You smell it before you see it… Allium ursinum - bear's garlic, ramsons, wild garlic - it announces itself with a warm, softly pungent breath that rises from the woodland floor. Early May sees it form a carpet of bright green leaves, starred with small white flowers, spreading out beneath the trees. Last weekend we went for a walk and that familiar smell hung in the air… I gathered lots of the leaves and while I’d like to say I placed them into a gingham-lined basket, I had to improvise with the roll of dog poo bags I keep in my pocket.
We spend so much of our time slightly removed from the origins of things. Food appears neatly packaged. The seasons blur and the gap between the natural world and our daily lives can feel quite wide. Picking leaves or berries and bringing them into the kitchen almost seems to reconnect us with nature.
And so, I happily emptied my bounty of green leaves into my colander and washed them. Armed with a recipe for wild garlic pesto, a small block of hard Italian cheese and a bag of pine nuts (side note : if you’ve bought either of these recently then you’ll know that the joy of gathering ‘free’ food is slightly diluted by the fact that the other ingredients are woefully expensive) I was ready to indulge in a little ‘nature kitchen’ alchemy.
Here’s the recipe I used :
90g wild garlic leaves
40–50g pine nuts
50g Parmesan, finely grated
75–100ml olive oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
Salt and black pepper
Method
1. Wash the wild garlic leaves well and dry thoroughly.
2. Lightly toast the pine nuts in a dry frying pan until lightly golden.
3. Add the wild garlic, pine nuts and Parmesan to a food processor and pulse a few times.
4. Gradually pour in the olive oil whilst blending until the pesto reaches a soft, spoonable consistency.
5. Stir in the lemon juice and season to taste with salt and black pepper.
6. Spoon into a clean jar and keep in the fridge.
The next day I decided that I would have a go at incorporating my wild garlic pesto into a loaf of bread. If you want to give this a go, I’d recommend mixing up a basic bread dough (mine is 500g strong flour, 1 tsp salt, 1 sachet yeast, 300 ml water and 2 tablespoons olive oil) and after the first rise, rolling out and spreading with your pesto. Roll it up and then leave to rise again, about 30 minutes in a warm place. I cut some slits across the top as I was feeling fancy and it seemed like it might make my bread look a little artisanal 😆 I think maybe it worked!
Once in the oven the kitchen was filled with the aroma of warm, garlicky bread. And the result? Delicious. There's a freshness to wild garlic that cultivated garlic can't quite match - it's gentler, grassier, more herbaceous and just perfect for spring.
Do you have wild garlic growing near you? Have you cooked with it before? Feel free to share your favourite recipes in the comments!
1 comment
Thank you for this recipe Caroline, I’m feeling very inspired to make my own!
You are so right, that wonderful pungent smell wafting on the breeze of a woodland walk brings out the forager inside you.
I came across a recipe for cheese and wild garlic scones which I’m also going to try, sadly I’m lacking the gingham covered basket too, however I’m always very well equipped with poo bags so you won’t be alone in the slightly unorthodox methods of transportation!
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