Broad beans on toast with sorrel, lemon balm & verbena dressing: a Mostly-Veggie manifesto

Broad beans and peas tossed in a no-lemon lemony dressing piled on top of herby whipped feta and garlic griddled bread. Plus, the big debate: to double pod or not to double pod?

And we’re off!

This is the first of my weekly Mostly-Veggie recipes. All subscribers will receive the recipe to their inbox and paid subscribers will be able to scroll down for a pretty, printer friendly PDF of the recipe and an ‘Extra Helping’ which, this week, is 5 more ways to enjoy your broad bean glut (how is your glut BTW? Mine is vast this year.) Since it’s launch week though, the whole lot is free this week.

Why ‘Mostly-Veggie’?

Well, I’m fed up. Fed up with being told I must pick a side – vegetarian or meat-eater. Why? It’s a false choice – most people don’t cook like this. When I do cookery demonstrations (and I do a LOT), most people in the audience say they want to eat less meat and need ideas for that, but don’t want to cut out meat altogether. And why should they? It is possible to eat meat in a sustainable, considerate way (but that’s a discussion for another time).

Plus, it does vegetables a disservice. What if a little pancetta would make my broad beans sing more sweetly? Can I not use a few chopped anchovies in my raw courgette salad without risky my moral integrity? Honestly, it’s dinner, not Brexit.

So that’s what I’ll be doing here – meat occasionally, meat as seasoning, veg the star of the show.

Right, rant over. Thank you for listening. Let’s get to it.

I’m so thrilled you’re here at the start of the tasty journey through the seasons with me. Thank you for coming and for all your support, it really means a lot to be able to make the recipes I love (rather than tat the algorithm will like) and share them so directly with you. Let me know what you think and shout with any veg gluts you’d like me to wrangle into a recipe in the comments below.

Broad beans on garlic toast with sorrel, lemon balm and verbena dressing

To double pod or not to double pod? That is the question. Personally, I like the slightly bitter toughness of a broad bean jacket, but if they are especially swollen and bursting out of their jackets like a gouty, well-fed Regency gent, then the pale jackets are likely to be chewy and I do think double podding is necessary.

Lemon, feta and broad beans are common bedfellows, so, in my enthusiasm to eat as locally as possible, I set to making a lemon-free lemony dressing. Enter lemon balm (smells like Jif, but takes much better), lemon verbena (sherbet dip in herb form) and sorrel (absolute thug of a plant with a very useful sharp citrus kick), the combination of which creates a mown-grass-meets-smashed-lemon flavoured dressing.

The calendula petals are a showy finish but they bring a mild peppery hit that works nicely with a good extra virgin olive oil.

Serves 1

• 100g fresh peas in their pods

• 300g broad beans in their pods

• 1 tbsp chopped lemon verbena

• 1 tbsp chopped lemon balm

• 1 tbsp chopped sorrel

• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

• 100g feta

• 1 slice sourdough bread

• 1 garlic clove

• Calendula leaves, to serve if available

• Baby sorrel leaves, to serve if available

Pop the peas and broad beans out of their pods and simmer in boiling water for 3 minutes. Drain and denude any larger broad beans of their pale green jackets.

Mix half of the chopped herbs with two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and a pinch of salt. Pour this dressing over the warm peas and beans and set aside to mingle.

Put the rest of the herbs and the feta in the small tub of a food processor and whizz until creamy – it can take a minute or so. Topping done.

For the toast, drizzle a little extra virgin olive oil over both sides of the bread. Set a griddle pan over a high heat whilst you peel the garlic clove, halve it and rub it vigorously all over the bread slice. Really give it some welly. (I know it sounds like a cheffy faff, but the flavour really comes through.) Once the griddle is smoking hot, fry the bread for 3-5 minutes on each side until charred and tempting.

To assemble the dish, slather the hot toast with the herby feta, then pile the bean mixture on top. Shower with a few calendula petals, a baby sorrel leaf, a kiss of extra virgin olive oil, then serve.

From next week, everything below this line in these weekly recipes will be for paid subscribers. If you’d like to sign up, it costs roughly the price of a punnet of strawberries a month.

Broad Beans On Garlic Toast - Kathy Slack

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Extra Helping: 5 More Ways with Broad Beans

The thing about broad beans is that they are all ready at once. This year, I sowed three rows, each a couple of weeks apart, to stagger the harvest. But still, when they come, they come in bucket-loads. So here are some other combinations you might enjoy:

Iberico ham, broad beans, poached egg – bunch slices of ham on a plate. Scatter blanched broad beans on top then finish with a runny egg, broken so it oozes yolk between the folds of ham.

Broad bean dip – great for older, stockier beans. Blanch, pod and whizz a handful of broad beans with a handful of butterbeans, some lemon juice, garlic and salt. Great with fish or as a dip. Just mushy peas really.

Fancy new potato salad – toss steamed new potatoes with blanched, podded broad beans, finely diced shallot, chopped tarragon, the best olive oil you can muster and plenty of salt. Perhaps the odd radish too if they haven’t bolted yet.

Instagramable broad bean salad – so pretty. So easy. Peach slices, blanched broad beans, shaved fennel, basil and lashings of extra virgin olive oil.

Broad bean frittata – It’s not classy, but, goodness, it makes a great al desko or packed lunch. Mix three whole eggs, a big glug of double cream (or crème fraîche or even yogurt), blanched broad beans, any cheese you have to hand (something salty ideally) grated, chopped herbs from the back of the fridge. Mix, season, bung in an ovenproof dish, top with parmesan and pinenuts, then bake for 20 minutes at 180C.

I’d love to hear your favourite ways to use broad beans too, so please do leave a comment: