Roast Pepper and Olive Salsa: lovely for serving with grilled oily fish and grilled chicken, beef or lamb
When cooked, remove from the liquid to drain and cool.
Beat the eggs and cream with a pinch of salt and pepper and add the Parmesan.
Slice or crumble the sheep’s cheese on to the tart base. Place the drained and cooled artichokes on top. Pour over the eggs and cream and place in a preheated oven at 180°C/350°F/gas 4 for 30–40 minutes, or until the tart is set. You will know it is set if you press the surface of the tart gently with your fingers and it feels just firm. The surface should have a rich golden colour by now.
Remove from the oven and place on a wire rack for at least 15 minutes. Remove the tin, place the tart on a large flat plate and serve warm with the pepper and olive salsa and a salad of organic leaves.
Roast pepper and olive salsa
This salsa is also terrific with grilled fish such as mackerel and salmon, with grilled lamb and chicken, or just smeared over warm grilled sourdough bread.
Serves 6–8 1 red pepper, roasted, peeled, deseeded and cut into 5mm dice
1 ripe firm tomato, peeled, deseeded and cut into 5mm dice (omit the tomato if not really ripe)
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped black olives
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove of garlic, peeled and crushed to a paste
10 basil leaves, torn or chopped
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Maldon sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Mix all the ingredients together, then taste and correct the seasoning.
Red onion, roast pepper, rosemary and anchovy pissaladière
Pissaladière is a flat Provençal onion tart with a distinctive lattice of anchovy on top. Here it is given a little twist with the addition of roast peppers and rosemary. The tart is best served while still warm and with a salad of organic leaves.
The ingredients
Onions, thinly sliced and cooked until soft, are a defining ingredient of this flat tart.
Red or yellow peppers, peeled, deseeded and cut into long thin strips, are used along with the anchovies to create a lattice on the surface of the tart.
Anchovies preserved either in oil or salt can be used here. Salted anchovies, if whole, need to be filleted and rinsed really well in cold water to remove excess salt. Anchovies preserved in oil are drained before using.
Serves 6–8 PASTRY
225g plain white flour
110g butter
1 egg
FILLING
4 tablespoons olive oil
700g onions, peeled and thinly sliced
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
1 large sprig of rosemary
3 roasted red peppers (2 if the peppers are large), peeled, deseeded and cut into long strips, 1cm wide
40g anchovies
Sieve the flour into a bowl and rub in the butter until you have fine crumbs. Beat the egg and add to the flour and butter. Mix it in with your hand or a fork to bring the pastry together. Knead very lightly to achieve a smooth dough. Wrap with greaseproof paper and chill for at least 30 minutes.
Heat the olive oil in a heavy-based saucepan and add the sliced onions, garlic and rosemary. Cover with a butter wrapper or greaseproof paper and the saucepan lid and sweat on a low heat for 30 minutes. Remove the saucepan and paper lid and allow the onions to cook uncovered for a further 10 minutes to become more golden in colour. Taste and correct the seasoning and spread out the onions on a tray to cool completely.
Meanwhile, roll out the chilled pastry and use to line the base and sides of a Swiss roll-type tin, 23cm x 33cm. Chill for 30 minutes.
Spread the cooled onions over the pastry in an even layer. Arrange the strips of pepper in a lattice pattern over the onions. Cut each of the anchovies lengthways into 2 strips and arrange these thin strips, again in a lattice pattern, over the onions.
Place the tin in a preheated oven at 190°C/375°F/gas 5 for 30–40 minutes, or until the pastry is cooked to a crisp golden finish.
Brush the cooked pissaladière with olive oil and serve with a salad of organic leaves.
Chicken and other broths
Vegetable soups
Savoury tarts
Salads and dressings
Pan-grilling and pan-frying
Roasting
Casserole-roasting
Baked fish
Green vegetables
Roots and alliums
Potatoes
Rice
Pulses – beans, peas and lentils
Simple soda breads
Sweet essentials
Fruit fools, compotes and salads
Biscuits
Ice creams, sorbets and granitas
Meringues
Warm puddings
Cold puddings
A few cakes
‘Always accurately measure ingredients for a dressing or vinaigrette. The aim is to balance the sharp ingredient such as vinegar or lemon juice with the richer oils or cream.’
A salad of leaf greens is a keystone of my cooking and eating. On its own, or as an accompaniment to another dish, it is almost always present at the lunch, supper or dinner table.
It is in theory a simple exercise, but in reality there is a great deal of subtlety and refinement involved. In some restaurant kitchens, a new recruit will be presented with a basket of greens to wash and dry as a first task. The way the task is approached and executed will give the watchful chef a good idea as to the recruit’s attitude to food and ingredients. Gentle and caring hands are needed so as not to damage or bruise the tender leaves. Drying the leaves, which is essential, also needs a light touch. If the leaves are not perfectly dry, the dressing will not cling to them and the surplus water will dilute it and the whole thing will become a soggy mess.
So there you were thinking what could be easier than a salad, and now I am ranting on about it as if it was an haute technique. I don’t mean to scare or irritate you, but in many ways one’s approach to a salad sets the standard for any other task in the kitchen. If you can make a really good, simple leaf salad, it means you possess the necessary patience, care and love of food to do almost any other task in the kitchen. Because what making a salad calls for, more than any other thing, is care, and care makes for really good food.
An entire book could be written about leaf salads, and indeed has been, so I won’t try to list all the possibilities here. I will give you some of the recipes and a list of the leaves that I like, and suggest some variations.