Luxurious Broccoli and Cheese with Gammon, and a Parmesan Crust

This is a green and decadent version of cauliflower cheese, consisting of just-tender broccoli florets in a creamy, mustardy, nutmeggy white sauce. With cubes of smoky gammon. And a crunchy breadcrumb-and-Parmesan topping. And lots of Cheddar. And fairies skipping around in glittery frocks all over the top of the dish.

Luxurious Broccoli 'n Cheese with Gammon, and a Parmesan Crust

I realise this dish is crammed with calories, but I maintain that the abundance of broccoli it contains cancels out the cream, milk, cheese and gammon, especially if you're trying to convince your kids to appreciate this king among vegetables.

All three of my children love broccoli, and are happy to eat a lot of it. This may be because the stuff is intrinsically delicious (really, it is) but I suspect it's because I've fed them broccoli since they were tots. I love the stuff, especially when it's a very vivid green and still squeaking as it comes out of the pot, to be dressed with a lick of olive oil and Kikkoman soy sauce.

But for most kids, broccoli is an acquired taste, and I hope this recipe will help them aquire it, because its luxurious cheesy-bacony sauce is so good.

Don't discard the broccoli 'tree trunks'. 

I cook broccoli in plenty of rapidly boiling, salted water when I need a great quantity of it, but if I am making a small quantity, I use a microwave oven. (I don't care what food purists say about microwave ovens: they are excellent when it comes to cooking peas, broccoli, asparagus, Brussels sprouts and similar green veggies to al dente perfection, provided that you get the timing just right.)

When boiling broccoli, remember that the stalks  ('tree trunks' my kids used to call them) take longer to cook than the outer dark-green bits.  People often discard the tree trunks, but these are very good, so I suggest you slice them about 1 cm thick, and put them in the boiling water for two minutes before you add the top bits.

Don't omit the step of plunging the broccoli into a bowl of iced water: this will set the colour, and prevent it from turning a muddy khaki in the final dish.  Drain them thoroughly too, or residual water will seep out as the dish bakes and thin the cheese sauce.

Leave the gammon out if you're a vegetarian.

Luxurious Broccoli 'n Cheese with Gammon

900 g (about three whole heads) fresh broccoli
400 g smoked gammon steaks
2 Tbsp (30 ml) sunflower oil
2 Tbsp (30 ml) fresh lemon juice
½ cup (125 ml) breadcrumbs
60 g Parmesan, finely grated
a little paprika or cayenne pepper, for dusting

For the cheese sauce:
90 g butter
6 Tbsp (90 ml) flour
1 litre cold milk
2 cups (500 ml) grated Cheddar
2 Tbsp (30 ml) Dijon mustard
2 Tbsp (30 ml) fresh lemon juice
½ cup (125 ml) cream
a quarter of a nutmeg, finely grated
a handful of fresh parsley, finely chopped
salt and milled black pepper

Fill a large bowl with cold water and add a handful of ice cubes. Cut the broccoli 'trunks' into 1-cm-thick slices. Throw these into a pot of rapidly boiling salted water, and two minutes later add the remaining broccoli, broken into florets.

Cook for exactly 7 minutes, then drain in a colander under plenty of cold running water. Plunge all the broccoli into the bowl of iced water and leave it there for 10 minutes.

Cut the gammon steaks into small cubes. Heat the oil in a pan and fry the cubes for 3-4 minutes, or until they are nicely browned.  Drain off any fat, add the lemon juice and toss the cubes over the heat until all the juice has evaporated. Set aside.

To make the cheese sauce,  melt the butter in a medium saucepan and tip in the flour. Cook over a medium-high heat, stirring constantly, for a minute, without allowing the flour to brown.

Pour in the milk, all in one go, and beat energetically with a wire whisk to disperse any lumps. Bring the mixture to the boil, stirring constantly. When it is bubbling, thick and smooth, turn down the heat and let it burble  gently for 3 minutes.

Remove the sauce from the heat and stir in the grated Cheddar, mustard and  just enough lemon juice to give it a pleasant zing. Don't add any salt or pepper yet. Cover the surface with a piece of clingfilm and set aside to cool for 10 minutes.

In the meantime, drain the broccoli, pat it dry on a clean tea towel and arrange the pieces in a large baking dish (or in individual dishes).

Stir the gammon cubes, cream, nutmeg and parsley into the sauce and season to taste with salt and pepper. You won't need much salt as the gammon and Cheddar are quite salty in their own right.

Pour the sauce all over the top of the broccoli and gently prod the pieces so each one is evenly coated.

Sprinkle the breadcrumbs and Parmesan over the top, and dust with a little paprika or cayenne pepper.


At this point, you can set the dish aside for up to 6 hours. When you're ready to cook it, bake at 180 ºC for about 25 minutes, or until the inside is very hot and the topping is golden and crunchy.

Serves 6. 

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Frozen Flavoured Roux Mixture for White Sauce

White sauce (Béchamel) was the very first thing I learned to make at my mother's elbow. Not that this was difficult - a chimpanzee could master this in twenty minutes.

This French 'mother sauce', with the addition of grated cheese and a few flavourings, is so useful in all those heart-warming family staples: macaroni cheese, lasagne, cauliflower cheese, creamed spinach, vegetable tarts, cheese soufflé, ham and eggs, and so on.

Not that cheese is an essential add-on to this sauce: a thin, silken Béchamel enriched with cream and lots of chopped fresh parsley is heavenly with fish and gammon steaks, as is the salty, oniony version that goes with a plain dish of simmered-in-broth corned beef, carrots and potatoes (known in my family as 'Boiled Beef and Carrots, Carrots, Carrots.) Added to a rich, slow-simmered chicken or veggie stock it makes a most luscious soup.

The milky, benign gentleness of this sauce makes it a highly nutritious comfort food for babies and toddlers - pour it over cooked baby carrots, stir it into grated stir-fried baby marrows, or mix it with cooked macaroni, a tin of drained tuna, a handful of parsley, a dash of fresh lemon juice and a knife-point of mild mustard to make a tasty toddler-friendly fish bake.

Anyway, because I make white sauce about once a week, and am always looking for smart, time-saving shortcuts, I have devised this method, which involves making a large quantity of flavoured roux and freezing it in individual blobs. To create a white sauce in a jiffy, you heat a pan of milk on the hob (or in the microwave), whisk in the the frozen blobs, and a lovely thick white sauce is yours in minutes.

You can use ordinary butter for this recipe, but clarified butter or ghee will reduce the chances of your butter burning.

Frozen Flavoured Roux Mixture for White Sauce

1 block (500 g) salted butter, or the equivalent weight of clarified butter or ghee
3 bay leaves, torn into big pieces
6 whole peppercorns
4 fresh parsley stalks or a sprig of thyme
1 large onion, peeled and roughly chopped
2 whole cloves
500 g (about 2 cups, or 500 ml) white cake or bread flour

Set a large pan over a very low heat and add the butter, bay leaves, peppercorns, parsley stalks, onion and cloves. Stir frequently as the butter melts. Now allow the mixture to stew very, very gently (use a heat diffuser if you have one) for fifteen minutes. Turn off the heat and allow the mixture to steep for an hour.

Strain the mixture through a sieve into a clean bowl (you may need to reheat it gently first, if it's a cold day and the mixture is solidifying) and return it to the pan. Tip in the flour, turn up the heat, and cook, stirring constantly, for three to four minutes, or until you have a thick, briskly bubbling paste. Don't allow the mixture to brown.

Put a sheet of greaseproof paper on baking sheet. Using a large metal spoon, place large blobs (about 4 tablespoons at a time) of the roux on the greaseproof paper. Don't worry if a little fat seeps out from the mixture. Allow to cool, then cover the tray with clingfilm and place in the freezer for 8 hours, or overnight.

Prise the blobs of roux off the paper using a palette knife, put them in a plastic bag or lidded container and return to the freezer.

You can use this roux in its frozen state, or take it out of the freezer an hour in advance. Either way, heat a litre of milk in a saucepan and add a blob of roux. Bring gently to the boil, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon or wire whisk.

Once the mixture is bubbling, turn down the heat and simmer for three to four minutes. If the mixture seems too thick, thin it down with a little more milk or stock. If it's not thick enough, break another blob of frozen roux into pieces and keep adding these until the mixture has thickened to your liking.

Season with salt and pepper and add any other flavourings or ingredients called for in the recipe you're using - grated cheese, lemon juice, mustard, sauteéd chopped onions, garlic, nutmeg, mace, herbs and so on.

Each blob makes 1 litre white sauce.

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Cauliflower Cheese Soup with Parmesan Crisps

Cauliflower Cheese Soup with Parmesan Crisps

This thick cheesy soup has 'Mum' written all over it.  If you turn misty-eyed at the thought of the bubbling cauliflower cheese you ate as child, you'll love this comforting meal.

My kids certainly do, even though they're not huge fans of cauliflower in its whole form.  

Flavoured with a hint of nutmeg, bay leaf and clove, this soup has great depth, and for that it depends on a good chicken or vegetable stock.

If you don't have time to make one from scratch, use boxed supermarket stock, fresh or long-life, or one made up of boiling water and a good quality condensed stock liquid or jelly.  But please, not a stock cube, which will add a dusty, salty note.

This recipe serves 8 to 10 (I always make a big batch because it tastes even better the day after) but you can halve the quantities if you have fewer mouths to feed.

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Cauliflower Cheese Soup with Parmesan Crisps

2 Tbsp (30 ml) sunflower oil
1 Tbsp (15 ml) butter
2 onions, peeled and chopped
2 cauliflowers, cored and roughly chopped
2 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 clove garlic, peeled and chopped
a bay leaf
a whole clove
about 2 litres good chicken or vegetable stock
salt and white pepper
2 cups (500 ml) grated Cheddar

For the white sauce:
6 Tbsp (90 ml) butter
6 Tbsp (90 ml) flour
1.5 litres milk
2 tsp (10 ml) Dijon mustard
2 tsp (10 ml) lemon juice
a pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

For the Parmesan crisps:
2 cups (500 ml) freshly grated Parmesan cheese or Grana Padano, grated on the coarse teeth of a cheese grater
½ tsp (2.5 ml) cayenne pepper or paprika

Heat the oil and butter in a large pot and add the onions. Fry over a medium heat for five minutes, until slightly softened, but don't allow them to brown. Add the cauliflower pieces, potato cubes, garlic, bay leaf and clove, cover with a lid  and stew very gently for 7 minutes. Pour in just enough stock barely to cover the vegetables, cover, and cook over a medium-low heat for about 25 minutes,or until the potato cubes are tender.

In the meantime, make a white sauce. Melt the butter in a saucepan over a high heat. When the butter stops foaming, tip in the flour and stir vigorously to make a paste. Cook for a minute, without allowing the butter to brown, then tip in all the milk. Using a balloon whisk, stir wildly to disperse any lumps.

Continue stirring until the mixture is smooth and thick. When the sauce comes to the boil, turn down the heat and bubble gently for three minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the mustard, lemon juice and nutmeg. Season to taste with white pepper and salt. Cover the surface of the sauce with clingfilm and set aside.

To make the Parmesan crisps, heat the oven to 180 ºC. Place small piles of grated Parmesan, 10 cm apart, on a non-stick baking sheet or dish lined with greaseproof parchment paper. Flatten each pile to form a little disk. Sprinkle with cayenne pepper or paprika. Bake for 6 to 8 minutes, or until golden brown and bubbling. Remove with a spatula and place on a rack to cool and crisp up.

Remove the bay leaf and clove from the soup and use a stick blender or liquidiser to whiz to a very fine purée. Stir in the white sauce. If the soup seems too thick, add a little more stock. Simmer gently for ten minutes.

Immediately before serving, remove from the heat and add the grated Cheddar, stirring until the cheese has melted. Season to taste with salt and a little white pepper (this soup needs more salt than you would think). Don't reboil the soup, which will make the cheese stringy.

Serve immediately with Parmesan crisps.

Serves 8-10

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My mom's legendary Asparagus Tart - wholewheat heaven, Seventies-style

I have friends who still swoon, 30 years down the line, at the memory of this dish, which my mom made at least once a week when I was a teenager. There is nothing dainty about this recipe. It's a rib-sticking dish of tinned asparagus mixed with cheesy white sauce and eggs, in a rather stodgy wholewheat-flour-and-oil crust, topped inelegantly with fresh breadcrumbs.

Some of the best lunch parties I can ever remember featured this legendary pie.

I love this recipe not only for the happy memories it evokes, but also because it reflects the beginnings of the wholefood/health food/vegetarian trend: ie, wholewheat flour, not white; oil, not butter; veggies, not meat. Besides, it's incredibly yummy.

My parents were heavily into Health Food (it all started when they read Let's Get Well by Adelle Davis; more about that in this post), and this dish was the thin end of the wedge.

Asparagus Tart

For the pastry shell:

1 cup (250 ml) white flour
1 cup (250 ml) wholewheat flour
1 1/2 t (7.5 ml) salt
2/3 cup (160 ml) sunflower or light vegetable oil
4 T (60 ml) milk

For the filling:

60 g butter
5 T (75 ml) white flour
2 cups (500 ml) milk
2 cups (500 ml) grated Cheddar
4 tsp (20 ml) Dijon mustard
3 T (45 ml) lemon juice
3 T (45 ml) finely chopped fresh parsley
2 tins of asparagus salad cuts, drained (each tin about 450g nett weight)
2 large eggs, lightly whisked
salt and a little white pepper
1/2 cup (125 ml) fresh breadcrumbs, brown or white

Preheat the oven to 180°C. First make the shell. Generously grease a large ceramic or earthenware pie dish. Tip the flour into the dish, add the salt, oil and milk and mash it all together with a fork until it forms a lump. Using your thumbs, press the mixture thinly across the base, and up the sides of, the dish. Don't bother about a neat edge, or about baking this shell blind - it's supposed to be rough and ready.

Now make the filling. First: a white sauce. Melt the butter in a saucepan over a high heat. When the butter stops foaming, tip in the flour and stir vigorously to make a paste. Allow to bubble for a minute or two, but do not allow to brown. Now tip in all the milk and, using a ballon whisk, stir wildly to disperse any lumps. Continue stirring constantly until the mixture becomes smooth and thick. When the sauce comes to the boil, turn down the heat and allow to bubble gently for three minutes. Remove the saucepan from the heat and tip in the grated Cheddar, stirring well until the cheese has melted. Set aside to cool for five minutes. Now stir in the mustard, lemon juice, parsley, asparagus and beaten egg, and season well with salt and a little white pepper.

Tip the mixture into the prepared pie shell, and sprinkle with fresh bread crumbs. Place in the oven, and bake at 160C for 25-35 minutes, or until the pie is slightly puffed, and no longer wobbly in the middle.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool for a while. Best served lukewarm, with lashings of home-made mayonnaise and a heap of tuna salad (trust me on this).
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