Straight from the land onto the plate

 Today was a real from spade to plate session. First we went to pick raspberries for the raspberry fool

We then walked to the allotment to harvest peppers, (red, green and orange) some new potatoes, oregano, butternut squash and a pumpkin.

 

When we arrived home we made this 'Greek new potato, courgette and pepper one pan recipe which turned out very well. So well that we voted to put it in our next cookery book. The only thing we changed was to parboil the potatoes before frying them and adding some roasted pine nuts at the end.

 

The butternut was turned into a simple and quick 5 spice butternut soup. We peeled the butternut, chopped into little cubes, boiled in stock until tender, then handblended it and added 5 spice to taste. Topped with some roasted pumpkin seeds, delicious!

Apple cider and blackberry balsamic vinegar

This post was first posted on 11/9/2017

Today I found a bucket full of windfall apples so decided to turn them into  apple cider vinegar.
Gillie's blackberries were already ripe and felt like turning them into blackberry balsamic vinegar

       

In September 2017 our From Spade to Plate group harvested apples for eating, storing, pressing and turning into vinegar.

Autumn is here, fresh mornings but when the sun breaks through it is glorious.

We started off  by sorting the apples. The best ones were used for storing and eating, the slightly blemished ones were turned into vinegar and used for  pressing the pears and apples to make some lovely juice. Then the rain came and we went inside to make the main meal.

The summer vegetables are starting to show signs of wanting to be harvested. I have decided to harvest the french beans Faraday  ( that we sowed on 19th June)  they were lovely and tender.

 and harvest the new potatoes (put the sprouting charlotte potatoes from Aldi in the ground in June after I had eaten the lettuces) to make space for the winter onions and garlic (later next month).

Served with a tomato, mozarella and basil salad.


This went down very well.
.

Courgettes and runner beans and new potatoes

As the courgettes are growing fast and furiously, we turned them into vegan fritters and had them with new potatoes and runne beans. A simple but tasty meal.  We also had the first of the blackberry cordial harvested this year.

Kevin and Rozenn preparing the runner beans

Lu and Tom

Carmen, Kevin, Rozenn and Simone harvesting new potatoes

Carmen, Lu, Tom and Simone making the courgette fritters

Mushroom Tartlets

Using the grey oyster mushroom  from the funguslab.com that we grew over the last month or so, we made some delicious mushroom tartlets with new potatoes,  french beans  and salad.
A very easy meal but out of this world scrumptious.

From Spade to Plate - 26 June Peas and courgettes

Today we harvested the last of the peas and new potatoes in one of the raised beds in the garden.

June harvesting the peas

Some of our freshly picked peas

harvesting the Charlotte potatoes

Shelling peas with a few friends is so much nicer and more sociable than doing this on your own


I noticed that the first courgettes in the allotment are ready too so what better to make for lunch than Jenny's Pea fritters.

June and Hyungi on the way to the allotment with the spent Pea halms

harvesting the first courgettes

 She brought some to the Garden Walk street party and they were yummy so was inspired as with all the fresh ingredient to hand, I could share it with more friends?

As the new potatoes are ready too and are in the same bed, we harvested them today to get the bed ready to transplant some lettuces and sow some beetroot.

For Salad we will be making a Rocket, pear, walnut and parmasan salad.

• walnuts
• pear
• parmesan, shaved
• rocket leaves
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Preparation time: 10 mins | Cooking time: 6 mins | Total time: 16 mins

Makes 12 Fritters

INGREDIENTS ·       2 Large courgettes (skinned) ·       150g cooked petit pois ·       A good handful of fresh mint, 1 tbsp lemon juice ·       140g flour ·       1 egg ·       Salt to flavour ·       Cracked Black Pepper ·      Olive Oil, or similar frying oil We thought that feta cheese incorporated in this mixture might be a nice addition, but we had not tried it. We had some runnerbean chutney with the fritters. Delicious

METHOD 1.     Grate the courgettes into a large bowl (be sure not to grate your fingers). 2.     Sprinkle grated courgette with a pinch of salt, stir through and leave to sit for about 10 minutes. 3.     In another bowl, combine the remaining ingredients (bar the oil). 4.     Once the courgette has finished resting, using your hands, squeeze over the sink with your hands to remove excess liquid. 5.     Add the courgette to the other ingredients and mix well. 6.     Heat the oil in a frying pan on a medium-high heat. 7.     Take a tablespoon, and transfer spoonfuls of the fritter mixture to the pan. 8.     Flatten the spoonfuls with the back of a wooden spoon. 9.     Cook for a few minutes on either side. 10.   Eat while piping hot, or leave to cool and store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days.