You must have all been busy doing your Christmas shopping this month, as there was only one entrant that complied with all the rules!

So, for the final time this year, I am pleased to announce that the winner of this month’s competition is …

Vicky’s “Lottie Sushi”

In Vicky’s own words, “This may seem unlikely, but I believe these sushi work well, and achieve the same balance of flavours sought by the Japanese. I’ve substituted nearly EVERY ingredient!

The only essential ‘exotic ingredients’ are soy sauce and pickled sushi ginger. Everything else is from the allotment, or Torbay supermarkets! (They’re not big on ‘World’ ingredients round ‘ere, unfortunately.)

Firstly, the ‘nori’ substitute – Cavolo Nero (henceforth known as ‘cavolo nori!’).

Ingredients

Cavolo ‘nori’ (a couple of dozen leaves)
Dill pickled cucumber – a few slices
1 small pickled beetroot
1 small parsnip
1 small carrot
0.25 pint cider vinegar
1 tbsp sugar
salt
200 g pudding rice
2 eggs
soy sauce
sesame oil
sesame seeds
You will need a rolling mat. (You may be able to work with a clingfilm and a tea towel, to support the rice as you roll, but I haven’t tried it.)

Method

Cut the central veins from the cavolo leaves. Salt the strips quite heavily, to try to emulate a seaweed flavour, and steam until tender. They need to be very tender – no ‘al dente’ here! Set aside to drain and cool.

Cook the rice. The ‘absorption method’ is very good: weigh 200 g of pudding, (or risotto or sushi rice but NOT long grain) into a bowl, add salt, then – still on the scales – top up with just under 500 g of water. Cover with a plate and microwave for 3 minutes. Give it a good stir and allow it to stand while you get on with the rest.

Cut all the vegetables into 2mm x 2mm sticks. You need to cook the parsnip and carrot sticks. Simmer them gently in the cider vinegar and 1 tbsp sugar until tender.

Check the rice. Give it a further vigorous stir to bring out the starch and make it good and sticky, and micowave for a further 2 or 3 minutes to finish absorbing all the water. Allow to cool.

Make a thin omelette by beating the egg with a dash of soy sauce and frying in a little sesame oil. Allow to cool, blot the surplus fat from the omelette with kitchen roll and trim it down to a square.

Now, all ingredients prepared, you’re ready to roll! You’ve got enough rice here to make three different sorts of sushi – the ‘nori’ rolled one, one wrapped in an omelette and one rolled in sesame.

Arrange the nori on the rolling mat to make a square sheet. Pat a third of the rice onto the bottom third of the nori. It’s important to get the rice even, and I use a teaspoon dipped in water to trowel it into shape!

Arrange the vegetable sticks along the rice, just slightly below centre. Roll up, firmly squeezing the rice as you go. Wrap in cling film and chill for several hours.

Make the other two rolls the same way. The sesame coated one doesn’t have a supporting sheet of nori or omelette for the rice, so you may like to lay it on cling film (without rolling it into the body of the sushi!). I tried assembling it straight onto the naked mat and it worked very well.

The real treat of this recipe is that you can make it well in advance, then cut it into neat sections just prior to serving. It should last a couple of days in the fridge.

Serve the sushi with soy sauce, pickled ginger and wasabi, if you’ve got it and you like it. They also go well with a chilli dipping sauce.”

Fantastic idea Vicky! Send me your address through the contact form, or by email, and I’ll get your prize of a sausage making kit from the lovely people at ‘Design A Sausage’ in the post. I can’t promise you’ll have it for Christmas though!

Vicky runs her blog “High And Tight In Brixham,” and is well worth a read.

Keep your eyes peeled as there will be another Cultivate, Cook & Click competition every month in 2012!

After a break ladies and gentlemen I am pleased to announce the return of the Cultivate, Cook & Click Competition!

So, here is a reminder of the rules …

Each month around this time, I will pick four or five vegetables or fruit that are in season, and you then have to devise a dish that uses at least one of those ingredients.

There are no restrictions on the style of cooking, so it can be a recipe plucked from anywhere in the world, but it has to be one that you have cooked yourself!


Each entry has to include:

• A picture of the vegetables or fruit that you are using in the recipe. This has to be ones that you use in the recipe, and not some random picture from Google! Extra points will be awarded when I shortlist the entries if you have grown it yourself.
• A copy of the recipe
• A picture of the finished dish that you have cooked yourself

You can upload your entries by going to the contact form of my blog or by clicking on this link.

I’ll then shortlist the best five, and then publish those on my blog. I’ll then open it up to the public vote, who will choose the winner each month.

The prizes for this month’s winner include a sausage making kit from the lovely people at ‘Design A Sausage.’

I’ll also be throwing in some prizes for this month’s competition too. Well it is nearly Christmas, and what’s Christmas without presents?!

So, for December, the vegetables or fruit that you can choose from are:

• Celeriac
• Kale
• Endive
• Parsnips
• Cauliflowers

You have until 12 noon on 18th December to get your entries to me, and I’ll be publishing the five finalists that night, and giving details on how you can vote.

Voting will then close at 12 noon on 31st December, and the winner will be announced later that night!

This will now definitely be a monthly competition, so don’t get downhearted if your recipe doesn’t get shortlisted, as there will be many more chances to win. In the meantime though, get your thinking caps on, and get those entries in!

A mixture of many things over the last two months has meant that my blog has been neglected of late.

However, I’m pleased to report that it is all systems go again! Over the next few weeks you will see all the old favourites, such as handy hints for growing your veg, but also a lot more recipes, and also some new sections of the blog too!

Welcome back, and keep your eyes peeled over the next few weeks …!

Thanks again for all of the entries and votes in this month’s competiton.

Voting was close right until the end, and then there was one person pulled slightly ahead with just over 50% of the vote. So, this month’s winner is …

Emma’s Tomato & Chilli Chutney

Congratulations Emma! Please send me your address either through the contact me page on here, or by email, so that I can send your prizes onto you.

Well done to everyone, and there will be another Cultivate, Cook & Click competition next month!

Thank you for all of the entries for this month’s competition.

Remember that you choose the winner of this month’s competition, so once you have chosen your favourite, continue down to the bottom of the blog, and complete the form to register your vote. You might want to cook some of these recipes too to help you decide which one is your favourite.

The vote closes at 12 noon on 31st August, so get voting!

Here are this month’s finalists …

Melanie’s Mixed Vegetable Balti

Ingredients:
3 tbsp vegetable oil
1 large white onion, diced
2 large garlic cloves, crushed
4 heaped tbsp Balti curry paste
2 large carrots, peeled and diced
500g potatoes, peeled and diced
1 large cauliflower, stalked and cut into small florets
1 tin chopped tomatoes
600ml vegetable stock
3 tbsp fresh coriander, chopped roughly
150g green beans, diced
1 tsp sugar
Salt and black pepper to taste
Extra chopped fresh coriander and natural yoghurt for garnish

Method:
1. Sautee the onion and garlic in the oil for five minutes, covered, to soften.
2. Remove the lid and cook for a further couple of minutes, or until beginning to brown.
3. Add the curry paste and stir in the onions, cooking for 1 minute. Stir in the diced potato and carrots, and cook covered for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Add the cauliflower, tinned tomatoes and vegetable stock, and cook covered for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
5. Add the green beans, coriander, and sugar and cook for further 15 minutes
6. Season to taste. Check that the vegetables are all fully cooked, and serve.

Have a look at Melanie’s blog for more of her recipes!

Emma’s Tomato & Chilli Chutney

Ingredients:
1 kg ripe tomatoes, quartered
2-3 chillies, roughly chopped
5 cloves garlic, sliced
1 onion, cut into wedges
3 tbsp balsamic vinegar
100g brown sugar
Olive oil

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 200c
2. Put the tomatoes, chilli, garlic, onion, vinegar and sugar into a large, shallow roasting dish. Pour on a large glug of olive oil and mix everything together with your hands.
3. Roast in the oven for around an hour until everything is soft and the onions have caramelised.
4. Allow to cool a little and transfer to sterilised storage jars.

Emma has her own blog “Mummy Musings” where she details juggling motherhood and a career.

Vicky’s Greek Beans

In Vicky’s own words, this dish is called ‘Greek Beans’ – “because they are based on beans I remember eating in Corfu on one of my first holidays abroad. They were meltingly tender, heavy with garlic and oil, and some tomato. This is one of those recipes that probably tastes nothing like the original, but has been filtered through my memory and has popped out like this.

This is my way of dealing with the French bean glut from our allotment every August (and probably Greece’s way of dealing with the same situation). These are bottled in recycled cook-in sauce jars, because they are cheap and because I can get 3 of them at a time in my pressure cooker; Kilner jars are just too wide.

They MUST be pressure cooked for 40 minutes, to kill dangerous enzymes that may cause spoilage and worse. Once sealed they keep for at least a year.”

Ingredients:
French beans, 3 big handfuls, topped and tailed
Creamed tomatoes, 2 x 500gms packs (Smooth, thick, sieved tomatoes. Good, cheap passata!)
Garlic cloves, to taste (I’d use 5 or 6)
Generous splash olive oil (4-5tbsps. Virgin recommended)
Salt
Sugar (1 dessertspoon approx – again, keep checking to get the taste you want)
3 cook-in sauce jars

Method:
1. Make tomato sauce by crushing garlic and salt, frying in lots of olive oil, without colouring. Add creamed tomatoes, salt and sugar and bring all to the boil. You only need to bring it to the boil at this point, as it will undergo further cooking during the processing time.

2. Thoroughly wash jars and lids (which must have safety buttons). Sterilise jars by putting in an oven at 100C for 10 minutes. Put lids in a small bowl and cover with boiling water. The pressure cooker will need a trivet in the bottom; the jars shouldn’t touch the bottom of the pan, or each other. Get boiling water ready. The key to success with this process is to make sure everything is as clean and hot as possible, and that the process isn’t interrupted at all.

3. Loosely pack the hot jars with the beans. Put in half the sauce, then squeeze in a few more beans until the jar is tightly packed. Top up with hot sauce. Give it a good shake, or poke around with chopstick, or similar, to make sure there are no air pockets. Fill it right to the top and apply lid, screwing on tightly.

4. Make sure the water is boiling in the pressure cooker and position jars as in pic below – not touching each other. Put on the lid and bring up to pressure. Pressure cook for 40 minutes. The pressure should be gentle, but not allowed to drop at any time. After 40 minutes, turn off and carefully remove from heat. Allow the pressure to drop in its own time. I leave it for half an hour or so before removing the pressure cooker lid. Forcing things at this point can cause a pressure difference that makes the sauce squirt out! Undesirable.

5. Sit back with a cool drink and await the delightful ‘pop’ from each jar as it seals. Any jars that don’t ‘pop’ and suck the safety button down should be refrigerated and used within a week. In truth, they’d probably last much longer than that – everything is sterile, after all – but, just to be on the safe side.

To serve:
1. Straight from the jar, in a salad, or
2. The Greek way, lukewarm with some crusty bread. You could crumble some feta cheese on top.

Vicky has her own blog called “High & Tight In Brixham.”

So now it’s over to you to vote and to pick your winner. Remember that voting closes at 12 noon on 31st August.

Take Our Poll

After a short break last month, here is this month’s Cultivate, Cook & Click Competition.

So, here is a reminder of the rules …

Each month around this time, I will pick four or five vegetables or fruit that are in season, and you then have to devise a dish that uses at least one of those ingredients.

There are no restrictions on the style of cooking, so it can be a recipe plucked from anywhere in the world, but it has to be one that you have cooked yourself!


Each entry has to include:

• A picture of the vegetables or fruit that you are using in the recipe. This has to be ones that you use in the recipe, and not some random picture from Google! Extra points will be awarded when I shortlist the entries if you have grown it yourself.
• A copy of the recipe
• A picture of the finished dish that you have cooked yourself

You can upload your entries by going to the contact form of my blog or by clicking on this link.

I’ll then shortlist the best five, and then publish those on my blog. I’ll then open it up to the public vote, who will choose the winner each month.

The prizes for this month’s winner have been supplied by the lovely Phil & Kay at Dartmoor Chilli Farm, who grow their chilli plants naturally and holistically without any pesticides, herbicides or fungicides. They are a very eco friendly business and run our nursery using wind and solar power. The majority of the ingredients in their sauces and other products are either grown on their farm or very close to it.

The prizes for this month are Beast Of Dartmoor Chilli Sauce, Dartmoor Dynamite Chilli Sauce – which I helped to name , Dartmoor Chilli Jam, Fireball Pickled Onions, Sweet Chilli Sauce, Extreme Apple Chutney and five bars of chilli chocolate.

This will be a fabulous prize whether you like your chillies mild, blisteringly hot, or in between!

So, for August, the vegetables or fruit that you can choose from are:

• Chillies
• Carrots
• French Beans
• Blackberries
• Sweetcorn

You have until 12 noon on 17th August to get your entries to me, and I’ll be publishing the five finalists that night, and giving details on how you can vote.

Voting will then close at 12 noon on 31st August, and the winner will be announced later that night!

As I’ve mentioned before, apart from the short break last month, this will be a monthly competition, so don’t get downhearted if your recipe doesn’t get shortlisted, as there will be many more chances to win. In the meantime though, get your thinking caps on, and get those entries in!

Thanks again for all of the entries and votes in this month’s competiton.

Voting was close right until the end, and then there was one runaway winner with almost 50% of the vote. So, this month’s winner is …

Emma’s Gooseberry & Elderflower Butterfly Cakes

Congratulations Emma! Please send me your address either through the ‘contact me’ page on my blog or by email, so that I can send your prizes to you.

For those of you who want to try Emma’s recipe, it can be found here, along with all of the other recipes that were entered in June’s competiton.


Well done to everyone, and there will be another Cultivate, Cook & Click competition next month!

Thank you for all of the entries for this month’s competition.

Remember that you choose the winner of this month’s competition, so once you have chosen your favourite, continue down to the bottom of the blog, and complete the form to register your vote. You might want to cook some of these recipes too to help you decide which one is your favourite.

The vote closes at 12 noon on 29th June, so get voting!

Here are this month’s finalists …

Edinburgh Foody’s Carrot & Beetroot Salad

I created a carrot and beetroot salad. Just add equal quantities (I used a tablespoon) of lime juice, fish sauce and maple syrup to finely shredded vegetables. Add salt and pepper to taste. Taste and add a little more of any the ingredients for a good balance.

Edinburgh Foody has a great blog, where they write about discovering the best food in Edinburgh, Scotland and beyond.

Emma’s Gooseberry & Elderflower Butterfly Cakes

Ingredients:

(For the cakes)
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 100g Soft butter/margarine
• 2 eggs
• 100g Self-raising flower
• A pinch of salt

(For the surprise centre)
• 200-250g Gooseberries (from your garden/allotment of course!)
• A knob of butter
• Half the juice of a lemon
• A glug of elderflower cordial
• 50-75g Caster Sugar

(For the decoration)
• 200g Icing
• 2 Tbsp of Fat free greek yoghurt
• The syrup leftover from the stewed gooseberries.


Method:
• Put the butter/gooseberries/lemon/elderflower/sugar in a pan and simmer for 5 mins. Once stewed drain off some of the syrup and leave to cool.

• Next begin making the cakes. Cream the sugar and the butter together in a big bowl. I do this using an electric hand whisk! You will know when the butter and sugar is creamed enough as the colour
will go from a bright yellow to a much paler, creamier yellow. The mixture will also be extremely soft to the touch!

• Slowly add a little bit of the whisked egg mixture to your butter and sugar. Make sure it is thoroughly whisked before adding more.

• Once all of the egg is mixed in, sift the flour and the pinch of salt into the bowl. Lightly stir (or fold) the flour into the mixture until it is all combined!

• Spoon into cake cases and cook for roughly 20-25mins. Before allowing them to cool.

• Once they have cooled, whisk up the yoghurt and icing sugar and 2 tbsp of the syrup in a bowl to make a thick yet glossy icing!

• Using a sharp knife, cut a circle out of the top of the cake. Fill this hole with the cooled stewed gooseberries. Then cover with the icing. Cut the circle you removed from the top of the cake in half and
place into the icing like butterfly wings!

• Sprinkle with some edible glitter and they are finished!

Emma has a blog where she wants to “share with you the things that make me happy; recipes that are simple to make, cheap, healthy but most of all tasty!”

Choclette’s Beetroot Tops with Mascarpone and Walnut Pasta

Feeds 2 hungry people!

Wash a large handful of beetroot stems and leaves and drain.

Heat some olive oil (about 2 tbsp) in a large pan and add 3 cloves of chopped garlic.

Almost immediately add the finely chopped beetroot stems. Stir well, cover the pan, reduce the heat and leave for 8-10 minutes.

Add chopped beetroot leaves and cover the pan again. Leave until wilted. Add sea salt to taste (about 1/4 tsp) and stir well.

Meanwhile, cook your chosen pasta as per normal in a large pan of salted water, then drain.

Toss with 125ml (1/2 tub) mascarpone, a couple of handfulls of chopped walnuts, a grating of nutmeg and a good grinding of black pepper.

Place into pasta bowls and top with the beetroot. Scatter with a few chopped walnuts.

Choclette has a fantastic chocolate related blog which “explores the joys of cooking healthy and delicious chocolate recipes using good quality ingredients – preferably local and organic.”

….since the rules didn’t say that anything about only entering one recipe, the next finalist is….

Choclette’s Beetroot with Yogurt, Chilli and Dill

Boil beetroot until soft – my two were freshly dug and not too big so only took 1/2 hr.

When cooked, peel and cube roughly into 1 cm bits.

Put in a bowl with some Greek yogurt (a couple of spoonfulls).

Add a good dash of chilli sauce, a chopped spring onion, a pinch of salt and a good few sprigs of chopped fresh dill (although chives or parsley or other green herb would be good too).

Stir until all combined and beautifully pink.

Monica’s Broad Bean Salad with Ricotta and Tarragon Vinaigrette

This salad was inspired by a dish I had on a French Cookery Holidaywith Rachel Demuth. The original salad was made with fresh goats curd, but I’ve found ricotta to be a worthy substitute. If you make your own ricotta cheese or goats curd, this salad is the perfect use of those delicate homemade cheeses. If you don’t have tarragon, dill and basil
work very well, too.

Serves 2.

Ingredients

720g broad beans (~250g shelled)
100g sugar snap beans
100g cooked broad beans
100g ricotta (or goats cheese)
salad leaves

Tarragon vinaigrette

3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tsp chopped fresh tarragon
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp honey
pinch salt & pepper

Method

1. Pod the broad beans and boil them until tender (about 2 or 3 minutes). During the last minute of cooking, add the snap beans. You want the vegetables to still be crisp so don’t cook for very long. Drain in a colander.

2. Make the dressing by whisking all of the vinaigrette ingredients together in a bowl.

3. Arrange the lettuce leaves on two plates. Add the snap beans and broad beans over the leaves. Top with crumbled ricotta and drizzle with the dressing (you may not need all of the vinaigrette – you can store the extra for later). Top with a grind of fresh black pepper if you like and serve straight away.

Monica is, in her own words, “a freelance writer, entrepreneur, and aspiring chef.” She also has her own blog.

So now it’s over to you to vote and to pick your winner. Remember that voting closes at 12 noon on 29th June.

Take Our Poll

As promised earlier in the month, here is this month’s Cultivate, Cook & Click Competition.

So, here is a reminder of the rules …

Each month around this time, I will pick four or five vegetables or fruit that are in season, and you then have to devise a dish that uses at least one of those ingredients.

There are no restrictions on the style of cooking, so it can be a recipe plucked from anywhere in the world, but it has to be one that you have cooked yourself!

Each entry has to include:

• A picture of the vegetables or fruit that you are using in the recipe. This has to be ones that you use in the recipe, and not some random picture from Google! Extra points will be awarded when I shortlist the entries if you have grown it yourself.
• A copy of the recipe
• A picture of the finished dish that you have cooked yourself

You can upload your entries by going to the contact form of my blog or by clicking on this link.

I’ll then shortlist the best five, and then publish those on my blog. I’ll then open it up to the public vote, who will choose the winner each month.

The prizes for this month’s winner are:
A recycled tyre trug from Hen & Hammock.





A bespoke chainsaw-carved owl from Kim Neith-Thompson.





A copy of ‘Preserves’ by Hazel Roberts.





So, for June, the vegetables or fruit that you can choose from are:

• Broad Beans
• Beetroot
• Gooseberries
• Carrots
• Peas

You have until 12 noon on 22nd June to get your entries to me, and I’ll be publishing the five finalists that night, and giving details on how you can vote.

Voting will then close at 12 noon on 29th June, and the winner will be announced later that night!

As I’ve mentioned before, this will be a monthly competition, so don’t get downhearted if your recipe doesn’t get shortlisted, as there will be many more chances to win. In the meantime though, get your thinking caps on, and get those entries in!

Well either I made the choice of ingredients too hard this month, or you were all too busy in the garden growing your fruit and veg, as I only had one entry that met the rules for the competition this month!

So, this month’s winner is ….

Melanie’s Spiced Dahl With Sweet Potato And Spinach

2 tbsp olive oil
Knob of butter
1 red onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, crushed
Dukka (toast + blend 2 tsp cumin seeds, 2tsp coriander seeds and 1 tsp sesame seeds)
1 tbsp garam masala
2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
300g red lentils
Handful of fresh coriander, leaves and stems chopped (plus a little extra for garnish)
1350ml vegetable stock
100g baby spinach
Black pepper
1. Cook the onions, garlic, dukka and garam masala in oil and butter for five minutes on a medium heat. Add the sweet potato and cook for a further few minutes.

2. Add the lentils, vegetable stock and chopped coriander, and cook for 20-25 minutes, covered

3. Uncover, add the baby spinach and cook for about 5 minutes more. Season with salt and black pepper, garnish with coriander, and serve!

Well done Melanie! Please send me your postal address so I can send your prizes onto you. There will be another Cultivate, Cook & Click competition next month!