Borough Market Winter Shopping Guide

Winter

SHOP PING G UID E

Welcome to winter

Borough Market is a place where the shifting of the seasons plays out as a vivid multi-sensory experience, an ever-evolving palette of colours, scents and tastes. The winter months bring brassicas and white roots, apples and citrus fruits, slow-cooking meat joints and hard cheeses.

The shopping suggestions in this short guide are just the tip of a vast iceberg. Hopefully they’ll serve to inspire a more thorough exploration of the Market’s seasonal offerings, which change day by day. Not everything will be available throughout the season, with different products coming in and out – but that’s part of the magic. Don’t hesitate to ask traders for their suggestions. They’re the real experts, and they won’t ever be short of a tip or two.

Explore more winter content

Fruit & veg WINTER

Look out for:

Amalfi lemons

Blood oranges

Brussels sprouts

Celeriac

Chestnuts

Heritage carrots

Jerusalem artichokes

Lychees

Parsnips

Persimmons

Purple sprouting broccoli

Radicchio

Salsify

Seville oranges

Winter truffles

Explore our fruit and veg traders

Back to my roots

The sweetness and light provided by the white roots of winter

Thom Eagle

In the first flush of winter, as the cold and wet really begin to set in, I’m more than happy to wallow in the comfort of beige and warming food, of afternoons spent in the slow construction of a braise. After a week or so of this, however, I find myself craving a little sweetness and light. Luckily many of winter’s roots and tubers possess these in abundance, their gnarled exteriors revealing, after a scrub and a cut, the clean white flesh within.

When I was young, I developed a profound dislike of parsnips. Christmas dinner always featured chunks of them roasted in a bowl together with the potatoes, and I never quite got over their unexpected spicy sweetness amid the salty starch. Now, it is exactly that flavour that draws me to celeriac, jerusalem artichoke and parsley root.

All these white roots take well to high heat, to charring on the bars of a griddle pan or simply browning in a frying pan. Unlike potatoes, they can all be eaten somewhat al dente, so you can concentrate on getting a good colour on them without worrying too much that they are cooking through, removing each chunk of, say, celeriac to a waiting bath of dressing, which it can absorb as it cools to room temperature. Equally, though, once you’re happy with their caramelised char, you can finish cooking them in the oven to a more giving softness; they are good at pretty much every stage of doneness. Charred and undercooked

celeriac makes a very good salad, with perhaps some celery leaf for company, some toasted nuts and a little biting onion, while cooked more thoroughly it can be stirred through a meaty ragu, offering a little light relief to the fat and richness. The dense minerality of parsley root in particular sits extremely well alongside dark braises of beef or venison.

You can also build these flavours into your stews from the ground up – outside of the western European tradition, in which just about everything begins with onion, celery and carrot, other roots bring their particular sweetness to stocks or stews, becoming part of the structure of the dish. A soup in Poland will often start with celeriac and parsley root alongside other vegetables, their flavours blending into those of allium, brassica and pork bones.

In general, though, I think they deserve to shine more or less alone; even plainly boiled and mashed with just a little butter and black pepper, these roots have plenty of character. For a long time, the only form in which I ate jerusalem artichokes was as a soup, cooked alongside onion and so forth before being passed through a moulis. And for all the toffee’d pleasure of a roasted tuber, this kind of simple cream is one of the best ways to eat them. Made thicker it can be a bed for a good pork chop or braised winter greens, while

blended with some crushed walnuts it can dress pasta or gnocchi.

THESE ROOTS DESERVE TO SHINE MORE OR LESS ALONE; EVEN PLAINLY BOILED AND MASHED WITH JUST A LITTLE BUTTER AND BLACK PEPPER, THEY HAVE PLENTY OF CHARACTER.

For something lighter and sharper, I have fond memories of a starter I once had in Paris: a great pile of tangled remoulade; matchsticks of celeriac softening in their sharp, creamy dressing, shot through with capers and chives. I often make versions with shaved jerusalem artichoke or parsley root. The trick is to get the texture right, somewhere between a crunch and a slump.

With their thick and hairy skins, they might lack the visual appeal of piled tomatoes or heaping ornamental squashes, but the white roots of winter possess no less potential. Sometimes I feel I have waited for them all year.

BRUSSELS SPROUT, RADICCHIO, SPENWOOD & COBNUT SALAD

Elly Curshen

Serves: 4-6 as a side| Prep: 15 mins

This salad is very great as a side dish with roast chicken or a slice of cheese tart. I chose to use Spenwood from Neal’s Yard Dairy, as it’s one of my favourite British cheeses – a sheep’s milk cheese with a sweet, milky flavour with a slight piquancy – but lots of hard cheeses would work well, including pecorino or parmesan. If you have not tried a roasted cobnut before, head straight to Food & Forest. A cobnut is an English variety of hazelnut, but you really need to try one to understand how special they are. The cobnuts stocked at Food & Forest are grown on their own farm in Kent using an agroforestry system.

INGREDIENTS

— 200g brussels sprouts, trimmed — 1 small radicchio

— 2 tbsp smoked olive oil — 1 tbsp lemon juice

— 25g Spenwood — 25g roasted cobnuts

METHOD

Use a food processor to very finely shred the sprouts. Tip into a large mixing bowl.

Use a large sharp knife to trim away the core and base then finely shred the radicchio. Add to the sprouts and toss together. Add just 1 tbsp of the oil plus the lemon juice and a large pinch of flaked sea salt.

Give everything a thorough mix then taste and adjust the lemon juice and salt levels. Pile onto a serving platter. Keep it piled up in an impressive mountain, don’t spread it out. Use a fine grater to grate the Spenwood all over the pile of vegetables.

Finely chop the cobnuts (either in the food processor or by hand). Sprinkle the chopped cobnuts over the salad and drizzle with the remaining smoked oil just as you serve.

ROAST WINTER VEGETABLES WITH PISTACHIO PESTO & WHITE BEANS

Tom Hunt

Serves: 4| Prep: 15 mins | Cook: 1 hour

INGREDIENTS

— 1 romanesco

— 1 small pumpkin (500g-750g), cut in half, seeds removed

— 1 large leek

— 6 cloves of garlic

— 2 clementines, halved

— 1 unwaxed lemon, halved

— A few sprigs of garden herbs (thyme, marjoram, rosemary)

— 150ml olive oil

— 2 tins of cannellini beans (drained) or 250g dried cannellini beans, soaked overnight and boiled until soft

For the pesto

— 50g shelled pistachios, crushed or chopped into small pieces

— 80g basil, stalks and leaves finely chopped

— 50g parmesan, crumbled or grated

— 1 clove of garlic, finely chopped

METHOD

Heat the oven to 190C. Stand the whole vegetables in a large roasting pan surrounded by the citrus fruit and topped with the garden herbs. Drizzle with olive oil and season, then cover tightly with parchment.

Place in the oven for 45 mins, then remove the parchment. Return to the oven for another 15 mins, or until cooked through. Aim to get a bit of charring on the outside of the vegetables towards the end of the cooking process, adjusting the heat as necessary.

Test that each vegetable is cooked by inserting a knife to check the softness. If one vegetable is cooked and charred nicely before another remove it from the oven until the rest catch up. Return any veg to the oven for a final warm-through before serving.

Meanwhile make the pesto by softly pounding all the ingredients together in a pestle and mortar or by simply mixing them together in a bowl.

When the vegetables are almost ready, heat the beans and season well. Serve the vegetables in their dish with a carving knife in the centre of the table. Serve the beans on main course plates drizzled with olive oil and the pesto in a side bowl for people to help themselves.

Cannellini beans

Gastronomica Market

CURRIED GREENS & DUCK EGGS

Hope Batchelor

Serves: 4 | Prep: 15 mins | Cook: 20 mins

If you’re after the perfect brunch or a quick weeknight meal, this dish of curried greens with soft-boiled duck eggs is just what you need. It’s easily adaptable – swap the duck eggs for tofu or paneer, or add extra protein with prawns or chicken. You can serve with rice or a fluffy naan for a heartier version. This is a great recipe for using up whatever greens you have in your fridge – a nourishing, flavourful meal that’s as easy as it is delicious.

INGREDIENTS

— 8 duck eggs at room temperature

— 2 shallots, sliced

— 1 onion, sliced

— 3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

— 1 tsp cumin seeds

— 1 tsp turmeric

— 1 tsp garam masala

— 1 tsp ground fenugreek

— 3 bay leaves

— 2 green chillies, finely chopped

— A bunch of coriander, leaves picked, stalks chopped

— 300g leafy greens (a combination of spinach and cavolo nero works well)

— 500ml stock

— 100g thick yoghurt, plus extra for serving

— Crispy onions, to serve

METHOD

Boil a pan of water then cook your duck eggs at a hard simmer for 7 mins before plunging straight into ice-cold water.

Meanwhile, in a large pan, gently fry the shallots, onion and garlic in butter, ghee or rapeseed oil until translucent. Add in all the dry spices and bay leaves and cook for a couple of minutes more.

Add in one of the chopped green chillies and the chopped coriander stalks, then the leafy greens and stock. Simmer for 2 mins then remove from the heat and blitz in a blender to create a smooth sauce. Add in the thick yoghurt and stir well.

Peel the eggs and add into the curry sauce. Serve with a drizzle of yoghurt, a sprinkle of chopped chilli, the coriander leaves and the crispy onions.

BUCKWHEAT PANCAKES WITH BLOOD ORANGE & BLUEBERRIES

Jenny Chandler

Makes: 12 | Prep: 10 mins | Cook: 10-15 mins

Buckwheat is not a true cereal, but a seed related to rhubarb. It does, however, behave like a grain and is especially good for making noodles and pancakes. These are more of an American pancake than a French galette, and work just as well with savoury ingredients – such as grated cheese, ham, leek or smoked salmon – as they do sweet.

INGREDIENTS

— 125g wholegrain buckwheat flour

— 1 tsp baking powder

— ½ tsp ground cinnamon

— 1 egg

— 250ml whole milk

— 20g unsalted butter

— Runny honey, to serve

— 1 punnet of blueberries, washed

— 2 blood oranges, segmented

METHOD

Mix the buckwheat flour, baking powder, cinnamon and a pinch of salt together in a large bowl. Make a well in the centre.

Separate the egg, taking care not to break the yolk. Place the white in a clean bowl (ready to whisk up in a minute) and tip the yolk into the well in the flour. Break up the yolk with a fork, add the milk and then stir until the batter is just combined. Beat the white into soft peaks and fold into the pancake batter.

Heat a large frying pan and add about a quarter of the butter. Once the pan is hot and the butter bubbling, add a large serving spoon of the mixture to the pan. You should be able to fry two or three pancakes at a time. Keep the heat at a medium temperature and turn each pancake when its surface is covered in bubbles. Fry for 2 mins more, until browned.

Keep the pancakes on a pre-heated plate and cover with foil or a napkin, while you finish frying the rest of the batter. Wipe the frying pan with a paper towel and then add another tiny knob of butter between batches. Serve the pancakes warm, with a good spoonful of honey, a few blueberries and orange segments.

Where to buy

Blood oranges Stark’s Fruiterers

Meat WINTER

Look out for:

Bacon lardons

Beef shin

Bronze turkeys

Forerib of beef Goose

Guinea fowl

Meat pies

Ox heart

Ox tongue

Pig’s cheeks

Pork belly

Pork loin

Short ribs

Suet

Venison shoulder

Explore our butchers

Life in the slow lane

Borough Market’s butchers on the joys of slow cooking tough, fatty, richly flavoured cuts of meat

Tomé Morrissy-Swan

It’s late on a cold, windy, rainy Thursday evening but tomorrow’s dinner is already on the go. Into the slow cooker go pearl barley, dry white beans, potatoes, paprika, fried onions and – the pièce de résistance –fatty bricks of well-browned beef short rib. A bit keen for Friday night dinner, you might think, but well worth the wait. The resulting cholent, a slowly-simmering pot of culinary comfort popular among Ashkenazi Jews on the sabbath, is sublime: rich and unctuous, each ingredient tasting of every other, in a way only hours of cooking can provide.

When it’s cold I turn to slow cooking. Out go summery salads and grilled fish, replaced by stews, braises and slowly roasted joints. It’s not just me. By autumn, customers are “fed up to the back teeth of steak and salad”, says Tim Wilson, founder of Borough Market’s Ginger Pig butchers. “You want brussels sprouts and roast parsnips, and when that comes along, slow cooking comes back in.”

Almost every culture has a treasure trove of slow-cooked dishes. Often, but not always, out of necessity, people who couldn’t afford or didn’t have access to prime joints turned to the tougher cuts, eking out flavour with time. From Brazilian feijoada to Asturian fabada, salt beef brisket or Texan barbecue brisket, slow cooking can be found everywhere.

At Borough Market, Dominic McCourt is guiding me through the different cuts at Northfield Farm, a butcher’s stand where much of the meat comes from the family farm in Rutland. He sells more meat intended for slow cooking in winter, but not necessarily at the expense of the premium cuts. In the colder month, people spend more time at home, more time at the hobs, and eat more meat. Dominic points to oxtail, beef shin, short ribs, beef cheeks. “Chuck is a really good entry-level cut for slow cooking,” he explains. “It’s quite forgiving, you can do it in an hour or so.” His favourite is lamb neck cooked overnight, cooled, glazed with barbecue sauce then flash cooked. “The meat falls off the bone.”

‘Unfashionable’ cuts were once far more economical. When Tim Wilson launched Ginger Pig in the late 1990s, slow-cooking joints didn’t fly off the counter. “Years ago, a lady came into the shop and said: ‘I want a piece of belly pork, please’,” he recalls. “The next person in the queue said: ‘I give that to my dogs.’” At the turn of the century that began to change. “All of a sudden, shoulder became more popular than leg,” says Tim. Why did things change? “Jamie Oliver. It was chefs.”

Price gaps have contracted but, overall, tougher cuts are still cheaper. “You’re still

YEARS AGO, A LADY CAME INTO THE SHOP AND SAID: ‘I WANT A PIECE OF BELLY PORK.’THE NEXT PERSON IN THE QUEUE SAID: ‘I GIVE THAT TO MY DOGS.’ AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY THAT BEGAN TO CHANGE

pork, whether stewed, curried or roasted. But one of the best dishes I’ve made was a 10-hour roast chicken in a clay pot. It simply disintegrated, in a good way. “You can slow roast any bird and it will just fall off the bone,” says Lin Mullet, founder of Wyndham House Poultry. Lin likes to roast duck legs marinated in Chinese five spice at 150C for a couple of hours. “The flavour intensifies. It’s absolutely lovely. It’s not something you need to stress about – you don’t need to be a clever cook to do it.”

Slow cooking is forgiving. Going over won’t affect the outcome, as long as the pot doesn’t dry out – it’s much harder to ruin a stew than a steak, even though cooking it requires more planning. Roast chicken convention says to cook fast for crisp skin and succulent breast but, according to Lin, slowly reared premium poultry have the texture and bone structure to withstand time. “Pot roasting is brilliant. A layer of vegetables, put the bird on top, liquid halfway up to the side of the bird, and they can be in there for quite a long time,” she explains. “That’s across all birds.”

looking at roughly a third of the price for shin versus a ribeye,” says Dominic. “It’s still worthwhile financially.” There are exceptions, like oxtail, once cheap but now increasingly costly for what is mostly bone. Brisket, on the other hand, is still good value and practically all meat.

Heart and tongue are currently seeing increasing demand at Northfield Farm. Today’s trendiest cut, though, is ox cheek, spurred on by chefs and their obsession with cheek ragus. “We’ve got a massive demand now, more than we ever have,” says Dominic. Tim agrees: “We probably sell as much ox cheek as fillet steak.”

Slow cooking evokes beef, lamb and

In a cost-of-living crisis, leaving the oven on for hours may be a challenge, but there are countless ways to slow cook. Low and slow on induction may not be as charming as a battered old dutch oven in an Aga, but the results are similar and the bill considerably lighter. A slow cooker comes out cheaper, too, as does a pressure cooker, speeding up the process but providing the same outcome. And slow cooking is much better for leftovers – you can do a lot more with succulent pulled pork than dried-up slices of roast beef.

Back in my kitchen I’m making a Tuesdaynight dinner in the morning. I brown the brisket before frying off onions. In throw in carrots, thyme, bay and stock. They get well acquainted in the oven before I pop in some dumplings. Slow-cooked beef and dumpling stew on a cold winter night? Until the sun comes out again, I’ll take that every time.

SLOW BRAISED BEEF SHIN & PANCETTA PUDDINGS

Hayden Groves

Serves: 4 | Prep: 30 mins | Cook: 4 hours

INGREDIENTS

— 100g unsmoked pancetta lardons, cut into 1cm cubes

— 1 onion, peeled and cut into 1cm chunks

— 1 large carrot, peeled and cut into 1cm chunks

— 100g flat mushrooms

— 600g boneless beef shin, cut into 3cm chunks

— 2 tbsp plain flour

— 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and left whole

— 2 tsp tomato puree

— 100ml red wine

— 500ml beef stock

— 2 bay leaves

— 2 sprigs of thyme

— 2 tbsp chopped parsley

For the suet pastry

— 175g beef suet

— 350g self-raising flour

— 1 tbsp finely chopped parsley

METHOD

Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large casserole dish over a medium-high heat. Add the pancetta and fry until golden, then remove with a slotted spoon and reserve. Add the mushrooms, onions and carrots to the pan and sauté until lightly golden, then remove with a slotted spoon and reserve with the pancetta.

Dust the diced beef shin with the flour thoroughly, fry the beef in the pan until nicely browned, add the garlic and tomato puree and cook stirring regularly for a further minute. Add the red wine and scrape to

dislodge any sticky caramelised bits on the bottom, simmer for a further minute. Add the stock, bring to a simmer, cover and cook for 1 hour with the thyme and bay. Carefully skim off any fat that has formed on top, stir in the cooked vegetables and pancetta, simmer for a further hour or until the shin is tender, season to taste, discard the thyme and bay and allow to cool in a shallow bowl. This stage can be completed up to 3 days before and reserved covered in the fridge.

Make the suet pastry by combining the beef suet with the flour, seasoning and chopped parsley, add a few tbsp water at a time until a soft dough is formed.

Roll out two-thirds of the suet pastry to a 5mm thickness. Line four 250ml pudding basins, then divide the cooled beef shin mix between them. Roll out the remaining suet pastry and top the puddings. Cover with greaseproof paper and then tin foil. Steam in a pan of simmering water with a tight-fitting lid for 45 mins or until the suet pastry is cooked and the filling piping hot. Turn out carefully onto a warmed plate and serve with creamed potato and your favourite gravy.

BRAWN Ed Smith

Serves: 8 | Prep: 1 hour | Cook: 3-4 hours + plus 2 x 8-hours chilling

INGREDIENTS

— 1 pig’s head (4-5kg)

— 1 pig’s trotter

— 1 large onion, halved

— 3 star anise

— 4 bay leaves

— 8 sprigs of tarragon, leaves picked

— 2 tsp red wine vinegar

METHOD

Use a warm, damp cloth to wipe down the pig’s head. Cut the ears from the head using a sharp knife, and put these and the trotter in a bowl full of warm water and again wipe to ensure the wax and dirt is removed. Use a disposable razor to shave any whiskers and stubble from the head. Cut the flesh attaching the eyelashes away with a sharp knife. That’s the visceral stuff done. Have a coffee or a stiff drink.

Put the head into a large stockpot and cover with cold water. Add the trotter, ears, onion, star anise and bay leaves. Bring to the boil and then reduce to a simmer for 3-3½ hours, when the flesh will be soft and pull away from the head if you prod it.

Remove the ears after 2 hours, rinse and leave to cool. You will need to spoon scum from the surface of the simmering water from time to time.

Once cooked, pour the stock through a colander into another large container. Carefully lift the head out and leave to cool on a platter for 20 mins.

Tip about 2 litres of stock back into the stockpot and reduce by half. Tip into a container and leave to cool, then refrigerate overnight. This allows the stock to settle –leaving gristle at the bottom, fat on top. We want the jelly-like middle bit.

Meanwhile, return to the head and pick the meat from it. It’s best to use your hands. You’ll find plenty of meat in the cheeks, behind the jaw, in the tongue if it’s there (you’ll need to peel). Put all the meat in a container.

Chop one of the ears into very thin slices. Add to the picked meat. You can fry slices of other ear for crackling like salad toppings.

Locate the jowls, the firmer fat that was around the cheeks and has striations of meat throughout. Remove the skin and cut the fat into 1cm dice.

The snout has a kind of firmer, fleshy quality too. Include that in your meaty mix, cover and refrigerate.

The next day, scrape the fat off the top of the jelly-like stock and decant all but the bottom sediment into a saucepan. Gently warm and season with red wine vinegar and a good pinch of salt and pepper.

Chop the tarragon, stir through the pork meat, then tip this into a 2lb/900g terrine mould or loaf tin that’s been lined with clingfilm. Pour the stock over the top – so it covers the meat by about 1cm. Leave to cool for 30 mins, then cover with clingfilm and refrigerate for at least 6 hours.

Where to buy

Cheese WINTER

Look out for: Abondance

Aged pecorino

Basajo

Bermondsey Hard Pressed

Cañarejal Cremoso

Edmund Tew

Fontina Aosta

Gruyère

Pitchfork Cheddar

Raclette d’Alpage

Stichelton

Sussex Blue

Vacherin mont d’Or

Wilde Weide Gouda

Wyfe of Bath

Explore our cheesemongers

Hot mess

Borough Market’s cheesemongers on the joys of cooking with cheese

Tomé Morrissy-Swan

Cheese is among the most versatile of ingredients. And seasonal, too. In spring and summer, I prefer a fresh goat’s cheese, perhaps a cooling burrata; come winter, sturdier mountain cheeses and pungent blues fill my fridge.

Cooking with cheese also changes throughout the year. In summer it might be fresh mozzarella in a salad, or halloumi on the barbecue. In the colder months, it’s all about melting: an oozing mac and cheese, a comforting toastie, or a bubbling baked camembert.

“Cheese is probably the best ingredient in the world for cooking,” says Bronwen Percival, technical director at Neal’s Yard Dairy. While cheese in its “native state” is wonderful, Bronwen marvels at the way it can transform into something completely different. “When you change the temperature of cheese, the taste changes dramatically.”

Coles Loomis, manager of the Jumi Cheese stand at Borough Market, which specialises in Swiss cheeses, agrees. Cheese adds a nuanced and exciting flavour profile to any dish, she explains – the reason we grate parmesan on pasta, for example, is to add umami. Texture is vital, too. “Cheese adds a lovely creaminess to sauces, or a nice melt in baked dishes. You can find a cheese for almost any dish you make, considering how

many different flavour profiles and textures the world of cheese has to offer.”

Take the fondue, that Swiss classic, the pinnacle of rib-sticking, restorative mountain food, and one of the last truly communal meals in Europe. It’s the prime example, perhaps, of melted cheese, right down into a thick, viscous sauce. “Every cheesemonger will have a different answer for what cheese makes the best fondue,” Coles explains. The traditional choice is gruyère or emmentaler, but she recommends shredding a mix of three cheeses, for balance. One hard and nutty, one semi-hard and buttery, and one sharp and slightly acidic. From Jumi’s stock, she suggests schlossberger, aarewasser and emmentaler. Melt them down low and slow, add a splash of white wine and a little minced garlic and herbs, says Coles, and “serve your fondue with anything you want to dip in molten cheese.”

Though Swiss and Italian cheeses may be renowned for cooking, at Neal’s Yard Dairy, British cheeses are the specialty, and they shouldn’t be overlooked when it comes to the kitchen, says Bronwen. A good mature cheddar is great in a mac and cheese, while adding some red leicester to the mix gives it that retro orange hue. She recommends adding cheddar curds if you want more of a stretchy melt. For burgers, Bronwen says an

aged farmhouse cheddar can lose moisture and become crumbly. Try “something younger, but still a classic British cheese, like a wensleydale that has freshness, milkiness, meltability and stretchability, but is not going to interfere with the experience of eating a burger.”

A cheese toastie is a classic for a reason. The combination of crisp, toasted bread and molten cheese is about as comforting and nostalgic as food gets. But with a little effort, even this humble sandwich can be elevated. Bill Oglethorpe, owner of Kappacasein, is about as qualified as anyone to impart knowledge on the grilled cheese. Not only does he run the Borough Market shop that serves the best toasties in the city, he makes much of the cheese that goes into it at his dairy in Bermondsey.

Kappacasein’s legendary toasties are made with a blend of Montgomery’s Cheddar, Ogleshield, a raclette-like cheese partially named after Bill, who developed the recipe, and other hard cheeses, including his Bermondsey Hard Pressed, which is similar in style to gruyère. Bill says the nuttiness of the Montgomery’s combines wonderfully with the milky, savoury Ogleshield and the fruity acidity of the sourdough. When making at home, he recommends thin slices of sourdough bread and a generous amount of cheese, always grated, which melts better,

CHEESE IS PROBABLY THE BEST INGREDIENT IN THE WORLD FOR COOKING. WHEN YOU CHANGE THE TEMPERATURE OF CHEESE, THE TASTE CHANGES DRAMATICALLY

the outer layer of cheese oozing through the bread to help it go deliciously oily (he doesn’t use any butter), and the cheese in the middle retaining some texture. A little raw sliced onion helps balance the rich, fatty cheese. Equipment-wise, all you need is a toastie machine, or a frying pan with a weight. Simple yet luxurious.

While almost any cheese cooks well, Bronwen says that one of the most common misconceptions is that good, artisan cheese is exclusively for the cheeseboard. “Using great quality cheese as a cooking ingredient elevates dishes like nothing else can,” she says. “Don’t be afraid to spend up on cheese as an ingredient. It will change your life.”

CAULIFLOWER CHEESE WITH FESSLI & GRUYÈRE

Rachel Phipps

Serves: 4-6| Prep: 20 mins | Cook: 50 mins

This simple cauliflower cheese recipe celebrates the beautiful flavour of two Swiss cheeses. Fessli, a hard goat’s cheese, is paired with gruyère. The latter provides that classic cheesiness without overpowering the earthy notes from the Fessli. As this cauliflower cheese is more subtle in flavour than the classic cheddar and English mustard version, it works best as a side as part of a larger spread, such as a Sunday roast.

INGREDIENTS

— 400ml whole milk

— 1 dried bay leaf

— 4 black peppercorns

— 1 head of cauliflower, broken into florets

— 30g butter

— 2 tbsp plain flour

— 2 tsp Dijon mustard

— 80g gruyère, grated

— 40g Fessli, grated

— Black pepper, to taste

METHOD

Bring the milk to the boil in a small saucepan with the bay leaf and peppercorns, then set aside off the heat to infuse while you get on with the rest of the recipe.

Heat the oven to 190C. Bring a pan of well-salted water to the boil and cook the cauliflower florets for 8-10 mins (depending on their size), until they’re just barely fork tender. Drain them well then allow to steam dry to remove as much of their moisture as possible.

To make the white sauce, melt the butter in a small saucepan over a medium heat. Once frothing, whisk in the flour and cook, stirring almost constantly for 2-3 mins.

Gradually pour in the milk, still whisking constantly, until you have a smooth sauce. Simmer for 4-5 mins until the sauce has thickened to a béchamel thickness and coats the back of a spoon well – don’t worry if it’s a little thick as moisture will come out of the cauliflower during baking. Season to taste.

Remove from the heat and whisk in the Dijon mustard, followed by half each of the gruyère and the Fessli.

Stir the cauliflower into the white sauce so that it’s well coated, then transfer the whole lot to a medium baking dish. Top with the remaining cheese, and a good few grinds of black pepper.

Bake for 30 mins, until the sauce is bubbling and the cheese is golden on top. Leave to stand for 5 mins before serving.

LEEK & POTATO SOUP WITH SMOKED RACLETTE & TRUFFLE OIL

Elly Curshen

Serves: 4-6| Prep: 10 mins | Cook: 20 mins

Jumi Cheese’s smoked raclette and truffle oil from Tartufaia make this a particularly indulgent soup –a real treat. Serve in small portions – it’s very rich! The experience of smelling and tasting real truffle oil from a specialist supplier is like nothing else. You only need a small drizzle for the soup and the team at Tartufaia will be able to share more delicious ideas for the precious oil. If you want a more everyday (but still delicious) cheesy leek and potato soup, make it with a strong mature cheddar and a drizzle of cream instead of the truffle oil.

INGREDIENTS

— 20g butter

— 1 leek

— 2 medium potatoes — 750ml vegetable stock

— 80g smoked raclette, finely grated — 1 tsp truffle oil, to garnish

METHOD

Trim the dark green tops from the leeks then finely slice the rest and soak in warm water while you thinly slice the potatoes.

Heat the butter in a large, heavy, lidded pan over a medium heat. Drain the leek then add to the pan, with a pinch of salt and cook with the lid on for 4-5 mins until softened but not browned. Add the sliced potatoes, stir to combine with the leek, then pour in the stock to cover. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook for 15 mins until the potatoes are fully soft.

Blend the soup until very smooth then pour back into the pan over a low heat. Stir in the grated cheese, mixing until it melts completely. Season with black pepper to taste.

Serve hot, topped with the truffle oil.

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