Mulberry, cranberry, wheatberry, walnut

All these berries seemed so coincidental - the wheatberries, the dried berries, the pickled berries, even the berry molasses appeared just when I was about to get out the honey. I am gradually plundering my cupboardful of preserves - these juicy pickled mulberries were from the first harvest of last year. So, salad or grain, either way, this is nice.

1 cup wheatberries, cooked until tender in ~ 2 cups water
~1 tbsp white miso
~1 tbsp mulberry molasses
~2 tbsp mulberry vinegar (from the pickled mulberries, top up with red wine vinegar if you don't have enough)
~2 tbsp olive oil
salt+pepper
~20 pickled mulberries
~1/4 cup walnut pieces
~2 tbsp dried cranberries
~1 tbsp chopped fresh parsley
~2 tsp cacao nibs (optional)

Put the wheatberries on to cook, and in the meantime prepare all the other ingredients. To make the dressing, whisk the miso, mulberry molasses, vinegar, olive oil and some salt and pepper together in a small bowl and taste to check balance. Put the cooked wheatberries in a serving bowl and add the dressing. Toss and let cool a little. Add the pickled mulberries, walnuts, cranberries, parsley and cacao, mix up and taste to check seasoning etc. Eat warm or cold.

Beetroot, lentils and wheatberries

This is a meal in a bowl, with all sorts of depths and exciting tastes and textures and colours. You might call it a salad? It comes together really quickly if you have the beetroot, lentils and wheatberries (or you could sub chickpeas and brown rice) already cooked and in the fridge. I had baked the beetroot while I had the oven on to roast some other veg a couple of days ago, so when I wanted to eat this I just had to cook the lentils and wheatberries and prep the other stuff. If I'd done the lentils and wheatberries previously it would have been even faster; as it was the remaining food prep pretty much fitted into the time they were cooking, so still quite speedy.

Baked beetroot:
~5 medium beetroot, washed and trimmed
few sprigs thyme
3-4 cloves garlic, peeled
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp water
salt+pepper

Boiled lentils and wheatberries:
1 cup wheatberries
1 cup brown or green lentils
1 bay leaf
stock powder

Seeds, herbs and spices:
1 tbsp coriander seed
1 tsp cumin seed
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp sunflower seeds
1/2 tbsp sesame seeds
zest of 1/2 a lemon
1-2 tbsp chives, chopped
1-2 tbsp parsley, chopped
1 tbsp mint, chopped

Dressing:
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1-2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp honey
1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
1 tsp white miso
1-2 tbsp olive oil
salt+pepper

To prepare the beetroot, heat the oven to 400F. Wash the beetroot thoroughly and trim. Chop into large / even sized chunks (in half or quarters) and put in a lidded ovenproof dish. Add whole, peeled garlic cloves, thyme (fresh or dried), seasoning, olive oil and water. Put the lid on, put in the oven and bake for 30-40 min, until tender to the point of a knife. Remove from the oven, let cool, then cut into chunky dice.

Put the lentils in a small pan with enough water to cover them by 1cm. Add the bay leaf and a sprinkling of stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for ~30 min, until done. Put the wheatberries in a different pan with ~1 1/2 cups water and a sprinkling of stock. Bring to the boil and simmer 25-30 min, until tender.

Heat a frying pan and dry fry the coriander and cumin seed until fragrant. Let cool a little, then transfer to a spice mill and grind. In the same pan, dry toast the sunflower and sesame seeds until lightly golden and starting to pop. Chop the herbs and zest the lemon.

In a serving bowl, beat the dressing ingredients together with a fork. Add the cooked, still warm wheatberries and lentils and mix well together. Add the beetroot (and garlic and juices) and ground spices and toss some more. Check it is not too hot, then, immediately before serving, add the toasted seeds and fresh herbs. Toss once more, taste and add more salt, pepper and balsamic if needed, and eat.


This is really hearty and versatile - an excellent Autumn / Winter salad protocol. Versions of this have been seeing me right for weeks, as lunches and quick dinners. So long as I have some cooked lentils and wheatberries (or other grain) in the fridge, plus some kind of roasted veg - this week it is butternut squash roasted with za'atar - I can grab some herbs from my pots and mix this up in minutes.

Kale salad with radish and spelt

All my salads lately have involved honey-mustard dressing (+raisins+flaked almonds). It's simple and tasty and storecupboard-friendly, and if you ask me it goes with almost anything. I guess it's kind of a go-to comfort food for me: I've been somewhat distracted by preparing for my trip to Scotland. This time it was kale's turn. I've been experimenting a bit with kale salads, this time I thought I'd try it super simple. The kale and the daikon radish both came in last week's bumper CSA. The kale was listed as 'White Russian Kale', which suggests, as S pointed out, that it might taste like kahlua, vodka and cream. Not so, but it was quite nice anyway: the lobed, non-crinkly variety.

1 bunch kale, washed, leafy parts only (stripped from main stems and torn into manageable pieces)
1 cup whole spelt berries (or wheat berries)
2 tsp wholegrain mustard
1 tsp honey
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp cider vinegar
salt+pepper
1/4 of a medium sized daikon radish, peeled and thinly sliced
small handful of golden raisins (would have liked cranberries but I was out)
small handful of flaked toasted almonds

Put the spelt on to cook (should take ~ 20 min). Prepare the kale and let it drain. Mix the dressing (mustard through salt+pepper) in a serving bowl. Add the kale and mix thoroughly, using hands to make sure all the kale is coated. Let it sit for a while to soften - at least half an hour. When ready to serve add the sliced radish, raisins and almonds and toss. Serve over the cooked spelt (or you could mix it all together before serving).


I liked this. I think this kale variety is perhaps a little better for salads than the regular crinkly stuff - with less surface area it seems to soften easier / be a bit less fibrous. Perhaps they just happened to be younger leaves, I don't know. Anyway, it definitely filled a comfort food gap for a late supper after aerials, and the crunchy peppery radish/irony green kale/sweet dried fruit/toasty crisp almonds were a pretty complete combination.

Sprouted grain loaf / pickled beetroot

Having enjoyed Dan Lepard's bread recipes so far, tried another one.  This one called for sprouted grains, so I did an experiment with wheat berries and spelt berries.  The wheat sprouted and the spelt didn't.  Required quantity seems to be a full sprouter load (all three little trays).  Not sure if they are what the recipe is asking for or not, but I used them anyway.

Also wanted to do something with the baby beets we got from the market last weekend.  Debated boiling or roasting them for salad, but decided to try pickling after consulting Delia - it's been a while since I had pickled beetroot, and I quite fancy it.

Sprouted grain loaf

No-knead loaf with sprouted grains (not beanshoots). Leave a day before slicing, if you can.

2 tsp fast-acting dry yeast
200ml warm water
1 tsp each honey and black treacle
50ml orange juice
150g toasted sunflower seeds
225g sprouted grains (sprouted wheatberries in sprouter)
50ml sunflower oil
300g strong white flour
75g rye or wholemeal flour (used wholemeal)
1½ tsp fine salt

Stir the yeast into the water until dissolved, stir in the honey and treacle, then add the juice, seeds, sprouted grains and sunflower oil. Add the flours and salt, mix well, cover and leave for 45 minutes.

Line a large (1.5-litre) loaf tin with nonstick baking paper. Flour a worksurface, then pat the dough to about the length of the tin and three times its width. Roll up the dough tightly, place it seam-side down in the tin, then punch it down to firm it. Leave, covered, for about an hour, until the loaf has risen by about a quarter to a third.

Preheat oven to 220C (200C fan-assisted)/425F/gas mark 7. Brush top of loaf with water, bake for 20 minutes, then drop the temperature to 200C (180C fan-assisted)/390F/gas mark 6 and bake for 30 minutes longer. Remove from the tin and cool on a rack.


Pickled beetroot

3/4 lb baby* beetroot (mixed golden and red - used the greens last weekend)
~6 black peppercorns
small cinnamon stick
~3 cloves
good pinch sea salt
~150ml red wine vinegar

Clean and trim the beetroot. Wrap all together in foil and bake at ~390F for about 2 hours / til tender when poked.  Alternatively, the beetroot can be left whole, put in a big pan, covered with water, and simmered for about 1 1/2 hours, until tender.

Meanwhile put the vinegar in a bowl above a pan of hot water with the salt and spices and bring the water to the boil. Remove from the heat and allow to sit til needed. Once the beetroot have cooled enough to handle remove the peel and slice thinly. Layer into clean jar(s) - made enough for 1 1/2 350g jars. Pour over the vinegar and put the lid on.

*larger beetroot can be used but I like the smaller ones - they cook faster, pack easier and make cuter slices when served.


We started the bread the morning after I baked it in the afternoon, and it was good but a bit... crunchy?  By that evening the crunch seemed to have softened up (to do with the humid weather? or perhaps the 'leave a day' advice really did mean 24h) and it went very well with salad.  It was very similar to a granary loaf (wondering if granary uses sprouted wheat?).

I left the beetroot for a couple of days before trying it, and then put some in my lunchbox today.  It tasted... like pickled beetroot.  In a good way.  I'm glad I put in the spices, they give it an interesting touch of otherness.  I like beetroot and cinnamon together especially.

Wheat berries, roasted veg and harissa-style dressing

Wheatberries:
1 cup wheatberries
1 tbsp parsley, chopped
juice of 1/4 lemon
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp honey
salt and pepper

Roasted veg:
1 red pepper
1 medium courgette
1 medium onion
2 handfuls small cherry tomatoes
5 cloves garlic
2 tbsp basil, chopped
1 1/2 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

Harissa-style dressing:
juice of half a lime
1 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tbsp tomato puree
1 1/2 tbsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground cayenne

Cook wheatberries in 2 cups water for about half an hour / until done.  Mix lemon juice, olive oil, honey and salt and pepper in the bottom of a medium bowl.  Add the cooked, warm wheatberries and mix together.  Allow to cool a little and then add the chopped parsley and mix.

Chop the pepper, onion and courgette into chunks.  Peel and chop the garlic.  Put into a medium baking tray and sprinkle with chopped basil, olive oil and salt and pepper.  Roast at 375F for ~45min, tossing occasionally to avoid uneven cooking / burning.  Remove from the oven, cool a little then add the balsamic vinegar and toss.

Mix the ingredients for harissa-style dressing together, tweaking quantities to taste.

Eat together, mixing to taste.

The harissa dressing is an old favourite - Delia Smith via Shireen.  The rest was just simple bits and pieces.  A good supper.