Fun with Fennel

While on a rare trip to a supermarket a few days ago I happened to spot some bulbs of fennel on offer so I picked them up. I like fennel, it has an interesting aniseed taste, I had originally thought to juice it to get a maximum taste hit but due to a mix up on my grocery order I didn't have a meal planned for last night so I made a spur of the moment decision to make fennel bake.

Who can eat it?

As usual this is a vegetarian gluten free recipe, you could also leave out the cheese and it would be vegan (this was one of my favourite dishes when I was vegan but my family REALLY like their cheese!) It's egg free (check your g-f bread carefully if using it), nut free, wheat free, yeast free and Coeliac friendly (leave out the cheese).

Who can't eat it?

It is possible that this may be too high in fibre for those with Crohns or colitis. Those with IBS may also want to watch out however fennel is supposed to have a calming effect on the stomach and bowel so actually this may work really well!

I'm going to give you a few different versions of this (why do one recipe when you can do 3?!). WITH gluten free pasta, it's big and bulky with plenty of calories and should serve 4, without the pasta it's nicely low in carbs and calories and might just feed 2 and finally there's a version at the end without pasta, onion  or tomato that goes nicely with a salad or 'Sunday veg'.

Ingredients 

2 small bulbs of fennel
1 shallot - optional
1 tablespoon of olive oil
300g of dried gluten-free penne pasta
400g of pasata (Suma do a nice organic one in jars that is sulphate free)
a large pinch of dried oregano 
2 tablespoons of black olives (drained from the brine!) cut in half. -optional

Topping
Either 1 cup of gluten free bread crumbs OR  half a cup of cooked quinoa and 2 tablespoons of buckwheat groats. 
and if dairy is OK, some cheese, blue cheese tastes fab but so does a hard cheese like Parmesan or even Cheddar.

Cook your pasta to a point where is it slightly under cooked. (You can read how to do that here http://the-inclusive-cook.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/pasta-food-of-champions.html )
Finely slice the fennel, (retain any leaves for garnishing the finished dish if you like that sort of thing) and the shallot and fry with the oil on a high heat for 2 to 3 minutes. Keep it moving and do NOT let it start to brown. Turn off the heat and add the cooked pasta (if your are using it), the pasata, the oregano and the olives if you are using them. (I had to leave them out and serve them as a garnish as my husband hates olives with a passion!) and gently stir then pop into your oven dish. Or you could just crumble some cheese on the top and serve it as is if time is short (4 dishes ;) )

Now choose your topping. Let me explain my thinking here - I chose quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) and buckwheat for a few simple reasons 1) they are both complete proteins, 2) they are more fun than gluten-free bread 3) I have them in my cupboard. I do try not to put anything too unusual on this blog, I want you to feel it's stuff you can easily cook for people, I short I want to show that with a little thought most cooks can cater for any and every kind of allergy, intolerance or ethical eating plan. The turning point on including buckwheat and quinoa was that 2 of my local supermarkets and the village shop now stock them so I figure they shouldn't be too hard for you to find.

Back to the topping, the easy choice is bread-crumbs. Choose your gluten-free bread with care and make sure it doesn't have egg or other allergens in it. Lightly toast it and crumble into breadcrumbs scattering it over the top.  

On to the quinoa, a common mistake is not to wash the seeds before you use them. Measure your seeds, stick them in a sieve and give them a jolly good wash under the tap, if you don't do this they can taste rather bitter. Now pop the wet seeds in a pan and add twice the quantity of fresh water. Pop a lid on the pan and bring to the boil. Reduce to a low boil for 15minutes when just like easy cook rice all the water should be absorbed and you should have nice fluffy quinoa. Mix with the buckwheat (this will add a nice crunch) and scatter over your fennel and pasta mix.

Dot over the blue cheese or grate your harder cheese if that's what you are using. I've not given a quantity of cheese because frankly you know how much cheese your family like, what might be normal for us might be tonnes for you and for vegans I can reassure you it tastes just fine without though a little drizzle of olive oil over the top might just improve the crunchiness of the topping later on.

Now pop the whole thing into an oven at gas mark 6/ 200 C/ 400F for about 40 minutes.

Serve with your retained fennel leaves for a garnish or with a green salad or just as it is.

Yum. Scoff the lot then face-palm because you didn't take a picture....

Crunchy fennel slices. (Tomato free version)

Trim the root and leaves from your fennel. Sit the bulb up right on the chopping board. Imagine it is an orange and you are going to cut it into segments (from tip to root), For a small bulb make 4 segments for a larger one make 8. Pop the segments into pan of boiling water for 8 minutes then fish them out and rinse in cold water.

Pop in an oven-safe dish you will serve them in. Coat them in a generous table spoon of olive oil then scatter the topping mixture over them and pop them in the oven at gas mark 5 for 30 minutes or until tender then serve.

(Sorry no pictures of this as I haven't done it in a LONG time.)



Final note, while fennel is very calming on the digestion it is quite 'cleansing', which is another word for saying 'it makes you pee a lot'. Just in case you needed to know that!!