Chef Thomas
A Ploughman's Salad
The old pub ploughman's, shaken loose from its board and laid across butter lettuce with a sharp mustard dressing, for the kind of lunch that feels like you've given yourself the afternoon off.
Culinary Explorer
A cooking platform built around craft, culture, and the stories behind what we eat.
Spring Leaves with Wild Garlic and Pea Shoots
Created by Chef Thomas
A tangle of pea shoots and tender spring leaves dressed with wild garlic pesto made from what the woodland floor offered this morning, gone in a few bites, gone in a few weeks.
Salads
British
Weeknight
Dinner Party
15 min
Active Time
0 min cook•15 min total
Yield4 servings
There's a week in April, sometimes two if you're lucky, when the woods smell of garlic before you see a single leaf. You catch it on the path, that green, peppery warmth rising from the ground, and then you look down and there it is: a carpet of broad, bright leaves pushing through the leaf litter. Pick a carrier bag full. They won't last, and neither will the season.
Pea shoots arrived at the market on Saturday, the first of the year, pale-stemmed and curling at the tips like something still deciding which way to grow. I bought two bags without a plan, which is how the best meals start. The plan came later, standing in the kitchen with the wild garlic already pounded into a rough pesto that smelled like spring condensed into a jar.
This is barely a recipe. It's a bowl of leaves dressed with something good, eaten quickly, in the narrow window when everything tastes of itself and nothing needs improving. The pea shoots are sweet and grassy. The wild garlic pesto is sharp and green and faintly hot. Together they taste like the turning point of the year, that moment when the cold lifts and the garden starts to mean something again.
I wrote it down in the notebook: wild garlic pesto, pea shoots, April light through the kitchen window. Some meals don't need more than a sentence.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
wild garlic leaves
Quantity
2 large handfuls
washed and dried
pine nuts or walnuts
Quantity
30g
Parmesan or hard British cheese
Quantity
30g
finely grated
good olive oil
Quantity
enough to bring it together
lemon juice
Quantity
a squeeze
fine sea salt
Quantity
to taste
mixed spring leaves
Quantity
200g
lamb's lettuce, young spinach, watercress, baby chard
pea shoots
Quantity
100g
radishes (optional)
Quantity
a few
sliced thinly
toasted seeds (optional)
Quantity
a handful
pumpkin or sunflower
flaky sea salt
Quantity
for finishing
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| wild garlic leaveswashed and dried | 2 large handfuls |
| pine nuts or walnuts | 30g |
| Parmesan or hard British cheesefinely grated | 30g |
| good olive oil | enough to bring it together |
| lemon juice | a squeeze |
| fine sea salt | to taste |
| mixed spring leaveslamb's lettuce, young spinach, watercress, baby chard | 200g |
| pea shoots | 100g |
| radishes (optional)sliced thinly | a few |
| toasted seeds (optional)pumpkin or sunflower | a handful |
| flaky sea salt | for finishing |
Equipment Needed
- •Pestle and mortar (or food processor)
- •Salad spinner or clean tea towel
- •Wide serving bowl or plate
Instructions
- 1
Make the wild garlic pesto
Put the wild garlic leaves in a mortar with a pinch of salt and pound them to a rough paste. Add the nuts and crush them in, not too smooth, you want some texture. Stir in the grated cheese. Now pour in the olive oil, slowly, stirring as you go, until the pesto is loose enough to dress leaves without clogging them. It should coat a spoon but still drip from it. Add a squeeze of lemon and taste. More salt, more lemon, more oil. You'll know when it's right. It will smell like a damp woodland floor in the best possible way.
A food processor works if you're short on time, but pulse it briefly. You want a rough, spoonable pesto, not a smooth purée. The texture is half the pleasure. - 2
Prepare the leaves
Wash the spring leaves and pea shoots gently in cold water and dry them thoroughly. A salad spinner is useful here, or lay them out on a clean tea towel and pat dry. Wet leaves refuse a dressing. They slide off it, and everything tastes diluted. This step matters more than people think.
- 3
Dress and assemble
Put the leaves and pea shoots in a wide bowl. Spoon over a few generous tablespoons of the pesto and toss gently with your hands. Not a spoon. Your hands. You can feel when each leaf has been touched by the dressing. Scatter the radish slices through and toss once more. Pile it onto a serving plate or into individual bowls, letting the pea shoots tangle and curl upward rather than pressing them flat.
Dress the salad at the last possible moment. Pea shoots wilt quickly under oil and acid. The window between perfectly dressed and sadly limp is about five minutes. - 4
Finish and serve
Scatter the toasted seeds over the top. A pinch of flaky salt. Another thread of olive oil if the mood takes you. Serve immediately, while the leaves still have life in them and the pesto smells of the woods. This is not a salad that waits.
Chef Tips
- •Wild garlic is free if you know where to look. Woodlands, hedgerows, damp shady banks. Pick the leaves, not the bulbs, and leave plenty behind. If you can't find it, a good bunch from a farmers' market will do. Supermarket wild garlic doesn't exist, and that's probably for the best.
- •The pesto keeps in the fridge for four or five days with a film of olive oil over the surface. Make more than you need. It's good stirred through pasta, spooned onto new potatoes, or spread on toast with a poached egg. You'll use it before the week is out.
- •If pea shoots aren't available yet, use young rocket or baby spinach. The salad changes character but remains itself. The market decides.
- •This wants a glass of something cold and dry alongside it. A Sancerre, or an English Bacchus if you can find one. The minerality suits the green sharpness of the pesto.
Advance Preparation
- •The pesto can be made a day or two ahead and kept in a jar in the fridge, topped with a thin layer of olive oil to prevent browning. Bring it to room temperature before dressing the leaves.
- •Wash and dry the leaves in advance and store them loosely wrapped in a damp tea towel in the fridge. They'll hold for a few hours, but no longer.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 135g)
Calories
225 calories
Total Fat
20 g
Saturated Fat
4 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
16 g
Cholesterol
5 mg
Sodium
550 mg
Total Carbohydrates
5 g
Dietary Fiber
2 g
Sugars
1 g
Protein
8 g
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