My glut crop this week is peas, and they are only a glut crop because my kids are grown up. For years, all through pea season, a whole gang of kids would arrive after school and feast on peas straight from the vine. I still can’t think of any better way of dealing with a glut of peas than a gang of kids.
There’s actually only a small window of the year when rice paper rolls are the perfect thing. Avocados need to be in season, and coriander. You need macadamias and limes for the dipping sauce. Pickled radishes and turnips and ginger are wonderful in them. And it needs to be warm enough for that cool, clean, crispness to be just what you feel like.
There’s lots of leafies to harvest at the moment. I’ve got a bit of an addiction going for Rocket and Macadamia Pesto, (without chili this time of year). The rocket you can see on the left of the photo, just next to the spring onions, is just the right stage for pesto. I have another patch of younger rocket that I like better in salads – it’s that bit milder.…
This is a real Spring recipe. You need 24 very young and fresh and tender vine leaves.
There’s a little mind shift I’ve found helps in feeling at home cooking eastern Asian style. Most of the time with western dishes, I amble along, starting with what I have, multitasking, substituting, tasting and adjusting as I go, ducking out to the garden for some herbs or garnishes as I think of them, and getting plates out and ready while it cooks.
I had a post about crystallised ginger I wanted to write today. But then I was made party to a terrible crime, and I can’t…
My glut crop this week is ginger. It’s roots and perennials planting days this week, and I think it’s time to divide up and transplant the ginger. It still hasn’t sprouted but it is warming up very fast this year.