The dinner I was serving up last night mainly consisted of leftovers so I wanted something a bit special to garnish them. We always get carrots with our Riverford food box which comes on Mondays so I did a quick search and alighted on Heston Blumenthal’s carrots glazed with cumin and orange.

The inevitable fly in the ointment was that there were no carrots! There was fennel though and I am pleased to report that my gamble that they would function just as well paid off. Carrots would have been sweeter and given a better colour contrast with the two varieties of steamed greens. However, fennel worked well; the flavour blended well with the spices and sugar and the golden sauce (olive oil — no butter to keep it dairy free for one of the diners) helped it contrast well with the cabbage and spinach.