This week I have been working hard on our book, Cooking for the Sensitive Gut which is jam packed full of recipes that will sooth heal and calm a troublesome stomach. It is being published in January 2016 by Pavilion Books. One in seven people have a sensitive gut at some time in their life and what you eat can trigger symptoms.
When I did my MMed Sci nearly twenty years ago at the Northern General Hospital Sheffield, I interviewed patients with troubled guts in a clinic run by gastroenterologist, Professor Nick Read. It gave me an interesting insight into a problem that affects so many people. Nick and I are now writing the book.
So this recipe is an out take. The photograph needs tidying up and the recipe needs a tweak before it makes it into the book. But this is all I have to post this week.
The recipe, in essence, is a good one. When I posted last week we had just eaten at the Portrait Restaurant, London and guess what? We ate fennel gratin as a side to out roast cod with grilled, pickled and puréed cauliflower with a caper and parsley butter. It was delicious.
I am also preparing for my second food photography course - this time at the wonderful School of Artisan Food, on the Welbeck Estate Nottinghamshire. The Masterclass at the Guardian went so well and the feedback from all the lovely students was fantastic so I am really chuffed. It is difficult to teach people how to use cameras. The Guardian have asked me to do another class in May. I will confirm later.
So on to this weeks lovely side dish which is based on one of my favourite vegetables.
Fennel is one of the aromatic umbellifers, alongside coriander dill and caraway. Its long stem is crowned with clusters of small flowers known as umbels which develop into beautiful seeds which can be made into a soothing tea. The seeds have traditionally been used to sooth symptoms in the gut.
In this recipe the swollen base of the Florence fennel is sliced and used layered with potato and baked with a crust of Parmesan cheese.
Wild garlic is in season in the UK and would be lovely snipped up and scattered over the gratin to serve.
Fennel gratin
Serves 4
Ingredients
- 1 small bulb of fennel, sliced lengthways very thinly
- 2 small old potatoes peeled and sliced thinly
- 1 small onion sliced
- 30 g/ 1 oz butter
- 2 tsp chopped chives
- ½ tsp organic vegetable stock (optional)
- 100 ml lactose free milk
- sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 20 g/ ¾ oz Parmesan cheese, finely grated
Method
Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6. Place the sliced fennel in a pan of lightly salted water and boil for 5 minutes until tender. Drain the fennel and reserve 150 ml/ 5 fl oz of the cooking water. This will make a flavoured stock.
Lightly butter a baking dish and layer the sliced potatoes, onion and fennel and scatter the chives between layers as you do.
Dissolve the vegetable stock powder, if using, in 100 ml/ 5 fl oz of reserved cooking water and add the milk. Pour this stock over the potatoes and fennel layers, dot a little butter over the surface and season. Cover the gratin with foil.
Place the gratin on a baking tray, to catch any spills as the liquid bubbles up in the oven, and place in the oven for 30 minutes. Take the dish from the oven and remove the foil. Scatter with the grated Parmesan cheese and cook for a further 10 minutes or until the top begins to brown.