I have wanted to try wild garlic for ages. I've seen it a few times on TV shows and the chefs always get extremely excited about it. Intrigue and curiosity aroused. We are incredibly lucky to have a local farmer's market very close to our house and I snapped at the opportunity to buy some Wild Garlic (also called ramsons) and try cooking with it.
Apparently they are only available for a short period of time, in the spring. This probably helps to explain some of the excitement chefs and foodies get from cooking with them. I also hear they grow very abundantly in deciduous woodland if you fancy foraging for some a la Hugh Fernley.
I got a big bunch from the market and hurridly took them home. The leaves were long and green and the first thing that struck me was how strongly of garlic they smell. Insane. I wasn't too sure what to do with them. Most recipes I have seen use them for soup. I have also seen a wild garlic pesto (use ramsons in place of basil) being done.
Since it was my first time using them, I kept it simple and went for a soup.
I sweated onion and the wild garlic in butter, added cubed potato and chicken stock and then blitzed.
Not bad for a first attempt. If I were doing it again I would definitely whizz the wild garlic into a pesto kind of paste and then sweat this in butter, maybe with leeks and onion. I would also add more potato as I prefer my soup thicker.
We experimented a bit more with the rest of the wild garlic, using it to flavour fish steamed "en papillote" and also in a potato salad at a BBQ (this was great). I recommend you go buy (or pick!) some.
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