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It appears that our taste for figs is evolving. Helen Walker from Te Mata Figs, which also supplies restaurants and caterers throughout the North Island and markets in Hawke's Bay, says regular customers are now ordering specific cultivars rather than just "figs". Indeed, there are many cultivars offig and all are different in taste and appearance. Helen says the main ones will be picked later this month and the season will continue to about the end of May.
If you don't have access to figs from your own trees or those of friends and family you should find them in good food stores and greengrocers. Or Te Mata Figs will deliver them to your door. Serve your fresh figs with best mates prosciutto and cheese, or make these fig rolls for lunch.
I am thinking Warren Elwin's honey roasted figs would be nice for an Easter meal. I am going use his recipe but pop a small rolled lamb roast on top and cook it all together so the meat juices meld with the figs and vegetables ... mmmm.
Lamb also makes an appearance in Bevan Smith's recipe for slow-cooked lamb with potato gnocchi and parsley oil - I am so ready for a spot of slow cooking and this dish from Bevan's Riverstone Kitchen Cookbook has been a long-time favourite.
Slow-cooked lamb with potato gnocchi and parsley oil and Barbecue lager-brined chicken. Photos / Bite magazine
A new favourite is Laurie Black's barbecue lager-brined chicken on page 5. It is the tastiest, juiciest barbecued chicken I have had for quite some time - you can actually taste the beer.
Brining, which Peter Gordon talks more about here, helps keep chicken moist which helps prevent that dry, overcooked result that most people end up with because they are petrified of under-cooking it. I also find that brined chicken doesn't burn like that which has an oil-based marinade on it.
