Fried Green Tomatoes - Moro East stylie

A few months ago now, I was actually in a supermarket, rather than the online parody of one, and was waylaid by the book section. The cookery books section, to be strictly accurate. They had a great selection, at bargain prices. I meant to write about it then and there, but of course, time marches on and I can no longer remember exactly which volumes I was pondering. It goes without saying, though, that I couldn’t walk on by without looking shiftily around me, and, pretending no one had seen me, adding one to the trolley. 

While I do a lot of my shopping from supermarkets online, actually going to one is not particularly good for my soul. It can actually quite be dangerous, especially when, as I was on this occasion, unfettered by children competing for attention and unnecessary additions to their lives. I go with my list and come out with twice as much as I need and an overwhelming sense of panic. And while I’d like to say that I NEED new cookbooks, it’s just not the case. Some people hide new clothes in the cupboard then produce them saying ‘oh this old thing’. I hide new cookery books about the place, then cook something delicious from them in an attempt to gloss over the fact of the purchase... I don’t think he’s fooled...

Anyway, the book that won out that day was Moro East by Sam & Sam Clark. No panicking involved.

I have heard much of their food – my mum has eaten at one of their restaurants, and I think her goddaughter is actually a friend of the Clarks. It’s somewhere I’d love to eat.

The food is beautifully simple, and their books are gorgeously evocative of the food they cook. As I remember, the supermarket concerned had 3 of the Moro books on the shelf, but even I couldn't justify buying more than one, and I was seduced most strongly by the story of Moro East. Not just a recipe book featuring delicious Eastern Mediterranean food, it tells the story of the Manor Garden allotments in Hackney, where the Clarks grew their own vegetables, and of the vibrant community that had grown up around them, as is often the case, and which had welcomed the Clarks. Most poignantly of all, it also details how, with the long march towards the Olympics this summer, the allotment association lost out and their beautifully tended plots were bulldozed and in their place now stands part of the Olympic Park. As recently initiated allotment holders ourselves, this was the book for me that day.

The recipes are seasonal, all based on the huge variety of produce that came out of that little piece of Hackney and mostly easy to prepare, although not all the additional ingredients are easily available in rural Hampshire. They are accompanied by beautiful, slightly wistful photography which I love.

The recipe that caught my eye from the very beginning was one for green tomatoes. Not fried in the southern US style, but in a more Mediterranean fashion, with sweet red wine vinegar, garlic and chilli. The Husband and I experimented extensively with battered versions in the early days of our tomato growing attempts, based entirely on watching Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistlestop Cafe, and let’s just say that we’ve felt they were best kept filed in the ‘interesting experiments’ section of our history together. However,  I’m always on the look out for a good green tomato recipe, and was interested to read the Clarks’ take on fried green tomatoes, with no batter anywhere. Having mentally bookmarked the recipe, I took the opportunity to make this dish earlier in the autumn, before we’d discovered the ‘ripen the green tomatoes in a drawer’ trick and after I had already chutney’ed more green tomatoes than I care to remember.

It was very tasty, and while it didn't please all of those who ate it, I would definitely make it again - more than I can say for my attempts from years gone by. I couldn’t think of any way to improve on the recipe, and so emailed the publishers to ask if they would mind if I reproduced it directly from the book. I am very pleased to say that they were happy for me to do so, so here, from Moro East by Sam & Sam Clark (Ebury Press, £17.50) 

Fried Green Tomatoes with garlic and sweet vinegar

Serves 4

5 tbsps olive oil

800g green tomatoes, cut into 2-3 cm wedges

3 garlic cloves cut into matchsticks

2 pinches dried red chilli flakes

1 tsp roughly ground cumin

1 tbsp sweet red wine vinegar or Pedro Ximinez vinegar (or balsamic)

In a wide frying pan, heat the olive oil over a high heat. When just hot, add the tomatoes, cut side down, in a single layer, and fry for a few moments till browned on the first side. Turn over one by one to fry the second cut side. As soon as this starts to colour, shuffle the tomatoes round to make a little room for the garlic and one pinch of the chilli flakes, and the cumin, tucking the garlic in so it makes contact with the pan. Once the garlic is a light nut brown, season the dish with salt, pepper and the vinegar. 

Serve immediately or at room temperature sprinkled with the remaining chilli.

I'm adding this post to November's Bookmarked Recipes on the Tinned Tomatoes blog.

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Pancetta and Pea Carbonara - to lift the mood

I'd like to think I'm not one to moan too much - that I can at least reflect on the lighter side of whatever the disaster was. Disasters usually offer the opportunity for comic observation, but a run of little 'things' offers less humour and more moan fodder. So I'm going to try and keep things light, but I'm warning you now, it may spill into a bit of a wallow. In which case, I'm enticing you to keep reading with the promise of the meal that lifted all our spirits this evening.

We had a fantastic bonfire night at school, Saturday. The skies cleared, the mulled wine flowed, the BBQ sold out and we sold more glowsticks and strawberry chewits than you could believe possible. I was looking forward to Remembrance Sunday - church parade followed by friends for lunch. I love Remembrance Day. Regardless of your views of war - both past and present, I firmly believe that it is important to remember those millions of people who have died in the course of war. 

Sunday dawned blue and clear, but I spent the day in bed, crippled by some foul 24 hour sickness bug. For anyone that thinks this is a euphemism for hangover induced by too much mulled wine, let me tell you that the Husband was also struck down early evening on Sunday resulting in the kids getting rushed through the bath at 6 p.m. and told to turn their lights off at 7.30. It was that bad. Come Monday, the weather reverted to miserable drizzle. The Husband was still suffering, so being 12 hours ahead of him on the bug front, I had to get up, sort the kids and get them to school. This morning, to put the final nail in the mood of the day, we had to say goodbye to the Husband who, now recovered, is spending up to the next week in Crete. I'm not sure if I'm more upset that he's gone and I'm missing him, or that he's getting some sun. He travels a bit, and never for very long. Linking back to the Remembrance Day theme, I have friends whose OHs are away in far more dangerous places for far longer, so I can't complain, but the kids find it very hard (I do too, but he was in the Army when we met, and I've had the best part of 20 years to get used to it) - even for one night. This trip is worse because we don't actually know when he'll be back - it could be the weekend, could be next week...



I collected them from school today, and they were both pretty flat. Pink's having 'friends' issues which seem to be getting her down - she's been creeping into our bed of late, which is very unusual, and being generally needy. After we'd done homework , she tearfully asked if we could do something fun together "...like play Operation, mummy". I could hardly refuse. Blue is knackered, despite half term, and I couldn't get the new TV to work in the way he wanted it too... What to give them for tea? Well, the answer in these circumstances is often pasta, and so today was no exception. The Husband had cancelled the Sunday lunch party on account of my being indisposed, and had frozen most of the food that we'd prepared, for Sunday lunchtime, but not the cream to go with the pudding. Spaghetti, cream, pancetta, some frozen peas. A recipe for comfort food par excellence, and easy to make while playing Operation.

Pancetta and Pea Carbonara

for 3 gloomy souls in need of cheering up

220g spaghetti, 100g pancetta cubes, 1 clove garlic, 2 tablespoons double cream (well, I didn't eat anything for 36 hours, so it's fine), 50g grano padana, parmesan or other hard cheese, 2 eggs, 180g frozen peas

Cook the spaghetti in a big pan of boiling, salted water. Fry the pancetta in a pan with a crushed clove of garlic till cooked and crispy. In a bowl beat together the eggs, cream and cheese along with a good grind of black pepper. When the spaghetti is nearly cooked, tip in the peas - they need 2-3 minutes, then drain the spaghetti and peas, return to the pan and put back on the heat. Tip in the cooked pancetta/garlic, then tip in the eggs/cream/cheese mixture, stirring till cooked and coating the spaghetti. 

Serve immediately - this is not a meal to keep sitting around. Watch the mood improve with the consumption of delicious carbs.

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Honey'd, ginger'd carrot soup and Quesadillas

Yes, folks, it's Saturday. It's been a pretty busy week what with one thing and another, and a busy weekend looming with the school bonfire & fireworks night this evening (and an afternoon setting up the 'tuck and glows' stall - the small child's capacity for glowsticks never ceases to amaze me) and Remembrance Day tomorrow, with my nearest and dearest (all 3 of them) parading and wreath laying at Church, then the scout leaders and families coming for lunch. 

Lunch today needed to be something fairly filling, and nutritious, given that supper will be bonfire burgers/hotdogs followed by sweets (for the kids) and copious amounts of a glass or two of mulled wine (for me).

The kids love quesadillas, which I have mentioned before - basically toasted cheese sandwiches made in soft tortillas, and it wouldn't be a November weekend without a pan of soup on the go. What to put in the soup today was easily answered by the surfeit of carrots that were lurking in the fridge. I had loads of little chantenay carrots left over from last weekend's casserole, and some ordinary carrots which had been superceded by a fresh bag purchased yesterday. I'd come across a Lesley Waters recipe in an old Good Food mag, and decided to pep it up a bit by adding some ground ginger. This, plus a small pinch of dried chilli, gave the soup warmth and depth rather than actual spiciness. And as I'd actually planned today's lunch rather than letting it evolve, I also had spring onions, a red pepper and a couple of avocados to turn the quesadillas into something that might make up for a dirth of veg this evening. 

The kids quite often enjoy helping chop the veg up for this, and Pink was my eager assistant today. I am still not a fully paid up member of the 'kids will eat much more if they are involved in the cooking' school of thought, having suffered some serious set backs on my road to child feeding-nirvana (the road I am still on - and will only consider myself at the end when I can get Blue to eat cauliflower cheese), and also because I have previously found it hard to share my kitchen. However, I am changing my tune. If nothing else, I find that the kids are more tempted to try things if they are allowed to chop and stir, feel and taste, and despite misgivings when the children were younger, it's a great opportunity to spend sometime together engaged in a common purpose. I'm discovering that all sorts of things come out without them even realising it.

Honey'd ginger'd carrot soup

Makes a good panful - would probably serve 6-8 depending on age & appetite and what else was on the table

Olive oil; 2 leeks, sliced; 1 tsp ground ginger; 1 pinch of chilli flakes; 850-900g carrots, topped and tailed and roughly sliced; 1/2 tbsp runny honey; 1 bay leaf; 2-2.5 litres veg stock, salt & pepper

 

yes, more orange soup...

Heat about a tablespoon of oil in a large pan, chuck in the leeks along with the ginger and chilli flakes and cook over a reasonable heat for a few minutes, stirring quite frequently, till the leeks soften. Add the carrots and honey and cook for another couple of minutes, then pour in the stock, and freshly ground salt and pepper, bring to the boil and simmer with the lid half on for 30 mins or so. Once the carrots are cooked, blitz the soup till smooth, then serve.




Quesadillas
 
To fill 6 tortillas: 100g grated cheese, 8 spring onions, trimmed and finely chopped, 1/2 red pepper, deseeded and finely chopped, 1 small tin of sweetcorn, drained.




 

Once you have assembled all your ingredients, put a large heavy based frying pan on a medium heat. Lay your first tortilla in the pan, and on half of it, sprinkle some cheese, spring onions, red pepper and sweetcorn.




 Fold over the other half of the tortilla and repeat with a second one so that the other half of the pan has a folded tortilla in it. 

By the time you've assembled your second tortilla, the first one will be ready, probably to turn. Now, I'm not denying that this is a but of a fiddle, but with a couple of spatulas/fish slices, you should be able to flip over the tortillas in turn to heat up the second side. Once the second side is done, the cheese should definitely be melted, so remove the first tortilla from the pan, slice, then remove the second one. Repeat.

I usually place my quesadilla slices on a wooden board covered with a tea towel till they are all done, to keep warm, although they don't tend to hang around long.

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Seasonal Ingredient Recipe Swap - Pumpkin Cheesecake

I'm quite partial to the odd culinary challenge - one imposed by someone else rather than by one of my own - and I couldn't resist signing up for Ruth's Seasonal Ingredient Recipe Swap when I came across it on Twitter. I signed up and promptly forgot about it, only to be sparked into action again a couple of weeks' later when I got an email with details for my swap partner and reminding me that I then had till the end of October to send some surprise seasonal ingredients to my swapper. It was a busy time and half term was looming, but I managed to get my package in the post on time. We were up at my mum's for half term so I had to wait till we got home to see what my parcel from Jean included, but I wasn't disappointed.

A can of pumpkin puree, cinammon, dried apple rings and some windfall nuts from Jean's holiday home in France. I was particularly excited about the nuts - walnuts and hazelnuts.

I was anxious to avoid the obvious pumpkin pie, and the other option that sprang to mind was a pumpkin tealoaf, which on reflection might not have been a bad idea, but last Sunday, we had guests for lunch and I was thinking dessert. 

Something stirred in the back of my mind. Was I mistaken, or had I read a recipe for pumpkin cheesecake somewhere? A quick rifle through my ever increasing collection of cookery books confirmed that I wasn't going mad - Nigella (of course) includes this delight in Feast. It's in the Christmas/Thanksgiving section. 

Granted, it didn't present an obvious opportunity for the nuts and apple, but I solved the nuts problem by including them with the digestive biscuits, cinammon and butter specified, to make the base. I had a slight hitch because the battery in my scales was limping along, and the scales weren't weighing accurately... The Husband diligently cracked the nuts for me and my intention was to replace 50g of the biscuits with the nuts bringing the weight back to the 250g required by the recipe. I ended up with more like 300g of biscuits and nuts combined, but no matter.


After pressing the base mix into a spring form tin, you get to fiddle around a lot with clingfilm and silver foil to make the outside of the tin watertight, before getting on with the cheesecake mix. You have to make the tin watertight because you bake the cake in a water bath. At this point, I had a minor panic that I didn't have a roasting tin big enough to accommodate the 23cm tin, but the turkey roasting tin came to my rescue.

The cheese cake mix then, is the pumpkin puree, cream cheese, some sugar and lemon juice. I was totally seduced by the goddess's assertion that I would end up with "...a delicate, rich, palest apricot pudding", so didn't see the need to change it. She's not wrong.

The cooking time in the book was 1 3/4 hours. It took a little longer, and I needed to pop some foil over the top to stop it colouring too much - and then the foil caught on the top and took a little bit of the surface of the cheesecake off, but there we go

And to be honest, once you've cut into the cheesecake, a little blemish on the top is not really going to matter that much.

The nuts added an extra flavour to the base which I enjoyed - the filling is pretty mild and it was good to have the added interest in the base. If I was going to make the whole thing again - and it's not unlikely - I'd probably reduce the amount of cheesecake mix, as it was quite muckle, and required thin slices only. There was loads leftover, sitting in the fridge, and I can confirm that it goes as well with a cup of tea as it does as a pudding following beef and brown ale casserole, so a worthy use of the lovely ingredients that Jean sent me. You'll have noticed, of course, that the apple rings haven't featured in this post. I have a plan for them, but I'm going to make that the subject of a separate post. Watch this space.

 Jean's blog is here . I'm hoping that she's enjoyed using the ingredients I sent her, and I'm also looking forward to seeing what the other participants received, and what they cooked up.

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Laying ghosts of dinner parties past - Beef & Brown Ale Casserole

I have a clear memory of a lunch party my parents held while I was (I think) still at college. Friends of my father’s – twin brothers with whom he had served in the Navy, and one of their wives – were in the area and had made contact. As I remember it, it had been some considerable time since they had seen each other. All were out of the Navy – one of the visiting brothers was running a bar in Spain, the other had been flying helicopters in Saudi Arabia. I have no memory of why they were in our part of Yorkshire. 

They arrived at the appointed hour and conversation ensued. The wife came with the helicopter pilot. Money abounded. She was very nice, but appeared to be rather high maintenance in a way that my mum and I most definitely are not. Long blonde hair. Impeccably groomed. Squashy fur coat. You get the picture.

All went well. Mum had, as usual, produced a magnificent meal. I helped clear away the main course and went into the kitchen to find her in a bit of a state. One of the kittens had walked along the chocolate loaf dessert, leaving beautifully formed kitten paw prints along the top.  As we somewhat hysterically decided that the best course of action would be to sieve icing sugar over the top and add a sprig of holly – we were in the post-Christmas period after all – for a festive touch, the wife came in. Instead of blagging it, Mum burst into gales of laughter and spilled the beans. The look on the wife’s face (I think her name might have been Sheridan. Or Scheherazade. Or something exotic) was a picture. She had the fruit salad in the end.

Why do I tell you all this? Well today, in similar fashion, we hosted an old friend for lunch. A colleague of the Husband’s from when they served in the Army together in York, many moons ago. I cannot recall exactly when the last time we saw him was, but it was certainly when we were living in Army quarters on the edge of Salisbury Plain, probably 10-12 years ago. I remember well the meal I cooked. How could I forget? In joyful and recent possession of The Return of the Naked Chef by Jamie Oliver, I decided we would have roasted fillet of beef rolled in herbs and porcini and wrapped in prosciutto. We scoured Salisbury for the meat and ended up paying an obscene amount of money for it in Waitrose. Ditto the prosciutto, which we diligently asked the butcher to slice thinly and lay side by side on some waxed paper – what for assisting the rolling element of the recipe. Oh! The DINKYs we were.

Now, the oven we were blessed with in our army quarter was completely and utterly rubbish. However, being as I was a relatively novice cook, I simply didn’t appreciate the need to be able to cook the finished roll of meat in a blisteringly hot oven. To be honest, I quite like my meat rare, but I would never presume to serve it to guests in that state. Having already cooked it for far too long, I proudly bore my creation to the dinner table and carved. Despite the appearance of being cooked on the outside, it was completely and utterly bloody. Literally. We haven’t seen him since. I’d like to think that was mostly down to life – but there’s always been a niggling suspicion that it was the beef...

Anyway, trying to set that thought aside, we were really pleased that he had got in touch, and jumped at the chance to invite him and his wife and kids (none of whom were around at the time of the previous get together) for lunch.

What to serve has therefore been occupying my mind for some days now, ever since the visit was arranged - typical man fashion – via LinkedIn. Obviously, I was anxious not to repeat the disaster of the last meal, although we no longer live in Army accommodation, and I am far more confident in my oven’s ability to reach a specified temperature. Would it be a roast? I can cook a roast in my sleep but there is always fiddling about at the end with gravy and what not. Should I slow cook a stew? And pudding – what to make?

The pudding will be the subject of another post, although I’ll tease you by saying that it involved pumpkin, but not as you might have known it. In the end, casserole and baked potatoes seemed like the best option, and because the Husband begged suggested that it might be a good idea, I made dumplings too. Along with the baked potatoes, I served roasted cauliflower – I bought a beautiful green romanesco cauli and an ordinary white one and roastedthem with sea salt and olive oil. Gorgeous.  

On a rain-sodden, dreary day, and if I do say so myself, this totally hit the spot. Even if I did manage to turn the oven down almost to off while the casserole was doing its last bit of cooking with the dumplings, causing a minor panic on my part as the children rampaged around, gnawing the furniture... Fortunately, I noticed, and the day was saved. And as the dog only has 3 legs, there was no chance of him getting up on the kitchen table and romping joyfully over the pudding.

Beef & Brown Ale Casserole– served 4 adults & 4 children

1kg braising steak, 3 tbsp plain flour, 1 tsp mustard powder, about 50g lard (yes, I know – you could use olive oil if you didn’t fancy it), 1 large onion, peeled &  sliced and about 10 shallots, peeled, 500g whole Chantenay carrots, 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce, 1 tbsp mushroom ketchup, 1 bottle brown ale (I used Newcastle Brown), a handful of thyme sprigs, 2 bay leaves, 2 beef stock cubes made up with 200ml hot water, salt & pepper.  

If you haven’t already asked the butcher to do it, chop the meat into bite sized pieces. Put the flour in a bowl or plastic bag, add the mustard powder, salt and pepper, mix/shake up then add in the meat and toss it in the flour. 

Pre-heat the oven to 160⁰C/140⁰ C fan.

In your oven-proof casserole dish (one which has a lid), on the hob, melt half the lard and brown the meat in batches, setting aside in a bowl or dish once browned. If you need to add a little more lard during this process, do. When the meat is browned, and set aside, use a splash of the stock or the ale to deglaze any tasty bits that are threatening to stick to the bottom of the casserole and burn, then melt the rest of the lard and add in the onions and shallots, frying for a few minutes till softening. Put the meat back in the pan, add in the carrots, the ale and all the rest of the ingredients, bring back to the boil, then pop the lid on to the casserole dish and put it in the oven.

Yes, I guess it does look a little heavy on the carrots...

My casserole took 2 hours to cook till the meat was deliciously tender – it might take up to 3 – but if it finishes cooking before you’re ready for it, it will stand on the stove until you need it. You can always pop it back in the oven if needed for dumpling purposes as I did.

Now, I know you're going to ask me about the dumplings. They were exceedingly good, despite our guests' 3 yr old son pronouncing them "Deegushting" much to the general hilarity of the table (grr). However, I totally made them according to a Hairy Bikers' recipe in the October 2012 Good Food mag. The casserole is also based on their recipe from the same feature, but I changed it sufficiently. If you're interested in dumplings (who isn't?), I used vegetarian suet, and mixed in 4 tbsps of horseradish sauce and some cold water as the binding agent. Having slow cooked the casserole in a low oven, I whacked up the heat dropped the dumplings in to the top of the casserole and baked for a further 25 minutes (plus extra when I realised that I'd then turned the heat down by accident). They were very good. Unfortunately, I forgot to take any pics.

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Braised Mince 2 - Cottage Pie

I feel like I've been majoring on the traditional recently. The un-fussy comfort food. That's because it's COLD. I feel less inclined to push the boundaries, or to expect the children to push their boundaries, when it's 'snuggle up in front of the fire' weather.

Today is no exception. Having spent the first few days of half term up north, being fed by my mum and generally not having to do a thing, we're back home, doing jobs and generally trying to get straight before the kids are back at school on Monday and we race through the next few weeks at an increasingly more frantic pace till we hit the Christmas break with a bang (or a whimper, depending on how it's gone). 

We have some old friends coming for lunch on Sunday, about which more of - perhaps - another time. For reasons that I may or may not divulge, what we will eat when they come has occupied most of the food-thinking part of my brain for the last few days. As a result, I haven't really planned what we are going to eat otherwise, relying on the freezer to provide until I can get myself sorted out. Yesterday, on our return, you'll be thrilled to hear that we had fish fingers and oven chips (although there were carrots, and cabbage out of the garden, to go with). Not wanting a re-run, and in slight desperation for this evening, I went freezer diving once the kids were in bed last night, and retrieved a portion of braised mince with a view to that most homely of meals, cottage pie. 

I can see a lot more of this type of food arriving on our table over the next few weeks: undemanding,  comforting and uncomplicated. Yes, I know that this recipe relies on you braising your mince first, but if you've done that in bulk and frozen in portions, it's a very straightforward dish to put together, relying little more than a bit of chopping and peeling.

I feel a bit of a fraud putting in a weight for potatoes here because I almost always forget and usually just do enough potatoes as if we were just going to have mash. This strategy doesn't always work - sometimes I have too much sometimes, it looks a little thin, but when I went back to the original recipe in Good Food for this, 800g is what they say for a cottage pie to serve 4 people.

Braised Mince Cottage Pie

Vegetable oil; 2 onions & 2 sticks of celery, finely chopped; 1 portion of braised mince (see my post here ), 2 large carrots, diced; 2 beef stock cubes, made up to 250ml with boiling water (or use the water the potatoes were cooked in if you do them first/at the same time); 250g frozen peas; Worcestershire sauce; 800g potatoes, milk & butter

Peel the potatoes, halve them, put in a pan, cover with water, bring to the boil and cook till tender. Drain the potatoes (use 250ml of the water to make up the stock of the mince mixture if you like) and mash with a splash of milk and a knob of butter. Set aside.

Heat 1tbsp vegetable oil in a large pan and add in the onions and celery. Cook for a few minutes over a high heat, then add in the mince, carrots and stock. Stir, then leave to simmer for 40-45 minutes when the mixture will be rich and thick. About 5-10 minutes before the mince is cooked, chuck in the peas and a few splashes of Worcestershire sauce depending on your taste. Grind in some salt and pepper too if you think it needs it. 


 
Spread the mince mixture out in a shallow dish and leave to cool as much as you can before adding the potato and spreading over the top. The benefit of leaving the mince to cool down is that it sets a little and the potato doesn't sink in to the mince when you spread it on top, but if you haven't got time, don't worry about it. Life, after all, is too short.

You need to bake your finished pie in the oven for 30-40 minutes at 200C/180C fan.

Serve with your favourite condiment.

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Roast Tomato & Thyme Soup

Tomatoes are one of the main reasons to grow your own fruit and vegetables. There really is very little that can compare with the smell and taste of a ripe, home-grown tomato, freshly picked from the vine. This summer, we managed to grow a pretty good selection of green tomatoes, but the lack of sun and warmth put paid to any further progression. We made chutney, and I experimented with a lovely recipe in Moro East for Fried Green Tomatoes – well, I thought it was lovely. And then, utterly dispirited with all the green-ness, we tried a trick that my mum had suggested and shoved a whole load of the unripened fruit into a drawer in the spare room and left them. They ripened. And then I panicked because we are off up to my mum’s for half term, and I didn’t want them to go to waste, so I made soup.

This is going to be pretty useless for anyone looking for a tried and tested recipe, because, true to my soup roots, I just do this by eye and taste and if you’re comfortable with that, it’s a great way to use tomatoes.

I filled a roasting tin with the halved/quartered (depending on size) tomatoes, chucked in 4 good sized cloves of garlic still in their skins, added the leaves from a good bunch of thyme, drizzled over some olive oil, added some freshly ground salt and pepper  and roasted it all in a fairly hot oven for 30 minutes or so.

Once the tomatoes are softened and a little charred, remove from the oven and set aside. There will probably be quite a lot of liquid knocking around in the dish. When cool enough to handle, squeeze the garlic cloves out of their skins and discard the skins.

Sweat off an onion in some olive oil, tip in the contents of the roasting tin (including the skinned garlic) and stock. Depending on how many tomatoes you have, probably start with 500ml. With a view to actually getting to the bottom of my freezer,  I retrieved a tub of frozen turkey stock lurking in the depths (yes, I know, from last Christmas) and used that. Simmer everything up for 10-15 minutes, then whoosh with your favourite whoosher. Taste and add more seasoning. 

Sometimes, I find that soup can taste a bit thin, so I have a number of tricks that I use to beef them up. Worcestershire sauce is a good addition to this one, as is BBQ sauce (a tip from Gordon Ramsay, would you believe it!). If you think the texture needs thickening up, a handful of red lentils is always a good standby to chuck in an cook up, then re-whizz. You can also add some sour cream to serve. 

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