My crusade for the new year is get everyone growing their own fruit and veg. I know that everyone is not lucky enough to have an allotment, a garden or even a patio. However, you can still grow your own food in even the smallest space, which is why I came up with the idea for my campaign – “Grow One Pot.” I want everyone to make a pledge to grow one thing this year and tell me what it is by leaving a comment below, and tweeting about it using the hashtag ‘#growonepot’

“Grow One Pot” came from the idea that you can using one pot or one container can produce a lot more fruit or veg than most people think.

Common things that people use are:
- A window box to grow herbs, or ‘cut and come again’ salads.

- A hanging basket to grow tumbling tomatoes

- A dustbin to grow your own potatoes

- Three canes to form a wigwam shape which can be used for all climbing plants such as peas, beans, etc to scramble up.

There are many wonderful reasons to garden partially or exclusively in containers. Growing crops in containers also gives you much more control over your plants. You can usually move them indoors if you are faced with an unexpected frost, or move them to another position if they do not appear happy where they are, perhaps getting too much sunlight? You can even grow some vegetables indoors if you have a suitable sunny or bright area where you can sit some pots. So it can be easy to have a fresh, year round supply of flowers, vegetables and herbs.

The great thing about container vegetable gardening is that, apart from buying a few essentials, like good quality compost, it can be done on a low budget and is extremely versatile. You can grow plants in virtually anything that holds some soil and has holes in the bottom for drainage. It’s only bounded by your imagination – a chance for some really creative recycling! I’ve used old bathtubs, 20-litre plastic containers with the tops cut off, baskets of various sizes lined with bin bags to hold the water in, milk cartons for seedlings, anything that comes to hand. I almost used some dumped toilet bowl …..only I didn’t like the colour as they were pink.

Using containers makes it possible to grow food in areas where it would otherwise be impossible, and by employing some simple and innovative methods covered in more detail in future blog posts, such as vertical gardening, raised bed gardening, and square foot gardening, you can extract some excellent, and money-saving crop yields from just a tiny amount of space.

I’ll also be resurrecting my monthly blog post of what to do in your garden each month, and include tips on what to grow in your ‘container garden’ that month.

So, start the new year by making a pledge to get your fingernails dirty and growing at least one crop this year. Don’t forget to tell me what it is by leaving a comment below, and by tweeting me (@wegrowourown) on Twitter, and using the hashtag #growonepot. I’ll retweet every one I see!

Happy gardening!

Bread is a fundamental part of our diet: 99% of UK households buy bread and 74% of us eat it at least once a day, whether it is a quick slice of toast before we rush out the door to work, or the essential part of that hangover curing bacon sandwich.

Unfortunately, the majority of households buy the tasteless pap created by the Chorleywood Process, that is sold by supermarkets up and down the land.

With that in mind, if you make one New Year’s Resolution this year, it should be to make your own bread.

The Chorleywood Bread Process, which was introduced in 1961, produces bread of phenomenal volume and lightness, with great labour efficiency and at low apparent cost. It isn’t promoted by name. You won’t see it mentioned on any labels. But you can’t miss it. From the clammy sides of your chilled wedge sandwich to the flabby roll astride every franchised burger, the stuff is there, with a soft, squishy texture that lasts for many days until the preservatives can hold back the mould no longer. If bread forms a ball that sticks to the roof of your mouth as you chew, or you can scrunch a slice of it into a white pappy little ball, this is down to the Chorleywood Bread Process – but don’t dwell on what it will shortly be doing to your guts.

Have a look on the ingredients list on the back of one of these loaves, and there is a list of ‘improvers’ and ‘additives’ as long as your arm.

I think sometimes people get scared of making their own bread, because they hear bakers using words like ‘sourdough’, ‘ferment’ and ‘sponge.’ In fact, it couldn’t be any simpler. With just flour, salt, water and yeast, you can have a fantastic tasting, additive free loaf of bread on your table within hours. Also, if you are that pushed for time, you can do a loaf of soda bread from start to finish in under an hour!

Once you have mastered the ‘basic’ loaf, if you look in books produced by great bakers such as Richard Bertinet, Dan Lepard and Andrew Whitley, you will see that with just a few small tweaks, and the addition of some other ingredients, these four ingredients can produce an infinite amount of yummy things!


If you want to take it one step further, join the “Real Bread Campaign” which is co-ordinated by the charity Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming. The Real Bread Campaign is a not-for-profit initiative that brings together bakers, independent millers, cereal growers, researchers, activists and anyone else who cares about the state of bread in Britain.

So make make your own bread at home. As I mentioned , you only need flour, water, yeast and salt. It is as easy as falling off a log, and I can guarantee that once you have tasted your own homebaked bread, you will never go back to eating what I consider to be the tasteless, mass produced pap that masquerades as bread in supermarket the length and breadth of this land.

I should really think up some better puns for the titles for my blogs as one of my New Year’s Resolutions …!

As you know, I’m always looking to show people how you can create great food with great local ingredients.

With that in mind, I have huge pleasure in introducing …

Andy from “Andy’s Kitchen.”

I’d chatted to Andy for a long time on Twitter, but we had never met, until we both went on a foraging course with Mark Lloyd, and we then got chatting, and decided to collaborate on certain projects.

To tell you more about Andy in his own words, “I am a very keen home cook, who now enjoys running one of the most popular UK Food Blogs, the blog which can be found at www.andyskitchen.co.uk includes recipes, reviews, competitions, foodie news and lots more. I also have an allotment so enjoy growing as much produce as possible, and last year I purchased a classic VW Campervan, so Im looking forward to creating many culinary camping recipes, and blogging about our camping trips.”

With Andy on board we can offer you some fantastic recipes, and great features, and we can offer you the producers some great recipe creations with your fantastic produce.

More to come soon ….!

Looking back at my 2011 New Year’s Resolutions post, I was pleased to see that I had accomplished some of my ‘resolutions’ for last year, although lack of time and job hunting made sure that I never had the time to get round to doing all of them.

This year, I’m going to take more of a relaxed approach to things, and if they happen, they happen. More ‘plans’ than ‘resolutions!’

One of my goals for this year is to do more writing. I’m about to see one of my articles in print for the first time in Great Food Magazine, which will hopefully become a regular column. I’m also still writing my cookbook, but have still to find that elusive publisher!

I’m also going to be doing some guest blogging, and I have some plans to expand and revamp my own blog. More details about that soon!

Also, now that we have a larger allotment, it will give me more space to expand my chilli empire, although the freezer and larder are groaning under the weight of last year’s harvest, both frozen and pickled. Even though our growing space has been tripled, I’m still going to have to scale back my current seed order for 2012, as otherwise I’ll run out of space in April, never mind by the summer!

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!

I received an email last week inviting me to a Morrisons M Kitchen pop up restaurant to celebrate and promote the new M Kitchen range.

As the website says, “Five of the UK’s leading chefs – Pierre Koffmann, Aldo Zilli, Nigel Haworth, Atul Kochhar and Bryn Williams – have each contributed a classic dish to the delicious menu at the M Kitchen.”

The M Kitchen is a new ready to eat range put together by Morrisons with help from these chefs. The range includes Nigel Haworth’s Lancashire Hotpot, Aldo Zilli’s Pizza Calabrese, Bryn Williams’ Shepherd’s Pie , Atul Kochhar’s Chicken Korma with rose petals, and Pierre Koffman’s Beef Bourguignon.

So, it was with a mixture of both interest and trepidation that I set off to the M Kitchen pop up in Birmingham, wondering how they could turn microwave ready meals into restaurant style food worthy of the surroundings at The Custard Factory.

After a glass of refreshing Morrisons own “The Best” Champagne Brut we were given ciabatta & olives while we studied the menu. For starters, I chose ‘Dumfries house’ beef carpaccio
with Ivy’s Vintage Reserve Cheddar, while Lisa chose Pulled pork with rice, beans and tortillas.

The pulled pork was definitely the winner out of these too dishes – very tasty. However, I was very disappointed by the carpaccio which was devoid of any taste whatsoever.

Moving onto mains, I chose Nigel Haworth’s Lancashire hot pot with pickled red cabbage, and Lisa chose Pierre Koffman’s Beef Bourguignon.

The creamy mash definitely complimented the beef bourgignon, and the hotpot was just at that gorgeous melt in the mouth consistency. However, there was a strange taste in the pickled red cabbage, as it seemed to be too heavy on the cinnamon.

For dessert there was too much choice, so we decided to have a little bit of everything! This included Baked cheesecake with seasonal fruits, Chocolate mousse with raspberries, Tarte Tatin using English apples and ice cream, and a selection of British cheeses including Cornish Blue & Quickes Cheddar.

The chocolate mousse had the surprise of popping candy in the middle, so that had to win, as it immediately made me feel like I was five again! I’ve always been a fan of Tarte Tatin, but this one was bordering on too sweet, but I suppose it is all down to personal taste.

Despite the little niggles that I mentioned above, I very much enjoyed my meal courtesy of Morrisons and was very impressed with what is essentially a selection of ready meals. Also a thank you to the staff who were excellent – attentive, informative but never annoying!

Although the event is free, all the remaining dates have now been booked up, but you can find more details about the M kitchen range here.

This post is not so much about how to grow your own chillies, but what to do with your bountiful harvest of chillies!

If you have more chillies from your plants than you know what to do with, there are essentially three ways of processing them for use later in the UK where leaving them to dry in the sun all day is not really an option! These are drying, pickling or freezing them.

Drying chillies

The first method of drying peppers is in the oven. If your oven is electric, preheat to the lowest setting. The pilot light on a gas oven is sometimes enough, use an oven thermometer to check the temperature; it should be around 150 – 200 degrees.

Slice your peppers in half and remove the seeds, or if you prefer you can cut them into thin rings. Spread the chilli peppers evenly over baking trays.

Allow the chilli peppers to dry all day or overnight in the warm oven. You may wish to turn them once during the drying time, but this is not necessary.

Another old-fashioned method is to hang the chillies to dry. If you have a screened in porch or other area where there is plenty of airflow, this method works well. You do not have to seed the chillies for this method of drying.

You will need a large eyed needle, and either heavy thread or fishing line. Begin by threading your needle with a long length of thread or fishing line. At the other end, tie a small wooden dowel or stick to keep the bottom pepper from falling off. Thread the line through the centre of each chilli, stacking one on top of the other in a rotating manner.

When the line is full, hang in a well ventilated area and allow nature to take its course. This method may take three weeks to a month for the chillies to dry completely.

The last way of drying chillies is in a dehydrator. Dehydrators can be purchased with or without a fan, and while the ones with a fan are a bit more expensive, they do their magic faster than those without. Prepare your chillies as you would for the oven method. You can leave the seeds in or remove them if you wish. Lay the prepared chillies evenly on the trays of your dehydrator and turn the machine on. Chillies generally take 8 – 10 hours to dry in a dehydrator with a fan or 10 – 12 in one without.

Pickling chillies

Did you know that if recipe calls for a chilli pepper and you can’t get hold of a locally-grown fresh chilli, you can always use pickled chillies. However be aware that the heat of the chillies is reduced slightly through the pickling process so you may need to use a little more than you would a fresh chilli.

Here is a ‘recipe’ to get you started. However, sterilize any jars and jar lids before using. Boil them on the stove for a half hour, or throw them in the dishwasher for a cycle or two.

600g / 1lb 5oz medium green or red chillies
15 black peppercorns
5 bay leaves
2 tablespoons coriander seeds
5 teaspoons salt
6 heaped tablespoons caster sugar
1 litre / 1 3/4 pints white wine vinegar or rice vinegar

For this recipe you must use perfect green chillies without any blemishes (you can use red chillies but they will be slightly hotter).

Carefully score from the stalk end to the tip on one side only and remove the seeds (use the handle of a teaspoon for this. Pour boiling water over the chillies, let them sit for 5 minutes, then drain. This will get rid of most of the seeds left behind.

Next put your black peppercorns, bay leaves, coriander, chillies and salt into a large jar or other airtight container.

Put the sugar and the vinegar into a pan and heat until the sugar is fully dissolved. When this is quite hot, but not boiling, pour it into the jar with the chillies.

Allow it to cool down and then put the lid on, put into the fridge and leave for a minimum of 2 weeks before using. They will keep in the fridge for at least 4 months.

Freezing chillies

Chillies freeze reasonably, retaining most of their flavour and heat. Freezing is the best way to preserve fleshier chillies like Scotch Bonnets and Habaneros.

To freeze chillies whole, spread them out on a baking tray so they are not touching, freeze and pop into a sealed bag or container. This way they do not clump together.

Frozen chillies, however, do not always keep their shape or texture well with freezing so you may prefer to process them first. Remove the stalks and the seeds if you like (seeds can go a bit brown on freezing but this will do no harm) and freeze in a sealed bag. You can them smash the bag with a rolling pin and use as required.

Alternatively, pack the chopped chillies into an ice cube tray, then empty chilli cubes into a sealed bag to store to make easily measured portions. Keep the ice tray just for your chillies though!

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!