Lamb, rhubarb and chocolate

Easter food past and present

I love Easter and thinking about what to cook much more than I do Christmas. The days are longer and brighter; the daffodils and maybe the tulips are out. I even have a special notes section on my phone, Cook Easter where I copy and paste in recipe links Truth to tell, I do this when people are coming to dinner too and I’ll have a note such as ‘Cook Sybil and Basil’.

Red horse chestnut today, apple blossom yesterday and tulips on Richmond Hill a week ago

Probably not a starter but I like

The recipe for baba ganoush which is distinguished by its use of confit garlic from London’s Oma restaurant in Borough Market

I also liked the leek burek from Helen Graham in the FT.

Diana Henry’s lamb

For the main course, it has to be lamb and I’ve realised that all the recipes I’ve cooked in the last few years have been by Diana Henry. This year, in the Telegraph , it’s Greek with lamb with greens, rice, lemon and feta which, in the comments, she suggests serving with a green tahini sauce. My question is can we have that and still have roast potatoes or is that double carbs?

Or will it be her roast leg of lamb with potatoes, pecorino, basil and garlic, or simply the leg of lamb with lemon and many herbs with a sarassou sauce from How to Eat a Peach or or the yoghurt-marinated roast leg of lamb with pistachio and orange couscous?

In the Guardian, the best sides and condiments for Easter lamb.

I was all set for lamb and then today I read Diana Henry’s Easter menu in Waitrose Weekend with her roast chicken with fennel, sweet potato & black olive stuffing and the roast peppers and onions with balsamic vinegar and pistachio gremolata. I’ll definitely make the peppers and save the chicken for another time

Decorating the Table

This definitely didn’t used to be my thing but now I enjoy it. I pick flowers from the garden or buy a bunch of daffs from the supermarket and put them in mini glass vases. Some are old spice jars I found in a charity shop without the lids. I scatter Cadbury’s mini eggs along the table. One year I was waylaid and bought pastel scented candles in the shape of Easter eggs and my husband has now been deputed to find out where they are in the house so we can use them again this year.

Chocolate

This year, it has to be Dubai chocolate, either Ravneet Gill’s DIY recipe which is made with vermicelli pastry, dark chocolate and white chocolate pistachio from the Guardian or Tarunima Sinha’s recipe for pistachio and kataifi chocolate from the Observer. The link also includes her recipes for fudgy chocolate cake with a cardamom milk soak, chopped chocolate cookies and chocolate, hazelnut and ginger friands.

For all things chocolate, Nigella Lawson can be your go-to.

with her Easter egg nest cake which is a flourless chocolate cake with a ganache icing decorated with mini Easter eggs

or her chocolate Guinness cake which doesn’t even have chocolate in it but uses cocoa powder. Do use a good one.

Or a pile of her brownies decorated with candles or eggs. Everyone has their own special brownie recipe but my daughters and I have been making these for years (without the walnuts) ever since ‘How to be a Domestic Goddess’ came out in 2000. I can’t believe it’s coming up to its silver anniversary. Half the batch is still a lot and just don’t cook them too long so to preserve their squidginess.

Or Benjamina Ebuehi’s double chocolate brownie tart from the Guardian

Rhubarb

Although the forced rhubarb season is finished the rhubarb grown outside is proliferating. We have an allotment glut.

I made Jacob Kenedy’s Fior di Latte ice cream from last weeks Times, ‘just the crumble’ by Benjamina Ebuehi from OFM and roasted some rhubarb in the oven with a tiny bit of sugar. The sun was streaming through the kitchen window this morning so I had to take a photo on the floor up the other end of the room. After all that palaver, I had a bowlful for my breakfast, just to try it out. The crumble is quite moreish on its own.

On Easter Sunday, I’m going to make Sally Clarke’s pistachio pavlova with spring rhubarb from the Guardian two years ago.

And I would like to make the savoury rhubarb, goats cheese and pecan tart from the FT. I’ve had a pack of butter puff pastry in the freezer for ages for this.

Simnel cake

There’s a classic Simnel cake from Alison Oakervee on the Waitrose website.

As I haven’t made one yet, this year I might do Cherie Denham’s all in one Simnel cake which was on Instagram from her book the Irish Bakery. I have the book and I love it. I will put bought marzipan in the middle and the real stuff on the top as I haven’t got enough ground almonds in the cupboard.

Diana Henry’s raspberry lemonade