by James Alexander-Sinclair
My father tells a story of when he was in the army. A particularly pompous officer lifted the lid of a dish of vegetables and snorted "carrots are not an officer's vegetable" before storming off.
My father tells a story of when he was in the army. A particularly pompous officer lifted the lid of a dish of vegetables and snorted "carrots are not an officer's vegetable" before storming off.
I mention this in light of a brief discussion I had earlier in the week with my fellow Bloggista, Pippa Greenwood, and the delicious Kay Maguire - Horticultural Editor of this magazine - about what constituted a Classy vegetable. Both of them know much, much more about vegetables than I do but the results of the conversation were something along these lines...
There are the obvious posh vegetables like asparagus and artichokes - because of their very short seasons and, probably because of the large amount of drippingly melted butter involved in their consumption. Both vegetables also make good additions to the border - asparagus has gorgeous ferny foliage and artichoke flowers are bee magnets
(Jerusalem artichokes are, however, excluded due to the possibility of indelicate post-prandial thunderings).
Less obvious is the fiddlehead - these are the emerging fronds of ferns such as Osmunda regalis or Matteucia struthiopteris. Popular in America, slightly toxic if undercooked and, according to my wife (whose taste I trust absolutely), absolutely disgusting.
The mange tout gets a place at the top table because it has a French name and in spite of the fact that it is really just a pea in an overcoat.
Pippa is not that keen on the brassicas and to a certain extent I agree: too many of us have vivid memories of grey school cabbage and that sour smell that haunts institutional kitchens. But I leap to defend purple sprouting broccoli (very classy), red cabbage (with cloves and bacon) and the white curds of cauliflowers.
The beetroot used to be considered rather dodgy when it was only available bottled in vinegar. Roasted or boiled, however, it is not only delicious but a wonderful colour so I propose it as a new entry in the charts.
Turnips are very definitely low on the list along with long leathery runner beans.
The kohlrabi is too bizarre to be taken seriously. However, there is an absolute King of Vegetables (Kay agrees with this while Pippa still needs to be completely convinced).
Perfect raw or cooked, easy to grow, simple to prepare and the pods make excellent compost. (My children used to sing a song about them "sleeping in a blankety bed" at Harvest festivals which always made me smile). All hail the broad bean, Emperor of Pulses.
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