The local market is awash with chard, a vegetable so healthy it could compete with spinach for Popeye’s attention. It’s also one of the easiest plants to grow, doesn’t require much space and shoots up as fast as you can cut it. Cook as soon as possible after you’ve harvested or bought it – this is not a vegetable that likes to sit around.
I also love sorrel, with its acutely lemony sharpness. It’s easy to grow but, unlike chard, very hard to find in the shops, plus it wilts to nothing, so you need a lot. Both are excellent standbys because they can be used in so many things. If stuck, spinach makes a good subsitute for either.
Crisp green potato cakes
Perfect for long, lazy mornings, these are incredibly satisfying, with the green oil and egg yolk oozing over the cakes. They also make you feel as if they’re doing you the world of good. Serves four or five.
750g floury potatoes (ie, maris piper), unpeeled, cut into equal-sized chunks
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
100g sorrel leaves (or spinach)
1 bunch basil, leaves picked
1 clove garlic
4 tbsp olive oil, plus extra to fry
4 tbsp grated parmesan
20g butter
Poached or fried eggs, to serve
Cover the potatoes in cold salted water and bring to the boil. Cook until just beginning to fall apart, then drain and leave to steam dry.
Meanwhile, roughly chop the sorrel and shred the basil, then blitz with the garlic. Stir in the oil and parmesan, and season to taste.
Once the potatoes are cool enough to handle, peel off their skins (I sometimes keep them for baking into crisps). In a bowl, crush the spuds with a potato masher until just broken down, stir through two-thirds of the green sauce and season again to taste – you want them packed with flavour.
Shape the potatoes into eight to 10 peach-sized balls and flatten out between your palms. Melt half the butter in a large frying pan over a high heat (add a splash of oil to prevent it burning) and lay in a batch of potato cakes. Immediately turn down the heat to medium, and cook for a minute and a half to two minutes a side, until a nice golden crust has formed; they can break up with rough handling, so turn them gently. Repeat with the remaining butter and potato mix.
To serve, put a couple of the cakes on each plate and top with a fried or poached egg. Spoon over some of the remaining sauce and, if you like, a little extra grated parmesan.
Pan–fried hake with swiss chard and smoky aïoli
Chard in season is so prodigious that it can become jading, but I recently tried it with this chipotle-spiked mayo and thought it was stunning, even if I say so myself. The sweet, slightly spicy tones of the mayo bring alive the soft flavours of the chard and hake, and it melts over everything with delicious silkiness. If you can’t get chard, slow-cook courgettes or marrow instead. Serves four.
2 bunches swiss chard (about 1kg)
7-8 tbsp olive oil
6 spring onions, finely sliced
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely sliced
½ bunch coriander, leaves roughly chopped and stalks finely chopped
Juice of ½ lime
4 hake fillets, about 150g each
For the aïoli
1 chipotle chilli (or 1-2tsp chipotle adobo)
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 tsp Dijon mustard
2 egg yolks
Salt and pepper
125ml olive oil
125ml vegetable oil
Juice of 1 lime
1 tsp soft brown sugar
For the mayo, open the chilli out like a book and discard the seeds. Put a small pan on a medium heat and dry fry the chilli for a couple of minutes, until it begins to smell fragrant; don’t burn it, or it’ll taste bitter.
In an upright blender, blitz the chilli, add the garlic, mustard and egg, and blitz some more, seasoning with a few pinches of salt. With the motor running slowly, add the oil drop by drop until the mixture starts to thicken and emulsify, at which point add the rest of the oil in a thin stream. Add the lime juice, stir in the sugar and season to taste.
Put a pan of water on to boil. Separate the chard leaves from the stalks, and cut the stalks into 2cm pieces. Blanch these for three minutes, then add the leaves and cook for two to three minutes more, until soft. Drain and leave to steam.
Heat the oil in a large frying pan on a medium heat, and fry the onions, garlic and coriander stalks with a pinch of salt until softened – three to four minutes. Squeeze any excess water from the chard and add to the pan. Season with a little salt and pepper, and fry until warmed through. Stir in the coriander leaves so they wilt, squeeze in the lime, remove from the heat and keep warm.
Dry the hake on both sides with kitchen paper, and season generously, also on both sides. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over a medium-high heat and fry the fish for three minutes or so a side (timing will depend on its thickness), until golden and just cooked through; if you want the fish to cook faster, just cover the pan so it steams and fries. Serve on top of the chard with a dollop of mayonnaise on each piece.
And for the rest of the week
I love making filo parcels of leftover chard with toasted pinenuts, raisins, lemon zest and feta: just bake until golden and crisp. Make double the amount of basil and sorrel oil, put in a jar and keep in the fridge: it makes a great dressing for soups and salads, and a good last-minute pesto with the addition of a few ground nuts and parmesan. Sorrel goes very well with the sweetness of toasted hazelnuts – add a generous handful with some dried chilli for a lively pesto. Finally, try sorrel (or spinach) soup, laced with a grind of mace, thickened with a forgotten potato and made irresistible with a dollop of crème fraîche and a slick of chilli oil.
• Thomasina Miers is co-owner of the Wahaca group of Mexican restaurants.
Follow Thomasina on Twitter.
