Bristol Jam Plan-food waste warriors!!

On Monday last week, after a crazy day of garden consultations, I popped along to meet up with my lovely pal Danielle, who runs Bishopston Supper Club. I adore visiting her home as she has turned a beautiful Victorian ground floor flat into a complete food hub. Her kitchen is her workspace so a professional kitchen but also a beautiful space that is always wonderful to be in, and as I arrived it was full of the evocative scent of plum chutney on the hob. Next to the kitchen is the space the supper club is held in, with wooden floors and high ceilings it's a glorious space to meet with friends both old and new!!

Sadly by the time I arrived it was dark but the other quite extraordinary thing about this home is that both front and back gardens are filled with raised beds full of fruit and vegetables that are used for the supper club meals. The beds are beautiful and always full of delicious looking and tasting goodies.

Bishopston Supper Club is also famed for the preserves they make and sell in various independent shops across the city. From rhubarb ketchup to medlar jelly, these jams and preserves use the seasonal harvest to create wonderful preserves that talk of the seasons with creativity and love.

 

But I was there to talk about Bristol Jam Plan, a new venture with a great community slant! Using surplus fruit and veg, Danielle will create great preserves, jams and jellies which will be used in two ways. Firstly using her cargo bike to deliver them, the jams and preserves will be given to homeless shelters for breakfast spreads and additions to meals later in the day. Relying on surplus means that often there's a lack of preserves for toast, to add to porridge etc, and so this is something that really matters in supporting people through homelessness and we already know is making a huge difference in severa shelters across the city.

The rest of the preserves will be sold at markets, food festivals and in independent food shops across the city, so you'll be able to buy them all over, including in the Bearpit and several other places where people are working hard to support the homelessness issue in Bristol. Any profit will go back into community projects that are supporting homelessness or food surplus issues across the city. 

So if we have any surplus at Incredible Edible Bristol you can guess where it will go!!

I think this whole project is awesome, but not just because it's using up surplus. It's also proof that by having a brilliant idea and getting on with it, everyone can support change to happen, just by talking to people and taking action. Often it's a scary proposition to begin with, but once there's support from the community, which there always is for great ideas, these projects fly and expand!! I'm so excited to see this happen at Bristol Jam Plan.

 

At the moment volunteers are coming together on Mondays to prep and make the preserves at Bishopston Supper Club HQ, and what's great here is that you need no experience to join in as Danielle takes you through everything you need to do, so not only is she supporting homelessness and food waste, but is also teaching folk how to preserve their harvests!! If you'd like to get involved just email hello@bristoljamplan.co.uk!!

I'll be there as often as my crazy diary allows. 

Pumpkin Jam Anyone?

I wonder if you might have had enough of pumpkin recipes yet?

Well in case you haven't here is another one from Danielle at Bishopston Supper Club, this time for pumpkin, apple and ginger jam which I can tell you is beyond delicious! The recipe for pumpkin puree is listed with the earlier recipe for brownies!!

Pumpkin, apple & ginger jam

500g pumpkin or any firm, orange fleshed squash (prepared weight), peeled, deseeded & diced into 1cm cubes or grated
350g cooking apples (prepared weight), peeled, cored & diced into 1cm cubes or grated

30g fresh ginger, peeled & diced as tiny as possible or grate with fine microplane-type grater

1 chunk of crystallised stem ginger, finely grated as above (If you're really not a fan of ginger, leave these out.)

250g pumpkin purée (optional)

1/2 tsp ground ginger (or to taste)

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon (or to taste)

2 lemons, juiced 

2 oranges, juiced 

700g granulated sugar

250ml water

Makes about 6-7 x 225g/8oz jars, 3-4 x 450g/1lb jars.

Place diced raw pumpkin, apples, gingers, cinnamon, lemon & orange juice, and water in a heavy bottomed pan, simmer gently until the pumpkin, ginger and apple chunks are tender, stirring occasionally. Grating the pumpkin & apple will mean it cooks quicker but I like the chunky texture of diced. Meanwhile, wash the jars in hot soapy water, rinse and sterilise in oven at 100c for 15-20 mins.

Add the pumpkin purée if using & stir in. Then add the sugar and stir to dissolve. (It helps to warm the sugar in a very low oven first.)

Simmer until reduced, thick and gloopy, there's no need to test for setting point with this jam. It's ready when a spoon pulled across the pan reveals the base.

Cool slightly then pour into the jars & seal with fresh lids or waxed paper discs & cellophane covers while still hot. Store in a cool, dry place and use within a year. Open opened, store in fridge and use within 4 weeks.

Now for some exciting news.....
I have a really excitng recipe to share as the final recipe, from someone I was lucky emough to spend time with at the weekend!! If you follow me on social media you'll probably guess....

Pumpkins.........as skincare?!

So rather than a recipe I'm going to talk about other uses for pumpkin flesh......

Skincare!!

I'm, quietly, a bit of a skincare monster. I love creams and oils and have done since being a fairly young girl. I blame my grandma who always had a fine range of lotions and potions that she used to let me try out. As a teen makeup and skincare was something I loved and as I've become an adult, whilst I still love those lotions and potions, what's become really important to me is that the skin products I use are good for me and for the earth, natural and man made chemical free. 

I've lots of favourite brands, and recently became a very part time consultant for one of my favourites, Neals Yard, which is amazing and great fun. 

 

But then I saw an offer on Facebook for Angela Landford Skincare. Angela was a MasterChef finalist and began making skincare for herself and now is making natural skincare in Somerset. I sent off for the trial pack and having used it sent a Twitter message to say how much I'd liked it. And then something slightly strange happened!! Up popped the lovely Emma Britton of Radio Bristol Breakfast fame, who obviously knows Angela, and introduced me as the Queen of Pumpkins!!

To which Angela tells me that some of her skincare includes pumpkins!! Of course pumpkin is full of good stuff-vitamin A, B2 and B3, omega 3 and 6, potassium, magnesium and zinc, so it lifts and repairs skin. There is a forming serum and a night balm and I will be ordering some soon because I can't wait to see what it's like! All in the name of pumpkin research you understand!! 

I hope to find more people doing great things with pumpkin flesh-let me know if you know of anyone or anything.

Recipes will continue tomorrow!! 

Radio Pumpkin.....

Today the campaign to make sure pumpkins are used as food, as well as to carve, stepped up a notch as I was invited into BBC Radio Bristol's Breakfast Show to chat to the very lovely Emma Britton about pumpkins and food waste. Emma showed me some tiny pumpkins she had been given and asked what I would do with them, so having told her, I will now tell you!!

The variety is one called Baby Bear and the pumpkins are tiny, approximately about 3-4 inches across. They are great fun to grow and are delicious. 

 

So what's the recipe I hear you ask?! Well chop the top off so you have a lid, put a knob of butter on the top of the flesh and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes, or until completely soft. Remove, add salt and pepper to taste and eat!! Perfect as an accompaniment to lots of dishes as a vegetable or great as a snack sprinkled with cheese.

Emma went on to suggest I need a superhero pumpkin outfit. I'm not so sure!!

 

Pumpkin scones?!? Oh go on then!!

So dear reader I thought a teatime recipe would be fun for today, but a savoury one. These are delicious and great to get kids joining in to help make too, and we eat them with cheese and chutney. They are great for that point on sweetens afternoon when you need something after a late breakfast or brunch, but aren't ready for dinner yet. And they freeze well too.

 

So all you need is......

40g butter

200g pumpkin flesh chopped into small pieces

225g self raising flour-don't put the bag away as you'll need more for dusting!!

1 tsp baking powder 

A (largish)handful of grated cheddar

A handful (smallish) of chopped herbs-we use parsley but anything leafy and fresh is fine

3-4 tbsp milk plus some for brushing.

Pop the pumpkin into a ban with water and boil until its tender and then drain, and mash and leave to cool off.

Then put the flower and baking powder into a bowl, add the butter and mix with your fingertips until it looks like breadcrumbs. This is a great bit for kids to help with and you'll stay clean. Then use a knife to mix the pumpkin into the flour mix, add the cheese and herbs and a tiny splash of milk and bring the dough together, and then lightly kneed it for 30 seconds 

Roll out the dough to about 3cm thick and cut out scone shapes using a cutter, put them on a buttered baking tray, brush the top with milk and bake for 10-12 minutes on 180fan/200c or gas 6.

When they're risen and golden take them out and hide until cool. 

It's that simple and they are delicious!!

More to come tomorrow folks!!

 

Pumpkin Stew recipe.....

Today's recipe is for pumpkin stew and is one I have kind of used for years, but never really felt it was quite wintery enough in terms of how filling it is.

But then the great Pete Lawrence published his cook book and I realised I'd been missing an extra ingredient that makes this a proper hearty stew, and that ingredient folks is lentils!!

 

So here's the recipe......

I use a couple of medium sized red onions, a clove of garlic, 2 carrots and 1 medium sized pumpkin. Sweat off the onions and garlic in a pan with some olive oil, add the carrots and pumpkin once the onions are transluscent and cook them all together for 5 minutes. Then add a litre of stock, and around 200 grams of lentils and cook on a slow heat until the lentils are cooked. I serve it exactly as it is at this point, with salt and pepper to taste and a swirl of sour cream and some sourdough bread. Pete on the other hand, says remove the pumpkin chunks, blitz everything else in a food processor and then add the pumpkin and stir in some cream. He's a famous media type so offers a bit more style perhaps!! 

Whichever way you choose to serve your stew, it's delicious, rich and very filling. 

If you have Pete's book you'll see he also has celery in his recipe but I cannot stomach celery and believe it to be the work of the devil!! However, you might like to add celery....

Please don't play with your food.....

I am a big fan of pumpkins. There are loads of different varieties from tiny Baby Bears to the enormous ones that are grown competitively. They're fun to grow, and great to eat in a huge variety of recipes; they can be roasted, spiralized, used in risotto, in pies, pastries and pasties, made into delicious soup and far, far more.

But what do we immediately think of when we think of a pumpkin? More and more they are part of our Halloween decorations, which of course is fine, but in so many households the precious flesh, that delicious orange filling, goes straight into the bin without a second thought.

Brace yourself for this but in 2014, 80,000 tonnes of pumpkin flesh went to landfill. 

80,000 tonnes when people are struggling to feed their children.

80,000 tonnes when we know children across the globe are dying, malnourished and weak.

80,000 tonnes when some older people are having to choose between eating and heating.

 

I deeply believe this is wrong. The core of my being screams when I hear these things and yet it continues. The supermarkets are as guilty as anyone, often selling the fruits as a carving kit, as if it isn't food and with very little information about what else you can do with a pumpkin but carve it. 

And as a nation we aren't used to cooking pumpkins and squash, with some people not having a clue how to prepare it, how to cook it or just what a great ingredient it is for so many dishes. And whereas we have books that relate to gluts of apples and the pumpkins cousin, the courgette, as yet a pumpkin and squash book is yet to appear.

 

So what to do about this enormous waste? 

Well this is just little old me but I'm going to try to blog as many pumpkin recipes as I can in the next few weeks in the lead up to Halloween and I ask you to join in. Share and cook the recipes, post recipes and photos of what you're cooking with your pumpkins and squash and be prepared to talk to people about the horror of this waste.

My first recipe is pumpkin and chilli soup which is the easiest recipe ever!!

Grab a pumpkin, peel and deseed it and chop it into pieces approx 1" in size. Pop the flesh into a roasting dish and roast for around 40-45 minutes or until soft, covered just with a sprinkling of olive oil and some salt and pepper.

In the meantime fry one onion and a chilli, chopped and deseeded if you don't want too much kick, and when your pumpkin is cooked, put it and your onion and chilli mix into a bowl. Add some stock, and blitz with a hand blender until smooth. And that is it!! 

Serve with a dollop of sour cream, and with a few of the pumpkin seeds, toasted, scattered on top. 

And if there's loads left over, it freezes really well.

 

Next recipe coming soon!!