Barbecued Potato Slices

This recipe can be varied to accompany your main dish. You can spice it up by adding chilli; make it more herby; use lemon juice or orange juice or whatever. Play around with it.

1 kg large, floury potatoes
4 tbsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp lemon juice or vinegar
1 tbsp chopped fresh herbs
2 tsp paprika
sea salt
black pepper

Slice the potatoes about 5 mm thick. I use a mandoline slicer to get even slices but you can use a knife.

Crush the garlic with the salt. Do this by roughly chopping the garlic; add salt and then mash it with the flat of the blade of your knife. This releases more of the garlic flavour and because it has combined with the salt it penetrates better.

Mix the olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, herbs, paprika and black pepper in a plastic container with a sealable lid. Add the potato slices and shake well to mix the ingredients and coat the potatoes. Leave to marinade for an hour or so. Shake the container every so often.

Barbecue the slices on a hot plate until crisp and browned on both sides.

Barbecued Leg of Lamb

The swallows have just arrived from Africa and the weather has taken a turn for the warmer here for the past few days with temperatures of 18-20 C so it is time to get the barbecue out. I love barbecued food. There is something primal about it I guess going back to some distant ancestor who discovered the delight of eating a carcass that had been cooked in a brush fire.

Today, we are a bit more intentional about it and prepare our victuals and add flavour with herbs and spices. Lamb is one of the best meats for the barbecue and one that I never tire of doing in different ways. This recipe is sort of Moroccanish with yoghurt, mint, garlic and other spices. I use whole spices and grind them when I want them as the taste is simply so much better than spices bought ready ground.

3kg (7lb) leg of lamb, butterflied (see below)

25g (1oz) fresh mint

juice of 2 lemons

4 garlic cloves, finely chopped

2 tbsp coriander seeds

4 dried birds eye chilli

2 tsp cumin seed

2 tsp black pepper corns

4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

6 tbsp Greek strained yoghurt

2 tbsp honey

salt and freshly ground black pepper

To butterfly the lamb cut down the front of the shin bone where the flesh is thinnest and continue this cut up the thigh bone. Now, using your knife, peel the flesh away from the bones. You will be left with a piece of meat that is shaped like a butterfly – hence the name. Place the lamb in a shallow non-metallic dish.

Grind the coriander, cumin, peppercorns and chilli in a spice grinder. Put the the mint in a bowl with the lemon juice, garlic, ground spices, olive oil, yoghurt and honey. Rub all over the meat, then cover with cling film and chill overnight or leave to stand at room temperature for 2-3 hours if time is short.

Light a barbecue. If the lamb has been chilled overnight, bring it back to room temperature. Salt the meat. Barbecue over medium-hot coals for about 50-60 minutes for medium rare lamb, turning occasionally. The time will depend upon the heat of the barbecue. Cover the meat with a sheet of aluminium foil while you are cooking it.

Remove the lamb from the barbecue and leave to rest in a warm place for 10 minutes. If you don’t like your lamb too pink you can cover it with foil at this point and it will continue to cook.

 As you can see in the picture I served this dish with barbecued potato slices and sliced courgette. See the recipe below.

Spicy Parsnip Soup

Pestle and mortar

The parsnips are just finishing now and I absolutely love this soup. It is packed with flavour - both the spices and the parsnips. Parsnips go very well with Indian spices and a variation on roast parsnips is to sprinkle them with curry powder or your own mix of spices, e.g. cumin, coriander, chilli, when you put them in the oven. Here's the recipe for the soup for now.

Ingredients
1 onion, medium finely chopped
1 garlic clove, chopped
1 parsnip, large, peeled and cut into chunks
45g Butter
1 tbsp plain flour
1 pinch salt and fresh ground black pepper
1 litre well flavoured stock - you can use any stock you like but I prefer to use vegetable
1 handful coriander, or parsley, chopped
1 tbsp coriander seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
¼ tsp Fenugreek Seeds
½ tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp ground turmeric

Method

1. First make the spice mix by dry roasting the first three spices in a small, heavy frying pan over a moderate heat until toasted and aromatic.

2. Tip into a mortar and leave to cool, and then grind with your pestle to a powder with the chilli, then add the turmeric. You can use a spice grinder (coffee grinder kept for spice grinding).

3. Sweat the onion, garlic and parsnip gently in the butter, with the lid on the pan, for 10 minutes. Stir in the flour and a tablespoon of the spice blend, plus a little salt. Cook for 2 more minutes, stirring occasionally.

4. Pour in the stock, gradually. Bring up to the boil and simmer for about 15-20 minutes until the parsnip is very tender.

5. Liquidise the mixture, adding water or more stock if you have any to hand, until he soup has a similar consistency to double cream. Taste and correct the seasoning.

6. Reheat when needed and serve scattered with coriander or parsley.

What's this blog all about?

Spring daffodils

The idea of this blog is to record and share what I grow in the garden and what I cook in the kitchen. I'm passionate about growing, cooking and eating food. For me, all three go hand in hand. There is nothing quite like growing your own vegetables and fruit, picking them yourself, cooking them within minutes and then sitting down to enjoy their freshness and goodness.

In some ways the blog will be a diary as I will be talking about sowing and planting before I get to cooking and eating. As I have been growing this garden for over 20 years I'm going to jump right in with what is in season at them moment and also talk about what I'm currently sowing or planting or harvesting.

I'll cover techniques and tips for both gardening and cooking - eating you will have to figure out for yourself. I'll use photos and video where appropriate to illustrate what I am writing about. Recipes will be included in case you want to try them out yourself.

I have wide and varied tastes in food. I really like spicy food so Indian, Thai and Asian in general feature highly. I'm also strongly influenced by Italian food which makes such good use of fresh ingredients. I don't grow all our food - we don't currently keep any livestock so we buy in meat. Also rice and many pulses don't do too well in Ireland so we buy these. Likewise wheat doesn't do too well so flour is bought in.

In the garden I will write about the philosophy and methodology I garden by. I became an organic gardener since the mid 1970's and have been growing according to these principles since. This is my fourth garden and the biggest of the lot.

The whole plot is about 2 hectares with a large house, outhouses and a yard. On that we grow most of our own vegetables, some fruit, quite a bit of our firewood, lots of shrubs, flowers and herbs. We also have allowed about 20% of the plot to remain untouched as a wildlife reserve.

I would like this blog to be interactive so please comment - send your suggestions, ask questions.......

Happy reading, growing and eating

A mixed salad bowl

Winter Mix

One of my favourite innovations from seed companies in recent years has been the introduction of mixed packets of salad leaves. There is a great range available from most seed merchants. Some of my favourites are Spicy Mix, Italian Mix, Mixed Lettuce, Winter Mix, Oriental Mix, Stir Fry Mix.

They couldn't be simpler  to grow and they are something you can do on your windowsill or back porch. You can grow them in pots, grow bags, outdoors or under cover. I'm currently enjoying Winter Mix, Mixed Lettuce and Stir Fry Mix from the glass house.


Other salad leaves that are easy to grow under cover or in the bed are baby spinach leaves. Simply sow them pretty close; about 2-3 cm between seeds and pick them while they are young. They go really well in a salad with rocket leaves. Again these are really simple to grow indoors or out.

It is important to keep a succession of salad leaves by sowing "little and often". Just one or two short rows of about a metre every two weeks will keep you in salad leaves.

Get your potatoes early

One of the greatest pleasures of gardening is eating your first early potatoes. They are simply perfect on their own, steamed, with a bit of butter, sea salt and fresh ground black pepper. If you like you can sprinkle a bit of parsley over them. For a celebration you can have a bottle of Guinness to wash them down.

There is great competition among gardeners to see who gets the first earlies. To get the jump on other gardeners you really do have to start early and you do need some form of protection. I have grown my first earlies under low cloches, in a poly tunnel and now I use bags in the green house.

Early potatoes in bags

It is simple enough to do. Get your seed potatoes as early as possible - ideally December - and chit them (let little sprouts grow). Then place about 10 cm of  well rotted compost in the bottom of a sack, like the ones shown in the picture. Place three seed potatoes on top and cover with a further 10 cm of compost. If there is hard frost cover with fleece.

Once the shoots are about 15 cm tall add another 10 cm of compost. Repeat this until the bags are filled. If you think they need it you can give a liquid feed of worm liquid or comfrey tea. If your compost is good enough they won't need it.

You should be able to pick your first earlies - they will be pretty small towards the end of April. Simply work your hand down and feel around until you get a few. The bags will keep on cropping for several weeks and can be moved outside once the risk of frost has passed. I cover them with fleece when I put them out.