Sloe gin

I've been biking to DTU and back lately (c. 27 km round trip). There have been some beautiful frosty mornings, with a view over the waking city once I've gotten up the Bellahøj hill. And a long curve past Utterslev Mose in the mist, and a last push through a horse school... Near there, in the last bit through Lyngby, when it feels like you've really left the city, I spotted a patch of blackthorn bushes right by the bike path. I couldn't resist stopping to pick some into my empty lunchbox on the way home, in the gathering gloam. I froze them in the freezer overnight to simulate the first frost and to let me make sloe gin when I wanted.

225 g sloes
4 oz sugar
500 ml gin

Put sloes and sugar in a large bottle with a wide enough neck. Add gin, put lid on securely, and shake. Shake every so often over the next few days to make sure the sugar dissolves. Then leave in a dark cupboard, shaking occasionally, for a few months or a year.

Pickled apples

Curious about apple pickling, since I had a suitable large jar from S's lupins, and obviously lots of apples. I liked the sound of the spices in this recipe.

700 g apples (approx. 4 med-large apples)
500 ml white wine or cider vinegar
120 g caster sugar
1 tsp salt
10 cm Carolina allspice bark or cinnamon stick (used cinnamon
1 tsp fennel seeds
3 whole cloves
½ tsp Szechuan peppercorns or black peppercorns (used black pepper)
1 star anise
Few sprigs of lemon thyme (used dried bayleaves)

Dissolve the sugar and salt in the vinegar in a pan over a medium heat. Add the spices, simmer for 15 min, then turn off the heat. Core, peel and thinly slice two apples as the pickling liquid cools. Place the slices in a large lidded jar and just cover the apples with spicy vinegar. Repeat with the rest of the apples. Eat within 10 days or so, or longer if the apples retain a good texture.

Spiced apple muffins with walnut streusel topping

Muffins for our new upstairs neighbours, in the hope we can start our neighbourhood sweetly. Using apples and walnuts from our garden. And a Delia recipe I've never actually tried before.

(makes 12 muffins, or one large cake)

For the muffins:
12 oz (350 g) apples (weight after peeling and coring), chopped into ½ inch (1 cm) cubes
3 oz (75 g) sugar
6 fl oz (175 ml) milk (used yoghurt mixed with water, as we never have milk)
4 oz (110 g) butter
10 oz (275 g) plain flour
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp baking powder
½ level tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
½ whole nutmeg, grated
2 large eggs

For the walnut streusel topping:
2 oz (50 g) walnuts, roughly chopped
3 oz (75 g) flour
3 oz (75 g) sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 oz (25 g) butter

Heat the oven to 190C. Melt the butter in a small saucepan over a gentle heat. Put the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves and grated nutmeg in a bowl and mix with a fork.

In another large bowl, whisk the eggs, sugar and milk together, then whisk in the melted butter. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined, folding in the apple at the end. Spoon into muffin cups.

To make the topping, mix the flour, sugar and cinnamon in a bowl, then rub the butter in with your fingers.Add in the nuts and 1 tbsp cold water, and press loosely together. Press the topping on top of the muffins, then bake for about 30 min, until done.

Pumpkin and apple soup

More uses for our heap of windfalls. This time in soup, with hokkaido from the veg share. I used this recipe.

For the soup:
2 kg pumpkin, cut into wedges and deseeded
2 onions, peeled and chopped into 6 wedges
3 sharp apples, peeled, cored and roughly chopped
5 garlic cloves in their skin
100 ml olive oil
1 tsp ground cinnamon
salt+pepper
1/2 a nutmeg
2 litres veg stock

To finish:
yoghurt
raw apple sliced into matchsticks
walnuts

Heat the oven to 180C. Add pumpkin, onions, apple and garlic to a large baking tray. Toss in the olive oil. Sprinkle over the cinnamon, salt and pepper and grate over nutmeg. Toss again. Bake for 30-40 minutes until cooked and nicely softened. Remove and let cool a little. When still hot but safe to handle, take the skin off the pumpkin garlic.

Transfer the contents of the baking tray to a large pot. Add the stock and bring to the boil. Reduce and simmer for about 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and blend until smooth. Season to taste.


Serve topped with a swirl of yoghurt, some apple and walnuts, and salt+pepper.

S's pumpkin muffins

S made a pumpkin-carving party for his lab last week. He got them all pumpkins, and asked them to bring pumpkin themed food and then they carved pumpkins together. These muffins were his idea, slightly adapted by him from this recipe, and he even bought special silicone baking forms with pumpkin faces for baking them. He used the guts scraped out of two small-medium sized pumpkins and one butternut squash that he planned to carve the following day to make these. He spread all those pumpkin guts out on a baking sheet and baked them until soft and not liquidy, then blended them up to make the 15 oz of pumpkin puree needed.

(makes 12-13)

1 3/4 cups plain flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1 tsp bicarb
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
1/2 cup walnuts
2 eggs
15 oz pumpkin puree
1/2 cup sunflower oil
1 tsp vanilla essence

Heat oven to 375F and prepare baking tin with liners (not necessary for silicone form). Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl with a fork. In a separate bowl, mix the wet ingredients. Pour the wet into the dry and mix until just combined. Dollop into baking cups, and bake for 20-25 min until a skewer comes out clean.

Apple cake

The food insert from a copy of the Guardian from February had been lying around since then, unread. I have no cutoff for how old such things have to be before I will read them. I read it a week or two ago, while drinking tea and surveying the apples on the table, and came across this apple cake recipe, which seemed so serendipitous (and a little different from anything I've made before), that I had to try it.

(makes 1 large cake)

200 g dark muscovado sugar
200 g unsalted butter, soft (or use salted and skip the salt)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
150 g plain yoghurt
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
½ tsp cinnamon
A good grating of nutmeg
4 apples (about 500 g)
2 tbsp demerara sugar

Butter and line a large (900 g) cake tin with baking paper. Heat the oven to 200C/400F/gas mark 6.

Using an electric mixer, cream together the muscovado sugar and soft butter until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Add vanilla and yoghurt and mix well.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Add to the butter mixture and beat just until incorporated.

Grate three unpeeled apples (about 375 g) and fold into the cake mixture.

Scrape into your prepared cake tin and smooth the top. Peel and slice the remaining apple and arrange on top of the cake. Sprinkle with demerara sugar and bake about 60 min, until a skewer inserted comes out clean.


My wholemeal flour was very coarse - this works well. Also, I was unable to resist throwing in some walnuts and raisins at the last minute before putting it in the oven, which I'd highly recommend - it introduces some interesting texture - otherwise the grated apple disappears into the cake - perhaps some diced apple would also add interest. It's dense and lovely though - cooks well but v moist.

Walnut pesto (and walnut-cauliflower pasta salad)

Our heap of walnuts remains, as yet undwindling. Seb is mocking me for spending all my spare moments cracking nuts with my Granddads favourite nutcracker from 1981. But the proceeds are so nice. Some went into cookies for people waiting to be deported in Jutland at J's bday get together. For a totally different use, I thought of walnut pesto, I think inspired by this. I adapted that recipe only in as much as I substituted stuff we had in the house.

1 cup shelled walnuts
1 small garlic clove
1/4 cup grated parmesan
3 tsp mixed dried thyme, chilli and salt
2 tsp white wine vinegar
1/3 cup olive oil
3 tbsp red pesto (subbed for 2 tbsp sundried tomatoes - used a bit less oil and cheese accordingly)

Toast the walnuts and let cool. Put in a blender with the garlic and pulse until roughly chopped. Transfer to a bowl and mix in grated cheese, herbs and salt, vinegar, oil and pesto. Mix together, taste for seasoning and vinegar, and eat on everything.

Some became an awesome pasta salad, with roasted cauliflower and tomatoes, white beans, parsley and diced mozzarella (or feta) - this is recommended. But it works with everything - a spoonful on top of some pasta e ceci, for example...

Oven-dried apple slices

More ideas to deal with all those windfalls. Our dehydrator did not survive the transatlantic voltage change, despite moving house with us twice before I tested it... I am debating purchasing another one - it might be useful for both walnut and apple harvests - but in the meantime thought it was about time I tested oven drying instead.

apples

Heat the oven to 100C. Core the apples and cut out any bad bits. Peeling is optional - I didn't, and it was fine. If you have apples without bad bits and a corer, circular apple slices would be nice. I had neither of the above, so just made regular slices about 3 mm thick. Dunking in lemon juice solution is also optional - mine were fine without, but it will help stop them from going brown if you are concerned about that.

Lay the slices out on baking paper on oven racks or trays, then put in the oven and dry for 2-3 hours. Check them occasionally, and turn over about halfway through to ensure even drying. Test by checking for any remaining sticky- or squishy- ness. When they are thoroughly dry, remove from the oven and let cool before putting in airtight containers to store (at room temp is fine, they might last longer in the fridge or freezer but reckon they'll keep for a few months at room temp).


These are good - perhaps a bit more crispy and with a slightly more caramelly taste than dehydrator ones.

Spiced apple, raisin and walnut crumble

Our garden is overflowing with apples and walnuts at the moment, and if the windfall apples hang around indoors for too long they attract too many fruitflies. So we have been eating a lot of crumble. With apples in the filling and walnuts in the topping, this is a perfect summary of our autumn garden (slightly adapted from Delia - I have had to admit that when I improvise a crumble it is never quite as good as when I at least approximate a recipe).

Filling:
2 lb apples
1 oz light brown sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp mixed spice
4 oz raisins

Topping:
6 oz self-raising flour, sifted
3 oz chilled butter, cut into small dice
4 oz shelled walnuts
2 tsp ground cinnamon
4 oz demerara sugar

Core apples, and peel if you like (also good with peel left on). Cut into thick slices and toss in a bowl with sugar, cinnamon, mixed spice and raisins, then place in a baking dish. Heat oven to 400F / 200C. To make the crumble topping, place flour in a bowl and add the butter. Rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs in texture. Finely chop the walnuts and stir them into the flour-butter mixture, together with cinnamon and sugar. Spread on top of the apples, smoothing out and pressing down lightly. Bake for 35-40 min, until the apples are tender and the topping is crisp. Remove from the oven and let rest for 10-15 min before eating - good with some yoghurt.


Note: I have also been enjoying this without the crumble: secretly (cake crisis alert), I often like the fruit part of a crumble the best. So I have been making this just the same - filling a baking dish with apple, raisins, spices and a little sugar, but then skipping the crumble part, covering with foil and baking at the same temperature for the same length of time. It's better than stewing the fruit as it keeps its shape and develops a richer, less watery and more delicious taste - only problem is I eat it so fast! But I guess this is good, considering the windfall mountain.

Apple cheese

Our apple tree is sick and full of wood worm. But surprisingly productive nonetheless. So far we've only had windfalls, attacked by woodlice and fruitflies so they need processing asap, but edible nonetheless. The apples are russetty, quite sour, good cookers.

S suggested making something like membrillo with them. I consulted my IFR 'Home Preservation of Fruit and Vegetables' book and decided I was pretty sure that 'fruit cheese' is the British equivalent. They said you could make it with apples, but recommended spicing them. We decided against the spicing, but went for it anyway.

The recipe is simple, similar to the membrillo / quince cheese I made before.

apples
sugar

Peel and core the apples and cut into chunks. Put the chunks in a large saucepan, cover with water and boil until the apples are soft. Drain the apples and puree them. Weigh the puree. Add the same weight of sugar to the apple puree in a large heavy-bottomed saucepan. Simmer for 45-60 min, stirring regularly to prevent sticking, until it is good and thick.

Line a straight-sided baking tin or mould with lightly oiled baking paper. Pour the apple mixture into the mould and put in a warm oven (50C) for approx. 60 min to dry out. Remove from the oven and let cool - it will firm up a bit as it cools. When cool, you can lift it out of the tray and slice.

Excellent with cheese - especially brie or parmesan type cheeses.

Elderberry and apple chutney

This recipe is from a little book called 'Favourite Country Preserves' that Miriam gave me a few years ago, and I'd never actually made anything from until now, although I'd browsed it with curiosity several times - it is full of interesting things, lavender chutney is most intriguing, or parsley honey.

With both apples and elderberries dripping from our garden, I remembered about this recipe and decided to give it a go. It didn't go great - it takes a looong time to remove elderberries from their stalks, and it look an interminably long time for the chutney to thicken (perhaps because I doubled the recipe below?), and it caught and burnt a wee bit. And this was on a Monday night when I just wanted to go to sleep and the whole house stunk of vinegar - I'd not made chutney for a while and forgotten quite how bad the vinegariness can get. Oh well, I think it tastes OK - moment of truth in a month or so.

1 lb elderberries, washed and stalks removed
1 lb cooking apples
4 oz raisins
8 oz onions, finely chopped
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp mixed spice
pinch of pepper
1/2 pint malt vinegar (used apple cider vinegar)
12 oz soft brown sugar

 Peel, core and chop the apples and put in a large pan with the elderberries, raisins and onions. Stir in the salt, spices and pepper and a little of the vinegar. Cook very gently for one hour until the fruit is soft, stirring from time to time to prevent the mixture sticking and burning. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar and the remaining vinegar. When the sugar has dissolved, return to the heat and bring to the boil. Boil steadily for about 30-40 min until thick and all the vinegar has absorbed. Spoon into warm, sterilized jars and seal immediately.

Mixed spice

Mixed spice, which I always have to remember not to confuse with allspice, is apparently distinctly British. Therefore, if I want to use it here, I have to mix it up myself.

1 tbsp ground allspice
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp freshly grated nutmeg
2 tsp mace (or use more nutmeg)
1 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground ginger

Grind all the spices and mix together.

Raspberry chia kombucha

I long meant to experiment with adding things to my kombucha. I also long meant to open and eat the bag of chia seeds in the drawer. Eventually I made this. It is the simplest ever, and it tastes amazing.

Approx. 250 ml kombucha
about 6 frozen raspberries
1 tbsp chia seeds

Pour the kombucha into a glass bottle with a lid. Crumble the frozen raspberries into the bottle, and pour in the chia seeds. Invert a few times to mix, and make sure the chia seeds are not clumping too much. Leave at room temperature or in the fridge for at least an hour. Keeps fine for at least a day in the fridge.


It's pink and full of gloopy chia seeds and sweet and tangy and lovely. And only takes a few seconds to assemble.

Tzatzkiki

We ate this a lot in the summer, when cucumbers arrived in our veg bag often, and the walk to the grocery shop past the greek restaurant often reminded me to buy skyr or greek yoghurt. That's the only trick - to use thick yoghurt so it doesn't get too runny from cucumber juice.

1/2 cucumber, grated
1/2 clove garlic, crushed to a paste
approx. 1 1/2 cups greek yoghurt or skyr
squeeze of lemon juice (about 1 tsp)
pinch of salt

Coarsely grate the cucumber into a bowl, then squeeze out / drain off some of the liquid. Add garlic, yoghurt/skyr, lemon juice and salt. Mix up and taste for flavour balance and seasoning.


Great with some bread and a greek salad.

Rye biscuits (småkager)

We visited Frilandsmuseet at Sorgenfri the other day, when S's mum was here. It was very nice for a warm day - it's an open-air museum with lots of old buildings from all over Denmark you can go in and around. It was Møllerlaug day, so the windmills and watermills were especially on show. A water mill from Ellested was running, milling flour, and they were giving away bags of flour (for a donation). It reminded me of the windmill in Bardwell, and also Preston Mill. Except they were milling rye! We took some home, and I have been experimenting a little. Some went into pizza dough (about 1/3 rye to 2/3 white wheat), which was quite nice (although maybe didn't rise that well). We took a recipe booklet from the mill, and a recipe for biscuits (småkager) caught my eye. I made some to take to Danish class on a day when I had to give a one-minute talk: I'd decided to talk about Frilandsmuseet.

150 g rugmel / rye flour
150 g hvedemel (wheat flour)
200 g smør (butter), chilled
125 g flormelis (icing sugar)
1 æg (egg)
1/4 tsp vanijepulver (vanilla powder)
25 g hakkede mandler (chopped almonds) (optional)

Rub the butter into the flour, then knead in the remaining ingredients to make a dough, mixing the almonds towards the end. Roll the dough out on clingfilm to make a 3 cm thick sausage (or two). Wrap each sausage in clingfilm and put in the freezer for about half an hour. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 220C (200C fan), and prepare 2-3 baking sheets by lining with baking paper. When ready, take the sausage out of the freezer and slice into approx. 5 mm thick rounds. Place them on the baking trays (they will not spread so can be reasonably close together). Bake for 6-10 minutes, until just starting to brown around the edges. Remove from the oven and let cool a few minutes on the tray, then transfer to a wire rack to cool. They will crisp up as they cool.

Bean pasta

Bean pasta is weirdly good. We've found and tried all sorts - red lentil, pea, soybean... Our favourite, after trying them all, is of course the first one we tried: green soybean fettucine. It's great - has a really interesting, springy texture. This recipe reminded me of it, and to combine green bean pasta with lots of other green things. 

200 g bean pasta
500 g asparagus, cut into 1-2 in long pieces
1 leek, trimmed and chopped
300 g frozen peas
1 pack tempeh, chopped into chunks
4 tbsp olive oil
zest of a lemon
3 tbsp capers
A large handful fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped

Boil a large pan of salted water.  Add the bean pasta. When it has about 3 min left add the asparagus, peas, leek and tempeh. Cook until done. Drain and put back in the pot with olive oil, lemon zest, capers, mint and some salt. Taste and eat.

Pasta and chickpeas (pasta e ceci)

Our trip to Italy last winter got us excited about more foods than pizza. We did a cantina food tour in the village next to S+C's house. We had seven or eight little courses and glasses of wine in different cantinas (private cellar / bars opened up for the event) connected by a walking map. Far and away S's fave was pasta and chickpeas. It's really simple, like most of the best food we had in Italy: pretty much just pasta and chickpeas cooked in stock to make a hearty soup.

I saw these recipes soon after getting back, and then pasta e ceci went into heavy rotation in our house through the winter months. In the end, I think our fave version was a merger of those two versions: dried pasta, dried chickpeas, rosemary, garlic, olive oil, and perhaps some celery.

250g dried chickpeas
2 garlic cloves
2 sprigs of fresh rosemary
1 stick of celery (optional)
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
200g short pasta, stumpy rigatoni was usually what we ended up with - you're aiming for something chickpea-sized
Salt and black pepper
olive oil and black pepper / red chilli flakes to serve

Soak the chickpeas in plenty of cold water for 12 hours or overnight, changing the water twice if you can. Drain the soaked chickpeas, cover with 2 litres of fresh water, add a clove of garlic and a sprig of rosemary. Bring the pan to the boil over a medium heat, and simmer for 1½ hours or until the chickpeas are tender. Start tasting after one hour. Keep in mind you want 1.2 litres of cooking liquid, so top up with more water if necessary.

In a large heavy-based pan or casserole, heat the olive oil and add the remaining clove of garlic (peeled and gently crushed with the back of a knife), and the other sprig of rosemary. Fry gently until the garlic and rosemary are fragrant. Cook for another few minutes.

Add the chickpeas, and then add the chickpea broth, making sure there is 1.2 litres – make it up with hot water if there isn’t – and a pinch of salt. Increase the heat to bring the soup to the boil.
Add the pasta and cook until tender, stirring, tasting and adding more broth to keep it a nice soupy consistency. Serve with a grinding of black pepper (or sprinkle of red chilli flakes) and a little more olive oil poured over the top.

Note: this works well simplified to use chickpea broth from cooking any amount of chickpeas (the more you cooked, the more intense the broth flavour), and without any measuring - heat oil and fry rosemary and crushed garlic, add cooked chickpeas, add enough chickpea broth to cook pasta (top up with water if not enough) and some salt, add pasta and any additional veg desired (e.g. chopped celery, diced courgette), boil until pasta is done and eat with a drizzle of olive oil and some black pepper or chilli flakes... or even a spoonful of walnut pesto on top if you want to be fancy. Also good with chopped fresh tomatoes added at the end... And our fave pasta shape for this, after testing many, is oriechette.

St. George's mushrooms and asparagus

We had a short but wonderful season of St. George's mushrooms in our garden. This was the first time I'd found and eaten St. George's mushrooms, but I checked them out thoroughly and was really sure. Key features are: that they grow in the lawn, in rings, they are white with white gills and a white spore print, they do not colour red or any other colour on bruising, they are firm and 5-15 cm across, and most importantly, they are pretty much the only mushrooms around in the Spring. They are named because in the UK they usually come up around St. George's Day. In German they are called Maipilz, because they usually come up a little later in May / Mai.

Here in Denmark, they first appeared early May. Despite being sure what they were pretty much from the beginning, we did a spore print, then I ate just one as an experiment. It's usually a good idea to eat just a little the first time, even though neither Seb nor I have yet had any bad reactions. That went well (and was delicious), so we decided to eat more!

I bought another mushroom book since moving back to Europe - I am building up quite a good collection. This one is definitely one of my favourites already: the River Cottage mushroom book. Like my other favourite mushroom books, this one is written by a strong and funny character who really knows his stuff. Also, it contains recipes. Something I realized soon after starting to hunt wild mushrooms is that every one has a different taste and texture, so different cooking methods suit different mushrooms. Therefore, it's great to have recipes that specify a particular type of mushroom. The book suggests a really simple Spring combination: St. George's mushrooms and asparagus. So that's what we did... twice!

St. George's mushrooms have gone straight to the top of my mushroom list. For several reasons... 1) they have a nice, mushroomy taste; 2) they have a great, firm texture - one of the best; 3) they do not shrink that much on cooking (because they are quite firm); 4) they are a good size and grow in rings, so if you find one you'll find several meals' worth; and 5) they come up in Spring, when there is a dearth of other kinds of mushrooms around, both edible and inedible - this makes identification easier, and means you get a dose of lovely tasty mushrooms to tide you over until Autumn.

We had St. George's mushrooms from our lawn, and some of the best asparagus I've ever eaten from our food share KBHFF. The second time, we shared with my sister, and she took the picture.

about 200g St George’'s mushrooms
salt and pepper
12 asparagus spears, trimmed
1 tbsp olive oil
50 g butter

Clean, trim and halve the mushrooms (or quarter them if they're large).

Bring a saucepan of water to the boil, add salt, then add the asparagus and cook for 3–4 min until just tender. Drain and set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat, add the mushrooms and sauté gently until they are tender and the liquid they release has evaporated. St George's mushrooms need a fair bit of cooking and don't contain that much water, so keep the heat low to avoid drying them out before they're cooked through.

Add the steamed asparagus spears to the mushroom pan, along with the butter. Season with salt and pepper, toss around once or twice, and serve at once, with bread.

Apple, apricot and walnut loaf cake

This is a Delia classic, as well as being a Sher classic and the first cake S ever made for me. I can't quite believe I didn't write it out on here but it looks like I haven't... It is simple, although it does take a little time to prepare the ingredients (nut toasting, chopping fruit etc), and a fairly long time in the oven (up to 2 hours). But it's very versatile (lots of fruit, nut, flour, sugar variations possible), and a great way of using one or two old apples. This time I actually used some marzipan instead of about 2/3 of the nuts (did not toast, obv), and that was well tasty. I also added marzipan to apple crumble topping last week (I had a whole marzipan pig begging to be eaten), which caught a little but I think is in principle an excellent and delicious idea.

For the cake:
175 g pecan nuts (used walnuts)
110 g wholemeal flour
110 g plain flour
pinch of salt
1½ tsp baking powder
2 rounded tsp ground cinnamon
110 g spreadable butter
175 g light brown soft sugar
2 large eggs, beaten
3 tbsp milk (plus a little extra if needed)
175 g ready-to-eat dried apricots, each chopped in half
175 g Bramley apples, cored and cut into 1 cm chunks with the skin on

For the topping:
2 tbsp demerara sugar
¼ tsp ground cinnamon

Heat the oven to 180C. Grease and line a 2 lb loaf tin. When the oven is ready, spread the nuts on a baking sheet and toast for about 8 min. Remove them to a chopping board, let cool a bit, then chop roughly.

Meanwhile sift the flours, salt, baking powder and cinnamon into a large mixing bowl. Then add the rest of the ingredients except the fruit and nuts. Using an electric hand whisk, beat slowly then increase the speed to mix everything thoroughly til smooth. Fold in the apricots, apples and pecans. When everything’s folded in, add a drop more milk if necessary to give a mixture that drops easily off the spoon when you give it a sharp tap. Pile the mixture into the lined tin and level the top. Combine the cinnamon and sugar together in a small bowl, then sprinkle over the cake.

Bake the loaf in the centre of the oven for about an hour, then cover loosely with a piece of foil and leave to bake for a further 15–30 min or until the cake feels springy in the centre and a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let cool for about 15 min before turning out onto a wire cooling rack.

Beetroot and horseradish dip

This is very simple, but really surprisingly tasty. I don't know if it was a fluke, but the amount of horseradish came out just perfect: fiery but softened by the earthy beet and creamy yoghurt.

approx. 4 medium beetroots
3/4 cup skyr
2-3 1 cm cubes of peeled horseradish
lime juice
salt

Boil the beets whole until tender, then let cool (do this in advance if you like). Peel (the skins should just slip off) and chop into large chunks. Blend together with the remaining ingredients, adding skyr/yoghurt until the consistency is as you like it, and adding salt/lime juice to taste. Eat with veg sticks or crackers or bread.

Sunchoke (jerusalum artichoke) and white bean soup

This is the first time I cooked with sunchokes in ages. They are much more easily available in shops  here than in the UK or the USA. I always thought maybe you didn't see them in shops much because they don't store well, but I guess that is wrong. When I was a kid we had them in the garden, and later L and I had them in our allotment... And they are unkillable (!), so I have eaten plenty of them in the past. I knew them as jerusalem artichokes then, but sunchokes is a better name I think - they are related to sunflowers and nothing to do with Jerusalem, after all. They lend themselves very well to soup. I kept this one simple: sunchokes have quite a distinctive but delicate taste and I didn't want to overpower it / thought they'd play well with white beans.

olive oil
1/2 a large onion, peeled and chopped
4 large sunchokes, well-cleaned and chopped into chunks
500 ml veg stock
1 1/2 cups cooked white beans or butterbeans
1 bay leaf
salt and pepper
more olive oil to serve

Heat oil in a large saucepan. Add the onion and saute for 5-10 min on a low-medium heat, until softened. Add the sunchokes, cover and cook for 10 min or so more, stirring often. Add the veg stock, bay leaf and beans. Simmer for 20-30 min, until the sunchokes are thoroughly cooked and tender. Blend until smooth. Add more water if necessary, and season to taste. Serve with a sprinkling of tasty olive oil, salt and pepper on top.

Roasted butternut squash with cardamom and black onion seeds

This is Ottolenghi, by way of our friends S and N who have been staying with us these last few days. They are the first to test our 'spare' room, which we haven't really worked out what to do with yet. The squash was really delicious: the spices were perfect, and they made it with wild rice mix, which soaked up the wonderful juices really well. It is a surprisingly straightforward recipe for Ottolenghi: basically just squash and some stuff we always have in the cupboards.

20 g unsalted butter
1 tbsp olive oil
1 large red onion, peeled and cut into 1 cm thick slices
1 large butternut squash, peeled and cut into 3 cm pieces
salt
30 g pumpkin seeds
1 tsp nigella seeds (black onion seed / kalonji), plus extra to garnish
½ tsp each ground cumin and coriander
¼ tsp ground turmeric
4 cardamom pods, lightly crushed
1 cinnamon stick
1 green chili, halved lengthways
1 tbsp caster sugar
200 ml vegetable stock
100 g Greek yoghurt
1 tbsp chopped fresh coriander

Heat the oven to 200C/400F. Put butter and oil in a large pan, and fry the onion for eight min over medium heat until soft. Add the butternut, turn the heat up to medium-high and cook for 10 min, stirring occasionally, until it starts to colour.

Remove from the heat and add half a teaspoon of salt, the seeds, spices, chili and sugar. Mix and transfer to an ovenproof dish large enough to hold everything snugly. Pour in the stock and roast for 30 minutes, by which point the butternut should be tender and all the liquid absorbed or evaporated.

Serve warm with yoghurt spooned on top, a sprinkling of chopped coriander and a few nigella seeds.


Note: This other butternut squash Ottolenghi recipe looks good too. I really ought to buy one of his books.

Dry kale and coconut curry

I can't get enough coconut at the moment, and kale and beetroot have been very regular fixtures in our veg bag. So when I came across these recipes for beetroot and kale curries I was dead set on making them asap. Not least because they reminded me very much of the delicious coconutty food I'd eaten in Tamil Nadu and Kerala in southern India many moons ago.

I made the kale one first, and it is great. I was totally going to follow it with the beetroot one (I have  a guilty beetroot mountain in the fridge - much though I love the stuff I have not been getting through it quickly enough!) but the site was down when I looked on Friday... So I made this beetroot soup instead. Very much intending to do the beetroot one soon too though (yes, I do still have more beetroot in the fridge)!

½ cup / 45 g desiccated coconut
½ cup / 125 ml coconut water (didn't have - just used water)
4 cups / 130 g shredded kale
1 small red onion (used white), sliced
1 tsp ground cumin
¾ tsp fine sea salt, plus more for garnish
1 green chilli, if desired (used a bit of red), finely chopped
juice of ½ lime, plus extra for garnish

Mix desiccated coconut and coconut water in a small bowl and let soak for about 30 min. Prepare veg while you wait.

In a large pot over medium heat, add the onions, salt and cumin. Stir often, letting the onions soften in the pan. Add a couple tablespoons of the liquid from the soaking coconut if the pot becomes too dry (reserve as much liquid as you can, however). After about 8-10 min, add the kale and the coconut mixture. Stir to coat, and quickly cover the pot with a lid so that the kale steams inside. Wait just 30-60 sec (or a bit longer if your kale is tough) – the kale is ready when it is bright green and tender. Remove from heat and squeeze in the lime juice. Season to taste.

Note: I ended up with loads of liquid at the end. I evaporated it with the pan tilted to avoid overcooking the kale, but it's probably smart to avoid adding extra water as much as possible, and to make sure the kale is well dried after washing.

Birthday mohnkuchen; and birthday pasta cake

 It was S's birthday yesterday. I had decided weeks ago upon his cake: mohnkuchen. I'd bought the poppy seeds even longer ago, in Germany, and had been meaning to make mohnkuchen ever since. Seems like I make cakes less and less often... But birthday cakes are essential!

I used the same recipe as before, without veganising it this time. I made it the day before, and it was delicious on the day and he loved it. BUT it was the ugliest cake ever. I mean, black poppy seeds don't make for the most beautiful cake to start with, but on top of that the mohn mixture rose up in a wall all around the edges like crazy. This didn't happen before and I don't understand why it happened this time. Perhaps I didn't put the streusel mixture thick enough on top? Anyway, I trimmed that bit back down so it didn't look quite as bizarre, and it tasted great. It meant it was a bit more sunken in the middle and the mohn layer wasn't quite as thick as it should have been, but it held together well and I can't really complain.

We had a good day - a good balance of making plans and being spontaneous, and being lucky. Cake and presents for breakfast; bus over to the sauna, some sunny sauna action; up to Papirøen for good food (the best pizza place has gone completely vegetarian, including many vegan options - wahoo!); bus back in time for S to watch Dortmund, who won, and it started raining as soon as we got back... While S watched football and then spoke to his mum, I decided to cap his day off by making his this spaghetti pie for his dinner - I had seen the recipe a few weeks back and it had his name written all over - pasta, cheese, crispy pasta, more cheese... This was a perfect opportunity to make it!

butter for greasing springform
8 oz broccoli rabe, chopped into few-inch segments
1 lb dried spaghetti
1 1/2 cups milk
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
2-3 tsp ground black pepper
2 tsp coarse salt
8 oz aged pecorino cheese, grated, divided
8 oz fontina cheese, grated, divided

Heat oven to 425F (220C, 200C fan). Butter a 9 in springform baking tin and wrap the outside tightly in foil. Set aside.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add broccoli to the pot and boil for 1-2 min, until just tender. Fish out with a large slotted spoon and drain well. Set aside.

Add spaghetti to boiling water and cook until 2 min short of done (i.e. very al dente) as the spaghetti will continue cooking in the oven. Drain well and let cool slightly.

Wring all extra moisture out of the broccoli and blot on paper towels to remove as much moisture as possible. Chop into very small pieces.

In a large bowl, whisk eggs and milk together with salt and pepper. Stir in all but 1/2 cup of each cheese and chopped broccoli. Add spaghetti and toss to coat.

Pour mixture into prepared tin and sprinkle remaining cheese on top. Bake for 50+ min (mine took more like an hour and a half), until the top is brown and there is no runny egg in the centre. If the top browns before the center is set, cover with foil for the remaining cooking time.

Cut around the springform ring to loosen, then remove ring. Run a spatula underneath the pie to loosen the base and slide onto a serving plate. Cut into wedges.


The mixture only just fits in the tin, but doesn't rise up so that's OK. It is huge, and very filling, so definitely serves many people or makes lots of leftovers. It took ages to cook: definitely not something to make in a rush or when hungry! It also messed up the springform quite a lot. I won't be making this often but it had a lot of impact for a special occasion for a pasta lover! He was pretty excited!

Black garlic dill dough balls

We went to the big Yayoi Kusuma show at Louisiana one evening last week. It was amazingly busy for a cold Wednesday night. But it was a super fun show. We'd seen some of her work at the Mattress Factory in Pittsburgh and at Louisiana before, but I was only really familiar with her reflecting rooms and polka dots. Turns out there was a whole lot of other stuff I didn't know about, which was just as great if not better. I really enjoyed her nets, and her pumpkins (especially the large bronze ones). And her earliest work: colourful paintings and beautifully precise botanical sketches. Although it felt very much of its time, her 60s NY stuff - pasta handbags, cut-out dresses and nude happenings - was interesting to see too. I wasn't very familiar with that period of her work, and it was all very smart and humorous. S got inspired by a little footnote listing the performers at one of her happenings - someone called Dill Dough...

So on the train back we decided that we should buy some dill and experiment with Dill Dough recipes. At the weekend we bought dill from a shop in København NV. And last night I was in the kitchen making fritters and decided it was time for dill dough. We still had anytime dough in the fridge from our latest pizza efforts. I also decided to include some black garlic, which we had bought on a whim the other day and is really interesting. It doesn't really taste like garlic at all - sweet and tangy - perhaps more like miso? Somewhere inbetween yeast extract and miso? Anyway, I mixed some of that in too...

1/3 quantity of pre-made dough
2-3 tbsp chopped dill
4-5 cloves black garlic, chopped
1-2 tbsp flour, as needed
butter to finish

Take the dough out of the fridge and add the dill and black garlic. Mix and knead a little to combine. Shape into bread roll shapes (this made 4 but it's flexible depending on dough quantity / ball size preference). Space on a baking sheet covered with baking paper and prove in a warm place for about 30 min. Preheat the oven to 200C and bake the dough balls for 20-30 min, until they sound hollow when tapped on the base. Take out of the oven and smear a little butter on the top of each one to melt. Best eaten still slightly warm.

Salsify fritters

Our latest veg bag came with some charismatic roots (besides the usual tatties and beets): salsify and horseradish. I've never cooked salsify before, so it seemed like a fun challenge. A silver lining to having to leave work early to get the veg bag is that I arrive home with time to cook before S gets home / before I get super tired and hungry. So I got busy in the kitchen. These fritters were one of the first salsify recipes I came across. I had all the ingredients and it had been a while since I made a fritter, so I decided to go with it. Salsify has quite a subtle, slightly sweet flavour, so I wondered if it would be overpowered by the chilli, garlic and coriander. It wasn't though: it was fine.

300 g salsify (5-6 roots), peeled and coarsely grated
1 clove garlic, peeled and chopped
1 small red chilli, chopped
3 tbsp chopped coriander
1 egg
1 tbsp flour
salt+pepper
butter and olive oil for cooking

Wash, peel and grate the salsify. Melt 1-2 tbsp butter in a frying pan and cook the grated salsify until it is tender, 5-10 min. Transfer cooked salsify to a bowl and add garlic, chilli, coriander, egg, flour and seasoning. Shape into fritters - it should make 5-6. Heat 1-2 tbsp butter and 1-2 tbsp olive oil in the frying pan and fry the fritters about 4 minutes on each side until browned on the outside and cooked through. Eat right away.

Exciting pizza

S has a different approach to the kitchen than me. I tend to make different things all the time (as evidenced here), and get bored if I make the same thing too many times. He finds things he likes and makes them again and again until he reaches perfection. Like pasta. Or pretzels: he reaches a level of perfect replication in pretzel shapes that I have never achieved with anything. The latest thing to gain his attention is pizza. Since I discovered the speedy dough trick, we have developed a system: I make the dough and leave it in the fridge, then anytime he wants he can make pizza (and then I can eat it)!

Since we got back from Italy he's been getting awesomely adventurous. One success was white pizza with mozzarella and truffle paste, inspired by pizza we had in Rome and truffles we brought back in a jar. Another, which I guess was more inspired by Otto's in Boston, is pizza with spicy tomato sauce, white beans and potato. I cannot fully express just how well beans work on pizza: they get a little bit crispy on the outside: a bit of a falafel vibe? Very good! Both beans and potato are best cooked before putting on pizza to simplify matters.

Red lentil and pumpkin pottage

Pottage is a nice word, isn't it? It evokes thick, lovely, stick-to-your-ribs warmth. Which is exactly what this is. This is from my New Covent Garden Soup Company book. I am not sure I ever made before, perhaps I had dismissed it for its apparent simplicity. It is simple, but it is good. And simple can be wonderful on chilly winter nights.

Also, I just came back from Italy struck by how good simple food can be. Basically every pizza or pasta dish we ate there comprised just one main ingredient besides the pasta or dough, often something cheap and hearty: pasta and spinach; pasta and chickpeas; pizza with aubergine, pizza with zucchini... All so good. I remember the first time I realized what Italian food really is, when I first visited Italy: I ate a dish of spaghetti with oil and garlic expecting to be underwhelmed but instead I got it for the first time after a life of boring non-Italian Italian food.

This little kabocha squash was loitering around from our last vegetable bag before Christmas, and we returned from Italy to a cold, busy day of unpacking and sorting things out, and simple soup from good ingredients, all of which we happened to have at home, was exactly what fitted into the day.

For the soup:
2 oz / 50 g butter
1 medium onion, peeled and chopped
1 medium kabocha squash (or butternut... 1 1/2 lb / 675 g), peeled and diced
1 bay leaf
red lentils
1 3/4 pints / 1 litre vegetable stock
salt and pepper

To serve:
yogurt or creme fraiche
chopped fresh coriander
toasted pumpkin seeds

Melt butter in a lidded saucepan and fry the onion, squash and bay leaf with the lid on until slightly tender but not coloured. Add the lentils and stock, bring to the boil and simmer for about 30 min until the vegetables and lentils are soft. Taste for seasoning, let cool a bit and blend until smooth. Reheat gently and serve in bowls with yoghurt swirled on top and sprinkling of coriander and pumpkin seeds. Those New Covent Garden Soup Company soups are endlessly great.