Fork on the Road

Sophia watching over the chives

These days I just can’t resist eating – or writing about – chives. They’re sprouting in our garden under “Sophia,” a stately stone lady who guards all things annual and perennial. Every year, under her statuesque watch, the chives multiply, getting bushier and bolder, more in need of a haircut with each warming day.  So come springtime I’m always looking for new ways to take advantage of their bounty and unique flavor, somewhere between onions and fresh grass.

Spring bounty

This past week I happened upon a special combination. A vibrant salad of string beans, pea pods, chives, hazelnuts and orange zest was a highlight at our dinner table. I found this recipe in a first rate cookbook by the London-based chef Yotam Ottolenghi. If you’ve never worked with one of his books or eaten at one of his restaurants, then you’re in for a real treat. And if you have, then I know you’ll be excited to read on.

The flavors in this dish are fresh and uncomplicated, simultaneously modern and rustic but also somehow obvious. In the middle of preparing it, I slapped my palm to my forehead wondering why I hadn’t thought to make this already. But that’s what makes his food special: the combinations include (mostly) everyday ingredients but it’s the way he combines them that makes his food fresh and artful, obvious and yet somehow unusual. Is it the toasted hazelnuts? Their coarse cut? Or perhaps it’s the combination of pea pods and green beans? Maybe it’s the roughly chopped chives?

Whatever the special “je ne sais quoi” that makes this dish jump off the plate, I urge you to try it. Now if I could only figure out how to give our stone lady Sophia a bite to thank her for watching over the chives.

A verdant side dish

Green Beans and Pea Pods with Hazelnut and Orange

Ottolenghi’s recipe calls for French beans but I’ve substituted green beans simply because they’re more economical. Go ahead and use the French beans if your pocketbook allows! Also, Ottolenghi writes his recipes using grams as measurements so I’ve taken the liberty of translating weights into pounds and slightly adapting his approach for our American kitchens. If you’re excited by this recipe which comes from his eponymous book published in England several years back, a new one entitled “Plenty” was published this month.

1 pound of green beans

¾  pound snow peas

1/5 pound unskinned hazelnuts

1 orange

25-30  chives, roughly chopped

1 clove garlic, crushed

3 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp hazelnut oil (or another nut oil -or just olive oil – if unavailable)

coarse sea salt and black pepper

1) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Using a small, sharp knife, trim the stalk ends off the green beans and the snow peas, keeping the two separate. Bring plenty of unsalted water to a boil in a large saucepan – you need lots of space for the beans, as this is crucial for preserving their color. Blanch the green beans in the water for 4 minutes, then drain into a colander and run them under plenty of tap water until cold. Leave to drain and dry. Repeat with the pea pods, but blanch for only 1 minute.

2) While the beans are cooking, scatter the hazelnuts over a baking tray and roast in the oven for 10 minutes. Leave until cool enough to handle, then rub then in a clean tea-towel to get rid of most of the skin. Chop the nuts with a large, sharp knife. They should be quite rough; some can even stay whole.

3) Using a vegetable peeler, remove the zest from the orange in strips, being careful to avoid the bitter, white pith. Slice each piece of zest into very thin strips (if you have a citrus zester, you could do the entire job with that).

4) To assemble the dish, mix all ingredients together in a bowl., toss gently, then taste and adjust the seasoning. Serve at room temperature. (This is also delicious the next day as a salad).

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