Stinging Nettle (“urzici”) & Spinach Soup

This is one of those soups that you do really need after a long, cold, dark winter. Nettles contain so many vitamins and have so many health benefits that you might consider this a blood purifying elixir (and far more civilised than leeches). Apart from the obvious “pain” of picking them and then choosing nice young leaves there isn’t really much to it. The “sting” is deactivated by heat so dont expect a “fugu” like experience! However if pain is what you seek then a dose of “urtication” (flogging with nettles that was believed to relieve palsy and numbness of limbs) might be in order. Enough medieval medicine…this soup is definitely twenty first century and this version is gluten and dairy free.

We are very lucky that in Romania people still gather new season nettles and sell them in plastic bags at the market. Traditionally a puree is made much like (to me at least) the French “epinards aux oeufs” which is absolutely delicious. Now the problem with such virtuous food is that if you don’t do quite enough to it you are in danger of creating something that tastes like juiced roadside weeds. So I add quite a lot of onions and garlic, a generous amount of nutmeg and I thicken with potato or rice.

Ingredients

These are a guide and make quite a lot of soup. If you don’t have so many nettles use more spinach or throw in some courgettes or cabbage.

500g young nettles the stalks and anything that looks remotely “woody” removed

500g spinach – preferably proper spinach not baby spinach. cleaned and well rinsed of sand/earth if using the real thing

1-2 onions – I like a lot of onions

2-6 cloves of garlic. I go for the full 6.

nutmeg – approx 1 heaped teaspoon

a few sprigs of fresh thyme if you have

1 litre of vegetable stock (a good bio brand works well but so does some water, a bit of marmite and a little leftover wine)

1 large boiled potato or a cup of boiled white rice. If not GF sensitive some slices of old white bread gone stale.

I would suggest bay leaves as well but they will get lost in the green and blended bay leaves render the soup so bitter that its inedible. dont risk it! or write an anally retentive stickit on the kitchen wall to REMOVE BAY LEAVES before blending. personal experience and the bitter taste of (in this case literally).

Gadgets & Gizmos

A large saucepan and a hand held blender/ whatever blender you have

How To

Chop the onions up roughly (its going to be blended so no masterchef perfection required here). Fry them in a little oil gently until translucent. Now add the also roughly chopped garlic. do not let it brown.

Add the nettles and the liquid. Boil 2-3 minutes until the nettles are just cooked. Now throw on top the spinach leaves and let them wilt for a further 3-4 minutes. Stir through until the leaves are all floppy and “just cooked” in fact almost still raw.

Add your chosen starch – you dont have to – I just like my soups a bit more substantial.

Blend it!

Now season with the nutmeg, salt and pepper.

Improvs & Ideas

I’ve served it with a chilli/red pepper oil in the photo but a simple drizzle of good olive oil is all thats needed really and a hunk of good bread.

Freezes well but what you want here is freshness and the joy of tasting new season’s produce

Smoked Trout & Leek Quiche with olive oil &wine pastry

Trout is readily available from the rivers of the Carpathians or yes to be honest nowadays the fish farms that dot the valleys. Anyhow its a local fish that has not flown half way round the world to be here and I like using it. It works well with the mild flavour of leeks and the result is a sweet very savoury tart.

Ingredients – for quite a deep 20cm quiche

1 olive oil and wine pastry case [link to recipe]

2 fat fillets of smoked trout or 1 fairly large smoked trout

4 eggs

400ml 3.5% milk or a mix of cream and milk

fresh herbs, bits of rucola. Nice herbs are parsley and dill. Tarragon would be great and very Transylvanian but not with the dill as they would compete. be generous with the greenery

half a leek extremely finely chopped (so you dont need to cook it first)

some salt and pepper

How To

Chop up all your herbs and the leeks and sprinkle into the quiche case

With your fingers roughly break up the smoked trout and place on top of the greenery

Mix the eggs, milk, salt and pepper gently with a fork and pour over the trout & herbs

Press down any “floating” bits of greenery because if they stick out they will burn. However some sort of haphazard, bits poking out look is nice

Cook at 160-170C gently until browned on top and the middle of the quiche no longer wobbles. It will rise up souffle like and then as it cools down setttle down.

Serve warm with a celeriac, carrot and apple salad and I fancy a nice glass of Feteasca Regala with it…

Gin & wild boar sausages (or meatballs or burgers)

Please don’t avoid making sausages because the entire idea of stuffing ground meat into intestinal tubes is abhorrent! Have a go with the seasoning and create amazing meatballs or gastro-burgers. If Michel Roux Jr can create a duck burger then it’s all OK! Now I did create these this week for a dinner where we served parsnip ciabatta (kind of gives it a sweetish flavor). The thought of slapping in a couple of sausages between the bread, adding a bit of salad, some meat juices and some red onion marmalade is more than appealing.

Making good sausages is really all about having good fresh meat, working fast to keep things cold (I know that every American article I read about making your own sausages involves hyper attentive instructions involving ice water baths but this is overkill). Simply work fast and keep things as cool as you can without giving yourself frostbite. The other key to sausages is seasoning – which is why starting with meatballs makes sense. When you have mixed your mixture fry up a little and taste it for seasoning and mouth feel. Now the first pass at this recipe made very lean sausages – not dry and besides you want things a bit lean from gamey sausages – but personally I would steer to a little more fat next time.

We made 5kgs of wild boar with 1 kg of fatty pork. 6kgs of sausages might be a bit much even for the most ardent sausage fan, so I have scaled it down here. The seasonings are personal – but don’t play too much with the salt because it is there for a reason. This recipe was sort of inspired by one of my favorite Greek sausages (involves red wine, chilli and orange zest) and also by my love of juniper. I find restraint quite difficult generally, but in this recipe go easy on the juniper to avoid sausages with a “soapy” flavor.

These sausages go great with a celeriac and potato mash or green lentils cooked in red wine and I really do think as meatballs or burgers sandwiched between good bread or popped in a pita they would be magical. I would be tempted to smoke these and in fact am curing a couple to see how they behave.

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