I figured it was time to throw the spotlight back onto a vegetable that most people find hard to fault-- the humble carrot. It's delicious raw, crunchy and sweet, and also great cooked, as its sweetness intensifies. I think it's one of the few vegetables I actually liked as a child, maybe because it's in a happy orange colour.
Carrot and coriander make up one of the most classic flavour combinations. I was inspired by the coriander to include something that's often combined with coriander and other similar spices: lentils! The lentils help thicken the soup out without the need for cream or whatever. This makes the soup a lot heartier too, and very savoury and more-ish.
Carrot, Lentil and Coriander soup
serves 4
Ingredients
3 large carrots (about 450g), peeled and chopped
1 large onion, chopped finely
3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
1/2 cup red lentils, soaked in advance
1 heaped tsp ground coriander
about 3 tbsp coriander leaves, chopped finely
about 1 litre of homemade vegetable or chicken stock
sea salt, black pepper
2 tbsp butter
Method
1. Melt 1 tbsp butter over medium high heat in a big pot, then add the onions, carrots garlic and cook for a further 5 min until the onions become translucent.
2. Add the ground coriander, stir about 1 min more till onions are just starting to brown, then add the soaked lentils and stock, and cook for about 20-25 min till the carrots are really tender and the lentils are melting.
3. Add seasoning and mash with a potato masher. You can puree it too, but I didn't have a blender then, and anyway, I like having the texture from the lentils. Add a bit more stock/water to thin it out if you want.
4. Stir in the other tbsp of butter and the chopped coriander leaves. Garnish with a pretty coriander leaf (:
For the lentils: 1-2 tablespoons olive oil 1 onion, finely chopped Sprinkling of salt 2 cups dried Puy lentils (green or black or a mixture) 1 bay leaf 6 sprigs of fresh thyme ½ cup red wine 3 cups stock or water to cover the lentils Salt and pepper to taste
For the sausages: 1-2 tablespoons olive oil 2 large garlic cloves, peeled and smashed 6 fresh uncooked sweet Italian sausages ½ cup red wine ¼ cup water or stock Flat-leaf parsley for garnish
1. To cook the lentils, put 2-3 tablespoons of oil into a good-sized pan or a Bram pot over low heat. When it’s warm, add the chopped onion and sprinkle with salt. Cook over a low heat until the onions are soft but not browned, about 10 to 15 minutes. Add the lentils, bay leaf, and thyme sprigs, stir well, and cover generously with the red wine and the stock or water. Bring to a boil, cover, and simmer gently for 30-50 minutes or until the lentils are cooked and most of the liquid’s absorbed, stirring occasionally. Add salt and pepper to taste. You can make this ahead. Reheat when you’re ready to proceed. 2. To cook the sausages, add 1-2 tablespoons olive oil and the smashed garlic cloves to a heavy frying pan, and fry for a few minutes. Add the sausages and brown on all sides. Add the wine and stock, bring to a boil, and then turn down the heat, cover the pan and simmer the sausages for about 15 minutes, turning mid-way. When the sausages are done, cut in half on the diagonal, add them to the lentils. Mash the garlic into the remaining liquid and add it to the lentil pot. Taste for seasoning and adjust with salt, pepper, or more liquid until it is to your liking. 3. Before serving, reheat the lentil and sausage mixture over low heat. Sprinkle with parsley.
4-6 servings Adapted from Nigella Lawson’s Nigella Bites
Warm Potato Salad with Garlic Sausage
6 ounces small potatoes or about 12 small potatoes ½ cup white wine 1 cup chicken stock 6 Garlic, Italian or Sicilian fresh sausages, cooked and cut in thick slices 3 ounces Swiss cheese, cut in small cubes 1 tablespoon chopped chervil (if you can find it) 1 tablespoon chopped tarragon ¼ cup chopped chives
Mustard and White Wine Vinaigrette: 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard 1/3 cup white wine vinegar ½ cup olive oil Salt and pepper to taste
1. Cook the potatoes in boiling water until just soft. (Or steam as in the French Potato Salad on my March 13, 2010 blog). Drain and cut into thick slices. If the potatoes are small, halve or quarter them. 2. Bring the wine and stock to a boil and reduce by two-thirds. Remove from the heat and toss the potatoes into the mix and leave for 10 minutes to infuse. 3. Warm the cooked sausages in a 350ºF oven for 6 minutes in a Bram pot or an ovenproof skillet. Combine the sausages and the potatoes in the pot or skillet. 4. Whisk together the mustard and vinegar. Slowly add the oil and season with salt and pepper to taste. Pour this over the potato mixture; you may not need all of it. Add the cheese and herbs and toss together. Serve the salad in the Bram pot or, if you used a skillet, transfer to a serving bowl. Serve warm.
4-6 servings Adapted from Simon Rimmer’s Rebel Cook: Bending the Rules for Brilliant Food
Brussels Sprouts and Bacon
1 pound Brussels sprouts 1 tablespoon butter or bacon fat ½ cup thinly sliced bacon or pancetta Salt and pepper to taste 3-4 tablespoons water, as needed 2 tablespoons fresh lemon or lime juice
1. Shred/slice the Brussels sprouts either by hand or with a food processor. The processor doesn’t do as nice a job as by hand, but it is so fast. 2. Heat the butter in a large, shallow pan. When it is warm, add the sliced bacon and stir until it is soft and cooked through. 3. Add the shredded sprouts and ½ teaspoon salt and pepper. Fry until the sprouts begin to soften. Add the tablespoons of water as needed to help with the cooking and to loosen and incorporate any brown places on the bottom of the pan. 4. The sprouts are ready when they are soft and coated with the bacon juices. Most of the water will have evaporated. Adjust the seasonings. Add the lemon or lime juice just before serving.
4 servings Adapted from Nigel Slater’s Real Fast Food
¾ cup small red lentils 1 bay leaf 4 cups stock or water 10-12 slices thick smoked bacon (10-12 ounces uncooked), cut crosswise into ½-inch pieces 1 small onion, finely diced 1 small carrot, peeled and finely diced You can add some fennel and some red and yellow pepper, chopped, if you have them on hand 1 garlic clove, minced or pressed 1 can (14 ounces) diced tomatoes OR 1 large beefsteak tomato or comparable smaller ones, peeled, cored, seeded, saving the juice and adding it to the soup. See instructions below. ½ teaspoon dried oregano ½ teaspoon cumin 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh mint, plus more for garnish Salt and pepper to taste 1 green onion, both white and green parts, thinly sliced Sour cream or crème fraiche, optional
1. In a medium saucepan, stir together the lentils, bay leaf, and stock or water. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer until the lentils are soft, about 20 minutes. They will change from an orange color to a muddy yellow—do not be alarmed. 2. In a soup pot, cook the bacon pieces over low to medium heat, turn as needed to brown but not crisp. Remove from the pan, leaving the bacon fat. If there is a large amount of bacon fat, you might want to pour some of it into a container to save for another use. Leave 1-2 tablespoons in the pot. 3. Add the onions to the soup pot and sauté over medium heat until tender and starting to brown, about 8-10 minutes. 4. Add the tomatoes, the cooked lentil mixture, ¾ of the bacon (save some for a garnish), the oregano, cumin, and mint and stir until mixed. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Simmer for 10 minutes. Remove the bay leaf. Adjust seasonings to suit you. 5. Ladle into bowls. Garnish each serving with the sliced green onion, bacon and sour cream, if desired.
Great served with lemon cornbread, on October 16, 2009 blog.
To peel a tomato: Drop the tomato into boiling water for 10-15 seconds depending on how ripe it is. Remove, slit the skin and peel it off. Remove the core. Slice in half around the equator. Place a small sieve over a bowl or pitcher. With your finger, remove as many of the seeds as you can into the sieve, allowing the liquid which comes out with them to drain into the bowl. It is, to my mind, precious tomato juice.
4-5 servings Adapted from Sara Perry’s Everything Tastes Better with Bacon
This is a very simple salad. It can be served with pita bread and a plate of fresh vegetables on the side: like green onions, fresh mint and radishes.
Serves 3-4 Ingredients: 1 cup of lentils 1/3 cup of chopped onions 1 small clove of garlic, mashed 1/4 cup of fresh chopped parsley Juice of 1 lemon About a 1/3 cup of Olive oil Salt & pepper to taste
Wash and drain the lentils, make sure that they're clean then add to a saucepan with 4 cups of water and some salt and bring to a boil. Then reduce the heat to medium and let the lentils cook. After they're cooked, drain the water then transfer to the serving bowl, add the garlic, onions, parsley, salt & pepper, lemon juice and olive oil. Mix the ingredients well and serve.
Damned tasty, infinitely versatile, globally and culturally diverse, not to mention inherently comedic (used to full effect by Ben Elton and Richard Curtis in Blackadder, see below) – you just have to love the sausage.
[Whizz forward to the five-minute mark if you’re short on time. Sausage? SAUSAGE?! Genius]
As a species we have probably been making sausages for as long as we’ve been roasting meat over the flames. Once appetites had been sated with charred primary cuts, it was found that meat could be preserved in a variety of ways: Drying, smoking, curing or grinding up and packing into lengths of intestine.
As such, sausages are believed to be some of the oldest prepared foods in existence.
Techniques may have improved in the intervening millennia but the principle remains the same: sausages are about economising and preserving – and finding a tasty way of doing it, to boot.
There are so many varieties and variations that it would be foolhardy to attempt to discuss them all within the meagre confines of a Friday Nibble. Perhaps a book is in order? Hmmmm. Alternatively, for a slightly shorter take on the subject, see this list of the top ten sausages, according to Askmen.com
Think about the difference between a dark, fragrantly spiced black pudding and the smoky notes of a frankfurter, or the paprika hit of a morsel of fried chorizo compared to the delicate flavour of a Bavarian Weisswurst and you start to get the idea.
In Britain, sausages are virtually a national dish. During the war the meagre amounts of meat were padded out with rusk and water, which then boiled inside the casing before the steam burst through in a mini-explosion. This led to them being christened ‘bangers’ – a moniker that has stuck.
The somewhat ambiguous ingredients list present on many sausages has given them some bad press recently with unscrupulous manufacturers bending the rules as far as possible in order to make a cheap product. But there are some seriously gourmet sausages out there and is well worth spending a few extra pence to enjoy the very best.
Sometimes they are best fried or grilled and sandwiched between two slices of bread or wedged into a steaming pile of buttery mash, topped with sticky onion gravy. But to assume that is all they are good for is to do them a great disservice.
For many culinary cultures, a variation on the classic sausage and beans is a virtual staple. It is cheap, it is tasty, it is nutritious, it makes the most of the local produce and is incredibly easy to cook. I particularly like the Umbrian version made with boar sausages and dark Italian lentils.
But my favourite take on this dish has to be cassoulet, a meal I spend a great deal of time talking about, writing about, cooking and eating.
This dish from southern France, like many versions of the combination, is hearty and cheap, what many might refer to as ‘peasant food’. Far from being a derisory and patronising term, for me ‘peasant food’ conjures up images of tasty meals that offer the best possible flavour of an area. Peasant food is something to be embraced and enjoyed.
I’ve made many different versions of cassoulet, every one of them different but each enjoyable in their own right. This one, whilst it may lack the confit duck and pork belly, is simple, rustic and cheap. Slow food at its finest.
Cassoulet Six good quality pork sausages, Toulouse if you can get them 500g of dried haricot beans Four large onions, two finely chopped Two bay leaves Two cloves of garlic 50g of goose or chicken fat Two tins of plum tomatoes, drained and the tomatoes blitzed in a food processor 500ml of pork stock A large, heavy bottomed casserole Salt and pepper
Soak the beans overnight. Drain them, tip them into a large pan and cover with cold water. Add two of the onions, peeled and quartered through the stem so they stay together. Tuck the bay leaves into the mass of beans (a great tip for getting flavour into all orts of pulses)and then simmer for about an hour until cooked. Don’t add any salt until the beans are almost done – about fifteen minutes to go – or they will toughen up. Drain the beans and discard the onions and bay leaves. They've done their work.
Spoon half the goose or chicken fat into the casserole and put on a high heat. Brown the sasuages on all sides, but don’t cook them, then place on a waiting plate. Turn down the heat and gently fry off the onion in the remaining fat. When the onion is cooked add the garlic, return the sausages to the pan and add the tomatoes. Season generously with salt and pepper.
Tip in almost all the beans and mix them in. Save a few handfuls for the top. Layer these on the top of the sausage and bean mix (see photo above) and put into a warm oven (about 150) for an hour.
After an hour the top layer should be crunchy. Stir this into the mix and poke seven or eight holes in the top of the cassoulet all the way to the bottom of the pan. The wrong end of a wooden spoon is ideal for this. Pour the stock into the holes and over the top of the dish. Return to the oven for a further hour.
Let it cool for ten minutes, serve with a ballsy red wine and eat far too much. Delicious.
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Ingredient: 1 cup of lentils 1 cup of white rice 1 cup of olive oil 2 onions sliced (medium half circles) 1 tablespoon of allspice 1 tablespoon of cumin Salt, pepper to taste 5 cups of water
In a pan, add the 5 cups of water and the lentils, cook on medium until the lentils are half way cooked, then add the rice then the allspice, cumin, salt and pepper. Let them cook on low. Meanwhile, in a skillet, add olive oil and the onions, season with some salt and pepper and let them brown but be careful not to burn them. After the onions are ready, drain the remaining olive oil and add it to the lentils and rice that are cooking. After the rice and lentils are cooked and the water is absorbed, transfer to the serving plate and add the onions on top. Serve with plain yogurt or a salad.
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