comes from the labouring classes pre-supermarket days...
when your store of food was becoming exhausted, one had, as one says, to become both frugal and creative...
but there are a lot of people nowadays who rely on the supermarket only...
in the UK... for the majority of people from all classes...
they have no idea how to keep a home produced larder...
the skills are neither taught nor handed down.
It is really a shame.
It has become a WI and upper-middle-class hobby...
but here in France... and in the US...
you can get everything you need for bottling...
[canning in States-speak]...
from the local hardware stores.
Even some of our older fellow allotmenteers...
who had lived through the war as teen-agers...
the idea of over-wintering crops was not even considered...
most left bare sandy soil for the winter, which leached out any nutrients...
or just had a few rows of over-wintering broad beans and onions...
crops that won't come good for a couple of months yet.
Those of us who grew cabbage, kales and chard...
and had winter root crops...
were looked upon with both surprise and amusement...
I often wonder what would happen if supermarkets suddenly vanished!?
I learnt the majority of what I know from my maternal grandmother...
my grandfather had left well before the war...
and she had to bring up three kids on her own...
with very little money!
She...
and my mother...
were wonders at both keeping a harvest safe and at frugal cooking.
As for tasty "Hungry Gap" greens, we will be growing Ken's Collard Greens every year from now onward...
very sweet flavoured...
 |
| Collard Greens... just beginning to sprout. |
similar to Red Russian Kale...
also growing well at the moment.
 |
| Red Russian Kale |
We often sow Chinese Mustard Greens in late summer....
these give a pick of young leaves all winter.
Red Mustard for colour and "Green in Snow" for a more peppery flavour.
There are still Red Cabbage out in the potager...
wonderful cooked with apple, raisins and red wine.
All of these, and the Brussel Sprouts that were too small to pick...
give wonderful sprouts to steam...
or eat in winter salads towards the end of March.
If you cut the Summer cabbages rather than pulling, then cross-cut the stump that's left...
you should have some sweet "Spring" cabbage by now.
You cross-cut the stump immediately after you've cut the cabbage off, using the same knife...
we always try and leave a ring of the outer leaves.
That usually means four buds are left to sprout...
initially developing as small cabbages and then...
at around the same time as most plants are putting out shoots...
each mini cabbage [if you haven't already picked and eaten them] throws out a flower shoot from each axil.
These snap off and can be steamed...
a mix of different shoots give a variety of flavours... from peppery to sweet.
And, as they have been steamed... a selection of colour too.
Worry not if the flowers have broken open... the flowers are all edible.
The flower shoots of rocket can be added at this time, too.
This wonderful selection of sprouts are often referred to as "Poor Man's Asparagus".
 |
| Some sprouts from Black Tuscan Kale... very expensive in the shops as each leaf has to be hand picked!! |
Also maturing now will be the Purple and the White Sprouting Broccoli... wonderful stuff!
If the winter has been kind, or if you have kept it sheltered...
any of last summer's Tenderstem Broccoli may well give a second flush around now.
 |
| Broccoli sprouts |
If you don't like cabbage... there are carrots, parsnip and swede still in the ground...
 |
| Fresh parsnips and carrots... |
the chard [or blête] should be starting its spring flush too.
The potatoes, shallots and onions should still be in store...
but remember to check the spuds for sprouts...
they take too much energy from the spud...
and can change the flavour as starch is turned to sugar for growth...
and then there are the previous year's dried or frozen pulses, the stored pumpkins, the fresh leeks...
as well as rocket...
 |
| Rocket flowers.... excellent!! |
and wild sorrel or the larger garden variety...
as well as, still on the wild side, the young nettles that are now sprouting like fury...
they make an iron rich spinach substitute.
try this mixed with fresh goats cheese as a sandwich spread.
And don't forget hop shoots and bracken fronds, either...
And then again...
dig some Jerusalem Artichokes and make a soup with them, onions and créme fraiche...
a real warmer!
All can be used to "fill" the "Hungry Gap".
So, you see...
it is not difficult to bridge the gap...
and wonderful food can be eaten if you've chosen your crops carefully...
and take advantage of the cheaper cuts of meat that the butcher has on offer.
With sorrel, if you can pick enough of the older leaves, you can make a superb, lemony flavoured, green mash...
[used with a really good floury spud - Remarka or King Edward]...
called stoemp in Flemish...
very tasty, looks wonderful on the plate too...
lime green mash!
An Early Spring recipe.
This serves two...
Fry up or grill a couple of bacon chops, sweated gently to extract some of their fat, and put aside to keep warm.
Fry a sliced onion or a couple of shallots in the fat... when soft, keep warm... but leave in the pan!
Put a good portion of stoemp on two plates and make a well in the mash...
Place a chop beside the mash and put the heat back on under the onions and bacon fat...
add any fat that leached out of the chops while keeping them warm.
When spitting nicely, remove from the heat and pour the fat into the well in the piles of mash...
the onions can go on the mash as well.... or be put on top of the chops.
Serve with steamed shoots from bolting greens... and put a good knob of butter on them to melt down...
add salt and pepper to taste... these shoots are eaten like asparagus.
To drink...
not wine... but beer...
a glass of Chimay Blue...
or a Tripel Karmelite.
6 comments:
A fascinating post and one that reminds me of how we used to live when I was a child, before supermarkets and when all we had to eat was what was in the garden or in season in the village shop. Food tasted like real food then, too.
As you say, if the supermarkets closed nobody would have a clue how to eat, after all, many of the UK population don't really cook any more, it's become a hobby. Which is why the supermarkets can get away with so much - the horse meat fiasco to start with. Too many people don't care what's in their food so long as it's cheap and they can shove it in the microwave.
Your bacon chop recipe sounds delish !!
The bacon chop is super... we first had it in a little restaurant in Brugges called "In Der Wittenkop" [In The White Cap]... it had been recommended to us by the barman in the "Brugse Beertje" [The Little Brugges Bear] as a good place to eat... it was! The landlady specialised in cooking traditional Belgian farmhouse food. Pub is still there, called by the same name, but not long after our first visit, the couple sold the bar and moved elsewhere... shame!
Our orchard neighbour has 2ha of collard greens this year. I didn't know that's what they were, but they look exactly like your pic. I thought they were sprouting brocoli. Anyway, he told me to simply pour boiling water over them and serve with hollandaise or vinaigrette. I've been stir frying them. They are quite good -- and all the better for being very yound and fresh.
The boiling water idea sounds good... it seems, though, that Ken boils his to death... follow the link from the page above [Ken's Collard Greens] - the result looks like a stringy mush.
I am looking at our meadow [2ha] and thinking... what does he do with all those greens??
I've had Ken's collard greens. He loves them, but they go a very unappetising khaki colour and I thought were edible, but I would never choose to cook and eat them like that. I thought you had to cook them for a long time to break down the difficult to digest bits. I would never have touched our orchard neighbour's greens if I'd known that's what they were because I thought they were basically inedible. But young and fresh they are fine. There's a sort of Italian greens sauté that I do from time to time that would really suit them too. Our orchard neighbour sells his produce at the market, that's why 2ha -- his pricing system is weird, but I know he is organic, so I always buy something from him.
Tim, your collard greens don't really look like collard greens. Must be a different variety from mine (Georgia Southern, I think they are called). The leaves are much darker — less like cabbage and more like dark kale leaves, but not curly.
Collards are one of those foods like beets (or beetroot as you say) that some people love and others can't abide. More for me, I say.
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