Savoury

Plums are a joy, and a fruit perfect for the English Clime. They give us pretty blossom in May, and sweet, fudgy fruit in September. Evesham is the heartland of the British Plum with dozens of orchards, growing hundreds of varietals.

Damsons, often available in August, are a particular tart plum, and bullaces, small green bloomy wild plums, are also abound in the Autumn hedgerow. All can be used in much the same way. Plums make a fantastic jam, slightly soft-set, if you boil 1kg of plums with 750g of sugar, and the juice of half of lemon. This becomes even more special, if a fist-full of crystallised ginger is roughly chopped and added as the jam comes to setting point. Poured into pretty jars, they look like squirrelled jewels – which in effect they are.

Damsons and bullaces make great fruit Gin. Take a large Kilner Jar (Savoury’s best friend), and add 500g of fruit. Wash them, tear the fruit open, and remove the stones. Drop them into the jar with a good squeeze – the idea if for the juice to flow. Add 200g of  sugar, and a thick syrup will probably be made even before you add a bottle of gin.  Try something not too Junipery here – skip  the Gordons, Plymouth all the way. Shake your jar, and every day for a couple of weeks, the Gin turning a deep purple. You can decant it after three months, but will have even more  depth of flavour if you can keep it for longer.

The decanting brings it’s own treat… gin soaked fruit… dip into molten dark bitter chocolate, for a very private, but delicious moment

There will be many, I am sure, who will be surprised to see The Red Grouse, listed in September, rather than August, the month of the Glorious 12th and the start of the shooting season of this majestic bird.

Whilst it is true that cordite will be in the summer air in North Yorkshire and Scotland, these plucky birds are best hung, and with prices at £35 a brace at the start of the season only really become affordable after the initial rush.

Truely wild, Red Grouse only live on heather, in managed moorland – the UK has 90% of the global habitat – and it is because of these birds that we have rolling moors in which to walk our dogs.

Grouse eat young heather, and hide and nest in older heather – this means the Keepers burn the moorland in rotation, meaning that it does not revert to a giant scrub, overcome with Elder and Gorse.

With a flavour not disimilar to gamey Campari, these birds really are treat, but so too are their feathered freiends the Pheasant, which is much more organic chicken like in flavour.

Pheasants are released into the wild as chicks, but otherwise fend for themselves – both birds forage for their food, fly about, and generally have a fantastic life until falling from the sky. This means both have super lean meat, and some thought needs to be given how to cook them.

Young birds of both (Check for a nice pliable beak and claws) can be roasted in a hot oven, well barded with bacon fat, or caul. Roast fast and furious for maybe twenty mins (Grouse) to forty (Pheasant) and check for done-ness. A little pink is a good sign, hungry reader.

With Grouse costing £10 a pop, this is a treat indeed – I’d serve it on a crouton, smeared with it’s own roasted liver, and something tart on the side – some late Scottish Raspberries roasted with honey maybe. Game chips and some ferric watercress are always a good thing too.

Pheasants are very cheap – as little as £5 a brace, means that this is a cheap supper indeed, cheaper than a broiler chicken almost. Roast it, and eat with stuffing, roast Squash, and cabbage, enlivened with cream and some chilli.

If your Pheasant is older – the season runs from September to January – or is a Cock Pheasant, then they make a fantasic Pheasant-au-Vin. Just remember, never cook with anything you wouldn’t drink at the table, and then all you need on the side is some very buttery Mash.