It’s Christmas. That means Brussels Sprouts.
I went to our local Farm Shop to get our eggs and there, propped against the door, were piles of sprouts sticks.
This is the best way to buy sprouts as you are certain that they are fresh. A stick like this had 43 sprouts on and cost £1.
Now sprouts can be delicious… or not.
It’s when people boil sprouts into mushy oblivion that the problems start. How can you possibly like a ball of green sludge that when you bite into it, dissolves into hot, watery, slightly smelly goo?
But if you treat a sprout carefully you can have a delicious, nutty-flavoured vegetable. If you combine that with a sweet tasting nut like a chestnut and some salty, crisply fried bacon shards… well then you have a dish that is worthy of having at a celebration.
Cut off the sprouts with a sharp knife and remove the outer layer of leaves so you are left with lovely, shiny green nuggets.
Steam them, or boil them lightly, so they are still firm. This will only take a few minutes, so no wandering off and leaving them for ages!
Put some oil in a frying pan and, on a gentle heat, slowly fry some good streaky bacon.
If you fry it slowly the fat renders down, leaving you with a wonderfully crispy and tasty piece of bacon, which is perfect for crumbling over the finished dish.
Now chestnuts are the perfect thing to go with sprouts… they are available at the same time as sprouts and they are also much the same shape and size. Makes sense then to put them together.
If you can get fresh chestnuts you need to roast them and peel them… that’s fine, I always think, if you want to eat them as you peel them. Somehow you don’t mind the burnt fingers and the mess and the bits everywhere when the next thing you do is put them in your mouth.
But when you know you are doing all that and you are only half way through a dish… well, that’s when you give thanks that someone else has already done that for you when you buy then vacuum packed!
I mean, how easy is this? All you have to do is open the packet! I always have a couple of boxes in the larder because I do use them in all sorts of recipes.
And then, the only thing you have to do is put everything together when it suits you.
When I’m ready I toss the sprouts in some hot butter
Add the chestnuts
And then either crumble or snip into pieces with the kitchen scissors and scatter over the chestnuts and sprouts….
The chestnuts are sweet and nutty and the sprouts seem to take on some of the nuttiness. They are firm and are good to bite into – no mushiness there and no awful, overboiled cabbagey smell either. Just a good and slightly bitter tang to them…..and the bacon adds a lovely salty counterpoint to the sweetness of the nuts.
That would be welcomed on any Christmas table!