Leek & Lemon Orzotto with Hazelnuts

by Liz Child

Leeks are one of our favourite vegetables. They are so delicious, I like to make them the star of the show when I cook with them. This simple, one-pot, spring dish is all about those luscious, soft and sweet leeks offset by toasty, crunchy hazelnuts (we stock organic hazelnuts in compostable bags here) and tangy caramelised lemon. Orzo is just rice shaped pasta which I love to cook like risotto rice, we stock an organic bag from Irish company, Bunalun. We love their store cupboard staples so much. Top quality, organic and affordable. Add some Bunalun groceries to your next fruit and veg order with us here. We deliver nationwide.

Liz x

Ingredients (serves 4 hungry people)

Method

  1. Find a large, deep, frying pan or pot. Start by toasting the hazelnuts in the dry pan. Just turn the heat to medium-high, tumble the hazelnuts into the pan and keep them moving around until they smell amazing and are deliciously toasty. Tip them into a bowl to cool a little then chop or crush into smaller pieces and save for finishing your dish at the end.
  2. Then, in the same pan, add the butter and oil. Place the lemons, cut side down, into the melted fat and let them cook until caramelised. Remove them to a bowl to finish your dish with later too. Caramelised lemon is so delicious. It makes the lemon softer, juicier and sweeter…and it looks pretty too.
  3. Tip the chopped leeks and garlic into the pan and season with salt and pepper. Stir fry until the leeks are starting to soften.
  4. Add the orzo and stock to the pan and simmer and stir until the pasta has absorbed the liquid and is cooked through. Taste and tweak the seasoning if needed with more salt and pepper.
  5. Stir the chopped parsley through, then serve in four bowls, each topped with a caramelised lemon half and a handful of chopped, toasted hazelnuts. Enjoy!

Easter Dates

by Liz Child

These sweet treats are so easy and fun to make. A delicious chocolate layer around a sticky date (which tastes just like caramel), stuffed with nut butter – this treat is reminiscent of a snickers bar, but the quality ingredients make it so much better! You can customise them to your taste using your favourite chocolate, nut butter and decorations. I’ve gone for a white chocolate drizzle here, but crushed hazelnuts or desiccated coconut make delicious decorations. Or try some Achill Island flakey sea salt to offset the sweetness of the dates? I’d love to see your re-creations. Tag us on social media or share in the comments below.

Liz x

Ingredients

  • Pitted dates
  • Your choice of nut or seed butter (we stock peanut, almond, hazelnut and tahini works well here too – or you can make your own nut butter, it’s easy! Simply blend roasted nuts or seeds into butter with a pinch of salt. We sell organic nuts and seeds in compostable bags here.)
  • Your choice of chocolate (we stock a really good range of ethically sourced, organic chocolates here.)
  • Your choice of toppings or decorations eg white chocolate, crushed nuts, desiccated coconut, sea salt flakes…

Method

  1. Gently melt chocolate in a bowl over a simmering pot of water. Place a sheet of baking parchment on a tray or chopping board.
  2. Open up a date and stuff it with a 1/2 tsp or so of nut butter. Close the date up again.
  3. Dunk the stuffed date in the bowl of melted chocolate. Use two small forks to turn the date over a few times to get it completely coated in chocolate. Then remove the date with a fork and place on the baking parchment.
  4. Repeat until you have made as many Easter dates as you like. Now, while the chocolate is still wet, you can quickly decorate the dates with some sprinkles of salt/nuts/coconut or a drizzle of white chocolate.
  5. Allow the chocolate to completely set in a cool place. Then enjoy! Pack into little Easter baskets to share with friends or bring along to a coffee date. They should stay fresh in an airtight container in the fridge for 4 days.

Is Cheap Food Undermining Our Food Security?

by Kenneth Keavey

This was a piece I was asked to write for the Sunday Times last weekend:

The start of a new growing season is upon us, and it always fills me with a sense of hope for the future. The plants will grow, and in a few short months we will be harvesting some of Ireland’s finest bounty. As with many growers, and food producers up and down the country this is a key time, but this year it feels different; the costs of producing food are skyrocketing, there is a sense of nervousness, the price of inputs are up and at the same time there is a squeeze on prices to meet the demands of the big retailers. And sometimes the sums just do not add up.

What does all this mean for a little country that is intensely reliant on food imports for its survival? As a food producing nation it seems we actually produce relatively little of what we eat, importing a staggering 77% of our food. We have been concentrating and focusing for many years now on developing an intensive and export driven meat and dairy industry, and as the intensification of the industry has accelerated, it has become more reliant on imported grain to sustain the national herd, with 60% of said grain imported. That equates to 3.47 million tonnes of grain feed imported into Ireland every year to feed our animals.

Our food security as a nation has been brought into the limelight as Charlie Mc Conalogue the minister for agriculture stated during the week.“Food security is really important over the next number of weeks and months and it is something we have to work together on.” Well Charlie, I think it is pretty important just about all the time, and it is unfortunate that the tragic events of the last month are required to bring what food we produce and how we produce it onto centre stage.

Irish farmers were asked last week to consider the idea of growing grain and fodder crops to help feed our population and our burgeoning dairy and beef herd. But the necessary skills cannot be magicked up over-night, it takes time, specialised machinery and experience to learn to grow crops on a reasonable scale.

It’s a pity then that Charlie does not turn his focus on the below cost selling practice by supermarkets which has weakened our non-export focused food industry and is causing more primary food producers to struggle to sustain their enterprises. The Jim Powers economics report published this week, states that retail prices compression threatens the viability of Irish horticulture which could lead to even more reliance on imports to feed our nation. The most recent national field vegetable census showed that the number of field vegetable growers fell from 377 in 1999 to 165 in 2014. That is a contraction of 56%

These skills are lost for ever, and once they are gone are difficult to replace.

If we don’t want to end up being a nation even more reliant on imports maybe we should shift our focus from an export dominated beef and dairy industry, to an industry that produces more crops destined for consumption at home and pay the farmer a fair price for the food. Surely that would allow us to invest and build a more secure and resilient food system.

Kenneth

Food Resilience

by Liz Child

A resilient food system is one with the ability to prepare for, withstand and recover from a crisis or disruption. This is important at any scale. If you are an allotment holder or have a veg patch in your garden, you want it to be resilient. You want to ensure your efforts can’t be completely destroyed by unexpected pests or weather so you plant a variety of crops in case some fail, you prepare for and prevent damage from pests and weather. The same goes if you have a large farm – it’s wise to plan with resilience in mind too. Planting huge mono-crops, or factory farming animals, although less work and more profitable in the short term, is terrible for the soil and the environment, and you need to use a lot of pesticides and antibiotics to ward off large scale pests and disease. It is a shortsighted, damaging way of farming.

Organic farms on the other hand, have resilience built into their roots. Organic agriculture doesn’t rely on external, artificial or chemical inputs, or genetic engineering to grow sufficient food. Organic vegetable farmers grow trees and hedges alongside a diverse range of crops and cover crops which mimics nature and prevents flooding, drought, pests, soil degradation, water pollution and more. All these protective and nourishing measures combat climate change and future-proof our agricultural land. We dream of a future where organic farming practises are the norm.

We like to think, if you run a country, food resilience and the ability to feed the nation when things go wrong should be one of your top priorities. Resilience-testing events like climate change and wars are no longer just on the horizon. So apart from voting for leaders who prioritise climate action, peace and fair trade with our neighbours, what can we do to ensure Ireland is a food resilient nation? We say, also vote with your money – buy local whenever it’s available and alway choose organic. What are your thoughts?

Okonomiyaki (Japanese style cabbage pancakes)

by Liz Child

This plant-based twist on the ’anyway you like it’ Japanese street food might be my new favourite way to eat cabbage! Instead of an egg and wheat batter (and several impossible-to-find specialist Japanese ingredients) I’ve used a simple chickpea flour batter. This simple dish doesn’t take long to put together and is perfect for any meal! Breakfast, brunch, lunch or even a quick dinner. Top with mayonnaise (I like a bit of sriracha too), kimchi (find my recipe here) and sesame seeds. Delicious!

Liz x

Ingredients (serves 2)

  • 1 small mug of chickpea flour
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 small mug of water
  • 1/4 of a cabbage, chopped
  • 1 nori seaweed sheet, snipped into strips
  • vegetable oil for frying
  • kimchi, mayonnaise, sriracha and sesame seeds to serve

Method

  1. Whisk the chickpea flour, salt and water together into a smooth batter.
  2. Add the cabbage and nori and mix well to coat them in the batter.
  3. Heat a frying pan over a medium heat and add a generous drizzle of vegetable oil.
  4. Add half the mixture to the pan and spread out. When golden brown underneath, carefully loosen and flip the pancake over and cook on the other side until golden brown.
  5. Cook the other half of the mixture in the same way then serve with toppings as you like.

Kimchi

by Liz Child

We are very excited about the first harvest of radishes this year. Have you ever grown them yourselves? They’re what we recommend for beginners (or kids!) as they are so satisfying to grow and only take a few weeks to turn from tiny seed to plump, ruby bulbs. They are so refreshing and peppery, of course brilliant in a salad, but our favourite way to eat them is fermented in a kimchi along with their leaves. Zero waste! Kimchi is a really delicious fermented cabbage, Korean side/topping, like a spicy version of sauerkraut. If you’ve never tried it before, it’s like a pickle – tangy, salty and spicy. So good with rice or noodles, in sandwiches (you HAVE to try a kimcheese toastie!) …we love filling dumplings with tofu and kimchi and pilling it up on savoury cabbage pancakes. Here’s the very flexible recipe.

Liz x

Ingredients (these are suggestions and amounts can be flexible)

  • 1 cabbage (Chinese Napa cabbages are traditional but you can use any loose, leafy cabbage – Savoy or January King work really well here)
  • 4 carrots
  • 2 bunches of radishes (including their leaves)
  • 1 leek or a bundle of scallions
  • Optional extra veg like a kohlrabi or a turnip…
  • 6 cloves garlic, 1 large thumb of ginger and 3 red chillies to make a paste
  • salt (2% of the weight of all the above)

Method

  1. You will need clean equipment (large bowls, jars, chopping board, knife, blender, serving spoon and rolling pin) but it does not have to be sterilised. Apart from the superior taste and beneficial bacteria, fermenting rather than pickling is also easier in this way.
  2. Rinse your vegetables and start chopping. Save a few outer leaves of the cabbage but cut the rest into bite sized pieces. Weigh it and add to a large bowl. Thinly slice the other vegetables, leave the radish leaves whole, weigh them and add to the bowl.
  3. Weigh the garlic, ginger and chilli then blend into a paste. Add up the weights of all the different veg to find the total weight and work out what 2% is.
  4. Measure the salt and mix it through the chopped vegetables. Give them a light massage to encourage brine to form. Then stir the spice paste through using a serving spoon.
  5. Pack the mixture very tightly into jars. Use the spoon or a clean rolling pin to really pack the vegetables into the jar ensuring no air-pockets have formed. Leave a couple of inches of head room in the jar if you can. Then break a reserved cabbage leaf to size and press it down on top of the cut vegetables and tuck it in under the shoulders of the jar to keep the small bits of sliced vegetables submerged in brine. If they get exposed to air then they are likely to go mouldy. Your cabbage leaf may be enough to keep the kimchi submerged in brine, if not, use a weight. Something brine-proof like a glass, small jar or ramekin.
  6. Place the lid on the jar loosely to allow gases to escape during fermentation (be aware your kitchen is going to smell a bit funky this week!) and put the jar on a plate in a room temperature place in your kitchen, not too exposed to light as the extreme changes in temperature are not ideal. Allow the kimchi to ferment at room temperature for one week then refrigerate.
  7. TOP TIPS: – no double dipping! This could introduce new, unwanted bacteria from your mouth. – Remember the mantra, “Submerge in brine, all will be fine”. Check the jar every day whilst fermenting. Have the gases pushed the vegetables up above the brine? If so push them back under with a clean spoon.

Below Cost Selling

by Kenneth Keavey

How many more horticultural enterprises organic or otherwise need to go to the wall before we realise it is too late?

A very significant report has been commissioned by the IFA and published this week: the Jim Power Economics’ report states ‘Retail Price Compression Threatens the Viability of Irish Horticulture’. In other words loss leading and below cost selling of fresh produce is putting Irish farmers out of business. 

The report’s findings are far from surprising and many primary producers up and down the country will tell you, the power that large retailers hold is enormous. They have hollowed out the horticulture industry here in Ireland and it is in real danger of closing it’s doors for good unless there is meaningful change. 

It states that farmers are the weakest link in the supply chain, they have the least say in what they get for the food they grow.

Imagine the food we eat, put into our bodies, the very stuff that makes us tick and to a large extent will dictate how long we will live, our fresh food as far as supermarkets are concerned should cost as close to zero as possible.  Are we all complicit in this race to the bottom though?

It is why in part that we ditched supply to the supermarkets all those years ago, in the famous words of Frank Sinatra we decided “to do it our own way”.  It isn’t all roses either here as we are constantly competing with the very idea that food should be cheap, and we cannot compete with the supermarkets. 

But it really is only through your support, by reading this, by supporting our business and farm week in week out that we are still here and have expanded our farm and continue to grow healthy happy food, whilst nurturing the land for 16 years.

The report goes on to say:

“A cheap food policy is not a sensible food policy”

It singles out the discounters as the main driver that have severely undercut the price given to Irish farmers, and as a result all other major retailer have had to follow suit to stay competitive. The end result is less for the farmer. This year the second biggest Brussel sprout farmer in Ireland closed his doors for good as the price he was getting for his food meant his business was unsustainable.

I really wonder how many of those farmers that adorn the walls of the supermarket aisles have forced smiles on their faces for fear of losing their contracts? 

As real costs increase and as the price the farmer gets paid for the produce decreases how does that equation end up? Yesterday we paid over €2000 for agri diesel for our tractors, last year it was less than half that.  It clearly is not sustainable.

Where will all this end, I wonder? Well maybe, just maybe, it will end with change, and with more and more people making the choice to support local food where possible, even if it costs more (and yes in these times that is a big ask). 

But the benefits are immense: Local food means better food, healthier food, local jobs, local enterprise in rural areas, higher nutritional content, better flavour.  If it is organic too then the health benefits and the benefits to the planet are surely worth something too?

Kenneth

Unsustainable Supermarkets

by Liz Child

The word ‘sustainable’ doesn’t just refer to environmental issues, it can refer to anything and means ‘something that is able to be maintained at a certain level’, like matters of economy and food security. So when we say ‘supermarkets are unsustainable’ we are not just talking about their over-use of plastic or their mountains of food waste, we are also talking about the way they source their products and pay their suppliers.

It has recently come to light here in Ireland, (read this article for the facts and figures) that local vegetable growers are being squeezed from all sides, so much so that many vegetable farmers in Ireland are forced to quit. Supermarkets demand lower and lower prices and present vegetables as ‘low value’ with ridiculous discounted prices (which, understandably, customers then begin to see as the norm which perpetuates the problem), and yet farming costs go up and up. It is unsustainable. Where will this leave us in the long term? Will there be no more Irish vegetables soon?

You know something is not right when it is cheaper to put potatoes, cabbages, onions, tomatoes, lettuce etc, all things that grow very well here, on a ship or an aeroplane and bring it over to Ireland than to just grow it here and pay Irish farmers enough to cover their costs. Now, just 1% of all farms in Ireland grow vegetables.

This is not to say importing is wrong. We love to trade with the world, who doesn’t love exotic fruit, tea, coffee, chocolate, olive oil, wine…? In fact, even here in Galway, our small business imports plenty of products and fresh produce ourselves to fill the gaps in your boxes (by the way, we never use airfreight). But when there is an Irish, organic option, even if it is more expensive, we always choose that. We grow as much as we possibly can ourselves, then source from other Irish organic farms, then import the rest. We would love to see more organic vegetable growers here in Ireland.

So what’s the solution? Do we just give up trying to produce vegetables here in Ireland? Do we rely solely on imports? Well, with food security issues being what they are at the moment, we believe that would be a very unwise decision. Not to mention missing out on the many benefits of buying local. One way to help is to buy Irish as much as possible. If you must go to a supermarket, spend a few extra cents getting the Irish option, otherwise we urge you to skip unsustainable supermarkets altogether and buy directly from farmers, farmers markets and veg box delivery schemes like ours. The future of food here in Ireland depends on it.

Have a look at our all-Irish selection here.

Fluffy Broccoli ‘Omelette’

by Liz Child

Another recipe inspired by Ukrainian chef Olia Hercules, is this delicious, veg-forward breakfast. I LOVE having lots of vegetables for breakfast. Sautéed mushrooms, kale, and tomatoes on toast is probably my favourite. So when I re-visited ‘Summer Kitchens’, one of Olia’s brilliant books, and saw this puffed broccoli omelette I knew I had to make a plant based twist.

We have just added chickpea flour to our grocery section. It’s one of my favourite pantry ingredients, so useful for making fritters, socca bread, bhajis, vegan tortillas or quiches and egg free omelettes. To make it puffy, I just used bread soda activated with some apple cider vinegar. The results were delicious and I’ll be recreating this veggie breakfast over and over again using different seasonal vegetables. Of course it would be wonderful with our purple sprouting broccoli and I’m going to use leeks next time for sure! Don’t forget to tag us in your re-creations, we love to see the spin you put on our recipes.

Liz x

Ingredients (serves 2)

  • 1/2 mug of gram flour
  • 1/2 mug of water
  • 1 tsp vinegar
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • black pepper to taste
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • sliced broccoli to cover frying pan
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • salt and pepper to taste

Method

  1. Start with the batter. The longer the chickpea flour has to re-hydrate, the better texture – you could even make the batter the night before and leave it covered overnight at room temperature to lightly ferment. Whisk together the flour, water, vinegar, salt and pepper. Wait to add the baking soda just before frying.
  2. In a frying pan which has a lid, fry the broccoli with the olive oil, salt and pepper until just starting to take on some colour. Then spread the broccoli evenly over the base of the pan and turn the heat down to medium.
  3. Add the baking soda to the chickpea flour batter and whisk it in – the batter should immediately start to fluff up. Quickly pour it over the broccoli and put the lid on the frying pan. This will ensure a crispy bottom and a fluffy, steamed top to your omelette.
  4. After 3-5 minutes or so, the batter should be cooked through. You can test it by touching the top of the omelette, your finger should come off dry without batter.
  5. Slice it into wedges and serve warm. It’s delicious with some juicy sliced tomatoes alongside too.

Beetroot & Tofu-Ricotta Ravioli

by Liz Child

Wouldn’t this pretty pasta be perfect for Mother’s Day? It takes a little more effort than our usual recipes but the ingredients are few, simple and affordable (using our ingredients at the time of writing this blog, this cost €5.64 to make 30 pieces).

Liz x

Ingredients (makes around 30)


~ pasta
• 300g fine flour
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 150ml water
• parsley leaves

~ beetroot tofu-ricotta
• 200g extra firm tofu
• 1 small cooked beetroot
• 1 clove of garlic
• the juice of 1/2 a lemon
• 1 tsp salt
• 5 tbsp olive oil

~ 1/2 jar of pesto to serve

Method

  1. Mix the pasta ingredients (except the parsley) into a shaggy, quite dry dough then knead it very well into a firm, smooth dough. This should take around 10 minutes of kneading. If your dough is too dry, wet your hands occasionally whilst kneading to incorporate just a little extra water. Rest the ball of dough in a bowl covered tightly with a damp tea towel.
  2. Blend all the beetroot ricotta ingredients until smooth. Taste and adjust the seasoning if needed with more salt or lemon.
  3. Roll your pasta dough out on a lightly floured surface. Once you have a large oval/rectangle, arrange some parsley leaves on one half and fold the pasta over. Now roll again into a very long strip, just over double the width of the size you want your ravioli. Get it as thin as you can – you should be able to read a paper through it.
  4. Space teaspoons of the pink ricotta along one side, wet the other side to help it stick, then carefully fold the pasta over the ricotta blobs and use your fingers to seal around each one. Use a knife or pasta wheel to cut the ravioli and save any off-cuts, they are just as delicious!
  5. Drop the fresh ravioli and off-cuts into boiling water, cook until soft but still with bite (around 3 minutes or so – test an off-cut) then scoop out with a slotted spoon, dress with pesto and serve!