Ideas for horseradish

Horseradish is one of those things that I knew I liked from the jars and restaurants, but I had no idea what it looked like until I bought one a month or so ago at the Spice Shop off Portobello Road. It looks like this:

It is worth noting that this is A LOT of horseradish. As I said, I bought it a month ago. I have made a lot of things with it (some that worked and some that did not) and it is still going strong.

Here are some of the things I did that were more successful:

Cold roast beef and veggie salad

Roast root veggies like onions, beetroot and carrots and toss with rocket and a salad dressing with grainy mustard and grated horseradish. Serve with roast beef.

Celeriac and apple soup

Make a celeriac and apple soup, and garnish with grated horseradish, black truffle oil and black pepper.

Sausages with apricot ketchup

Soften onions and add fresh apricots, apricot jam, grated horseradish and water. Bring to a boil for a few minutes and then reduce it to a simmer until thick. Add more grated horseradish before serving.

I am trying to come up with additional ideas of how to use it, as I love the short, sharp heat of horseradish, that fades, rather than burns like chilli. Suggestions welcome!

Pumpkin seed oil – the sweet

Pumpkin seed brittle ice cream that serves 4 people in an hour or so (this includes cooling time for the brittle)

I’m just going to put it out there right up front, so we can get it all over with. This recipe involves pouring oil over ice cream – yes, oil over ice cream. Please don’t be turned off, read on. It’s delicious and worth it!

One of the things I love most about pumpkin seed oil is its colour – a rich orange-brown that almost looks green by the edges. As a result it is a beautiful thing to use to finish a dish, drizzling it on a butternut squash soup, risotto or, in this instance, ice cream.

I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, but I wanted to do a sweet with this oil due to its awesome drizzability. Having seen olive oil on ice-cream in Italian restaurants, I decided this was the approach I would take and made a pumpkin seed brittle to go with it. Pumpkin and caramel are a lovely flavour combination after all (just ask an American).

Ingredients:

• 50g pumpkin seeds
• 50g sugar
• 25g butter
• 1/2 tsp sea salt flakes
• 2 tbsp water
• 4tsp pumpkin seed oil
• 8 scoops of vanilla ice cream

Put a large flat frying pan on a medium heat and toast the pumpkin seeds until they are very slightly brown – just a slight shade darker than they are regularly. Then shake onto a big piece of wax paper.

Turn the pan down to a medium-low heat and add the sugar, water and salt. Once the sugar has melted, bring it to a boil, until it is bubbling.

Stir it and let the sugar brown to a caramel colour. Then add the butter.

Pour the caramel all over the pumpkin seeds and let cool.

Once cooled, break it into chunky pieces.

Scoop two scoops of vanilla ice cream into 4 bowls. Drizzle each with 1-1.5 tablespoons of pumpkin seed oil and divide the brittle between the bowls. Mmmm …