Frittering Time Away

In the world of retail, your annual calendar can go quite awry. January trade shows are full of
Christmas stock, we're about to take a trip to Copenhagen to buy spring and summer stock from Rice, and this week on Monday we put up a tree, had a feast and took it all down again in one day for a magazine photo shoot I was asked to help style with props from the shop.

In the here and now it is, of course, harvest time and whilst I was chatting to Kirstie, the photographer, and Lia, the journalist, on this photo shoot we discussed school harvest festivals. Apparently canned goods ready to be donated to food banks are "trending" at harvest festivals - a great charitable idea but canned goods rather misses the point of harvesting things to me. Harvest festivals are about the time of food abundance we get now as crops are bought in from the fields - about being in touch with the seasons; how food is produced, stored, shared and celebrated. All those things and, of course, making loaves which look like sheaves of wheat with mice climbing up them. And squashes. Lots of squashes.

But Kirstie, it turns out, isn't at all keen on the eating of squashes, claiming they taste of nothing whilst she does concede they look quite snazzy in an Autumnal picture. So in an attempt to convince her, I have written a recipe designed to make you want to eat those beauties as well as look at them. After they've adorned the harvest table at school, try taking them home and doing this to them. We'll skip over the fact that this recipe is designed to make them taste of mint and feta, rather than of themselves. And don't worry - if you go squash crazy and buy more than you can stomach - if the beauty of these beasts overcomes you and you strip the greengrocer clean of them - you can always spray paint them silver, tie a red bow on top and shove it on the Christmas table when we get there. You can't deny they look good.
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By Mark Fletcher

Squash and Feta Fritters

For the Batter

100g plain flour
Pinch of Salt
2 eggs
200ml semi-skimmed milk

For the Filling

500g squash, grated
125g feta, crumbled
25g mint, chopped
2 shallots, finely diced
1 tbsp sunflower oil or vegetable, plus extra for frying

For the sauce

200g Greek yoghurt
25g mint, chopped
juice 1 lemon
1 clove garlic, crushed.

Make the batter first as it's best left to rest for 30 minutes. Put the flour in a bowl. Whisk the eggs with half of the milk. Make a well in the centre of the flour and pour in the egg / milk mix. With a balloon whisk or fork slowly pull the flour into the egg mix as you whisk so it forms a smooth batter. Add the rest of the milk to thin the batter.

Next make the sauce by simply mixing all the ingredients together.

Finally, add the filling ingredients to the batter and mix through. Heat the oil in a pan over a medium heat until it starts to smoke. Then add three or four table spoons of mix to separate corners or the pan to form the fritters. Fry for 2 minutes then turn and fry for a further 2 minutes. Put the fritters in a low oven to keep warm as your fry the next batch.