Green tomato chutney

“A Tigerella never loses its stripes”, I said when I had finished this chutney. With mixed feelings I have now officially ended my tomato growing season and next week I will cut the remaining vines down. Couple of weeks ago I harvested the green tomatoes that weren't able to ripen anymore in this lack of light and cold nights. Some I was able to ripen in a vase indoors, but there was still a fair amount left that I didn't want to go to waste. So I explored the possibilities what to make of them and went with the chutney idea. I just made a basic chutney like I normally would, and it got actually very nice. Now I can still enjoy my tomatoes during the winter.

Ingredients

400 g green tomatoes

1 onion

100 ml Aspall cyder vinegar

200 g sugar

1 tsp chilli flakes

1 tsp ginger powder

Method

Chop the onion and the tomatoes.

Cook the onion with the vinegar, sugar, chilli flakes and ginger powder for 5 minutes.

Then add the tomatoes to the pan.

Let the pan contents simmer for about 40-50 minutes or until the liquid has mostly evaporated and the mixture has reached a sticky texture.

Pour the chutney into sterilised preservation glasses and store. I got a large jar and a small one out of this.

Chutney has many uses, have it for example with cheeses, veggie nuggets, sandwiches or roasted vegetables.

Your VegHog

Broccoli and cheese nuggets

Today my three part burger meal series comes to an end, and I shall end it with my recipe for broccoli and cheese nuggets (have a look at the previous posts: basic burger buns and pea and leek burgers). Don't you also think that vegetarians are still discriminated by the poor choice on vegetarian nuggets? If you're lucky you can get either plain cheese or cheese and chilli nuggets, but I think that a nugget is a great way of combining different vegetables and cheese, and I promise you to make other ones as well in the future.

These broccoli and cheese nuggets are oven baked, so there's neither playing around with hot oils, nor is there any need for a deep fryer. That's why I claim that these are more healthy in comparison to the deep fried ones, as no fat (or additives!) is used. Vegetarian nuggets make quite a nice change to the normal fries and burger combination. You might even be able to convert some broccoli haters with these. I have already managed to do so! So, here's how.

Ingredients to make about 12 chunky nuggets

1 broccoli

1 shallot

3 garlic cloves

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp oregano

½ tsp salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

180 g mild Cheddar

2 eggs

100 g breadcrumbs

Method

Steam the broccoli florets until they are cooked soft, and then let them cool. Chop them into fine pieces.

Also chop the shallot and garlic finely and cook them in olive oil until soft. Season them with oregano, salt and pepper and let cool.

Grate the cheese and combine the broccoli, shallots and cheese.

Separate the eggs; add the yolks to the nugget mix and set the whites to side.

Use half of the breadcrumbs (50 g) to the mix and the other half for rolling the nuggets in. Prepare a production line with two plates with the beaten egg whites on one and the breadcrumbs on the other.

Shape small nuggets of the mix. I made mine triangle shaped, but you can shape them as you like. Roll the nuggets in the egg whites first and then in the breadcrumbs. Then set them to a baking dish.

Bake them at 200C for about 20 minutes until the surfaces are crispy.

Serve with a dip as a part of a burger meal. I had the Lyme Bay Winery's gorgeous Spicy Tomato Chutney with Jack Ratt Cider on the side. This is a really good chutney!

So, this was my vegetarian burger meal suggestion posted in three parts, how did you find it?

Your VegHog

Kartoffelpuffer – German potato fritters with apple chutney

As you may already know The VegHog used to live in Germany and its kitchen has been somewhat influenced by some German dishes. German cuisine tends to be very meaty, but you can find rare vegetarian gems among the traditional food. One of those gems is Kartoffelpuffer, also called Reibekuchen, which are potato fritters made of grated potatoes. Kartoffelpuffer are offered at pretty much every German public outdoor event and it's indeed nice to get a vegetarian alternative offered.

I'm going to share my Kartoffelpuffer recipe with you today. I made my potato fritters fairly traditionally German, but added a British twist to the dish by serving them with apple chutney. Germans would eat their potato fritters with apple puree, but I wanted something more savoury and a British style chutney seemed to be the right choice.

Ingredients for the apple chutney:

2 pink lady apples

1 small onion

50ml cider vinegar

50ml dry cider (I used Wyld Wood organic cider)

80g sugar

Salt

Let's start by making the chutney. This recipe doesn't make such a huge amount, but multiply the ingredients if you want to store some of this chutney for a later use. Grate the apples and chop the onion very finely. Heat the onion, grated apples, sugar, salt, vinegar and cider gently in the pan. Let it simmer at low heat for about 20-30 minutes until the consistency becomes sticky. If needed add more sugar or cider. Then let this chutney cool and make the fritters.

Ingredients for the potato fritters:

1kg potatoes

1 large onion

3 eggs

2tbsp flour

Nutmeg

Salt

Black pepper

Vegetable oil for frying

Grate the potatoes and chop the onion finely. You could also grate the onion if you have a good device for doing it. Dry the potatoes with a tea towel or kitchen roll in order to remove the excess fluid. Mix the potatoes and onion with the eggs and flour. Season the mix with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Add more flour if the mixture is too moist. The fritters should stick together nicely in the pan.

Heat vegetable oil in a pan and shape fritters of the potato mix. Normally Kartoffelpuffer tend to be quite large, but you can make smaller ones if you prefer. I would call mine medium size. Fry the fritters at moderate heat on both sides until they are golden brown and crispy outside and fully cooked inside.

Serve them with the apple chutney. For serving I also made a few fresh apple strings as decoration.

Enjoy!

Your VegHog