It’s a super exciting time of the year for cooks and gardeners.
The hungry gap is almost over. We’ve been rewarded with a bumper garden rhubarb harvest this year after we piled on a generous mulch of compost last autumn.
The soil has warmed up so we’re sowing seeds as fast as we possibly can. The ground needs to be between 6-10C before seeds will germinate but of course you can scatter salad leaf seeds into a seed tray on your windowsills or radish seeds into a mushroom chip. (The latter need a greater depth of soil) and will be ready to enjoy, 3-4 weeks from now depending on whether they are grown inside or outside. Make sure to enjoy the fresh leaves also, just add them to a salad of fresh spring greens.
It’s also a terrific time of the year for foraging for ‘weeds’ and edible flowers. We’ve been adding the tender, young leaves of hawthorn into our green salads too. That may sound crazy, but they are scientifically proven to be hugely beneficial to our cardiovascular system, so go and have a nibble, check it out…
Both hawthorn and blackthorn are Irish natives, the leaves come first on the May bush (hawthorn) and the flowers come later and the haw fruits ripen in autumn to the delight of the birds.
The fruit of the blackthorn on the other hand are sloes. The fluffy white flowers come before the leaves in May so make a mental note of where you spot a shrub so you can harvest sloes in early September in time to make a batch of sloe gin for Christmas.
Asparagus spears are loving this warm, sunny weather, they’ve been popping out of the ground with gay abandon for the past few weeks. Enjoy the Irish crop while it’s in season, Bradley Putz’s asparagus from Lisheen Greens can be found at his stall at Skibbereen Farmers’ Market. Get there early on Saturday morning before it’s all snapped up. It’ll be quite different from the Italian or French asparagus on the supermarket shelves.
My most recent discovery at our local fish shop is monkfish cheeks. They are about the size of a ‘half-crown’ if that rings bells and can of course be poached, fried in a little sizzling butter or grilled. They are exquisite served with sea kale, asparagus and a buttery sauce – a feast.
Rhubarb, sea kale and asparagus are really worth growing in your garden. Rhubarb is relatively easy to buy during the season. Irish asparagus is difficult enough to find whereas sea kale is virtually never sold in shops or supermarkets so it’s essential to put the effort into growing your own for its delicate, exquisite taste. It’s even more rare and delicious than Irish asparagus, you’ll need to cover the crowns to protect them from January until April. Traditionally, with terracotta pots which look beautiful in your garden. Apart from costing an arm and a leg, they are really difficult to source but black plastic bins weighted down with a brick or heavy stone works perfectly even though they look far from photogenic.
There are also lots and lots of young spring nettles ready for the picking so next week, I’ll devote an entire column to them.
Meanwhile, try this new recipe for Monkfish cheeks with asparagus and butter sauce.
Sea Kale on Toast
We grow sea kale both in the herb garden and the kitchen garden – it really is the most exquisite vegetable – delicate and precious. It’s rarely found in the shops so for that reason alone it’s really worth trying to find a space in your garden or flower bed. You’ll need chimney liners, or plastic buckets or in an ideal world terracotta sea kale pots to blanch the sea kale from November to April. I’ve got lots of wonderful frost proof pots made by the Whichford Pottery in Warwickshire. The sea kale pots are not exactly ‘given away’ but I was unbearably tempted when I saw them at the Chelsea Flower Show, so I went on a mighty spree and had to hide the evidence for ages. The special sea kale pots with the little lids to enable one to peep into the pots to check the growth, are best. Even if you don’t grow sea kale, they look great in the garden all year round.
Serves 4-6
Ingredients
450g sea kale
50-75g butter
salt and freshly ground pepper
Method
Wash the sea kale gently and trim into manageable lengths – about 10cm. Bring about 600ml water to a fast rolling boil, add one teaspoon of salt. Pop in the sea kale, cover and boil until tender – 5 to 15 minutes depending on thickness.
Just as soon as a
knife will pierce the sea kale easily, drain it and then serve on hot plates
with a little melted butter and perhaps a few small triangles of toast. At the beginning of its short season in
April, we serve it as a first course on hot toast with melted butter or
Hollandaise sauce. When it becomes more
abundant it makes a wonderful accompaniment to fish, particularly poached Wild
Irish Salmon or Sea Trout.
Poached Monkfish Cheeks with Asparagus Butter Sauce
This is by far the most popular monkfish dish in our restaurant. Serve it sparingly for a special occasion and don’t compromise the recipe!
Serves 6 as a main course
Ingredients
675g fresh monkfish cheeks
1.2 litres water
1 tsp salt
Asparagus Butter
6-12 spears of asparagus, depending on length
150g butter (preferably unsalted)
225ml cream
Garnish
sprigs of chervil
Method
Trim the monkfish cheeks if necessary. Sprinkle lightly with salt and refrigerate until needed.
To prepare and cook the asparagus.
Hold each spear of asparagus over your index finger down near the root end, it will snap at the point where it begins to get tough (use the woody ends for asparagus stock for soup). Some people like to peel the asparagus, but we rarely do.
Tie similar-sized asparagus in bundles with raffia. Choose a tall saucepan – one can buy specially designed tall asparagus pots with baskets.
Alternatively, cook in about 2.5cm of boiling salted water (1 teaspoon salt to every 600ml) in an oval cast-iron casserole. It’s really easy to overcook because it’ll go on cooking after you remove it from the heat. or until a knife tip will pierce the root end easily. Cook for 3-4 minutes until al dente and drain.
Put the cream into a heavy bottomed saucepan and gently reduce to about 3 tablespoons or until it is in danger of burning, then whisk in the butter bit by bit as though you were making a Hollandaise sauce.
Trim off the tips of the asparagus, then slice the stalks. Gently fold both into the butter. Thin the sauce with a very little of the warm asparagus cooking water if necessary and keep warm.
Bring the water to the boil and add the salt. Add the monkfish cheeks and simmer for 4-5 minutes or until completely white and no longer opaque. Drain well. Arrange in a warm serving dish or on individual plates.
Coat
the monkfish cheeks with the asparagus butter.
Garnish with sprigs of chervil and serve immediately.
Myrtle’s Almond Tart with Roast Rhubarb, Strawberries and Sweet Cicely
This was one of the first recipes I learned from Myrtle when I came to Ballymaloe House in the late 1960’s – still a top favourite. I love the contrast of the bittersweet rhubarb and strawberries with the crunchy almond base. Raspberries can also be used or even a blob of homemade raspberry jam and softly whipped cream in a tartlet – irresistible for afternoon tea.
Serves 12, makes 24 shallow tartlets or 2 x 18cm tarts
Ingredients
110g soft butter
110g caster sugar
110g ground almonds
300ml whipped cream
Filling
roast rhubarb (see recipe from my column on March 29th 2025)
early Irish strawberries (or raspberries in season)
Redcurrant Glaze (optional)
Garnish
sweet cicely
2 x 18cm sandwich tins or 24 tartlet tins
Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4
Cream the butter and sugar together, stir in the ground almonds together. Divide the mixture between the two tins. Bake in the pre-heated oven for 20-30 minutes approx., or until golden brown. The tarts will be too soft to turn out immediately, so cool for about 5 minutes before removing from tins. Do not allow to set hard or the butter will solidify, and they will stick to the tins. If this happens, pop the tins back into the oven for a few minutes so the butter melts, they will then come out easily. Allow to cool on a wire rack.
Just before serving, arrange the roast rhubarb on the base, top with raspberries. Glaze with red currant glaze. Decorate with rosettes of whipped cream. Garnish with sweet cicely.
Red Currant Glaze
Ingredients
350g red currant jelly
1 tbsp water approx. (optional)
Method
In a small stainless steel saucepan melt the red currant jelly, add 1 tablespoon of water if necessary. Stir gently, but do not whisk or it will become cloudy. Cook it for just 1-2 minutes longer or the jelly will darken. Store any leftover glaze in an airtight jar and reheat gently to melt it before use. The quantities given above make a generous 300ml of glaze.
* If you are using yellow or green fruit, use apricot glaze instead of red currant jelly.