Herbs and spice and all things nice.

Work is back in full swing now and at home we're busy trying to get the house and garden ready for the winter. I love autumn as most of the plants and flowers are still in colour and this year at least, we're still having summery weather.
As always my mind has turned to the seasonal change in cooking and how best to use some of the lovely things I've got growing in the garden.
 When we moved here 5 years ago we brought with us all of the herbs we'd been growing from seed. I'll be honest they'd been really neglected and the sage we had was on it's last legs so to speak. True to form, Hubby suggested we just plant them and see what happens, now 5 years later they're well established and in the case of the sage they're HUGE!!

I always give away quite a lot when I cut it back and this year as well as cooking with it, I'll be stringing it into bunches to hang up in our Iron Age room at work. Hubby will save some little bits to burn on the fire on November the 5th as it always makes the place smell lovely too.
Herbs are always part of my favourite autumn recipes and I add them to most of my cooking. My favourite by far is for  gluten free dumplings that I add to casseroles and soups. They add a bit of body to one pot meals and are really handy if you've ran out of gluten free bread!
Herby Dumplings
Ingredients:

• 125g/4oz Fine cornmeal
• 100g/31/2 oz of gluten free flour
• 2 tsp of gluten free baking powder
• 1 tbsp of chopped fresh thyme ( you can use dried if you don't have fresh)
• 40g/1 1/2 oz chilled butter or baking margarine.
• 250ml water
• Salt and pepper

1. Mix together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder and seasoning until evenly combined.
2. Grate the butter into the mixture  and add the water. Mix to a thick paste, adding more water if necessary.
3. Using 2 dessert spoons roughly pat the paste into 8 rounds. Spoon the rounds into the soup or stew you are serving them with. Cover and simmer gently for about 10 minutes until the dumplings are light and puffy.

* These can be added to a slow cooker at least 30 minutes before the end of the cooking time.

These dumplings go really well with any soup, stew or casserole and even my boys who are not gluten free enjoy them.

As well as adding to my herb store from my garden during autumn I always make sure I have plenty of spices in my cupboard too. We get through quite a bit when "porridge season" comes and the boys want a hot breakfast in the morning. This has led to some interesting combinations such as chocolate spread and

black pepper on toast ( not my invention!)

 I do use quite a bit of spice to jazz up our winter vegetables and I use copious amounts in soup especially my faithful freezer stand by, spicy root soup.

Spicy Root Soup

Ingredients:

• 200g carrots grated
• 200g parsnips grated
• 1 onion finely chopped
• 1 tsp group coriander
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1/4 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 litre of vegetable stock ( you may want to use more or less depending on how thick you want the soup to be.)

1. Place the grated vegetables and onion in a large saucepan with the oil. Fry gently over a medium heat until they begin to soften.
2. Add the spices to the vegetable mixture and fry gently for a minute to release the flavour of the spices.
3. Add the stock and bring to the boil. Once boiling reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
4. Once the mixture has cooked remove from the heat and allow to cool before blending with a hand mixer or food processor.
5. Serve with gluten free rolls and swirl in some cream if desired. This soup freezes brilliantly.

I'll be batch cooking soup all this week as well as a few other things to stock up my freezer, so they'll be lots of other recipes for autumn coming your way!

 Enjoy!!