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Fat Hen makes a delicious green vegetable. In this recipe Marion Turnbull, our resident Wild Food Cook has created a simple, light Fat Hen recipe that works great either as a main course or as a mezze.
Fat Hen Recipe Ingredients
- 3 medium courgettes, sliced
- 6 medium tomatoes, sliced
- 50g breadcrumbs
- 50g cheddar cheese
Fat Hen Recipe Pesto
- 100g Fat Hen
- 50g pine nuts (or any nut of your choice)
- 100ml olive oil
- salt and pepper
Fat Hen Recipe Instructions
- Blend the Fat Hen and pine nuts until coarsely chopped.
- Add olive oil and blend again along with the salt and pepper, until of the pesto consistency you like.
- Layer the sliced courgettes and tomatoes in an ovenproof dish.
- Smear pesto on top of the courgettes and tomatoes.
- Sprinkle the top with breadcrumbs and cheese.
- Bake in an oven at 190C / Gas Mark 5 for 40 minutes.
You may not need all the pesto, so store in a fridge in a jar (covered in oil) and use within one week on things like jacket potatoes, pasta etc.
Serves: Two as a main course, or four as a mezze
Tried this with vegan cheese, gorgeous! Yummy!!
Please can your recipes start by saying which part of the foraged plant to use?
If you look at the picture of the fat hen plant at the top of this article, focus on the plant on the right side.
Going out from the center, you’ll see three, smaller leaves that look like a mistletoe jetting out. Do not use these smaller leaves–they won’t hurt you, it’s just better to let them grow more before clipping so their flavor can develop.
The more medium size leaves beneath the mistletoe ones, THOSE are the leaves you want to use. They taste the best, imo, and are the most versatile for cooking. Clip them where the base of their stems meet the plant. You will later clip off the stems from the leaves before using them or eating them as a part of any dish, but while you are cultivating, just leave the stems attached to their leaves.
The leaves below the medium ones are also very good for cultivating! Clip those off as well. You can probably go one more level down and take another layer of medium-large size leaves off as well, but the largest leaves I would just keep on the plant. They’re still okay to consume, they’re just kind of “over-ripe” at this point.
Hope that helps!