Cheesy cauliflower and pickled chilli tart; beetroot, herby yoghurt and dukkah; spiced carrot cous cous, harissa honey halloumi
A feast of joyful and comforting vegetable-packed new recipes
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Hello my friends. I’d like to congratulate all of us for almost making it through January. Are you still standing? I’m trying to do that as little as possible these days. After weeks of rather slowly and cumbersomely - because I’m huge and have someone permanently performing TikTok dance routines on my pelvis - beavering away behind the scenes, I come to you with some goodness to bolster and brighten. This is the sort of food my growing body is really craving right now, and I’m so proud to bring you these brand new, vegetable-packed, comforting but joyful things to make with the best of the winter veg and citrus. This month it’s a belter.
There’s a cheese-oozing, pickled chilli-spiked cauliflower tart with crumbly, buttery pastry (described by a very discerning food editor friend as “hands down the best quiche I’ve ever eaten”), and two toothsome, textured, colourful and vibrant salads. I’m talking spiced carrot and chickpea cous cous with - and how’s this for pleasing alliteration - hot harissa honey halloumi; and a beautiful beetroot and citrus concoction, pleasingly bleeding its burgundy juices onto a cooling, creamy slick of herb yoghurt, topped with a fragrant, crunchy pistachio dukkah.
These dishes might sound and look impressive, but they’re actually deceptively simple, and what I love about them is that they’re interesting and elevated enough to serve to pals at the weekend or for a treat lunch, but also pleasingly family-friendly (our toddler devoured the cous cous and beetroots!)
I promise I’ve kept ingredients lists to a minimum and broken them down into simple steps, meaning they’re a snip to pull together, plus each recipe includes some handy new ideas and sub-elements that can be used in isolation - like the amazing pistachio dukkah which is such a quick and easy way to elevate and finish so many dishes. Plus all of them can be made ahead and then dipped in to for sustenance and pleasure over the following days. Or made fresh and eaten there and then as a celebratory salute to the often-overlooked loveliness of this moment’s produce. I’m trying something a bit different this time, attaching a handy printable PDF of the recipes AND including some video snippets for reference as I think that could be more helpful in terms of my cooking and plating style, do let me know if you like this video element?
Full disclosure: I’m a January baby, and so is my daughter. Our birthdays are one day apart - it was SO considerate of her to wait - and while many of you are reading this newsletter today, I’ll be easing into some very low key fortieth birthday celebrations (more on that, and how I’m feeling about turning forty soon), so I may be a bit slower than usual in getting back to your comments. But looking forward to chatting more with you next week when the double birthday madness is out of the way.
Now, to the recipes!
Beetroot, herby yoghurt and pistachio dukkah
Serves 4-6
Some people feel strongly about beetroot and will avoid this recipe (I adore it), and if that’s you, can I suggest using roasted carrots or parsnips instead of beetroot, and also make the case for making the pistachio dukkah regardless, because it’s so easy to do and it makes for the most amazing topping for everything from salad to fried eggs - see further suggestions below. Dukkah is a delicious Egyptian condiment made with roasted nuts (usually hazelnuts rather than pistachios) and seeds and it’s something I make on repeat and in bigger batches in my kitchen because it takes literally minutes to pull together and adds a wonderful crunchy texture, fragrant flavour and real intrigue to so many dishes. Using the beetroot stalks here is a zero waste approach, and they bring a wonderful crunch, but don’t worry too much if you can’t get beets with stalks. Also, I used pink grapefruit here, but if you can get them blood oranges are well worth seeking out for this.
There are two ways you can assemble and serve this salad.