Darina Allen: Comfort recipes to ease you into the new year

Darina's fresh fish with buttered crumbs

Don’t we all need comfort food to ease us gently into the New Year?

I’ve been longing for a bubbly cauliflower cheese or a creamy mac and cheese, flecked and golden on top with crispy bits around the edge of the dish. 

All that’s needed as an accompaniment is a robust green salad. Some shredded Savoy cabbage, watercress sprigs and whatever winter lettuce I can still forage in the garden.

Keep an eye out for hairy bittercress (Cardamine hirsuta) or wintercress too, there will be lots of it growing in little rosettes in your flower or vegetable beds.

Don’t dream of spraying it, eat it – it’s delicious added to salads or a starter as soon as the weather warms a little, it will flower and go to seed. 

It’s abundant and at its best at present and is packed with Vitamin A and C as well as iron and calcium folinate and it’s free. 

What’s not to like about that, with the added bonus of ‘weeding’ your garden? 

Let 2025 be the year when you start to eat your ‘weeds’, a very high percentage of what we call weeds are edible and super nutritious. 

So, instead of trotting off to the health food shop or pharmacist, swot up on the wild food around us.

There are many excellent books on foraging but if your budget has run a bit low after Christmas, just do a Google search for a ton of information. 

Careful as once you get started, you’ll become obsessed with nature’s medicine cabinet, and you’ll be a nerd in no time.

Back to a gratin of cauliflower and mac and cheese - both of these dishes are dependent on being able to make a silky béchamel sauce, one of the ‘mother sauces’ in culinary jargon, but don’t let that put you off, it’s super easy to make and can be converted into countless, daughter sauces with fancy names by adding another flavour at the end. 

For example, lots of grated cheese and it becomes Mornay Sauce. Copious amounts of chopped curly parsley added at the end, make Parsley Sauce, the very best accompaniment to bacon or corned beef and cabbage. 

Sweat a pan of chopped, Irish grown onions until meltingly tender, add to a basic béchamel with a dollop of cream and hey presto, you have Sauce Soubise, one of the very best accompaniments to serve with a roast shoulder of lamb, as well as redcurrant sauce and fresh mint sauce made with the first of the new season’s mint - watch out, spearmint will make an appearance in a sheltered part of your garden before too long.

Béchamel is also an essential component for a fish pie, another of our all-time favourites. 

Try this riff, a back to front version with a few crunchy buttered crumbs on top, I think it may become a family favourite. 

But the fish MUST be fresh – easier said than done. 

First learn how to recognise fresh fish…your challenge for 2025.

Fresh Fish with Buttered Crumbs

recipe by:Darina Allen

Fresh fish with a crunchy topping in a creamy sauce is always tempting. There is an added bonus with this recipe because one can do many variations, all of which are delicious.

Servings

8

Preparation Time

 45 mins

Cooking Time

 50 mins

Total Time

 1 hours 35 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• 1.1kg hake, cod, ling, haddock, grey sea mullet or pollock

• salt and freshly ground pepper

• 15g butter

• For the sauce

• 600ml milk

• a few slices of carrot and onion

• 3 or 4 peppercorns

• a sprig of thyme and parsley

• 50g approx. roux (equal quantities of softened butter and plain flour, cooked together for 2 minutes)

• 150-175g grated cheddar cheese or 75g grated Parmesan cheese

• ¼ tsp mustard preferably Dijon

• salt and freshly ground pepper

• 225g mushrooms

• 1 tbsp freshly chopped parsley (optional)

• 15g butter

• salt and freshly ground pepper

• For the buttered crumbs

• 25g butter

• 50g soft, white breadcrumbs

Method

1. First make the Mornay sauce. Put the cold milk into a saucepan with a few slices of carrot and onion, 3 or 4 peppercorns and a sprig of thyme and parsley. Bring to the boil, simmer for 4-5 minutes, remove from the heat and leave to infuse for 10 minutes if you have enough time.

2. Strain out the vegetables, bring the milk back to the boil and thicken with roux to a coating consistency. Take off the heat, allow to cool for 1 minute then add the mustard and two thirds of the grated cheese, keep the remainder of the cheese for sprinkling over the top. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper, taste and correct the seasoning if necessary. Add the parsley if using.

3. Next make the buttered crumbs. Melt the butter in a pan and stir in the breadcrumbs. Remove from the heat immediately and allow to cool.

4. Slice the mushrooms, melt the butter and sauté them on a very hot pan, season with salt and freshly ground pepper, add the chopped parsley and keep aside.

5. Skin the fish and cut into portions: 175g for a main course, 75g for a starter. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper. Lightly butter the ovenproof dish, spread a little mornay sauce on the base, lay the fish on top and coat generously with more sauce. Mix the remaining grated cheese with the buttered crumbs and sprinkle over the top.

6. Cook in a moderate oven, 180°C/Gas Mark 4, for 25-30 minutes or until the fish is cooked through and the top is golden brown and crispy. If necessary, flash under the grill for a minute or two before you serve, to brown the edges of the potato.

Everyone's Favourite mac and cheese

recipe by:Darina Allen

Mac and cheese is simple fare but everyone loves it.

Servings

6

Preparation Time

 15 mins

Cooking Time

 30 mins

Total Time

 45 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• 225g (8oz) macaroni or ditalini

• 50g (2oz) butter

• 150g (5oz) onion, finely chopped

• 50g (2oz) plain flour

• 850ml (scant 1 1/2 pints) boiling whole milk OR 700ml (1 1/4 pints) milk and 150ml (1/4 pint) pint cream

• 1/4 tsp Dijon or English mustard

• 1 tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley (optional)

• 225g (8oz) freshly grated mature Cheddar cheese or a mix of Cheddar, Gruyère and Parmesan

• 25g (1oz) freshly grated Cheddar or Parmesan cheese, for sprinkling on top (optional)

• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

1. Bring 3.4 litres (6 pints) water to the boil in a large saucepan and add 2 teaspoons of salt. Sprinkle in the macaroni and stir to make sure it doesn’t stick together. Cook according to the packet instructions until al dente. Drain well.

2. Meanwhile, melt the butter over a gentle heat, add the chopped onion, stir to coat, cover and sweat over a gentle heat for 6–8 minutes until sweet and mellow. Add the flour and cook over a medium heat, stirring occasionally, for 1–2 minutes. Remove from the heat. Whisk the milk in gradually, season well with salt and pepper, then return to the boil, stirring constantly. Add the mustard, parsley, if using, and cheese. Add the well-drained macaroni and return to the boil. Season to taste and serve immediately.

3. Alternatively, turn into a 1.2 litre(2 pint) pie dish and sprinkle the extra grated cheese over the top. Bake at 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 for15–20 minutes.

Cauliflower cheese

recipe by:Darina Allen

Even a mediocre cauliflower can be made to taste delicious in a bubbling cheese sauce

Servings

4

Cooking Time

 35 mins

Total Time

 35 mins

Course

 Side

Ingredients

• 1 medium-sized cauliflower with green leaves

• Salt

• Mornay Sauce:

• 600ml béchamel sauce

• 110g grated cheese, eg cheddar or a mixture of gruyere, parmesan and cheddar

• ½ tsp Dijon mustard

• Salt and freshly ground pepper

• 30g grated mature Cheddar cheese for the top

• Chopped parsley

• Béchamel Sauce:

• ½ pint (300ml) milk

• A few slices of carrot

• A few slices of onion

• A small sprig of thyme

• A small sprig of parsley

• 3 peppercorns

• For the roux:

• 110g butter

• 110g flour

• Salt and freshly ground pepper

Method

1. Melt the butter and cook the flour in it for two minutes on a low heat, stirring occasionally. Use as required. Roux can be stored in a cool place and used as required or it can be made up on the spot if preferred. It will keep at least a fortnight in a refrigerator.

2. Remove the outer leaves and wash both the cauliflower and the leaves well. Put not more than 1inch (2.5cm) water in a saucepan just large enough to take the cauliflower; add a little salt. Chop the leaves into small pieces and either leave the cauliflower whole or cut in quarters; place the cauliflower on top of the green leaves in the saucepan, cover and simmer until cooked, 15 minutes approx. Test by piercing the stalk with a knife: there should be just a little resistance. Remove the cauliflower and leaves to an ovenproof serving dish.

3. Meanwhile, make the mornay sauce. Make the béchamel sauce in the usual way and at the end add 4ozs (110g/1 cup) grated cheese and a little mustard. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper, taste and correct the seasoning if necessary. Spoon the sauce over the cauliflower and sprinkle with more grated cheese. The dish may be prepared ahead to this point.

4. Put into a hot oven, 230°C/gas mark 8, or under the grill to brown. If the Cauliflower Cheese is allowed to get completely cold, it will take 20-25 minutes to reheat in a moderate oven, 180C/350F/regulo 4.

5. Serve sprinkled with chopped parsley.

6. Note: If the cauliflower is left whole, cut a deep cross in the stalk.

Seasonal Journal

How to Identify Fresh Fish

Fresh fish doesn’t smell at all, it just has the merest scent of the sea, reminiscent of fresh seaweed. 

Fresh fish looks lively and stiff, and the skin glistens. 

Another really important skill to master, but a life-changing one!

Foraging Book Suggestions

In this country, we have a wealth of edible wild foods to forage and enjoy, both on land and along our seashores. 

For many, gathering food in the wild is a forgotten skill, hardly a necessity, but in reality, much of the food we eat nowadays is nutritionally deficient. 

However, wild foods that have been untampered with provide a wide range of vitamins, minerals, trace elements and micro-nutrients that are no longer available to those who live on a diet of highly processed foods.

A couple of great foraging books to help get you started...

• The Wild Food Plants of Ireland by Tom Curtis and Paul Whelan and Wild Food
• A Complete Guide for Foragers by Roger Philips
• The Thrifty Forager by Alys Fowler
• Urban Foraging by Lisa M. Rose