Home Grown Courgette Antipasto Slices

This is a great recipe when you have a spare afternoon to spend in the kitchen and lots of medium sized courgettes, as it can be made in bulk and bottled. But it's a great lunch time dish or addition to a summer salad if you only want to make a small amount, and can be easily made the day before so it can soak up the flavour of the basil and garlic.
   It has a lovely smoky flavour and it one of the nices ways of cooking courgettes.


Courgette Antipasto Slices

1 medium sized Courgette per person
Balsamic Vinegar (or similar)
Olive Oil (or similar)
Garlic (you choose how many cloves!)
a few sprigs of Basil

Slice the Courgettes lengthways, about half a centimeter thick.
Using a griddle pan and a little oil cook the courgettes in batches until begining to smoke. They will end up with attractive griddle marks on them (dark brown rather than crispy black though)
   Arrange on a dish, layering with torn basil and Garlic. drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinigar. leave to soak up the juices and develop flavour for at least an hour.

Home Grown Vegetable Crisps

This is a very naughty but very nice recipe. It's just the absolute basic version but you can add extra spiciness with chili flakes, pepper or herbs.
  I used a special slicing gadget to get even slices, it's name currently escapes me....
 You can use any oil, pick one that you like the flavour of, i prefer sunflower oil, which is produced in the UK.

Vegetable Crisps

Ingredients

Any or all of the below can be used:

medium sized raw beetroot

sweet potatoes

Carrots

Potatoes

Parsnips

Oil, for deep-frying

Sea salt

Method

Peel the vegetables, then slice thinly, either by hand or using the slicing blade of a food processor.

Sprinkle with salt and dry well on kitchen paper.

Heat the oil to 180C or until a slice of vegetable added to it rises to the surface instantly and starts to brown.

Add vegetable slices in batches and fry until crisp and golden. Serve piled up on a plate and sprinkled with sea salt.

Home Grown Marrow and Lemon Jam

As promised here is the first of the courgette recipes. Over grown courgettes are ideal for this recipe, which uses the flesh's ability to absorb flavours perfectly. The soak over night will result in the little cubes of marrow expressing large amounts of water as they take in the sugar, so no water needs to be added.

This is a lovely sweet but tart jam, it only sets lightly, but it keeps well and tastes great in jam tarts, cakes, and on scones. In the big print i tend to label it without mentioning the word marrow, instead using the variety of courgette that it comes from! Lemon and Little Gem Jam looks so much more appetising i think!

MARROW AND LEMON JAM

2lb. Marrow (weight after preparation)

5 lemons

1½lb. Sugar

1½ pints water

½oz. Ginger root.

Peel the marrow, remove the seeds and cut the flesh into dice. Put into a basin, sprinkle with the sugar and allow to stand overnight.

Cut the lemons in half, squeeze out the juice and slice the peel and pith thinly. Put the juice, shredded peel and water into a saucepan and boil slowly for about 1¼hours, until the contents have reduced considerably, then strain: the extract should measure about half a pint.

Put the lemon extract and the prepared marrow and sugar, into a saucepan, add the root ginger and lemon pulp, tied in a piece of muslin, bring to the boil and boil slowly for about 1½hours, or until the marrow is clear and it's reached jamming temperature on the jam thermometer. Remove the ginger and, wearing rubber gloves, squeeze the muslin bag to express the juice. Pour into warm pots and cover immediately in the usual way.

This will make about 3 pounds of jam.

July 2011

   Well it's that time of year again.....the Courgettes are beginning to arrive in numbers...it started in late June, with the excitement of the first one, and then the second, small and perfectly formed...but now they are ripening thick and fast, far faster than we can eat...so i may be adding a few marrow, easily substituted for giant courgettes, recipes this month. My personal favourite is marrow and ginger jam.

  The broad beans are coming into their own too, though the runner beans seem late this year. Peas and Mange Tout are still coming, as are the carrots, new potatoes, salad leaves, hearting lettuces, strawberries, black currants, spring onions,  and the beginnings of the salad beetroots. I'm sure I've missed many things off that list!

  I've started adding foody foraging to many of my excursions out, I head for the hills as often as i can for long distance wanderings, and I've been trying to pick up local produce at the place they are produced. It's a wonderful excuse for having a snoop around some beautiful Somerset farmyards and it's a great way of meeting some really interesting people.

   My new toy for the month is a DK Rocket Stove, bought at the Blackdown Woodland Festival. I haven't quite got it working yet...but I've only had a chance to play with it once. I aspire to being a good bushcrafter and that seems to be the ideal cooking implement. Once i have it working well, I have a lovely yogurt and honey flat bread recipe to try out on it...