Spanish vegetable stew

Here's another autumn dish - filling and delicious, but with a few flavours of summer in there. And it's packed with vegetables. Aubergines seem to be cheap and abundant at the moment, and this is one of my favourite ways to use them. The other good thing about this dish is that it doesn't require much preparation, just a bit of time in the oven while you get on with something else.

This is based roughly on a recipe from the Eagle in Farringdon, which was arguably the first London gastropub back in the early 1990s. I think I have been making this recipe, on and off, for the last 15 years or so.

I've called it a stew but it's also hovering near the salad zone, especially if you eat it at room temperature. I slightly prefer it hot but either will be pretty good.

Ingredients

Serves 4

Two red peppers
Two aubergines
Two courgettes
Two to four potatoes (use an all-purpose or floury potato, not new - two if they are jacket potato size, three or four if they are smaller)
Two to four onions, unpeeled (as with the potatoes, depends on size)
1 bunch fresh basil, roughly chopped
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Method 

Put the whole onions, aubergines, potates and peppers in a roasting tin and cook them for 30 minutes (check them after 25, but the potatoes and onions may need longer) or until they are all soft.

Slice the courgettes into medium rounds, coat them in 1 tbsp of the olive oil and cook them in a separate tray for about 25 minutes or until soft but not burned. Take out any vegetables which are in danger of burning and set them aside while the rest finish cooking. 

As soon as the vegtables are cool enough to handle, discard the aubergine and pepper stems, the pepper seeds, and peel and trim the onions. Cut everything into rough chunks (I sometimes find it easier to do this with a pair of scissors than a knife).

Mix together with the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil and half the basil. Season to taste. Serve with the rest of the basil scattered on top and some crusty bread on the side, if you like. You can eat it hot straight away or later at room temperature.

An apple cake for autumn

If blackberries are the fruit that speak of late summer, then apples sum up autumn for me in all its fruitfulness. There's so much generosity about a tree that's laden with fruit, especially a fruit as versatile as an apple.

On a walk last weekend I gathered an armful of windfalls scattered along a footpath. They were a bit bruised, but after a bit of preparation, fine for cooking with. But what to make? I've got quite a few ways of using up a glut of apples - everything from crumble to chutney and even a savoury pie with cheese and onion.

But my all time favourite is apple cake. I've made this cake most autumns for the last ten years, and it was a real pleasure to make it again. It's full of fruit and spices - not the most elegant kind of cake perhaps, but very good.

Racing pigs and London honey at the Lambeth Country Show

I hadn't long been in London when I visited last year's Lambeth Country Show in Brockwell Park. Now that I'm more of a city girl, the whole concept of having sheep, ducks, goats, owls and racing pigs in the middle of south London seems more bizarre than ever. Racing pigs? I hear you say - yes indeed.

But as this is a food blog, I suppose I'd better tell you about the edible aspects of it. There were the amazing fruit and vegetable sculptures once again, and a produce show displaying perfect plums, purple potatoes, tomatoes like jewels and lettuces as frilly and elaborate as any flower.

The fruit and vegetable carving competition (You can't see it so well here, but the carrot sculpture on the right is a version of Antony Gormley's Field for the British Isles artwork of 1993)

I tried some great cakes, including a Jamaican rum cake that was egg free and dairy-free and extremely tasty (made with wholegrain spelt flour, coconut oil and raw cane sugar by the Heavenly Cake Company).

Autumn squash

By coincidence I had two delicious butternut squash dishes last weekend, and I thought I would share them with you. Squashes and pumpkins are in season at the moment – get English ones if you can. You could use a different sweet orange-fleshed squash such as acorn squash if you prefer.

The first of these was cooked by my friend Paul at a housewarming party. It was warming, aromatic, extremely tasty and not too much trouble to cook. I think it came from a BBC Good Food cookbook. This is my approximation based on memory rather than an exact recipe.

The second was in the cafe at the Whitechapel art gallery. It was a substantial salad of roasted squash, toasted flatbread, watercress and feta. (The gallery cafe also does tasty-looking cakes, and has some good recipes on its website. There is also a fairly smart restaurant with Angela Hartnett as executive chef). Squash and feta is a great combination – it’s that sweet/ salty thing. Again this is my approximation of it rather than the exact recipe.

(Sorry  I haven't got pictures of the actual dishes, but here are some lovely squashes and pumpkins I saw at the weekend instead.)

Butternut squash and butter bean stew

1 onion, chopped
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1 butternut squash, peeled and chopped
1 tin butter beans, drained
Good pinch chilli flakes
1 tin coconut milk
About 275ml/ half a pint vegetable stock (you can use a cube)
Zest of one lime
A handful fresh coriander
Chopped cashew nuts

Cook the onion in the oil until softened. Add the squash and cook, stirring, for five minutes. Add the stock, coconut milk and chilli and cook for 20 minutes or until the squash is soft. Add the butter beans, lime zest and half the coriander and cook for another five minutes. Scatter over the cashew nuts and the rest of the coriander just before serving. Serve with rice.

Butternut squash, feta and flatbread salad

1 butternut squash, peeled and chopped
3 tbsp olive oil
1 bunch or small bag watercress, washed
One or two flatbreads eg Moroccan flatbread, or use pitta if that is what you can find
150-200g feta

Roast the squash in 1 tbsp oil at gas mark 5 / 375F / 190C for half an hour or until soft and slightly charred at the edges. While this is happening, toast the flatbread for about a minute on each side or until crisp but not too browned. Allow to cool so you can handle them, and then cut the flatbreads into small pieces – triangles look best. Mix the squash with the flatbread pieces, the watercress and feta. Add the oil and some black pepper (you can add salt if you feel it needs it, though bear in mind that the feta is salty). Serve warm or at room temperature.

If you have any favourite squash or pumpkin recipes, let me know using the comments.