and place on a plate. Top with your selected topping (see below) and enjoys.

Pancake Toppings

Spinach with avocado and goat cheese
Toss baby spinach with sliced avocado and dress with an olive oil and lemon vinaigrette (50% olive oil, 50% lemon juice, salt and pepper). Arrange some dressed spinach on each pancake, and top with grated goat or sheep cheese. Garnish with additional slices of avocado and a grind of black pepper.

Tomato, basil and egg
Drizzle cherry tomatoes with olive oil and roast in a 200C oven for 30 minutes. Toss with shredded basil and lemon zest. Arrange on pancake and top with a crispy fried egg.

Brussels sprout slaw with avocado and cheese
Trim the bottoms off several handfuls of Brussels sprouts and shred them finely. Dress with a lemon vinaigrette and toss with chopped parsley or coriander. Arrange on top of each pancake. Garnish with sliced avocado, freshly ground black pepper and lots of grated cheese.

Recipe adapted from Anna Jones, Guardian 6 Oct. 2018.

A friend gave me a very long courgette. It was about ¾ of a meter long. Actually, she gave me two. Research suggests that they are ‘Sicilian courgettes’—genuine courgettes (not hard-skinned marrows) that simply grow to extraordinary lengths. Anyway, we’ve been eating courgettes. Fortunately they are delicious, and came accompanied by several recipe suggestions. This one is for an exceptional courgette soup.

The courgettes are roasted together with onion and garlic, which gives the flavour an unexpected complexity. Peas bring additional sweetness and this is a good way to use the fresh basil we’re enjoying in the shares. As with most soups you can vary the proportions and quantities a bit to match what you have to hand. Serve with crusty bread and some grated cheese.

Roasted Courgette Soup with Peas and Basil
Serves 3

Ingredients
2 tablespoons rapeseed or olive oil
1kg courgettes (approx.)
4 garlic cloves (unpeeled)
7 tiny Canalside onions (or 2 medium onions)
Salt and pepper, to taste
200g frozen peas
20g fresh basil
750 ml stock
4 tablespoons full-fat milk
Parmesan or pecorino, to serve

Preparation
Preheat the oven to 200C. Drizzle the oil onto a large baking sheet.

Trim the ends off the courgettes and slice them into rounds about 1 cm thick. Place them on the baking sheet and scatter the unpeeled garlic cloves around them. Peel the onions, and if they are the tiny Canalside ones leave them whole and scatter them alongside the courgette and garlic. If they’re a bit larger slice them into thick slices before adding them to the baking tray.

Season with salt and pepper, toss them around a bit, and roast them for 40-45 minutes, until the vegetables are golden brown and roasted. Don’t let them char to a crisp but let them get toasted. Remove from the oven and let cool a bit.

Once the vegetables are cool enough to handle squeeze the roasted garlic flesh out of their paper skins into a pan. Add the remaining vegetables, the peas and the basil.

When you’re ready to serve, heat the stock and add it to the pan together with the milk. Blend the soup using an immersion blender and heat gently until warm. Add some additional water if you’d like the consistency to be a bit thinner. Serve with grated cheese on top.

Recipe adapted from The Veg Space, courtesy of Jean Noonan.

Grilled mackerel with cucumber-fennel relish, boiled potatoes, and, perhaps some steamed fresh spinach: between two people you can have this on the table in 25 minutes from turning on the grill. It makes a lovely Saturday night supper. Grill the fish whole for 8-12 minutes per side.

The relish or salsa has a crisp, assertive sharpness that contrasts well with the rich oiliness of the mackerel. It would be good with grilled trout, as well. The recipe makes enough for four generous servings. The key is to cut the vegetable into very small pieces; it’s this that gives its charm. ‘Dicing’ is cutting into cubes—but you can also simply chop the cucumber and fennel very fine, if producing tiny cubes seems too fiddly.

Cucumber-Fennel Relish

Ingredients
1 cucumber, cut into 3mm dice
1 small fennel bulb, cut into 3mm dice
¾ cup chopped fresh dill
zest and juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
¾ teaspoon Demerara sugar
¾ teaspoon salt, or to taste
½ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste

Preparation
Combine all the ingredients and taste for seasoning. Add more salt, pepper, sugar or vinegar/lemon juice if you wish—this should be quite sharp.

The great chef James Beard declared that in his kitchen no pepper was used until it had been roasted. I would not go quite that far, but roasting certainly transforms a pepper into something irresistibly delicious. It’s easy to do. Roasted peppers can be used in many ways—I’ll mention a few in a minute—but it’s hardly worth the effort since in my experience a dish of roasted peppers in a little olive oil and salt will be gobbled up immediately. Serve with an aperitivo or as part of your meal.

If by some miracle the peppers don’t get consumed on the spot you can arrange them on a platter with a few quartered hard-cooked eggs, black olives, and fresh basil, to make a little salad (drizzle with more olive oil before serving). Or use anchovies instead of or in addition to the eggs. You can drape them over a pizza. You can mix them with a tin of white beans, parsley, chopped tomatoes, and olive oil for a more substantial lunch. But really you’re going to eat these right away.

Roasted Peppers

Ingredients
Whole peppers of any colour or shape
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Fresh basil or parsley (optional)

Preparation
Preheat your grill. Arrange the peppers on a baking tray or oven rack and place them about 4 inches from the grill. Roast the peppers for 8-10 minutes, turning them regularly, until they are charred on all sides. The goal is for the skin to go black and flaky so that it can be removed easily.

Once each peppers is charred on all sides remove it from the oven and set it aside to cool a bit. When it’s cool enough to handle rub off the charred skin to reveal the smooth, roasted flesh underneath. Don’t run it under the tap or you’ll remove the flavour. Cut the pepper in half and remove the seeds.

Slice the halved peppers into long strips and put in a bowl. Drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add chopped herbs if you wish. They’re ready to serve.