Vegetables - Sophie Grigson

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first base. You bake them just as if they were ordinary potatoes, in other words, prick the skin and then put them straight into the oven at somewhere around 180–200°C/350–400°F/Gas 4–6. Size will dictate how long they take to cook, but think in the region of 45–60 minutes. Split them open and serve with salted butter, or flaked Parmesan or Cheddar, or a great big dollop of Greek-style yoghurt. Remember that if you are eating them with the main course, you will need to partner them with something salty – I find that they are rather good with bacon, or even with tapenade. Excellent, too, with sausages.

      Americans and New Zealanders like to surmount their baked kumara with other sweet things like pineapple, grated apple or dates (hmmm), or drizzle orange juice over them, which makes far more sense to me.

      So, once you’ve done the oven experience, it’s time to move on. Kumara can be cooked in most of the ways that suit potatoes, i.e. sautéed, chipped, roast, mashed or boiled (a bit dull, frankly). Additionally, kumara can even be eaten raw, or transformed into pudding. I’ve tried it raw, grated into a salad. It’s okay, but not something to write home about. Pudding, on the other hand, is a natural end for the chestnutty kumara. Think that’s odd? Just try making a kumara fool (see recipes) and then tell me that it’s not pretty impressive.

      PARTNERS

      In recent days, I’ve sautéed cubes of kumara with diced spicy chorizo, which was very successful, and then taken more sautéed kumara and tossed it with rocket and feta and a vigorous lime juice, chilli and sunflower oil dressing to serve as a first course. Mashed kumara are good on their own, seasoned fully to balance the sweetness, or speckled with finely chopped spring onion or coriander. I rather fancy a smoked haddock fish cake held together with cooked kumara (slightly more smoked haddock than kumara, I think), though I haven’t tried it yet.

      Also good, and I say this from experience, is a kumara cake – just substitute grated kumara for the carrot in the recipe on page 28. Fantastic.

      SEE ALSO SWEET POTATOES (PAGE 91).

      Smoky Parmesan roasted kumara cubes

      Just damn gorgeous, these are. They’re wolfed down by one and all whenever I make them. There is something utterly irresistible about the combination of sweet kumara with a salty, crisp cheesy crust and a hint of hot smoke from the Spanish pimentón. They probably should go with something (a real burger, perhaps, or roast pheasant) but you might just make them as a snack when the right moment comes.

      

      Serves 6

       600g (1 lb 5oz) kumara

       30g (1 oz) Parmesan, freshly grated

       1 heaped teaspoon Spanish smoked paprika (pimentón)

       3 tablespoons olive oil

       salt

      Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas 6. Cut the kumara into 2 cm (scant 1 in) cubes. Blanch in boiling salted water for 4 minutes, then drain thoroughly. Toss with the Parmesan, paprika, salt and oil.

      Put a roasting tin or baking tray in the oven for 5 minutes to heat through really well. Take out of the oven and quickly tip the kumara on to the hot tray. Spread out in a single layer, then dash it back into the oven before the tray loses any more heat. Roast for 20 minutes, turning once, until golden brown and tender. Eat while still hot, but not so hot that they burn your mouth.

      Kumara crème brûlée

      The Brits tend to like their kumara and sweet potato served along with the main course, salted and savoury, but they are in fact sweet and suave enough to work nicely in puddings. And if you don’t believe me, just give this one a try.

      Mashed with cream and eggs, kumara become as smooth as butter. Add a little heat and they bake to form a tender custardy mixture that is perfect topped with a crisp crust of sugar. Although many traditional recipes partner them with cinnamon and other warm spices, I prefer to add vanilla to highlight their chestnut-like taste.

      

      Serves 6–8

       1 kg (21/4 lb) kumara, give or take

       30g (1 oz) unsalted butter

       30g (1 oz) caster sugar

       1 teaspoon vanilla extract

       200 ml (7 floz) whipping cream

       4 egg yolks

       To finish

       caster sugar

      Bake the kumara in their skins just as if they were potatoes, or peel and boil until tender and drain thoroughly.

      Preheat the oven (or reduce the temperature if you’ve baked the kumara) to 140°C/275°F/Gas 1. Weigh out 350g (12oz) of the hot kumara flesh, then mash with the butter and sugar until smooth. Now stir in the vanilla, cream and egg yolks. Divide among 6–8 ramekins. Stand them in a roasting tin and pour enough water into the tin to come about 2 cm (scant 1 in) up the sides of the ramekins. Place in the oven and leave to cook for about 40 minutes until just firm. Take out of the oven and lift the ramekins out of the hot water, then cool, cover and chill in the fridge.

      Up to 2 hours before eating, preheat the grill thoroughly. Sprinkle the surface of each baked kumara custard with a thick layer of caster sugar, then place under the grill. Don’t get them too close to the heat – as with any crème brûlée, they need to be close enough for the heat to melt the sugar, but not so close that it burns before it liquefies and caramelises. As the sugar begins to melt, turn the custards every few minutes so that they caramelise fairly evenly. Take out and leave to cool and set. Eat with a little whipped cream.

      Kumara fool

      Make as for the crème brûlées above, but leave out the egg yolks and beat in a little more cream. Don’t cook the mixture – just spoon into bowls and serve as it is.

       Oca

      Will the oca ever make it big in Europe? It ought to. It could…and I for one will be cheering when it does. This small tuber grows well enough here, but its real home is far, far away, up in the chilly heights of the Andes. And in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru it is rated almost as highly as its compatriot, the potato. I first came across oca in a market north of Quito, the capital of Ecuador. It was the last stop of our holiday, so back came my haul of oca in the suitcase (smuggled in, if you must). We ate some, we grew some. We loved them. Almost end of story.

      In fact that would have been the end, if I hadn’t spotted oca for sale here at home a couple of times in the past decade. If you are blessed enough to stumble across a rare basket of oca up for grabs, take them at once. The flavour of the fresh tuber lies somewhere between that of a new potato and a tart green apple, with a mealy, soft texture. Very good and just unusual enough to be interesting, without being weird.

      The tart, appley tang comes courtesy of a splash of oxalic acid. If this sounds dismaying, reflect that this same acid gives rhubarb its distinctive sourness, far more astringent than the humble oca. Mind you, there are literally hundreds of varieties of oca grown down the backbone of the Andes and they vary from highly acidic to incredibly mild. The sharper varieties are not eaten fresh, but given a ‘soleado’, or a sunning. Left out in the sunshine for up to two weeks,

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