We’ve a huge fennel plant growing in our garden….we didn’t plant it I think it self seeded from next door. Anyway we kind of ignored it but now its time to tidy the garden so I decided to harvest the seeds before we up rooted it and find a few uses for them.
A bit of googling told me that they aren’t really seeds they are teeny fruits, and that instead of taking nice photos of ladybirds clambering over the yellow flowers earlier in the year I should have been harvesting the pollen as this is the most sought after part. I didn’t but I’ll know for next year.
I’m only part way through collected all the ‘seeds’ and I have tons so I’ve been searching for ideas of how to use them so far I’ve got the following to try:
– spelt and fennel bread from Scandilicious cookbook
– meatballs
– beany sausage casserole with some fennel added to the cooking sauce
– fennel shortbread
– fennel (and possibly pear) ice cream or sorbet
– toasted fennel seeds to snack on
– sprinkled on salads especially ones involving cheese
– torta aciete
– crackers for with cheese (I tried these yesterday see recipe at the end)
– scandi style vodka (of course)
– simple fresh cheese with fennel
And I’ve yet to properly explore the section on anise in The Flavour Thesaurus. Still I think it’s going to take rather a long time to use them all so I’ve promised some to Scandilicious (as she loves them an they are big in Scandi cooking) and some to Northcore Brewery so thye can play with how they work in beer.
All further suggestions for how to use them welcome. Many thanks to the following tweeters for the list so far:
@scandilicious @urbanfoodie_net @leafhsetherapy @rentaquill @jamsmithsclub
Fennel biscuits/crackers
I found this recipe for seedy crackers by Hugh FW on the Guardian. I thought it looked good so naturally I read it and erm then fiddled with it. This is what I did:
125g strong white flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
20ml EV rapeseed oil
water
I mixed all the dry ingredients together, I added the oil and stirred it in. I added water a tablespoon at a time until I got a softish dough. I reckon it took 60ml water. I kneaded it gently. I rolled it out in one big piece direct onto some non-stick foil and cut about half way through in strips to make rectangular biscuits. Into a pre heated oven at R3.5 (oven runs low) and baked for the supposed 5 minutes, and another and another…and in total it took 25 mins and I still don’t think it was quite cooked. But it tasted good especially with some salty pecorino or robust cheddar. I probably didn’t roll it thin enough and I guess 1 large piece takes longer to cook than lots of neat biscuits.
Verdict: good, no way the cooking time is 5 mins (perhaps in a giant bakery deck oven?!) definitely one to try again and play with flours maybe spelt or some oatmeal next time.