The Guardian

Food & drink Nigel Slater

New ways with the refreshing green leaves of early summer

Photographs JONATHAN LOVEKIN  @Nigelslater

These days of early summer with crisp young greens at the market and the garden fizzing with new growth are glorious. This week, I stuffed great handfuls of spinach – thick stemmed, leaves as pointed as an arrow – into a deep saucepan, letting them cook for a minute or two in their own steam, then tossed them with young broad beans into a classic, aromatic white sauce. The filling was then covered with a rubble of butter crumbs and baked until the greenfreckled sauce bubbled up around the edges and the crumble was lightly crisp.

Deeper into summer, I will make this recipe with lightly cooked runner beans and shredded summer cabbage. Blanched asparagus may go in, too, especially now the price of homegrown spears has come down. The crucial point is to make a seriously good sauce, using cloves, bay leaves and onion, but also to give your sauce the baptism of time. A béchamel, thoughtfully seasoned and given a good 25 minutes or longer over a very low heat with scarcely a bubble to be heard, is a cook’s time well spent.

The sauce will happily take some fat, cooked butter beans, nuggets of crisp bacon or a spoonful of fried onions. You could add a handful of finely grated cheese to the crumble if you fancied, but I’m not sure it is necessary.

The crumble came to the table with a crunchy salad: cool cucumber and microgreens (radish sprouts, broccoli and alfalfa) and the punch of wasabi paste. The contrasts of cool, crisp and hot made for a better cucumber salad than I can remember, one that I must bring out more often. The microgreens were more than purely cosmetic; they carry peppery notes that make their inclusion worthwhile.

Green vegetable crumble

A calming dish of gentle summer flavours. It is worth mentioning that the crumble can be assembled the day before and baked as needed. Serves 4

milk 600ml

bay leaves 3

onion 1, small

cloves 4

black peppercorns 6

butter 50g

plain flour 50g

crème fraîche 100g

spinach 500g, large-leafed variety

peas 200g, podded weight

broad beans 400g, podded weight

For the crumble:

flour 100g

butter 100g

breadcrumbs 50g, soft and fresh

thyme leaves 1 tbsp

Pour the milk into a saucepan, add the bay leaves and the onion, peeled and cut in half, then add the cloves and whole peppercorns. Watch carefully, then just as the milk is reaching boiling point, remove from the heat and set aside for 20 minutes to infuse.

In a nonstick saucepan, melt the butter over a moderate heat, then stir in the flour. When you have a thick, biscuitcoloured paste, let it cook for a minute or two, stirring regularly, then pour in the milk, slowly, stirring constantly, holding the aromatics back in the pan (you can discard them, they have done their work).

Keep the sauce at a low to moderate heat, stirring regularly, and let it cook for a good 20-25 minutes. Should the sauce be lumpy, then beat with a whisk until smooth. Stir in the crème fraîche. Check the seasoning and set aside.

Make the crumble: put the flour in a mixing bowl and rub in the butter with your fingertips (or give it a quick blast in a food processor) until it resembles the texture of coarse fresh breadcrumbs. Add the breadcrumbs, the thyme leaves and 1 tbsp of water. Shake the bowl from

Perfectionism

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2023-06-04T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-06-04T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://guardian.pressreader.com/article/281844353015456

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