Broadway Market - near London Fields

Yum yum is all I can say. Our friend Wendy recommended Broadway market (http://www.broadwaymarket.co.uk/www.broadwaymarket.co.uk/welcome.html) for a Saturday activity.

For those of you that don't know Broadway market, it's not strictly speaking a food market. It has a long history as a community market with a jellied eels restaurant that has been serving the market and local communnity since 1900. The market was crumbling as the community moved out of London but in 2004, volunteers from the Broadway Market Traders’ and Residents’ Association revived it. The market has grown beyond expectations. It is now described as the most successful community market in London. It has the feel of Columbia Road flower market (which is nearby on a Sunday morning) and a very mini Borough market, with other bits and pieces. Apart from great foodie stalls there are fun stalls including home knitted children's clothes - knitted by real grandmas, a guitar stall (which my husband who plays guitar says he's never seen in a market before), and the usual vintage clothing and other crafts based stalls.

We spent the first half an hour of our visit resisting eating lunch from every stall. You must know what it is like to go food shopping when you are hungry - don't do it! (You can end up with way too much food. An amount you just can't eat in the allotted week that the shopping is meant to last for - been there done that!). We chose to go backwards in the course decisions, starting with dessert first, buying a gorgeous piece of apple strudel from a Popina stall (One of my favourite companies -http://www.popina.co.uk/), followed by some cheese for dinner (and some pecorino for a butternut and pecorino soup I plan to make for a family party in a few weeks) and then finally settling on lunch from a pie stall that was gorgeous ( The Pie Cart by Mike Meehan - I have a card but no website). I chose steak and cheese and my husband had a lentil, butternut squash and Thai curry pie, warm and lovely.

We were both satisfied and were able to continue browsing without eating the whole market. Next, another of my favourites, La Tua - freshly made pasta. We bought some pumpkin tortellini, it's divine and in memory of our wedding dinner, some of their fantastic gnocchi (we had it flown over to France for our wedding). La Tua is expensive but truly worth the money. http://www.latuapasta.com/ There a few fruit and vegetable stalls there and I managed to get some end-of-season Jerusalem artichokes (we made a great, creamy soup from them on Saturday night which we followed with bread and the cheeses from the market). We also stumbled upon an unusual stall just selling variations on the classic pork Scotch egg. As I don't eat pork but love the idea of this hard boiled egg snack, I was intrigued. I make Scotch eggs at work and keep meaning to make them with beef sausage meat, in fact at work this week I was discussing the very idea of doing this soon. Anyway the stall was great. Everything from three bean to smoked haddock Scotch eggs, we opted for the smoked haddock and were not disappointed. Unfortunately I didn't get their card but I will return to this great place, if only for one of those pies or Scotch eggs.

It's really worth a visit even if it's just to 'people watch' and maybe listen to some of the fantastic bands and buskers.

Filo pastry, artichoke, spinach, feta and Parmesan tarts

What you need:

4 x 12cm loose bottom tart tins

150g unsalted butter – melted

1 pack of filo pastry (I used the Just Roll brand– it was the perfect size and quite thick so didn’t dry up and crumble too much whilst I handled it, though I love the real stuff from my Turkish supermarket)

3 or 4 lumps of frozen spinach leaf or chopped

3 tsp Creme fraiche

Freshly Ground nutmeg

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

4 or 5 Artichoke hearts - tinned in water not oil

Feta Cheese

Parmesan - a block, you may use a lot of this

Method:

1. Pre heat your over to about 150c and wash your tins if new.

2. Cut your pastry in half and then cut one of the halves in half again, you should end up with two piles of filo pastry.

3. Use a pastry brush to lightly grease your loose bottom tins with some of the melted butter.

4. Lay a sheet of the pre-cut pastry in your first greased tin. Twist the tin around a little and brush your pastry lightly (not forgetting the edges that are sticking up over the edge) with some of the butter, repeat this process so you have about six layers of buttered pastry, you will end up with the edges of the tin having little points sticking up over the edge. Continue until you have done this for all 4 tins.

5. Defrost the spinach, I do this in a microwave for ease, you can defrost it overnight in a bowl if you prefer.

6. When the spinach has cooled a little, add in a few tsp of creme fraiche, some freshly grated nutmeg, pepper and sea salt.

7. Divide this mixture evenly between your pastry lined tart bases and spread it out over the base.

8. Finely grate some Parmesan, about two tbsp over the spinach.

9. Crumble about a third of a pack of feta over your tarts, grind a little more fresh pepper over the top of the feta.

10. Cut your drained artichoke hearts in to thirds and lay over the top on your filling.

11. In a bowl beat up two large organic eggs (the real yellow colour given to the tarts from the organic eggs when the tarts are cooked, is worth the extra expense) Then beat in about 120ml of double cream. grate about two more tbsp of finely grated Parmesan in to this mixture.

12. Pour the filling equally over the tarts, be careful not to over fill them.

13. The final touch and you may think I am a little cheese mad but grate some more Parmesan on the top of the tarts as much as you want really. I love it and can't get enough , but it really is up to you. The beauty of real Parmesan is that it enhances the flavour of your dish it's a little like salt and pepper - it's the natural seasoning of the cheese world.

14. Place the tarts on a flat baking sheet if you have on, just in case they spill over.

15. Cook them on the middle shelf of your oven, for about 15 min and then check them. They should be set and getting golden, then put them back in to cook for about another 10 mins. I can't give you the exact timings, as we all have very different ovens. Mine is quite old and fierce (but I love it - thank you mum) and I have to keep an eye on things a lot more than in other ovens I use. So just get to know your oven and don't believe everything you read re timings in recipes - trust your own instinct.

You should now being looking at four yummy tarts, I served mine at room temperature with a simple mixed leaf and herb salad with a home made vinaigrette dressing, and some of Nigella's Moon blushed tomatoes. Try them they are gorgeous, much more digestible than sundried tomatoes and cheaper, here is the link:

http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/moonblush-tomatoes-58

Quiche VS Tarts:

I'll be honest I am not a quiche fan. It's an unbalanced "pastry to filling ratio" for me. So these are a great treat, enabling me to eat yummy fillings with the added bonus of the fine featheriness of filo. Filo pastry is a classic north African/Mediterranean ingredient and it's in many of my family's dishes. Also it's in many other dishes that I love to buy or order when out - Spanakopita just to name one. So for me these tarts are a little food marriage I am happy to share. I hope you enjoy them as much as we did. You can of course try other fillings. See my ideas below, keep the egg/cream base the same but add other yummy stuff, as I said I am a little Parmesan mad so I still add it to other versions of the tarts but it's up to you. You can even experiment with little things you have left over in your fridge; bits of roasted vegetables, left over cooked meat/charcuterie, there are no rules really just things you like to eat together. Its like tapas, meze or a picnic, lots of yummy little bits ( Picnics, by the way, are a whole other blog subject I will get on to soon)

Variants of my tarts:

Salmon and leek - Poach a piece of salmon in milk with a bay leaf, slice a leek and fry in a little butter and olive oil with a crushed clove of garlic until its soft and golden. Fill the tart as above.

Roasted veg and feta - In a hot oven roast a mixture of aubergine, courgette, pepper and mushrooms with some mixed herbs, salt and pepper, crushed garlic and olive oil. Cook until soft and golden brown. Fill the tart as above crumbling in some feta. Any left over vegetables can be used in a pasta dish or simply mixed into a salad

Butternut squash, thyme and goats cheese - In a hot oven roast some diced butternut in butter, olive oil and crushed garlic. Cook until soft and golden brown. Fill the tart as above and crumble in some goats cheese and sprinkle some dried thyme over the top.