RECIPES (Cooking ideas from your freshly grown vegetables)
 

BRAISED RED CABBAGE

Ingredients:

A Red Cabbage (about 2lb).
About 1lb firm eating Apples peeled, cored and chopped (not too small).
About 1lb Onions peeled and coarsely chopped.
One Garlic clove, chopped.
Salt and Pepper to taste.
¼ to ½ teaspoon  Ground Cloves.
¼ to ½ teaspoon  Ground Cinnamon.
¼ to ½ teaspoon  Grated Nutmeg.
Three tablespoons Wine Vinegar.
Three tablespoons Brown Sugar.
Dob of Butter.

Method:
Remove the tough outer leaves from the cabbage and shread, discarding the hard stalk.
In a casserole, layer the cabbage, onion and apple, sprinkling the seasoning, garlic, sugar and spices between the layers.
Add the vinegar and butter, put on the casserole lid and cook for about two hours in the oven at 150 degrees C (Mark 2).
Stir once or twice during the cooking and check softness after about 1½ hours. Remove from oven if it is soft enough for you.
Braised Red Cabbage can be reheated successfully or just kept warm after cooking without spoiling. 

POACHED RHUBARB

Another couple of months and we should be pulling the first stems of forced rhubarb so a recipe to encourage gardeners to get out and put the rhubarb forcer in place seems appropriate for the last week in January.

It is all to easy to cook rhubarb to destruction. Cover the stems with fluid to ensure even cooking and it will be too wet. The right amount of fluid sees the stems in the bottom of the dish cooked before the rest. Turn the stems in the dish to try and even things out and they start to break up and we're left with a pink sludge. Poaching gently in a slow oven is the answer. Try it out on this recipe with orange and ginger.

Ingredients:

• Juice and grate the zest of 3 oranges. (Alternatively, cut thin slivers of peel before juicing and slice these into very thin strips. Tastes the same but looks better)
• 2 Tablespoons of brown sugar.
• About 2lb rhubarb stems cut into one and a half inch lengths. (Use the tender pink stems of forced rhubarb if you have them)
• A small piece of root ginger peeled and thinly sliced. ( One level teaspoon of ground ginger will do)

Method:

• Warm the juice in a pan and dissolve in the sugar.
• Place the rhubarb stems in an oven proof dish with a lid (A foil cover will do), pour over the warm juice and scatter over the orange zest and ginger.
• Cover and place in a slow oven until the stems are tender when tested with the point of a kitchen knife.

Serve with ice cream. Soft ice cream with a little ginger syrup and maybe even a few small pieces of crystallised ginger stirred in will make it special

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SPICED CELERIAC WITH LEMON

This goes well with chicken, lamb or fish and serves 5.

1 large or 2 small celeriac                2 tbsp olive oil

Pinch of paprika                                Pinch of cayenne pepper

Pinch of ground cinnamon                Grated zest of one lemon

Juice of 1½ lemons                            Salt and freshly ground pepper

Peel the celeriac, cut in to 5mm-1cm thick and then cut the slices into thin sticks.  Heat oil in a large pan, add celeriac sticks and fry for about 15 minutes until slightly browned.  Then sprinkle with the spices, lemon zest and juice and 100ml of water.  Simmer for about 10 minutes until the celeriac is just tender.  Season to taste, adding more lemon juice if necessary.

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PARSNIP AND TOMATO GRATIN

This recipe [a variation on a Woman's Weekly offering] uses parsnips and onions.  It is particularly enjoyable served with buttered leeks so is a good idea for using winter crops [assuming you have dried your onions properly so they have kept into the winter months.]

Ingredients

o        About 1½lb parsnips peeled and sliced about ¼" thick [weight after peeling]

o        400 gm can of chopped tomatoes

o        6 oz Mature Cheddar cheese, grated

o        Two medium sized onions, coarsely chopped

o        A very generous cupful of coarse breadcrumbs

o        Salt and pepper

o        Paprika

Method

o        Put the sliced parsnip into salted boiling water, bring back to the boil and simmer for 5 minutes.  Drain well and set aside

o        Fry the onions in a little butter until soft but not browned

o        Grease a deep oven-proof dish with butter and lay half the parsnip slices over the bottom of the dish.  Cover the parsnips with half of the cooked onions.  Add seasoning to taste.  Sprinkle about a third of the cheese over the onions and then empty the whole tin of tomatoes into the dish and spread them evenly.  Add another layer of onions followed by the remaining parsnips laid fairly evenly over the top.  Spread another third of the cheese over the parsnips

o        Put the remaining cheese with the breadcrumbs into a basin and rub together [as if making pastry]  to form a rough crumb structure.  [You may want to add some more cheese if you are not fussed about calories]

o        Spread the crumb mixture over the top of the dish and sprinkle with paprika

o        Cook at Gas mark 6 for about half an hour.  The top should be nicely browned

o        Serve with buttered and peppered leeks and fresh crusty bred.  A nice glass of red wine helps too!

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