Side

Even though much of the bitterness of this cultivar has been bred out, some extra sweetness is often welcome. Casting around for something sweet to scatter over a plate of steamed kale, I suddenly remembered the Sicilian habit of adding golden raisins to soft, sweet onions. The contrast between the leaves and their seasoning is strangely comforting. Quite when you might eat this is debatable. We first ate it with treacly rye bread and Gruyère cheese, next to fillets of smoked mackerel. It is tricky to know where it would sit most comfortably.

I often take bright young leaves and their sprouting shoots, cook them briefly in boiling water, then toss them into sizzling butter seasoned with garlic and lemon as an accompaniment for grilled pork belly, a roast fillet of lamb, or a nice piece of fish. That said, it still takes up more room on the plate than the meat. Red Russian kale, which I often cook in this way, is finer boned than the curly plumes we know so well. The heavily laced leaves have a fragility to them, and wilt quickly after picking. For all their gentility and mauve-pink blush, they still carry something of the coarseness of the stronger stuff.

A fantastic little recipe, cheap, simple, and fast. I usually have some bread with this, if only to rub round the plate afterwards. This is best on very hot plates.

The juicy crunch of a raw artichoke bears many of the qualities of a water chestnut. Few ingredients pack such snowy crispness. I use them in a parsley-flecked salad to add a snap to baked pork chops, but have also offered them at a Saturday bread’n’cheese lunch of Cornish Yarg and Appleby’s Cheshire. Lemon is essential if the peeled tubers are not to discolor.

Having discovered the delights of raw artichoke with lemon and walnut oil, it was only a matter of time before the ingredients took the leap into the pan. A main course of artichokes is probably more than most gentle people could take, so I use this as something to cuddle up to a main course. It is very good with smoked mackerel.

“Monday cold cuts” is a key dish in our house: it shows our intent to use every scrap, to make the most of what we have, but it also gives me a break. It is one meal I don’t have to think about other than sharpening the carving knife. The appearance of thin slices of cold meat on the first day of the week also gives me a chance to consider a side dish more interesting than a baked potato. Sometimes I bring out a bubble and squeak, fried in my old cast-iron pan, or some leftover mashed root vegetables warmed in a bowl over hot water with a tablespoon of butter; other times it’s red cabbage, shredded with pickled walnuts as black as coal. Another favorite is a warm salad of some sort of root vegetable, fried or steamed, then turned in a mustardy dressing.

Jerusalem artichokes share with the potato an ability to drink up both dressings and the fat in which they cook. Roll a still-warm steamed artichoke or potato in a sharp oil and vinegar dressing and it will soak up the liquid like a sponge. It is this quality that makes them a candidate for cooking in luxurious mediums such as bacon fat or, better still, duck fat. This contemporary twist on the sautéed potato is, as you might expect, something with which to garnish a steak. An ice-crisp salad of winter leaves (Belgian endive, radicchio, frisée, maybe) would slice the edge off its richness.

Fava beans are gentle, soothing, calm (particularly so when they have been skinned), a vegetable without the vibrancy of spinach or even peas. Surely we don’t always want vegetables to be full of fireworks? Rather than fight this mild character with an addition of spice or bright tastes, I go along with it, and often serve the beans as a side dish with cream and perhaps a stirring of parsley. A dish as soporific as it is beautiful. Some poached ham would be nice here, as might a piece of lightly cooked white fish. Though I would be more than satisfied with some triangles of hot brown toast. Should you happen to have any summer savory in the herb bed, this is your chance to use it.

I was wary of the idea of eating the pods until I grew my own beans; young vegetables tempt in a way that full-sized specimens often don’t. The recipe is only worth doing when you can get your hands on unblemished beans without the cotton-wool lining to their pods and no longer than a middle finger. If you can catch them at this point in their lives, then you can eat them whole, like mangetout (snow peas). Serve warm, with thick pieces of bread or as a side dish for roast lamb or cold ham.

Green stuff—asparagus, nettles, peas, spinach, and fava beans—adds life and vigor to the seemingly endless calm of a shallow plate of risotto. My first attempt found me convinced that I didn’t need to skin the beans. In theory it works, but the skins interfere with the harmony of stock, rice, and cheese and add an unwelcome chewiness. I am not sure you should ever need to chew a risotto.

This is a gorgeous dish, sumptuous and rich, a perfect accompaniment to grilled lamb or to steak. I have served it as a vegetable main dish with brown basmati rice too. By rights, cream and eggplant should never meet, but here they seem to work splendidly.

I make the most of cooking just for myself, with a supper of intense frugality that might not appeal to others. A favorite is a bowl of white rice seasoned with Vietnamese fish sauce and masses of mint and cilantro, eaten from my most fragile and precious bowl. A humble meal of consummate purity. A baked eggplant may not sound like an indulgence, but its luxury and richness lie in its texture rather than its price. A simple supper that feels more expensive than it actually is. Some soft Middle Eastern bread would be good here.

You could probably use any finely ground dried chile for this, but I like the mixed ground seasoning known as nanami togarashi. Togarashi is simply the Japanese term for red chile, but this one is blended with orange peel, sesame seeds, and ginger. It has a slight grittiness that works well with the silky softness of the eggplant. You can find it in any Japanese market. Get the yellow miso, by the way, not the darker and substantially saltier one. Small eggplants are best for this, available from Chinese and Asian markets.

Eggplant and tomato are excellent bedfellows; the sweet sharpness of the tomato adding much in the way of succulence to the bland flesh of the eggplant. Garlic and olive oil are almost certain to come along for the ride. What follows is a recipe I use over and again as a relatively quick supper, occasionally introducing mozzarella instead of Parmesan, and sometimes adding basil with the tomatoes.

It is essential to get an eggplant truly tender. The knife should barely have to cut it. This is easier to achieve when baking or frying than when an eggplant meets the grill. It is, I think, essential that the heat is lowered during cooking so that the inside of the slice has a chance to soften while the crust lightly browns.

The smoky, parchment-hued cream moutabal is one of my desert-island dishes. Few recipes can produce anything as soft and sensuous as grilled eggplant, mashed to a pulp, and seasoned with lemon and sesame paste. The lemon is essential, working an ancient magic when involved with anything charred and smoky. Many lightly bake their eggplant for this, but without a good charring they lack the mysterious, smoky back notes that I consider as much a part of the ingredients as the eggplant itself.