Winter veg

How are you doing? I am roadmapped out. It looks logical, I guess. It feels long, but it's a third of the time we've done already, best case. Will it happen? I have absolutely no idea. Does the idea of not being indoors with people till Juneish make me want to cry? Yes. But, as above, we've done it this long.  

I am very confused by the press conference being at 7, mind. Pointless was on BBC1 as usual. What's going on?

Anyway. We're at home for weeks more, and we still need nutrients. I am not great at salads, most of the year. Peak summer, when the tomatoes and peaches are ripe and the thought of putting on the oven gives me hives, I can live off them. But generally speaking, not so much. And live should hold salad, or at least ample vegetable matter. 

 I need help. I was going to recommend to you the Department of Salad weekly newsletter but it's suddenly turned ppv (I don't mind paying for content but the baseline for most newsletters seems to be £5 a month, which is a lot for something that short - but if the archive stays open it's worth a browse). Hey ho. I shall push on. 

But I've done three decent wintry veg options lately, very different in style, and I offer them to you:

Super Green Polenta

I'm sure this is a leisurely thing with Proper Cornmeal, but I only have instant polenta so for me it's a bit like a stir fry: line everything up ready on the side, and stir like buggery till it's all in. 

If you were making it with PC, it would be a matter of making two mixes, and combining them at the last minute. In this case, it's definitely greens first, then worry about the polenta. 

 

 The greens bit involves boiling 5 cloves of garlic and a spoonful of fennel seed with lots of dark green leaves. The recipe wanted kale or cavolo nero (leaves not stems). The supermarket gave me rainbow chard (I will find something to do with the stems later this week) and purple sprouting. But the approach is the same: boil till pretty soft. This isn't an al dente moment. 

Then drain and blend it all into supergreen gloop.

Then cook the polenta. You're going to want to add lots of parmesan and either butter or olive oil, and then pour in the green sludge. If it's instant polenta, you basically need to do all this at once, while stirring and heating, so... good luck with that. Take the lid off the olive oil beforehand if you're using, unless you have kitchen helpers.

I wanted soft polenta for this first serving, but I'd made enough for two nights, and so I also tipped a lot out onto a lined baking tray to let it spread out and cool. Ideally, cook this second half a bit longer so it firms up - I didn't do this, but it wasn't a disaster. 

This is the first night's green sludge:

It's very nice, as a sort of soupy sludgy cheesy slump, though I doubt it will help you to smuggle veg past green sceptics. It was also nice the next day cut into big chips and roasted for a while to give crispy edges. If it had been a firmer mix they might have been camera-respectable, but in this case not so much. Imagine grim green slumps. But tasty, honest. 

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Or there's actual salad using alllll the best winter fresh stuff in one tasty but slightly bloody-looking dish: blood oranges, beetroot, pomegranate with ideally radicchio (obviously I still can't get radicchio so it goes with green leaves here, making it less sinister than it might be). 

Dress it with sherry vinegar (I don't have any, lemon was fine), olive oil and membrillo (quince paste - Sharon, are you reading?). I bet you can substitute with something that works as a sweet element, say honey or even pomegranate molasses for an extra-bloody splash.

A better disguise for vegetables might be pancakes. And that's my third recipe - another from Simply, which is going very well indeed for me. 

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Courgette and oregano pancakes

I suspect this recipe is meant to be for 4 people, but tbh it's more like 2-3 unless you're having lots of sides, which I am not. 

 2 courgettes grated and drained a bit (I salted mine and left them to drip for a bit, rather than squeezing them properly - a useful between-meetings-get-off-your-chair activity).

Mix with:

• 2 eggs
• 4 tbsps flour
• 1 tsp baking powder 
• Chopped half-packet of fresh oregano. I reckon dill would be a good option, maybe coriander, certainly parsley if you're pushed. Plus a shake of dried herbs maybe.
  
• Salt, cumin seeds, pul biber (in theory a hefty pinch of the first, a tsp of the others)

Blessedly little faff here, no standing or weighing. Stir, and then fry. Fry in tablespoonfuls, slightly flattened.

 

 The recipe says fry on medium-high for 1 minute either side. I think I was doing it slightly lower than that, but I'd definitely suggest doing it 2-3 minutes on each, to let the courgette cook. They were still nice and bouncy rather than dry, and had gone golden rather than carbonised.

Now to serve: with a bit of crumbled feta *and* a drizzle of runny honey. Ohhhhhh yesssss. 

Also some roast tomatoes which isn't ideal but I have handy. I'd probably do this with a green salad for preference, acksherly. It's not a huge amount of flour but it's plenty warm and pancakey rather than courgetty.