Market Life: the autumn edition

Market Life Autumn edition

281003 772397 9

ISSN 2397-2815

The Borough Market magazine boroughmarket.org.uk

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Welcome to Market Life Autumn edition

BOROUGH MARKET OPENING HOURS Monday—Thursday: 10am-5pm Friday: 10am-6pm Saturday: 8am-5pm Borough Market 8 Southwark Street London SE1 1TL Underground London Bridge Train London Bridge Twitter @boroughmarket Instagram @boroughmarket facebook.com/boroughmarket To ensure that a weekly fix of articles, recipes and Borough Market event information lands in your email inbox, sign up to our newsletter: boroughmarket.org.uk/newsletter

pp18 Oysters with Market garnishes

Spiced beetroot soup pp20 Grilled corn in harissa mayo

Girolles, chanterelles, brambles and egg pp22 Chilli cornbread with tomato salsa

Autumn beets and squash salad with hedgerow dressing pp25 Rabbit and pig’s trotter terrine with whole grain mustard and parsley

Squash, mushroom and sage tart pp26 Rouille on toast and fish stew

Curried monkfish and clams pp28 Pork and plum meatballs with cauliflower puree and roasted greens

Deer and hedgehog pie pp30 Quail with apple, red cabbage & fennel slaw

Venison loin, hedgerow sauce and wild mushrooms on celeriac puree pp32 Roast pumpkin pie

Plum & yoghurt fool

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Nothing at Borough Market stays the same for very long— and that’s not true only in extraordinary years like this one.

Because of the way that our produce traders operate, the stalls are constantly being reshaped by the rhythm of harvesting, fishing, breeding, hunting and maturation. Right now, as autumn kicks in, that transformation feels particularly dramatic. It’s a change that happens gradually, day by day, but if you haven’t been to Borough Market for a while it can seem as though a curtain has been brought down and the entire set changed, with all the bright colours of summer replaced with a more muted palette: squashes, apples, pears, nuts, beets, mushrooms, oysters, game birds.

One of the biggest things we gain from this is an incredible breadth of offering. By losing produce from the stalls as it goes out of season, our traders are able to clear the decks for whatever is coming next, in all its many forms. In 1883, the Royal Horticultural Society logged 1,545 British apples, each of which had its own small window of availability. Now, most people eat the same handful of varieties all year round, only one or two of which are native to these shores. In the coming months, our greengrocers’ stalls will feature a rolling cast of those old, unfamiliar apples, most of them from southern England, all of them highly distinctive. The same diversity will be seen in the squashes and mushrooms, shellfish and mountain cheeses.

But while much of our seasonal produce comes from local sources, our approach is not about being narrow and parochial. Ours is a proudly international market, and many of our traders bring in food from abroad—but their reason for doing so is to broaden our palette, not narrow it. Every year, we look forward to the arrival of the first Vacherin cheeses from the Alps, the beautiful, bitter winter leaves from Italy, the blood oranges from Spain: all of them regional specialities that are in season at their place of origin, produced in their natural environment with minimal intervention.

And that, ultimately, is the point of all this. Eating with the seasons demands far less human intervention—nature runs its course. More often than not, the less we intervene, the better the food will taste. Food that has been produced in the conditions best suited for it to thrive, food that has been transported no further than it needs to be, is always going to be the tastiest food. At Borough Market, the food on the stalls may change all the time, but the commitment to quality doesn’t.

IN SEASON

Cobnuts A special, highly seasonal variety of native hazelnut, identifiable by their long husk and spade-like shape.

Kale These leafy brassicas are out in all their glory: be they curly, purple, green, or beautiful Italian cavolo nero.

Parsley root The underused root of the familiar herb. Slender and carrot-like in appearance; celery-like in flavour.

White beetroot All the sweet, earthy goodness of its pink-hued cousin, but often a little milder and without any of the finger stain.

Medlars Once ‘bletted’—left to become extremely ripe—roast these native autumnal fruits, scoop out their flesh and fold into a fool.

On the cover Venison, wild mushrooms and hedgerow sauce on celeriac puree

Rapini A broccolilike member of the cruciferous family, delicious served with an anchovy, chilli, garlic and olive oil dressing.

Chegworth beauty With its reddish, yellowy-green skin and crisp, sweet-sharp flesh, this apple more than lives up to its name.

FIVE SQUASHES

Squashes Chegworth Valley Elsey & Bent Paul Wheeler Fresh Supplies Ted’s Veg Turnips

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Greengages A late harvest, heritage variety of plum. These sweet, attractive lime-green orbs make a wonderful topping for tarts.

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Patty pan These miniature, spaceshiplike gourds are technically a summer squash, but should be around until the colder weather properly sets in. The beauty of the patty pan is, that unlike its hardier winter cousins there’s no need to peel it: simply chop into chunks and fry in a (relatively) dry pan, sautéed with shallot, tomato and cumin sauce, then simmer with a little extra water.

Good hot or cold.

Colchester native oysters Plump, silken and sweet, these native oysters are harvested in the shallow creeks off Mersea Island in Essex.

Dover sole A large, firm, slipper-shaped flat fish best grilled whole on the bone for full flavour and tender flesh. A real luxury.

Cobnuts Food and Forest Chegworth beauty apples Chegworth Valley Colchester native oysters Richard Haward Oysters Cantal au lait de Salers Mons Cheesemongers Vacherin mont d’Or Une Normande a Londres Novello olive oil The Olive Oil Co Blackberry and sloe gin jam Rosebud Preserves

Cantal au lait de Salers Rich, buttery and characterful, this cow’s milk cheese is made in the mountains of Auvergne.

Vacherin mont d’Or Try baking this silken soft cheese from the Jura mountains in white wine with a sprig of rosemary.

Clams Clams of all guises become plump and juicy in the colder months. Use palourdes for vongole; cherrystone for creamy chowder.

Red-legged partridge A bird with pale, tender flesh, less intensely gamey than the smaller, stronger-tasting grey variety.

Novello olive oil The first extra virgin olive oil of the season from Sicily, pressed in October, boasting a rich green colur and creamy taste.

Pheasant The start of this large, lean, versatile game bird’s season heralds the arrival of autumn. Cook with plenty of fat.

Beef shin Cook low and slow in stews, casseroles and ragu to turn this economical, fullflavoured cut into a meltin-the-mouth treat.

Blackberry and sloe gin jam A fusion of autumnal fruit flavours, warm spices and orange zest, handmade in Yorkshire.

Crown prince A fine textured (and fine tasting) squash befitting of its regal name. Beneath that beautiful silver-blue hued skin is plenty of dense, deep orange flesh. Roast in wedges with the skin still on, peel away the skin once cool enough to handle, then blitz the flesh into a silky soup. Or make the most of its sweet and nutty flavour in pumpkin pie, layered with currants, spices and sweet custard.

Acorn Another hard-skinned varietal with a delicate taste and soft, pulpy flesh. Recognisable for its distinctive acorn-like shape and deeply ridged, dark green skin, it’s small enough to be stuffed and baked. Alternatively, toss chunks into casseroles or ragouts; the flesh will soften and eventually collapse, thickening the juices in the pot without having to use any flour—a bonus for those with a wheat intolerance.

Kabocha As the name might suggest, this teeny-weeny, dark green gourd is of Japanese origin. Its pleasing texture and buttery flavour make it great for stews .

Alternatively, remove the seeds (but keep the skin on), slice thinly, waft through the lightest of batters, then deep fry to make tempura, perfect for dipping in a ginger and soy sauce: an autumnal veg dish as crisp as fallen leaves.

2345 Delica A squat, inelegant-looking fruit, but one whose appearance belies its culinary reputation.

Cut it in half and the radiantly orange flesh and honeyed perfume tells a tale of a pumpkin pampered—and indeed, it’s an ingredient that’s coveted around the world. Look out for those with a red waxy tip; these French beauties have been ripened an extra couple of months to intensity the depth of flavour.

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BEET SURRENDER Angela Clutton on how, after growing up despising the pickled beetroots of her youth, she came to fall in love with this most sweet and earthy of autumnal vegetables

Image: Regula Ysewijn

Millennials and Generation Zed-ers, how I envy you the beetroot roasts, carpaccio salads and blended dips you have grown up with. Because like many a child of the seventies and eighties, the beetroot of my formative years came crinkle-cut and pickled.

And I loathed everything about it: the inevitable staining of fingers and favourite dresses, the smell and, most of all, the taste.

It would be many years before I realised that beetroot came in anything other than a jar, and saw for the first time a true beetroot, one with actual roots and leaves attached, its rough skin just waiting to reveal the glistening sweet flesh underneath.

Ideally, it’ll have a little soil still on there too—soil that is somehow redolent of the deep earthiness of flavour that beetroots carry and that came as a taste revelation to me.

These days, I can’t imagine not having beetroots in my cooking life, and whenever I use them I try to bear in mind that they’re at their best when prepared in ways that protect and embrace that earthy flavour.

Sure, beetroots can be boiled or steamed. Know, though, that even when a few centimetres of the roots and tops are left on as a precaution, it is inevitable that some of the colour— and flavour—will bleed out into the water. Roasting is the way to go for achieving the deepest intensity of flavour. All the better with some sprigs of woody herbs, garlic cloves and a few tablespoons of red wine vinegar in the roasting tin to help the flavours along.

Cooked and cooled, their skins slide off with the barest rub of your thumb, leaving them ready to partner with the glorious autumnal produce that clever old Mother Nature, with her unerring knack of knowing exactly what goes with what, has arranged to have in

season at just the same time.

Think about beetroot as a perfect fit for game meats, maybe roasted with shallots and a slug of port wine for venison steaks. Or as a foil for autumn’s blackberries, plums or figs, the acidity of the fruits balancing the beetroot’s sweetness. It’s the same, too, when winter’s oranges start to appear. One of my go-to, midweekfavourite, cold-weather dishes is roasting beetroot with chunky sausages and a hefty squeeze of halved orange, the spent fruit thrown into the roasting tin too. Served alongside will be the beetroot tops’ leaves, stirfried in the way I might do some swiss chard, beetroot’s botanical cousin.

The sharpness of the fruits against the sweetness of beetroot is a clue to how successful beetroot is with soused herring or mackerel. And given sousing is just pickling with a slightly snazzier name, I can’t for too much longer avoid admitting that, now I’m a self-declared vinegar obsessive, I see that pickled beetroot can be a very fine thing indeed. Inspiration comes from chefs such as Yotam Ottolenghi, who offers a ferment of beetroot with turnips in his Jerusalem cookbook, or Olia Hercules, who has so many gorgeous recipes for fermented or pickled beets.

Those writers and many others tell us of beetroot’s connection with the culinary heritage that runs through the Middle East, the Caucasus and into eastern Europe—a spread of nations whose mention in the context of beetroot means I’m swiftly headed to one thing: borscht. Borscht seems to have sometimes become a bit of a catch-all word for any beetroot soup, yet there is an authenticity to the many variations that come with different nations, all of which make it with the produce they have in abundance, in a way that suits their lifestyle.

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Beetroots Chegworth Valley Elsey & Bent Paul Wheeler Fresh Supplies Ted’s Veg Turnips

Borscht is almost always made with dill, and often with horseradish—two more flavour partners we would all do well to remember. It might be chilled, or not. Light, or rib-sticking. Vegetarian, or made with meat stocks or chunks of pork. Blended smooth, or with the elements left whole and distinctive.

Blending beetroot makes me think too of glorious beetroot dips: baked, then blitzed with yoghurt and some of the many flavours it has a natural affinity for. That could be dill and horseradish, yes; or perhaps cumin, walnuts, mustard, garlic or capers.

I have become a huge fan of heaping beetroot dip on rye for lunch, or in a bowl for flatbread with a drizzling of the very best extra virgin olive oil I can lay my hands on.

My Great Beetroot Epiphany has so far centred on cooked beetroot, but what about using it raw? That can be just as fabulous. Try grating some into latkes to give more colour and sweetness than the traditional potato. Grate into a carrot salad, finely chop for a remoulade with celeriac, or use in a winter leaf salad for gravadlax. ‘Carpaccio’ beetroot salads can be made by simply slicing raw beetroots as thinly as your fingers or a mandoline will provide and styling the circles on a platter—a dressing of sherry vinegar, olive oil and pounded walnuts works exceptionally well here.

That’s a beauty of a dish that becomes extra Instagram-able if you use a mixture of beetroot varieties.

Modern cooks may not have quite so many different shapes and sizes and colours of beetroot as were around in the 19th century, when beetroot first properly burst onto the culinary scene, but we do okay. Keep an eye out for gorgeous golden beetroots, or the choggia ‘candy-stripe’ variety that give the classic ruby-red globes a run for their money. Note that the choggias are best used raw, as their stripes can sadly disappear on cooking.

The ‘candy’ name of the choggias is a nod to their colour but also to the inherent sweetness I have been banging on about here, and which makes them such a joy in savoury dishes. It does not, however—for my money, anyway—make them anything like so useful or joyous in sweet cooking. I just cannot get my head or tastebuds around using beetroot in the chocolate cakes, brownies, mousses and more that I know lots of people enjoy. I don’t know if I can ever fully escape the feeling and flavour of the earth. Even beetroot ice cream is a thing. Just not my thing.

I shouldn’t say that, though, when I haven’t actually tried it. Maybe you have, and maybe it is fabulous. And isn’t this just the kind of beetroot prejudice that first got me into my anti-beetroot bind all those years ago?

Perhaps we should all be more openminded about cooking with beetroots and beet leaves, and enjoy the diversity of ways they make autumn’s meals zing with colour and flavour.

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SWEET AS A NUT Market Life pays a visit to the Cascina Valcrosa nut farm in northern Italy to see hazelnuts being grown in a way that ensures quality, sustainability and—vitally for a product that elsewhere has been tainted by exploitative practices—complete traceability Words: Clare Finney Imagery: Orlando Gili

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A year ago, almost to the day, the BBC ran a Radio 4 documentary and accompanying website feature about the murky world of hazelnuts. At its heart was the revelation that Ferrero, the maker of Nutella and the world’s biggest buyer of hazelnuts, was likely to be sourcing many of its nuts from Turkish farms that pay exploitation wages to poor Kurdish labourers, including children well below the legal working age. At the very same time, towards the end of September 2019, I was in Piedmont, northern Italy, waving goodbye to the Bruna family and their quiet, mistwreathed hazelnut farm. The timing could have been described as ironic, were the BBC story not so depressing. “Nearly three-quarters of the world’s hazelnuts come from Turkey,” the journalist Tim Whewell informed us, “and the biggest buyer is Ferrero. But the nuts are picked mainly by migrants, including children, who work long hours for very low pay.” At the farm we’d just left, the hours were long, this being harvest time, but absolutely no one was being exploited.

To say a lot has happened in the past 12 months would be a statement of the blindingly obvious, and Ferrero has, in spite of everything, made significant progress on ensuring its ingredients come from reputable 10 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

sources. Yet the intractable nature of the food system means this global food giant is still some way off its expressed goal of 100 per cent traceability. Turkey’s hazelnut industry is centred upon the Black Sea coast, a region that contains as many as 400,000 familyowned hazelnut orchards and employs the services of millions of seasonal labourers and legions of middlemen, from contractors to traders to brokers. The length and opacity of the supply chains means that if you’re eating a nutty sweet or spread made by a food corporation at the end of one of those chains, there’s a chance that exploitative practices may have a played a part in its production.

By way of contrast, at the Cascina Valcrosa farm in the Alta Langa region of Piedmont, the Brunas have brought all their processes in house. Here, they grow, harvest and process their own nuts and sell them directly to retailers like Borough Market’s Food and Forest. Their trees, of the local Tonda Gentile Trilobata variety, are planted five metres apart to allow for maximum sunlight and promote maximum yield, and their nuts— large, round and russet-brown, with a crisp, fine shell—are only reaped once they’re fully ripe and have fallen to the ground. There is no child labour, just the Bruna brothers, their

Cascina Valcrosa is surrounded by woodland, a dense blanket —which sweeps the hills around us.

Every January, when the Brunas’ hazelnut trees flower, they are pollinated via the wind, not just by each other but by the wild hazelnut trees in these forests

father and a few employees working tirelessly during the annual harvest period of August and September—although not so tirelessly they don’t take an hour off for a homemade lunch, prepared by Signora Bruna, the family matriarch, which they eat together every day.

The Brunas’ harvesting machine looks like something straight out of Willy Wonka’s factory, a pleasingly clunky construction of rakes, vacuums, belts and forklifts. When it works, it works brilliantly: hazelnuts are collected gently, the leaf and twig debris are removed (“for compost”) and the nuts laid out in the sunshine to dry. This is the ideal. The difficulty, explains Fabrizio Bruna, comes when it rains, leaving the ground too wet for the machine to work. On days like this, they must rake and collect by hand, a long and arduous process. If there is no sun (and there wasn’t last Thursday) they use a warm air dryer to dry the nuts, a step that is “important for good conservation” as well as being, like the large spaces between the trees and the harvesting from the forest floor,

MEANWHILE IN KENT BACK IN ENGLAND, THE FOOD AND FOREST TEAM ARE GATHERING COBNUTS FROM THEIR KENTISH ORCHARD

While the Brunas have been harvesting their hazelnuts, Charles Tebbutt and his team at Food and Forest have been labouring away in a beautiful, tree-filled field in Sevenoaks, Kent, picking the first of the season’s cobnuts.

Charles took on the orchard, which is managed in partnership with Gillian Jones under license from the National Trust, around two years ago. Much like everything else at Food and Forest, the nuts are grown using the principles of agroforestry—an environmentally-friendly method of farming with trees, in a way that limits soil erosion and encourages biodiversity. “In an ideal world we’d also like to get some animals grazing in the orchard too, using a type of agroforestry called wood pasture, but there are other things we can do which could have a big environmental benefit,” he explains.

“Common practise with an orchard is to keep growth right down, mowing it every month or so, but we let it grow up with bluebells and anemones earlier in the season—it’s looking very healthy as a result.”

Cobnuts, a native British variety of hazelnut, are a speciality of the region.

“The reason so many are grown in Kent is to do with the climate—it’s the Garden of England, after all—although there are 11 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

producers elsewhere,” Charles explains.

Despite having such a long history in the region, Kentish cobnut production is an increasingly niche pursuit. “The reason cobnuts are not more commonly grown is that the nut itself has a peculiar shape and a very tight husk, which makes it quite difficult to process mechanically. This adds an extra stage to the processing that you don’t get with other varieties.” The fact that they have to be picked from the tree by hand also makes harvesting cobnuts hugely labour intensive. “ The hazelnuts we get from the Brunas in Italy can essentially be hoovered up by machine. That means they can wait for them to fully mature and fall to the ground.

The thing is that there they don’t have to worry about squirrels taking all the crop, as there’s less of a squirrel population. We don’t have that luxury” Charles’s commitment to growing and selling these uncommon kernels stems not just from a desire to offer his customers something uniquely delicious, but to preserve the tradition of growing them.

“It’s also about sustaining rural livelihoods,” he says. “Cobnut growers tend to be of an older demographic. I want to make sure that the tradition is continued.”

a stipulation of the Piedmont hazelnut’s PGI protected status.

This PGI is vital: to the quality of the nuts, to the sustainability of the farms, and to the population of the region, many of whom are dependent on this industry. It protects them from competition from producers outside of Piedmont who do not share the area’s unique topography and microclimate. The high altitude—Alta Langa is 700m above sea level—makes for cool nights and slow ripening process, while the breeze that reaches the region from the Ligurian coast strengthens the trees, and lends their nuts a subtle minerality. It also—and this pertains to Ferrero’s problems in Turkey—ensures maximum traceability, as not only must the packaging bear the indications ‘Nocciola del Piemonte’ or ‘Nocciola Piemonte’, it must also include the name and address of the producer and the packaging company. The Cascina Valcrosa farm is small, and simply managed. The Bruna family have lived on this land for generations, growing nuts, grapes, grass and grain, but only recently— when Fabrizio and his brother Silvano took over—did they choose to sharpen their specialisation by setting up a shelling plant and a high quality semi-finished product production laboratory, and converting the farm almost entirely to hazelnuts. They still produce some honey and their father produces a little wine, which we enjoy halfway through our tour alongside their mum’s hazelnut and honey torte, but for the most part their lives and livelihoods are tied to these bushy yet surprisingly slender nut trees.

This is no story of biodiversity reduction, however. Far from it: Cascina Valcrosa is surrounded by woodland, a dense blanket which sweeps the hills around us. Every January, when the Brunas’ hazelnut trees flower, they are pollinated via the wind, not just by each other but by the wild hazelnut trees in these forests. “It keeps the biodiversity,” says Fabrizio, and it strengthens the hybrid vigour of their trees to have genetic input from the wild trees outside.

The family are as rooted in the land as their vines and trees, which they grow chemical free: protected from pests by fences, and from diseases by copper sulphate and the judicious spacing. Every year they prune the trees of their dead or dried branches by hand.

“We tried with machines, but it was damaging to the health of the trees,” Fabrizio continues, and in this business that is paramount. It’s a long game, growing hazelnuts trees: “They cannot be harvested until they are eight years old, and will produce for another 30 or 40 years before production starts to decline.”

Even the processing isn’t quick. After drying, the nuts are sorted into different size categories, shelled (by machine), then roasted in a familiar-looking contraption that Silvano reveals was originally built for coffee beans. “It’s better for the nuts that they don’t touch the grill, but the hot air goes through them,” he explains, as the shelled nuts bob and fly furiously around. This process, while partially automated, still takes skill and experience. “Roasting for different times changes the taste and the colour,” Silvano explains. The optimum time is determined by the size and original flavour of the nuts harvested that day, as well as by their final destination—for example, nuts for gianduja,

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The Brunas’ harvesting machine looks like something straight out of Willy Wonka’s factory, a pleasingly clunky construction of rakes, vacuums, belts and forklifts.

When it works, it works brilliantly

the Piedmontese chocolate spread, need to be roasted for longer—but on average the nuts are heated for 20 minutes at around 85C. After roasting, they are painstakingly sorted by hand: those with insects, or stowaway pieces of skin or shell are removed by a patient, beady-eyed woman who—because the job demands her utmost attention—takes regular breaks.

The discarded shells can be used as fuel; the skins as compost. Those nuts that are deemed too small for selling whole are either transformed into hazelnut flour in Signora Bruna’s kitchen, or macerated with chocolate and sugar in a machine full of ball bearings to create the Bruna version of gianduja: a process which takes a little over two hours.

At this point I should probably issue a disclaimer: I am not a huge fan of hazelnuts.

I love them in gelato and gianduja—and come on, who doesn’t?—but compared with pistachios and almonds, I’ve always considered hazelnuts to be second tier. So when Silvano scoops up a handful of freshlyroasted nuts (back in the halcyon days of 2019, remember, when such a tactile approach was still permissible) and proffers them round, it was more out of duty than desire that I pop one in my mouth, still warm from the roaster. The taste is extraordinary: toast, autumn leaves and golden caramel intermingled with the minerality borne in on that fresh sea breeze.

There is always great merit in choosing a product that is traceable, supplied by a retailer that shares your values and can tell you about the producer in detail. But it’s a no brainer when the flavour of that product is as exceptional as the Brunas’ hazelnuts, available in bags or in the form of toasted brittle either at Food and Forest’s stall or from Borough Market online. Ferrero is trying to address the issues of child labour and exploitative wages in its supply chain, with a Farming Values programme that offers training to all hazelnut stakeholders on how the sector can be made more ethical and sustainable. For that it should be commended.

But with farmers like Silvano and Fabrizio at Cascina Valcrosa producing nuts that are as exceptional as they are environmentally sustainable and ethical, hazelnut lovers need not wait any longer to reconcile their cravings with their moral compass.

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A CLOSER LOOK APPLES The British apple season starts in earnest as early as August, but ramps up significantly as autumn unfolds. Now is surely the time to abandon energyexpensive foreign imports in favour of the dozens of lesserknown homegrown varieties whose exceptional quality is testament to this country’s long and venerable tradition of apple growing.

How seasonal are apples?

Discoveries, worcester permains and collinas arrive while the summer holidays are still in full swing. Sweet, aromatic and joyfully juicy, these varieties do not store well, so munch as many as possible while you can. Egremont russets and cox’s orange pippins start in mid-September but are at their best in October, by which point the santana and topaz apples will also have appeared.

While most apples are at their best fresh from the tree, some later, hardier varieties like cox’s, russets, braeburns and galas can be squirrelled away in dark, cold, oxygen-depleted storage rooms for several months

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without spoiling, meaning you can feasibly buy them as late as next March, even April. More ephemeral pleasures can be found in those whose seasons are truly short-lived: apples like ashmead’s kernel, blenheim orange, krasava and beauty of bath.

What should we do with them?

British apples vary enormously in character: for example, while Chegworth Valley’s popular egremont russets boast a sweet, nutty flavour, the july red is juicy and vinous, and the slightly coarser flesh of the white transparent has a heady, sweet fragrance that fills a room when you cut into it. The varieties you see pictured here are all known as ‘eaters’; if it’s crumble, cobbler, pie, slump or sauce you’re after, plump instead for the large, luminous bramleys.

Where can I buy them?

Bramleys, cox’s and braeburns are ubiquitous at Borough Market, sold by the likes of Jock Stark, Ted’s Veg, Elsey & Bent and Paul Wheeler Fresh Supplies. Chegworth Valley’s Kentish farm grows blenheim orange, topaz, worcester permain, ashmead’s kernel and santana apples, among others, while Turnips sources an impressive selection from Brogdale Farm, home to over 2,000 apple varieties.

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Oysters with Market garnishes

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AUTUMN RECIPES A selection of seasonal dishes made with Borough Market produce Images: Helen Cathcart, Orlando Gili, John Holdship, Kim Lightbody, Kathy Slack,

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Oysters with Market garnishes Ed Smith

Spiced beetroot soup Kate Young

Where to buy In the Market or online

After a break through the summer months, native oyster season begins again in September—a seasonal change that’s easy to celebrate at Borough Market, thanks to Richard Haward’s Oysters, Shellseekers Fish & Game, and Furness Fish Markets.

These three simple garnishes utilise striking condiments from around the Market (and will work just as well with rock oysters). Each garnish recipe makes enough for a dozen oysters.

This soup is gloriously beautiful to look at—a rich purée in a bright purple-pink that would work just as well as a lipstick as it does in soup form. Find some rye bread to dip into it and serve in generous portions in deep bowls.

Native oysters Richard Haward’s Oysters Raspberry vinegar Fitz Fine Foods Aged balsamic vinegar Bianca Mora Scotch bonnet sauce Pimento Hill Crème fraîche Neal’s Yard Dairy Harissa Borough Olives Feta Borough Cheese Company Pig’s trotter Ginger Pig Streaky bacon Northfield Farm Comté The French Comté Thai green curry powder Spice Mountain Monkfish Furness Fish Markets Venison shoulder Shellseekers Fish & Game Quail Wyndham House Poultry Whole milk Hook and Son Honey From Field and Flower Seasonal fruit and vegetables Chegworth Valley Elsey & Bent Paul Wheeler Fresh Supplies Ted’s Veg Turnips

Serves 4

Raspberry vinegar and shallot mignonette: — 3 tbsp sweet raspberry vinegar — 1 tbsp very finely diced shallot — 3-4 grinds of a black pepper mill Aged balsamic vinaigrette: — 1 tbsp aged balsamic vinegar — 3 tbsp peppery extra virgin olive oil — ½ tsp flaky sea salt — 4 chives, finely chopped (optional) Hot sauce: — Scotch bonnet hot pepper sauce — For the raspberry vinegar and shallot mignonette, combine the ingredients in a small bowl. Add 1 tsp mignonette onto each oyster.

— For the aged balsamic vinaigrette, combine the balsamic, olive oil and sea salt in a small bowl. Stir vigorously to emulsify the liquids.

Add 1 tsp vinaigrette onto each oyster, and garnish with the chopped chives.

— The hot sauce method could not be simpler!

Simply add 2-3 drops of hot pepper sauce per oyster.

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Serves 6

— 2 large carrots — 2 waxy potatoes — 5 beetroot — 2 medium brown onions — A thumb-sized piece of ginger — 1 tbsp groundnut oil — 1 tsp mustard seeds — Crème fraîche or sour cream, to serve — Dill fronds, to serve — Scrub the carrots, potatoes and beetroot.

Peel the onions and ginger. Dice the vegetables into roughly even pieces.

Warm the oil in a saucepan and tip in the vegetables. Add the mustard seeds and season with salt and black pepper. Cook for 5 mins.

— Add 600ml water and bring to the boil.

Reduce to a simmer and cook for 40 mins, until the vegetables are soft. Remove from the heat, allow to cool a little, then blitz to a smooth purée in a blender or with a stab mixer.

— Warm through (or chill completely—it works cold too) and serve with crème fraîche and dill.

Spiced tbc beetroot soup

Grilled corn in harissa mayo

19 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Grilled corn in harissa mayo Sabrina Ghayour

Girolles, chanterelles, brambles and egg James Lowe

This is a classic combination. You’ll be able to find a wide variety of wild mushrooms at this time of year—chicken of the woods, ceps, hen of the woods and beefsteak mushrooms—but what’s special about these to me is that girolles and chanterelles are the main Scottish mushrooms we source at the restaurant. Their flavours are a mix of the woods, earth and trees, with the richness and comfort in this dish coming from the yolk and the broth. This recipe makes far more broth than you need, but you can never have enough stock in the fridge, and it’s easier and more useful to make a larger amount.

Makes 4

For the harissa mayo: — 3 tbsp mayonnaise — 1 tbsp harissa — Zest of 1 lime, finely grated — A squeeze of lime juice — 4 corn on the cobs — 200g feta cheese, very finely crumbled — 1 tsp chilli flakes — A handful of fresh coriander, finely chopped — 6-8 large mint leaves, roughly chopped — Combine the ingredients for the harissa mayo in a bowl, stir well and set aside.

— Cook the corn in boiling water for 10 mins.

Meanwhile, heat a griddle pan over a medium-high heat. When the cooking time has elapsed, drain the corn and pat it dry with kitchen paper. Place the corn cobs on the hot griddle pan and immediately increase the heat to high. Cook for 6–8 mins, turning occasionally, until char marks appear and the corn is blistering in parts.

— Spread the feta crumbs on a plate. Divide the mayo into 4 portions and spread 1 portion all over each cob. Roll the coated cobs in the feta. Sprinkle over the chilli flakes, fresh coriander and mint. Serve immediately.

Serves 6

— 8 onions — 3kg chicken wings — 50g dried mushrooms — 30g konbu (dried seaweed) — 6 eggs — 300g cider vinegar — 200g demerara sugar — 100g wild blackberries — 1 bunch of tarragon, leaves picked — 360g girolles (plus a few extra in case of wastage) — 240g chanterelles (plus a few extra in case of wastage) — 50g butter — To make the chicken broth, chop 4 of the onions into 8 wedges and put on an oven tray.

Place half the chicken wings on a separate tray and put both in the oven at 170C. — Keep checking the onions, moving them around and flipping them to stop them burning. After 1 hour, turn the wings and continue cooking for 30 mins—if you’ve a fan assisted oven, they may cook quicker.

You want the wings to have rendered their fat and released all their liquid—ideally you are looking for the colour of the most perfect roast chicken you can imagine. The onions are ready when they too have coloured all over and softened completely.

— Put the roast onions and chicken wings into a pan or tray, cover with filtered water and bring to a simmer. Cover, then place in an oven for 8 hours (or overnight) at 90C. Leave to cool, pass off the liquid and discard the wings (or use them for a pie mix!)

— Now roast the other half of the wings and the onions in exactly the same way. This time, instead of covering them with water after they’ve cooked, cover them with the chicken stock you made the first time. Bring to simmer and cook for 8 hours, again at 90C. In the morning, add the dried mushrooms and konbu and leave to stand for 1 hour.

Pass off the broth and chill.

— Cook the eggs at 63C in a water bath for 1 hour. This can be done ahead of time if you chill down the egg after cooking.

— Bring the vinegar and sugar to the boil, drop in the berries and leave to cool.

— Now prepare the mushrooms. Remove any

20 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

soil and leaves by either rubbing with a damp cloth or cutting away. Scrape the stems of the girolles with a small paring knife.

— Use a pan that will fit the girolles snugly in one layer. Put the girolles in the pan with 50g butter and some salt, place on a high heat and cover with a lid.

— After 2 mins you will notice that the mushrooms have released liquid through cooking. Turn the heat down, stir, test the seasoning, and add the chanterelles. Cook the mushrooms together for 10 secs, then take off the heat. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper if necessary.

The mushrooms should have a glossy liquid surrounding them all.

— To serve, reheat the eggs if cooked in advance and heat up 600ml of the broth.

Crack the eggs, remove the whites, then carefully place a yolk into the centre of each bowl. Place the mushrooms around, drop in 4 or 5 berries, add some tarragon leaves, then pour the broth in carefully.

Girolles, chanterelles, brambles and egg

21 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Chilli cornbread with tomato salsa Kathy Slack

Autumn beets and squash salad with hedgerow dressing Rosie Birkett

This recipe is a real celebration of the glorious bounties of autumn. It has a few different stages to it, but you can prepare almost everything while the beetroots are roasting, so read the recipe through first and then get going. It’s certainly worth giving the elderberry vinegar a go, but if you don’t have time just use a fruity red wine vinegar mixed with 1 tsp caster sugar and the berries.

Elderberries grow wild from summer to autumn and it’s worth stockpiling them in your freezer to add to vinegars and sauces.

They work especially well cooked into gravy!

Serves 8 (as a side or snack)

— Olive oil, for greasing — 15g butter — 8 spring onions, chopped — 200g sweetcorn kernels — 325g quick cook polenta — 250ml full fat milk — 4 eggs, beaten — 100g plain flour — 1 tsp baking powder — 175g cheddar cheese, grated, plus extra for topping — 1 green chilli, finely chopped — ¼ tsp chipotle chilli flakes For the salsa: — 500g tomatoes, a mix of varieties if possible — 1 tsp finely chopped green chilli — ½ tsp finely chopped red chilli — ½ red onion, finely chopped — 3 tbsp finely chopped coriander — 1 garlic clove, crushed — 1 tbsp olive oil — ½ lime, juiced — A dash of Tabasco — Heat the oven to 200C. Grease a 22cm cake tin or skillet with olive oil and line the base with a circle of greaseproof paper.

— Melt the butter in a frying pan over a medium heat. Once the butter is foaming, add the spring onions and sweat them in the butter for 2 mins. Add the sweetcorn and a pinch of salt and cook for another 2 mins. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool.

— In a large bowl, mix together the polenta, milk, eggs, flour and baking powder. Add the grated cheese, green chilli, chilli flakes, the onion and sweetcorn mixture, a big pinch of salt and stir again.

— Spoon the mix into the tin and bake for 20 mins. Sprinkle a handful more grated cheese on top, then return to the oven for another 10 mins or until the bread is spongy to touch.

— While the cornbread bakes, make the salsa.

De-seed and chop the tomatoes. Tip them into a bowl then mix in the other ingredients and a pinch of salt. Leave for a few mins to allow the flavours to mingle, then check the seasoning and serve.

22 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Serves 2

— 100g puy lentils, rinsed — 4 large beetroots, skin on and cleaned— I like to use a mix of purple, golden and candy stripe — 4 thyme sprigs, leaves picked — E xtra virgin rapeseed oil — ½ large butternut or kabocha squash, peeled, seeds removed and sliced into wedges — 1 tbsp pumpkin seeds — 1 fresh bay leaf — 100g purple, red or mixed kale — 2 sprigs of tarragon, leaves picked — 2 sprigs of flat leaf parsley, leaves picked — 50g fresh goat’s cheese, torn into chunks — 1 handful of blackberries — 1 clove of garlic, finely grated — 30g fresh or frozen elderberries (optional) For the elderberry vinegar — 150g red wine vinegar — 150ml water — 80g golden caster sugar — 1 fresh bay leaf — 1 tsp salt — 150g ripe elderberries, picked from their umbels with a fork — First make the elderberry vinegar. I like to do this a week in advance and keep it in the fridge to infuse, but it also works if you make it just a couple of hours ahead.

Combine the red wine vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and bay in a non-reactive pan and bring to a gentle boil. Once the sugar has dissolved, turn down to a simmer and add the elderberries, pressing about half of them with the back of a wooden spoon to burst them, and stirring, cooking for 3-4 mins. Remove from the heat and strain through a fine mesh sieve, discarding the pips and skins and reserving any of the whole elderberries to add back in. Pour into a small pan and heat gently. Add in the blackberries, grated garlic and extra elderberries and simmer for 3 mins, stirring. Remove from the heat.

— Preheat the oven to 180C. Soak the rinsed lentils in cold water for 30 mins.

Meanwhile toss three of the beetroots in some rapeseed oil with salt, pepper and half the thyme leaves. Wrap each beet individually in tin foil, leaving a little space

for air to circulate, then place in a roasting tray. Roast for 1 hour, or until tender when you poke a skewer into them. Remove from the oven and allow to cool. Use some kitchen towel to remove the skins—they should peel away easily—then slice into wedges.

— In another roasting tray, toss the butternut squash with some salt, pepper, the remaining thyme and some more rapeseed oil. After the beetroots have roasted for 20 mins, put the squash into the oven for 30 mins, then scatter with the pumpkin seeds and pop back in the oven for 10 mins more, during which time the seeds will puff up and go crispy. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

— Drain the lentils then place in a pan with double the volume of water, a bay leaf and a large pinch of salt. Cook for about 30 mins, until tender. Drain, rinse and toss with a little rapeseed oil and 1 tbsp elderberry vinegar.

— Peel the remaining beetroot and slice very finely into ice cold water. Put the kale into a bowl, pour over ½ tbsp rapeseed oil, then season. Massage the oil into the kale until the leaves darken and become more floppy.

— Now assemble your salad. Lay some raw and roasted beetroot on the plates along with the squash and crispy pumpkin seeds. Toss the kale with the lentils, herbs and some more of the vinegar and top with the beets and squash. Divide the goat’s cheese between the plates and dress with the blackberries, pumpkin seeds and a little vinegar.

Autumn beets and squash salad with hedgerow dressing

Chilli cornbread with tomato salsa

23 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

tbc

Rabbit and pig’s trotter terrine with whole grain mustard and parsley

24 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Rabbit and pig’s trotter terrine with whole grain mustard and parsley Gill Meller

Squash, mushroom and sage tart Rosie Birkett

Wild rabbit is delicious, sustainable, economical, easy to cook and, in my view, at its best in autumn. Most good butchers will sell rabbit; they should happily joint it for you as well. It’s far more interesting than chicken and just as versatile.

This dish is a harbinger of autumn and the generous, comforting, though sometimes underestimated larder that it brings. While there’s a certain melancholy about the end of summer, the shift in the seasons brings with it culinary offerings of ample consolation for the home cook.

From the thrilling appearance of nutty, earthy wild mushrooms and bulbous gourds, to the lure of knobbly Jerusalem artichokes and the first sweet, orchardscented mouthful of roasted quince, this is one of the most exciting times to be in the kitchen, and the ingredients on offer beg for the attention that soporific summer days don’t encourage.

This tart is the sort of dish that will fug up the kitchen windows and fill the house with the smell of good cooking. It brings together three good pals: mushrooms, squash and sage—the savoury, sweet and aromatic, all of which sit happily together in a golden walnut pastry with the creamy tang of comte for company. You could add bacon, if you’re that way inclined, but otherwise this is a meat-free meal that will sate and delight.

Makes 1 terrine

— 1 wild rabbit, jointed — 1 organic or free-range pig’s trotter, split in half and rinsed — 150g streaky bacon, cut into lardons — 1 onion, quartered — 2 sticks of celery, halved — 2 large carrots, peeled — 4-5 sprigs of thyme — 2 bay leaves — 1 large glass of dry white wine — 1 small bunch of parsley, leaves picked and chopped — Heat the oven to 180C. Set a large, heavybased pan over a medium heat. Add a dash of oil, followed by the rabbit, trotter and bacon.

Allow the meat to brown lightly in the pan.

Add the vegetables, thyme, bay, wine and enough water just to cover. Place a lid on the pan, pop into the oven and cook for 2-2½ hours. Remove the rabbit, pig’s trotter, bacon and carrots from the pan and leave on a plate to cool. Pass the cooking liquor through a fine sieve into a clean pan, set the pan over a high heat, bring to the boil, then allow the liquid to reduce to a scant 300ml.

— Pick the cooled rabbit meat off the bone and shred it with your fingers into a bowl. Pick the skin and any meat from the trotter and place on a board with the bacon and carrots, roughly chop it all, then add it to the rabbit along with the chopped parsley, reduced cooking liquid and plenty of salt and pepper to taste. Pack the mixture into a terrine dish and even it out, levelling it off as you go.

Place the terrine in the fridge to set overnight.

— To serve, remove the terrine from the fridge about 20 mins before you intend to eat.

Turn it out carefully and slice the terrine thickly. Serve with pickled cucumbers, toast and mustard.

Alternative There’s no reason why you couldn’t try making this terrine with pheasant instead

25 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Serves 4

For the pastry: — 50g skin-on walnuts — 150g plain flour — A pinch of salt — 120g cold butter, chopped — 1 egg yolk — 1-3 tbsp iced water For the filling: — 350g butternut or acorn squash, peeled and sliced into half moons — 250ml double cream — 3 eggs — A pinch of chilli flakes — Nutmeg — A small bunch of fresh sage — 100g comté or other hard cheese, grated — 200g mushrooms (ideally wild), sliced — Heat the oven to 200C. To make the pastry, put the walnuts in the bowl of a food processor and blitz to breadcrumb consistency. Add in the flour and salt and pulse briefly to combine. Tip in the butter and pulse until you have a crumb, then add in the egg yolk and pulse again. Now, 1 tbsp at a time, add the iced water, pulsing until the dough just comes together. Tip it out into a large bowl and squidge it into a smooth ball, adding a little more water or flour if required.

— Flatten to a disc, wrap in greaseproof paper and chill for 30 mins. While it’s chilling, toss the squash with olive oil, salt and pepper and roast for 12 mins, until softened and colouring. Remove from the oven and set aside.

— Roll the pastry out to £1 coin thickness and line a 23cm tart tin. Chill again in the fridge until hard, then turn the oven down to 180C. Line the pastry with baking paper, fill with

baking beans and blind bake for 15 mins.

Remove from the oven, lift out the beans and paper, then bake uncovered for a further 12 mins, until crispy and golden.

— In a bowl or jug, whisk together the cream and eggs and season with salt, pepper, a pinch of chilli flakes and a good grinding of fresh nutmeg. Roughly chop half the sage leaves and stir these through with the cheese.

— Heat a knob of butter and dash of olive oil in a frying pan over a medium to high heat and fry four of the remaining sage leaves for 1 min to infuse the oil, then fry the mushrooms with some salt and pepper until coloured and giving up their moisture— about 5 mins.

— Now, get your pastry case and pour enough of the custard into it to cover the base entirely, then layer up the squash with the mushrooms, pouring a little custard between each layer. Top with the rest of the custard.

Fry off the few remaining sage leaves in a bit more butter and pour this over the top of the tart. Bake for 25-30 mins, until deeply golden and just-set. Allow to settle for 20-30 mins then slice and devour.

Rouille on toast and fish stew Angela Clutton

Curried monkfish and clams Ed Smith

Rouille is a rustically delicious version of mayonnaise, with added bread to give a thicker texture and cayenne for a bit of extra pep. Just the thing to serve spread on toast with a simple fish stew.

As the nights get longer and temperatures drop, warming meals appeal. It’s still nice to keep things light, though, and this curried monkfish does just that, through its fragrantly-spiced coconut milk and clam juice broth. Spice Mountain has a wide range of really interesting pre-mixed curry blends, inspired by the flavours of Sri Lanka, Kerala, Mauritius and more. I’ve suggested using the Thai green curry blend in the recipe below, but any blend based on a coastal region would work well.

Serves 4

For the rouille: — ½ slice of bread, crusts removed — 2 tbsp hot fish stock or water — 1 garlic clove — A pinch of saffron — 2 egg yolks — ½ tsp cayenne pepper — 2 tsp red wine vinegar — 1 tsp Dijon mustard — 100ml extra virgin olive oil For the fish stew: — 2 onions — 2 fennel bulbs — Oil or butter, to sauté — 2 garlic gloves, crushed — 150ml fish stock — 100ml white wine — 1 tin of chopped tomatoes — 4 fish fillets of your choice — 4 king prawns — Chopped parsley, to garnish — Soak the bread in the hot stock or water.

While that is soaking, peel the garlic clove and crush in a pestle and mortar with a good pinch of salt until it becomes a paste. Add the soaked bread and saffron, and pound again to a paste. Transfer to a mixing bowl and whisk in the egg yolks, cayenne, vinegar and mustard. Then slowly whisk in the oil, adding it bit by bit. Taste for seasoning.

— To serve with a simple fish stew: slice the onions and fennel bulbs. Heat the oil or butter in a large sauté pan, and gently cook the vegetables for 15 mins. Add the garlic and cook for 5 mins. Pour in the fish stock, white wine, and chopped tomatoes. Simmer for 5 mins. Cut the fish fillets into chunks and slide into the pan. Cook for 5 mins, until opaque. Finish with the king prawns fried in oil, chopped parsley, and the rouille thickly spread on toast.

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Serves 4

— 250g palourde clams — 200g rainbow chard — 240g basmati or jasmine rice — A thumb-sized piece of ginger, cut to matchsticks — 1 large banana shallot, finely sliced — 2 cloves of garlic, finely sliced — 2 tsp Thai green curry powder — 200ml coconut milk — 2 tsp golden caster sugar — 450-500g monkfish fillet — 1 lime — Purge the clams by placing them in a bowl and covering with cold water. Leave for 5 mins, drain the gritty cloudy water away and repeat until clear. Discard any clams that remain open if tapped.

— Cut the stems off the chard at the point those stems meet the leaves. Cut the stems into 2cm lengths, and halve any leaves that are bigger than your hand.

— Rinse the rice, then place in a saucepan of rapidly boiling salted water. Cook for 2 mins fewer than the packet instructions, drain and leave to steam.

— Once the rice is on, start cooking the monkfish. Place a heavy-bottomed sauté pan (for which you have a lid) on a medium heat. Add 1 tbsp sunflower oil, then the ginger, shallot and a pinch of salt. Sweat and soften over a low-medium heat for 4-5 mins, stirring occasionally. Add the garlic and cook for 1 min more, before measuring the spice powder into the pan and cooking for 1 min, stirring continuously. Pour in the coconut milk, fill the tin with water, then pour that into the pan. Add the sugar and simmer for 5 mins.

— Cut the monkfish into four equally weighted portions (probably around 4cm deep). Add the clams to the broth and place the lid on top of the pan. After 2 mins, add the monkfish pieces to the bubbling broth, return the lid and simmer for 2-3 mins more, shuffling the pan once or twice, until the clams are all open and the monkfish has turned from translucent to pearlescent white. Remove the pan from the heat, squeeze in the juice of half the lime and cut the other half into quarters.

— While the monkfish and clams are cooking, place another large frying pan or sauté pan over a medium-high heat with a knob of butter or 1 tbsp coconut oil or light olive oil.

When warm, add the chard stems, fry for 2 mins, then add the chard leaves and stir occasionally until wilted—this should take around 4 mins.

— To serve, pile a ladle of rice into the middle of each bowl or plate. Lay chard leaves and stems over the rice. Add the monkfish portions and ladle the clams and curried sauce on top and around, with a wedge of lime on the side.

Squash, mushroom and sage tart

Curried monkfish and clams

Rouille on toast & fish stew

Pork and plum meatballs with cauliflower puree and roasted greens

27 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Pork and plum meatballs with cauliflower puree and roasted greens Ed Smith

Deer and hedgehog pie Gill Meller

Don’t worry; I haven’t put real hedgehogs in this venison pie. Hedgehogs (also known as pied-de-mouton) are delicious wild mushrooms that are in season right now.

Serves 4

For the meatballs: — 60g soft white breadcrumbs — 70ml whole milk — 100-150g plums, halved and de-stoned — 600g minced pork — 1 medium egg — ¼ nutmeg, freshly grated — 12 sprigs of thyme, leaves picked — ½ tsp flaky sea salt For the cauliflower sides: — 1 medium cauliflower, including leaves — 1 clove of garlic, peeled — 600g whole milk — 30g butter For the sauce: — 1 banana shallot, finely diced — 1 clove of garlic, minced — 250ml chicken or vegetable stock — 300ml full fat creme fraiche — 6 sprigs of tarragon, leaves picked and chopped — Put the breadcrumbs in a bowl and add the milk. Stir and leave to soak.

— Mince the plums by finely chopping. In a mixing bowl, use your hands to combine all of the meatball ingredients.

— Wet your hands and roll the meatball mixture into 60g spheres (slightly larger than golf balls).

Arrange the meatballs on a baking sheet, then chill for at least an hour.

— Make the cauliflower puree, which can be reheated on a low heat just before serving.

Trim the green leaves and set aside. Cut the florets and stem into 2cm wedges, then place in a saucepan with the garlic and milk. Simmer over a medium heat for 15-20 mins, until soft.

Scoop into a blender, add a good pinch of salt and pepper, the butter and three quarters of the warm milk. Blend until smooth and silky—it should be quite light and loose, but not soupy.

— Wash the greens and cut the thick stems in half lengthways. Place on a roasting tray, toss in olive oil and season with sea salt and black pepper.

— When ready to eat, heat the oven to 200C. Bake the meatballs for 10 mins. Put the cauliflower leaves in the oven at the same time.

— Meanwhile, find a saucepan or sauté pan large enough to hold the meatballs in one layer.

Place over a low-medium heat and briefly warm 1 tbsp light olive oil. Add the shallot and a pinch of salt. Soften for 3 mins without browning, stirring occasionally. Add the garlic and cook for 1 min more. Increase the heat, wait for 10 seconds, then pour in the stock.

Reduce by a quarter, then stir in the creme fraiche and turn down to a very gentle simmer.

Add the meatballs and tarragon and simmer for 10 mins more.

— Reheat the puree and keep an eye on the cauliflower greens—they should soften and brown a little, but not dry out. If your cauliflower lacked plentiful layers of green, serve with blanched or wilted curly kale.

28 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Serves 4

For the rough puff pastry: — 175g unsalted butter, chilled and cut into small cubes — 350g plain flour — A good pinch of salt — Iced water — 1 egg, beaten (for the egg wash) — 2 tbsp dripping (or olive oil) — 600-700g venison shoulder, in large cubes — 1 knob of butter — 200g hedgehog mushrooms — 1 large or 2 smaller onions, peeled and sliced — 4 cloves of garlic — 4 bay leaves — 2 sprigs of rosemary — 4 sprigs of thyme — 2 tbsp flour — 500ml light ale (nothing too bitter) — To make the pastry, combine the butter with the flour and salt, then add just enough water to bring it together into a fairly firm dough.

Form into a rectangular shape with your hands and, on a well-floured surface, roll out in one direction to make a rectangle about 1cm thick.

Fold the two short ends into the middle so they overlap. Give the pastry a quarter turn and repeat the rolling-and-folding process five more times. Wrap the pastry in cling film, then rest it in the fridge for 30 mins to an hour.

— Season the meat with plenty of salt and pepper.

Set a large casserole pan over a high heat. Add half the dripping and when hot add the cubed venison (you might need to do this in batches).

Avoid shaking the pan too much—you want the meat to caramelise on the outside, so let it sizzle for several minutes before turning. When lovely and golden, lift the meat from the pan to a plate.

— Turn the heat down and add the remaining dripping, followed by the onions, mushrooms, garlic, bay, rosemary and thyme, and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring regularly for 10-12 mins, until the onions are soft and the mushrooms have given up their juices—don’t let anything burn. Return the meat to the pan, turn the heat down, scatter over the flour and stir it in well. Cook for 2-3 minus, then pour over the ale, stir well and bring to a simmer.

Top up with water to just cover the meat. Cook with the lid ajar in a 175C oven for 2-2½ hours.

— Remove the casserole from the oven. The meat should be nice and tender and the sauce should be rich, but might need seasoning.

Stir the pie filling gently then let it cool.

— Turn the oven up to 190C. Cut the pastry in two, about two-thirds and one-third. Roll out the larger piece and line a lightly greased pie dish (about 1.2 litres). Don’t worry if you have some over-hang, this gets trimmed off. Roll out the smaller piece of pastry to form a lid.

Spoon in the venison and all the lovely juices,

but you might want to whip the bay leaves and herb stalks out now, if you can find them.

— Brush the edges of the pastry base with beaten egg, lay on the lid and crimp together the edges, then trim away the excess pastry.

Brush with more egg, and cut a little vent in the centre of the pie. Bake for 45-50 mins, until golden brown. Leave to settle for around 15 mins before serving.

Deer and hedgehog pie

29 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Quail with apple, red cabbage & fennel slaw Kathy Slack

Venison loin, hedgerow sauce and wild mushrooms on celeriac puree Rosie Birkett

Rich, buttery quail with sweet and sour crunchy slaw.

Autumnal ingredients offer a fullness of flavour that beautifully echoes the maturity of the year, and early autumn rivals spring as my favourite time of year for cooking, thanks to a glut of rather special ingredients that come to market. As the leaves start to turn, elderberries hang heavy from their purple stems and bring their nostalgic winey scent to the canal path where I walk the dog. Rainy spells after the heat of high summer bring with them the mysterious, thrilling promise of wild mushrooms pushing up their caps beneath the trees on Walthamstow Marshes, but there’s so much competition between local foragers and flies that I’ll often turn to Turnips for immaculate punnets of golden chanterelles and chunky ceps. At the same time, game starts appearing on the butchers’ stalls: little birds redolent of heather that need careful roasting, and venison, with its ruby red flesh, begging to be seared. Celeriac is one of my absolute favourites, and is still so underrated. I take every opportunity to cook it when it’s in season—its pearly flesh the perfect foil for the the richness of game and forest fruits.

Serves 2

— 2 quails — 20g butter, softened — 1 small eating apple — ¼ red cabbage — ½ fennel bulb — 2 spring onions — 1 tbsp plain yoghurt — 1 tbsp good quality mayonnaise — ½ lemon, juiced — 3 tbsp parsley, chopped — Pre-heat the oven to 220C. Spatchcock the quails by cutting out the back bone and pressing the birds flat to squash the breast bone. Spread the skin with the butter and season well. Roast for 15 mins or until the juices run clear and the skin is crisp and golden, then leave to rest in the pan for 10 mins while you get on with the slaw.

— Very finely slice the apples, cabbage, fennel and spring onions. A mandolin is best for this, but do take care as they are pretty lethal.

— In a large bowl, mix the yoghurt, mayonnaise, lemon juice and a pinch of salt. Add the veg and the parsley to the bowl and toss everything together. Check the seasoning and add more salt or lemon as necessary.

— Pile the slaw onto 2 plates and top with a quail each, spooning the buttery juices from the pan over the top to finish.

Serves 2

— 1 celeriac, peeled and chopped — Butter — Fresh horseradish root — 1 large head of ripe elderberries — 3 sprigs of thyme, leaves picked — 1 bay leaf — Olive oil — 1 shallot, finely chopped — 50ml madeira — 150ml beef or game stock — 500g venison loin — Rapeseed oil or another high smoke-point neutral oil such as sunflower — 200g wild mushrooms, cleaned — 1 clove of garlic, finely chopped — Handful of parsley leaves, chopped — Handful of blackberries, washed — Heat the oven to 200C. To make the celeriac puree, put the celeriac into a pan and just cover with water. Add 1 tsp salt and bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 12-15 mins, until the celeriac is fork tender. Drain any excess water then place in a blender with a large knob of butter.

Season with salt and pepper and some grated horseradish and blitz until creamy. Transfer to a bowl, cover with foil to keep warm.

— Using a fork, gently pull the elderberries off their fine stalks into a bowl. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil and a good knob of butter over a medium heat and add the bay and thyme, followed by the chopped shallot and a pinch of salt. Cook, stirring, for a few minutes until the shallot is translucent, then add the elderberries and cook for a few more minutes, until the berries are starting to break down. Add the madeira and cook off for 2 mins, then add the beef stock and stir. Reduce a little more while you cook the venison, then remove from the heat.

30 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

— Season the venison with sea salt on both sides. Heat a little rapeseed oil in a heavybottomed skillet or frying pan until stinking hot, then add the venison and cook for 2-3 mins, until a caramelised crust has formed on the underside. Flip it over and cook for another 2 mins, then seal any edges that haven’t had contact with the pan. Place on a baking sheet and put in the oven for 3-5 mins, depending on how rare you like it. Rest for at least 5 mins, while you cook the mushrooms.

— Fry the mushrooms in some butter and olive oil with the chopped garlic (being careful not to burn the garlic) and a pinch of salt and pepper until they are coloured and have lost their moisture—about 5 mins. Stir through the chopped parsley, set aside and keep warm in the oven.

— Return the elderberry sauce to a low heat and add a knob of butter. Cook until it’s melted into the sauce then add the blackberries and stir. Taste for seasoning.

— Slice the venison loin into thin slices against the grain. Spoon some celeriac puree onto warm plates and use the back of a spoon to smooth it out. Lay the venison on top and spoon over some of the sauce. Serve with the wild mushrooms.

Quail with apple, red cabbage & fennel slaw

Venison loin, hedgerow sauce and wild mushrooms on celeriac puree

31 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Roast pumpkin pie Beca Lyne-Pirkis

Plum & yoghurt fool James Lowe

I love to experiment with the many types of plums we have in this country. There is no such thing as a ‘standard’ plum—they are all so different, they react differently to cooking or baking and have wonderful variations in acidity and sugar. The important thing is to always taste everything you are cooking and think about what the dish will be like overall. If the fruit is overly sweet, remove sugar elsewhere. If it is slightly sharp, then increase the dairy or the sugar in another part of the recipe.

Serves 8

For the pie crust: — 200g plain flour — ½ tsp salt — 115g cold unsalted butter, cubed — 25g ground pecans — 4-5 tbsp cold water For the pumpkin filling: — 400g roasted pumpkin — 350ml whole milk — 170g caster sugar — ½ tsp salt — 1 tsp cinnamon — ½ tsp ground ginger — ¼ tsp ground cloves — 2 large eggs — Place the flour, salt, ground pecans and butter into a bowl and rub together until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add the water gradually until the dough starts to come together. Tip the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, knead a little until smooth. Dust the work surface again and roll out the pastry to the size of your pie plate, around 20-23cm.

— Grease your pie plate and place the pastry into the plate, making sure it fits snuggly.

Trim some of the pastry from the edge, leaving an over-hang of around 1.5cm.

Tuck the over-hang pastry underneath itself and then using your fingers, crimp the edge all the way around. Pop into the fridge to chill and rest whilst you make the filling.

— To make the filling, firstly you need to roast the pumpkin. I used two small pumpkins/ squashes weighing around 600-700g each.

Cut them in half and scoop out the seeds and fibres, then cut into 2.5cm wedges. Place on a baking tray with a drizzle of rapeseed oil and a pinch of salt and roast in a preheated oven at 200C for around 25 mins.

— Leave the pumpkin to cool a little so that it’s easier to handle, then scoop out the flesh into a bowl. You’ll need 400g of the flesh. Mash the pumpkin with a fork—I like to keep some texture in the puree, so don’t pop it in the food processor.

— Heat the milk until it nearly reaches boiling then take it off the heat. Beat the eggs, sugar, salt and spices into the pumpkin puree then add in the milk to make a custard. Remove the pie crust from the fridge and carefully pour the pumpkin custard into your pastry lined tin.

— Bake in a preheated oven at 220C for 15 mins. After this time, reduce the temperature to 180C for 40-50 mins, or until a knife inserted near the centre comes out clean. Cool on rack for 2 hours.

Serve immediately or refrigerate. Serve with slightly sweetened whipped cream.

32 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

Serves 12

For the oat biscuit: — 300g butter — 270g demerara sugar — 200g oats — 10g salt — 10g bicarbonate of soda — 200g plain flour For the yoghurt mousse: — 250g cream — 2 sheets bronze gelatine — 110g whole milk — 40g sugar — 500g yoghurt — 20 plums — 100g honey — Halve and dehydrate 8 plums overnight at 55C. — To make the oat biscuit, use an electric mixer to beat the butter and sugar until just mixed—do not cream. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix until just combined.

— Roll out as thin as possible between two sheets of baking paper. Bake for 4 mins at 180C (still with baking paper) on a heavy baking tray, weighed down with another baking tray.

— For the yoghurt mousse, whip the cream to stiff peaks then bloom the gelatine in cold water. Warm the milk and dissolve the sugar and the gelatine in this.

— When the milk is cool, mix with the yoghurt, then refrigerate. When the mix is cold, carefully whisk in the cream until there are no lumps.

— Cut the rest of the plums in half, remove the stones and sprinkle with sugar. Bake in a 100C oven until the flesh is yielding and the flavour of the plum has deepened.

— To serve, chop the dehydrated plums. Take 4 large spoons of the mousse and spread flat in a mixing bowl. Drizzle with honey and sprinkle with dehydrated plums. Fold together gently—you want a kind of ripple.

— Add 2 halves of the baked plums to each bowl, spoon over the mousse mix as well as some of the cooking juices from the plums.

Cover with a big slice of the biscuit.

Roast pumpkin pie

Plum & yoghurt fool

33 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk

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34 Market Life Autumn Edition / boroughmarket.org.uk