Seasonal local food recipe No.263 – Hugh’s pasta with purple sprouting broccoli, garlic and chilli

This is a variation on a recipe from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s book River Cottage Veg Every Day I posted last spring, using purple sprouting broccoli instead of spring greens, but it is so good that I think it is worth sharing it again.  If you don’t have a fresh chilli you can use 2 pinches of dried chilli flakes.

Serves 4

Cooking and preparation time: 15-20 minutes

Ingredients
250g purple sprouting broccoli
6 Tbs olive oil
1 red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely slivered
300g pasta shapes such as penne or fusilli
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

To serve:
olive oil
parmesan cheese, grated

Method
Rinse the broccoli and break into bite-sized pieces. Bring a large pan of water to the boil and add the pasta.   Add the broccoli to the pasta giving it a good 5 minutes cooking time.  Warm the olive with the chilli and garlic for a few minutes.

Once the pasta is al dente, drain the pasta and broccoli thoroughly and toss with the olive oil, chilli and garlic.  Check the seasoning then serve with olive oil for trickling and lots of grated cheese.

Purple-sprouting broccoli in Camel CSA’s veg boxes

Purple or white sprouting broccoli in our veg boxes

It’s a bit of a lottery this week. Our veg box members are getting one of two types of sprouting broccoli – either purple (Camel CSA) or white (Restharrow Farm, Trebetherick). There’s a very subtle distinction!

All boxes have: –
* sprouting broccoli (Camel CSA/Restharrow)
* spinach or chard leaves (Camel CSA)
* cabbage (Camel CSA)
swede (Restharrow)
onions (Restharrow)
cauliflower (Restharrow)
potatoes ‘Wilja’ (Restharrow)

Standard boxes also have: –
extra 500g potatoes
* flat-leaved parsley (Camel CSA)
* radish bunch (Camel CSA)
* mixed salad bag** (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles
** baby leaf beet, lettuce, rocket,  red mustard and golden mustard greens

Seasonal local food recipe No. 132: Char-grilled sprouting broccoli with sweet tahini

Apologies for the lack of a recipe last week. This unusual winter salad can be made very quickly. It comes from chef Yotam Ottolenghi‘s weekly column in the Guardian. He says: “This salad is loved even by those who claim not to like tahini.”

Serves four

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes (at most)

550g purple-sprouting broccoli
1 tbsp olive oil
Salt and black pepper
40g tahini paste
1½ tsp honey
2 tsp lemon juice
1 small garlic clove, peeled and crushed
1 tsp each black and white sesame seeds, toasted (or just 2 tsp white)

Trim any big leaves off the broccoli and cut off the woody base of the stems. Blanch for three minutes in boiling, salted water until al dente, refresh, drain and leave to dry.

Toss the broccoli in the oil, a teaspoon of salt and a large pinch of pepper, then cook on a very hot ridged griddle pan for two minutes on each side, until slightly charred and smoky. Set aside to cool.

Whisk the tahini, honey, lemon juice, garlic and a pinch of salt, and slowly start to add water half a tablespoon at a time. At first, the sauce will look as if it has split, but it will soon come back together. Add just enough water to make the sauce the consistency of honey – around three tablespoons in total.

Arrange the broccoli on a platter, drizzle with sauce and scatter with sesame seeds. Serve at room temperature.

More sprouting broccoli recipes from Camel CSA
Pasta with sprouting broccoli
Stir-fried purple sprouting broccoli