Get Your Oats

Summer seems to have come and gone since I last had time to catch up with my blog. It is not that I have not been cooking and photographing - I have, non-stop. I have also been down at my allotment as much as I possibly can and really, considering how little time I have had to put in this year, it has been a bumper crop. I have been overloaded with rhubarb, cucumbers, runner beans, courgettes and lots of lovely salad leaves to name just a few.

Last week I was asked to work on some seasonal recipes and photographs for the website of a new project. This is the very exciting Harborne Food School in Birmingham who's main aim is to educate people about healthier and more sustainable eating. I wrote a couple of seasonal recipes for them but my first priority was to use up some of my glut of rhubarb so I made a compote and served it with granola and a big dollop of greek yoghurt. As we all know, oats are a superfood and I make sure I have at least a bowl a day. Packed with antioxidants and fibre, they reduce cholesterol and contain manganese, a mineral that helps enzymes in bone formation. You'll also get good helpings of vitamin B1 and magnesium and most of all they fill you up with out filling you with calories.

Making your own granola may seem like a lot of effort but you get to control exactly what goes into it. A lot of the shop bought ones have a frightening amount of sugar. You should be able to get all of the ingredients in a health shop, if they are not in your supermarket. Play around with the ingredients and you can come up with something unique.

Finally, because I have never seen so many plums around as I did this year, a plum crumble. I have added some almonds and oats to the crumble mix to add a little extra goodness there as well.

Mixed Seed and Nut Honey Granola
Makes approx. 500g

2 tbsp. coconut oil
2 tsp. vanilla Bean Paste
2 tbsp. Maple Syrup
4 tbsp. honey
200g porridge oats, not the instant kind
100g rye flakes
25g sunflower seeds
25g pumpkin seeds
2 tbsp. sesame seeds or linseeds
50g chopped pecans
50g chopped almonds

Preheat your oven to 150C/130C fan/gas mark 2.
Mix the oil, vanilla and honey and Maple Syrup together in a large bowl.
Add in all of the remaining ingredients.
Mix everything really well together and then spread the mixture thinly and evenly on to two baking sheets.
Bake for 20 minutes. Check from time to time. If the oven seems too hot, turn it down. It should only be very light brown in colour. Break up the mixture and stir it around and bake for a further 5-10 minutes
Remove the baking trays and spread it evenly onto a flat dish to cool. It will crisp up as it cools.
After it has cooled, pour it into an airtight container and store in a cool dark place. It will keep for up to a month.

Rhubarb Compote

2 tbsp. honey

½ tsp vanilla bean extract or ½ vanilla pod split

500g rhubarb, trimmed, washed and cut into thin pieces no thinker than 1 cms

Place a pan over a low heat and add the honey and vanilla. Stir until the honey dissolves. Add the rhubarb. Bring it to a simmer and then cover the pan, cooking slowly for about 10 minutes or so, checking regularly. The rhubarb should break down into a puree. Remove the vanilla pod if you used one. Check the sweetness. Rhubarb varies and it may need a little more honey.

When cool store it in an airtight container in the fridge. It will keep for about a week.

TO SERVE

Spoon 3 tbsp. of the rhubarb compote into a glass or bowl. Top with 125g pot of natural yoghurt and about 40g of the granola.

Oat and Almond Plum Crumble 
Serves 6.
650g plums
4 tbsp honey

For the crumble
130g plain flour
80g butter
40g light muscovado sugar
40g porridge oats
40g flaked almonds

Set the oven at 170C. 
Remove the stones from the plums and toss with the honey. Tip into a saucepan and cook over a medium heat for a bout 10 minutes until the plums begin to break down. Tip into a baking dish. Meanwhile make the crumble topping by rubbing the butter into the flour till it resembles fresh breadcrumbs. Lightly rub in the sugar and then stir in the almonds and the oats. Tip the oat-and-almond topping on to the fruit and bake for 30-35 minutes till the crust is crisp and golden. The fruit should be bubbling round the sides. Serve hot, with cream or ice-cream.

Pretty in Pink

I am not a great romantic and Valentines day is the most abhorrent day of all to me.  It makes me cringe, just thinking about it. It smacks of everything I dislike. An exploited, commercial opportunity which seems to focus on making as much money as possible out of peoples complete lack of imagination and originality.   Why on earth would I want a bunch of dodgy overpriced, cheap Dutch roses or worse still, a nasty box of chocolates.  Worse still, is the thought of going out to dinner on Valentines day.  Massively over-inflated prices, in packed restaurants, desperately trying to get rid of you so they can turn your table.  In my last restaurant, The Vale, the bookings would start flooding in as early as the first week of January and we would be booked to bursting before February began, with a waiting list as long as my arm.  The whole dining room would have to be completely recreated to accommodate endless tables of two, who would whisper all night and gaze at each other adoringly.  Please don't get me wrong.  I am not bitter.  I am very happily settled with my Hughie.  We try to love each other every day, all year.  O.K. -" try to" may be the operative word but at least it is not on one allotted day a year, in a forced show of over-sentimental emotion.  

What does fill me with passion about February however is the first of the forced Rhubarb. I love it with its mouth-watering sourness, which when balanced with something sweet is just sensational. I also adore it's beautiful, deep and luscious colour. So as soon as I saw it for sale, I just had to have some and I had my heart set on a cake but what sort to choose?  I am bit particular about my flavour pairings with my rhubarb.  Whilst many lean towards orange and ginger, I feel that they are too distracting in flavour and I will only match vanilla or almonds with mine.  Secondly, I was determined that this cake should fully exploit the rhubarbs beautiful colour.  Thirdly I am particularly fond of the sort of cakes that you can serve as a pudding, with a big dollop of clotted cream or a jug of custard.  Eventually I amalgamated about five different recipes together and came up with this Upside-down Rhubarb, Almond and Vanilla Cake and I have to say, I was pretty enamoured with the result.  The rhubarb gently stews in it's own juices and ever so slightly begins to caramelise.  Quite delicious!

In fact, I was so infatuated with it, I entered it for Tea Time Treats over at What Kate Baked. Well it is pink!

Rhubarb, Almond and Vanilla Upside-down Cake

400g pink rhubarb
150g golden caster sugar
130g dark Muscovado Sugar
150g unsalted butter,softened
3 large eggs, beaten
110g  self-raising flour
110g ground almonds
135g (1/2 cup)  sour cream
1 tsp of Vanilla Bean Paste
pinch salt
Spring-form cake tin with a diameter of 24cm and a depth of 6cm, greased, sides and base lined with one piece of baking parchment

Serves: 8
Cut  the rhubarb into 1cm slices and toss them, in a bowl, with the caster sugar.
Tip into your tin and scatter evenly.
Preheat the oven to 170C, 325F, gas mark 3.
Cream together the butter and Muscovado sugar until light and fluffy. Gradually beat in the eggs.  Don't worry if it curdles.  Fold in the flour, almonds, vanilla and sour cream. Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and smooth on top of the rhubarb, making sure it is evenly covered.  Bake in the oven for about 3/4 hour or until the cake is firm to a light touch in the centre. Cool in the tin for 15 minutes before loosening around the edges with a knife and turning out either onto a serving plate or a wire rack to finish cooling.

This is good served with some custard, clotted cream or vanilla ice cream.