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Showing posts with label green tomato. Show all posts
Showing posts with label green tomato. Show all posts

Monday, November 11, 2013

Green tomato cake (+gluten-free option)

I had just about dealt with all the green tomatoes from my roof when I was gifted a pile more from ECO (thanks to D, K and A!). I actually still had lots of unrealised green tomato ideas, and ended up going with green tomato cake for these toms - a new one in my repertoire of weirdo vegetable cakes...

4 cups chopped green tomatoes (chop fairly fine)
1 tbsp salt
1/3 cup veg oil
1 1/3 cups sugar (used mixture of white and brown)
2 eggs (or 2 tbsp ground linseed mixed with 5 tbsp boiling water)
2 cups plain flour (or 2 cups TJ's GF flour mix plus 1/4 tsp xanthan gum)
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup raisins

Put the green tomatoes in a bowl with ~1 tbsp salt. Mix and let sit for ~ 10 min, while you prepare the rest of the ingredients and start on the cake. Heat the oven to 350F. Beat the vegetable oil and sugar together in a bowl with a fork. Add the eggs (or linseed mixture) and beat until reasonably well combined and aerated. Mix the flour, xanthan gum if using, 1/4 tsp salt, spices and bicarb in a separate bowl with a fork. Add the raisins and walnuts to the dry stuff and mix. Add the wet to dry and mix until just combined. Rinse and drain (try to get most of the liquid out) the green tomatoes and then fold into the cake mixture. Grease a loaf tin and line the base. Dollop the cake mixture into the tin. Bake for 45-60 min until a skewer comes out clean (exact cooking time will depend on shape of tin used). Let cool in the tin for at least half an hour before lifting out.


This was really, surprisingly good. The green toms are hardly noticeable - visually only if you look for them, and taste-wise hardly at all. So it is basically a moist, spiced cake rich with walnuts and raisins. The GF version was a little bit crumbly when sliced but really just a little bit - quite acceptable in this type of cake (made with eggs; rose beautifully). We took it for D's birthday party, and it went down well (especially with A).

Roasted apple and fennel seed chutney

I keep thinking this year's harvest is over - I thought the quinces would be the last thing for sure. But then something else crops up. This time it's apples - a LUrC tree five minutes from my house! How could I resist? I spent a fun few hours with M on a busy street corner - our strategy was for one person to try and knock apples out of the tree with a pole while the other (usually M - he is good at catching, I am decidedly not) tried to catch them, all the while trying to avoid hitting people, bashing parked cars, or sending apples to become untimely apple-roadkill-sauce under passing wheels. We grabbed a surprising amount before I had to leave and it was getting dark; at which point M was still up the tree in gathering gloom, unable to resist reaching for the final few.

The other reason I was happy about that harvest was that I'd joined a skillshare group wherein some people wanted me to show them how to make jam. It was starting to seem like it wasn't going to happen, but this last-of-the-season bonus made it possible. So, on Sunday, three ladies came over and I took them through my jam making process using this recipe.

I wasn't really meaning to make any more preserves. But then started constructing an apple and fennel seed chutney in my mind. And, while thinking of it, came across this recipe, which featured an interesting new chutney-making technique (roasting in the oven rather than simmering on the hob - also here), and sounded exactly like what I wanted (and completely delicious).

(made 4 small jars)

90g dried sour cherries, soaked overnight in apple juice (used white grape juice, soaked ~3 hours)
1 kg Cox's apples, peeled, cored and roughly chopped (used Packard's Corner apples)
2 fennel bulbs, finely sliced across (a mandoline is very good for this) (used green tomatoes instead)
1 red onion, cut in half and sliced lengthways, from the root end to the top (used white onion as had no red)
100g fresh ginger, finely grated
1 red chilli, finely sliced into rings (used dried)
2 tsp fennel seeds (used 2 1/2 tsp)
2 tsp coriander seeds
3 star anise (used 2 1/2 tsp anise seeds instead as liked the taste more than star anise in this context)
250 g demerara sugar
400 ml cider vinegar

Put everything in a roasting dish, cover with foil and place in an oven preheated to 160C/320F. Cook for an hour and a half, stirring once or twice, then remove the foil and continue to cook for about an hour, until thick and browned and a good chutney consistency (cook for longer if necessary). Remove from the oven and spoon into sterilised jars while still hot. Seal immediately.


The roasting worked well although not sure if it is any different or better than doing it on the hob, and does make sterilising the jars a bit more faffy since the oven is occupied. It's a delicious chutney. The ginger is pretty strong, the fennel / anise is present, but the sour cherries are perhaps a little lost. Will taste again when it is mature - for now I am definitely happy with it. Would probably be even better with fennel - just used green toms as that's what I had, but they don't really add anything to the taste.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Pickled green tomatoes (and grapes)

With my harvest of green tomatoes, I decided to pickle some (using my trusty faux-Grillo brine) as well as making jam. In fact, I still have some left even after all this - perhaps frying is also on the cards, or exciting sauce, or who knows what else? The grapes were left over from my last bunch of Concord grapes of the season - I hung onto the unripe ones to try pickling them.

~1 lb of green tomatoes
~10 unripe Concord grapes
~20 mint leaves
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
1/2 tsp celery seeds
1/4 tsp red chilli flakes
3/8 cup cider vinegar
3/8 cup white vinegar
1 1/4 cups water
3/4 tbsp salt

Slice the green tomatoes thickly and pack into two (~400g size) jars. Add the Concord grapes and mint leaves to one / the fennel seeds, celery seeds and chilli flakes to the other. Put the vinegars, water and salt into a small saucepan and bring just to the boil. Pour over the jar contents, making sure to fill right up to ~1 cm from the brim, jiggling the contents to minimize air bubbles. Put lids on while the contents are still hot, then let cool before storing in the fridge.

Green tomato, pepper and chilli jam

I took in all the green tomatoes from my roof after seeing a forecast of -1C for Friday. I had quite a lot - they had come back in September but not many of that second round had ripened much. I also had a lot of green peppers (from D) and some green chillies, so I decided to make another version of this, but with everything green - also reminiscent of this, but somehow more savoury due to the garlic, ginger, chillies, peppers.

(makes ~5 smallish jars)

800 g green tomatoes
18 green peppers
18 green chillies
12 garlic cloves
two thumb sized ginger chunks
1.4 kg sugar
400ml cider vinegar

Finely chop the green tomatoes, peppers, chillies (wearing lab gloves), garlic and ginger.

Put sugar and vinegar in a pan and stir til sugar dissolved. Add the rest of the ingredients and simmer til reduced  / thick and sticky (~60 min). When reduced, cook on high until setting point is reached. Let cool for 10 min before putting into sterile jars.


This tastes great - similar to sweet chilli sauce. And is resoundingly, pleasingly, emerald. It's a soft set, but I think that's OK. Perhaps some lemon juice would help with the set?

In a wonderful postscript, S took some of this for his friend / colleague W, who is a legend and who had been chatting with S about taking in his green tomatoes while I was taking in mine - it seemed a nice thought and it's fun to share successful preserve experiments. I thought nothing more of it, but a couple of days later W gave S a wee jar of liquid gold from his Brookline bees - so excited and thankful! It's gorgeous honey - very pale and delicate - quite different from A's JP honey despite both coming from city bees - perhaps the time of year, perhaps the flowers in the different hoods? I love them just the same.

Monday, October 14, 2013

Piccalilli

I saw cauliflowers coming into season, and for some reason thought of piccalilli. I'm not even sure if I like piccalilli! But I was thinking about making some more savoury preserves for Winter - I have a lot of jam, and the aubergine chutney I made a few weeks ago reminded me how good savoury preserves can be (and how much faster I tend to eat them). And in my head piccalilli has to involve cauliflower and be really yellow and crunchy... and that's about all I knew (aside from a sketch in the James Herriot country vet books I loved as a kid where he had to eat piccalilli to be polite to a farmer's wife although he loathed it... anyway, I digress).

The version in my preserving book looked OK, but this Jamie Oliver version really grabbed my attention - the ingredient list sounded intriguing and delicious - mango, broccoli and apple as well as the cauliflower. So I followed it (more or less) - gave me the chance to preserve some Somerville-harvested apples I had hanging around the kitchen as well as broccoli, chillies and carrots from the CSA and green tomatoes and green beans from my roof garden. Surprisingly, mango is something I often have in store, owing to my frozen mango habit.

(made 3 large jars and 2 medium ones)

½ large cauliflower, cut into small florets
1 head broccoli, cut into small florets
2 bulbs fennel, cut into small chunks (subbed ~4 medium carrots, peeled and cut into small (~1cm dice), and some chopped green tomato)
4 red chillies, seeds still in, finely sliced (subbed dried)
2 green chillies, seeds still in, finely sliced
200 g fine green beans, chopped into short lengths (used roof beans - Kentucky Wonder and French Filet of varying ages - for these plus runners)
150 g runner beans, cut into short lengths (see above)
300 g shallots, cut into eighths (subbed 1 large and 2 small white onions for this and the red onion)
1 red onion, roughly chopped (see above)
2 handfuls fine sea salt
2 tbsp mustard oil (subbed canola oil)
2 heaped tbsp mustard seeds (used 1 tbsp yellow mustard seed and 1 tbsp brown mustard seed)
2 tbsp ground cumin
1 tsp fennel seed, ground (I added this to make up for the absence of fennel)
2 tbsp turmeric
1 nutmeg, grated
2 tbsp English mustard powder (subbed ground yellow mustard seeds)
4 tbsp flour
500 ml white wine vinegar (subbed cider vinegar)
100 ml water
2 apples, grated
2 mangoes, peeled, stoned and roughly chopped (used equivalent quantity chopped frozen mango)
6 tbsp sugar
3 cloves garlic, crushed (/finely chopped)
2 tbsp dried oregano
4 bay leaves

Put all the vegetables in a bowl, add the salt and enough water to cover. Leave in a cool place for about 1 hour. Meanwhile, prep the remaining ingredients and start cooking them.

Heat a saucepan big enough to hold all the vegetables. Add the mustard oil to the pan, then fry the mustard seeds, cumin, turmeric and nutmeg for a moment. Lower the heat, add the mustard powder, flour and a splash of vinegar. Stir well to make a thick paste. Gradually add the remaining vinegar and the water, stirring all the time to make a smooth paste. Add the apples, mangoes, sugar, garlic, oregano and bay leaves. Cook for 2-3 minutes.

Drain the salted vegetables and add them to the pan, stirring well to coat with the spicy paste. Cook for 10-15 minutes until the vegetables have just softened and started to release some juice. Spoon into sterilised jars and close the lids tightly. Give it at least a month to mature in a cool dark cupboard before eating.


Ha, I took a photo because having that hour of soaking veg in brine meant I was probably the most organised I've ever been before I started cooking...  I haven't tried the piccalilli yet (got to wait a month!) but it looks suitably, violently yellow - I especially enjoy how yellow the cauliflower becomes...

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Green tomato chutney

The other half of my green tomato preserving marathon. This is a classic chutney, from the book Grandma gave me (with a few adjustments).

(made about 3 standard sized jars)

2 lb green tomatoes, chopped
1 lb onions, sliced
2 1/2 tsp salt
300 ml cider vinegar
5/8 lb (275g) brown sugar
8 oz apples, peeled and chopped
8 oz raisins (used a mixture of golden and normal)
1 in piece of ginger, peeled and finely chopped
2 habanero peppers, deseeded and finely chopped
1/2 tsp red chilli pepper flakes

Mix the tomatoes and onions in a large bowl with the salt, cover and leave for 24 hours.

Drain the tomatoes and onions and discard any liquid.  Heat the vinegar in a large pan, add the sugar and heat until dissolved. Add the raisins and bring to the boil. Add the rest of the ingredients and heat over a low flame for 2 hours / until dragging a wooden spoon through the mixture leaves a trail you can see the bottom of the pan through. Allow to cool for five minutes or so then spoon into sterilised jars. For best results, leave to mature for at least 2 weeks before eating.

Green tomato jam (Confiture de tomates vertes)

It was the first of the end of season tidy up days at the garden on Saturday, and I collected a lot of green tomatoes. I had chutney in mind, then thought maybe I had enough tomatoes to make a couple of different things, and came across this unusual sounding jam (possibly a French idea). I saw several recipe variations but decided to go with this simple amalgamation.

(made 3-4 standard sized jars)

2.5 lb green tomatoes, thinly sliced
2 lb sugar
zest and juice of one lemon

Mix the sliced tomatoes in a large bowl with the sugar. Cover and leave for 24 hours. Transfer the mixture to a large pan with the lemon zest and juice, and heat over a low flame for 2 hours. Check for setting point, heat faster for a while if necessary. Allow to cool for ten minutes then put carefully into jars and close the lids tightly.


This stuff is really interesting. It looks like a Martian raspberry jam - lots of small seeds and a deep colour, but richly green rather than pink-red. The taste is fairly subtle, with a slight sharpness to it. I haven't quite figured it out yet: will need to eat some more...


A couple of months later I was at Grandma's, looking through an old cookery book (Miss Tuxford's Cookery for the Middle Classes, 9th Edition, 1927) that we found in a box of books that used to belong to Mum. In the chapter on 'Food Reform Cookery', which I think means vegetarian food but perhaps has a grander meaning too, I found a recipe for Green Tomato Jam:


So perhaps it's just an old-fashioned idea rather than being particularly French. Anyway, it was nice, and next time I have green toms I will try it with ginger!

Saturday, September 29, 2012

Fried green tomatoes

It is harvest time: tonight is the harvest moon, and I spent the day at the garden today gathering ground cherries, purple potatoes, bundles of herbs, various squashes, raspberries and green tomatoes. I gathered more than 5 lb of green tomatoes total, mostly small ones but a few large enough to try frying. I've never tried fried green tomatoes, although I knew they were a thing: I had thought it would need faffing around with batter. But Hannah recommended frying them simply in a pan, so we ate the big ones fried like this for a late lunch, hunger piqued by a day of working outside.

~4 large green tomatoes
butter or oil for frying
salt and pepper

Slice the tomatoes thickly: about 1 cm thick, making sure each one has the two flat sides without skin. Heat the fat in a frying pan then place the slices in the pan.  Fry for about 5 minutes on each side, turning over halfway through, until both sides are lightly browned and the tomato is tender. Move the slices to a serving plate, season liberally and eat.


Really good: them being underripe made the texture nice and firm and not too wet, great for frying. The taste is not so strong, but tangy and good: goes really well with salt and pepper.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Baked squash, corn and exciting sauce

The first time I made this Seb said it was the most exciting thing I had ever cooked!

Basically from here.

This is great with warmed corn tortillas. Serves four to six.

1 squash (butternut or red onion), weighing around 1 kg
1 tbsp olive oil
3 cobs of corn
2 cloves garlic, peeled and very finely chopped
2 red chillies, very finely chopped
200g goat's cheese, crumbled with your hands (or chopped) (did not use)
Juice of 1 lime
1 handful chopped coriander leaves, to garnish

For the dressing
80g pumpkin seeds
2 cloves garlic crushed
2 tomatoes (green ideally, but not to worry if you can't get hold of any; or tomatilloes)
2 green lettuce leaves (romaine or cos), chopped
1 tbsp coriander leaves, chopped
2 green chillies, roughly chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt and freshly milled pepper

Peel and deseed the squash. Chop the flesh into 1-2cm chunks, tip into an oven tray, toss in olive oil, season and roast in a medium oven (190C/375F/gas mark 5) for about 30 minutes, until starting to brown and just cooked through.
While the squash is roasting, cook the corn in boiling water for about 10 minutes. Drain, refresh and leave to cool a little, then cut the kernels from the cobs.

Take the squash out of the oven (leave the heat on) and toss in the chopped garlic, chilli and corn kernels. Transfer the lot to an ovenproof serving dish and return to the oven for five minutes.

Meanwhile, make the dressing by dry-frying the pumpkin seeds over a medium heat for five minutes, until they are toasted and have popped. When cool, tip the seeds into the jug of a liquidiser, add all the other dressing ingredients and blend, adding a little water to take it to a pouring consistency.

Fold the goat's cheese into the squash and corn mix, and return to the oven for another 10 minutes or so, until the goat's cheese is hot.

To serve, squeeze lime juice over the pumpkin mix, drizzle the dressing over, season to taste and sprinkle with coriander.

I tend to downregulate the chili and garlic in the sauce a little (or just modify to suit the spiciness / sizes I have).  I also used sunflower seeds instead of pumpkin sometimes, or a combination of.  Left out the goat cheese.  Used frozen, briefly defrosted and refreshed, sweetcorn instead of fresh.  Used any kind of squash.

It is yummy.  Even just the squash roasted with corn and garlic and chili is very simple and tasty.