Alice says: This vegan recipe is to celebrate the new season’s Jersey Royal potatoes, purple sprouting broccoli and earliest asparagus, simultaneously pleasing poor vegans and vegetarians, who so often get a raw deal at barbecues. Consider doubling the recipe for large appetites; I’ve kept the serving sizes delicate, assuming there will be various salads and breads to accompany the skewers. You’ll need to make the endlessly useful Salsa Verde or you could make a variation using a fresh pesto.

Serves 4 – makes 8 medium skewers

Preparation time: 20 minutes

Cooking time: 15 minutes (plus salsa verde time)

Ingredients

• 1 x quantity Salsa Verde
• 300g small new potatoes, preferably Jersey Royals
• 250g purple sprouting broccoli, cut into 5cm lengths
• 1 bunch of asparagus spears, cut into 5cm lengths
• 100g stoned green olives
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

If you are using wooden skewers, soak them in cold water for at least 15 minutes, preferably a few hours, before use.

Put the potatoes in a medium saucepan with plenty of water and a large pinch of salt. Bring to the boil, then simmer for 10–12 minutes until just tender but certainly not mushy or soft. Drain in a colander, then tip into a large mixing bowl with the broccoli, asparagus and the whole olives. Season generously with black pepper and sparingly with salt. Add a tablespoon of salsa verde to the bowl along with the olive oil and tumble to mix well, gently coating the vegetables in an oily dressing.

Thread the dressed vegetables onto the drained, soaked skewers, reckoning on two per person as a serving and alternating the whole potatoes and olives with the broccoli and asparagus pieces.

If you don’t have a barbecue with white-hot coals to cook on, put a griddle pan over a high heat until smoking hot, or preheat the grill (broiler) to medium. If grilling, put the skewers in an oiled baking tray. Barbecue, griddle or grill the skewers for about 5–6 minutes, turning halfway, until the vegetables are sizzling, tender and charred in places.

Serve the skewers with a dish of the remaining salsa verde to spoon generously over the cooked vegetables as you eat.

Alice says: Aren’t these tostadas pretty? A celebration of broad (fava) beans, double-podded to show off their spring greens. They taste as good as they are handsome; the pickled radishes and avocado cream being essential components, I feel.

Serves 4 – makes 20

Preparation time: 40 minutes

Cooking time: 50 minutes

Ingredients

• 200g podded broad beans
• 600g butternut squash, cut into
• 2cm cubes 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 2 tsp coriander seeds, crushed
• ½ tsp dried chilli (hot pepper) flakes or smoked paprika
• 100g radishes, finely sliced
• 2 tbsp red wine vinegar
• ½ tsp caster sugar
• 2 large, ripe avocadoes, halved and stoned
• juice of 1 large lime
• 1 handful of coriander leaves
• 20 x 10cm diameter fresh corn tortillas
• 4 spring onions, trimmed and finely shredded
• 100g Wensleydale or feta cheese, crumbled
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

To serve

• hot sauce

Method

Blanch the podded broad beans in boiling water for 1–2 minutes. Drain in a colander, refresh under cool water, then ‘double-pod’ by nicking the pale green outer skins with a knife and slipping each bright, jewel-green bean out. Chill until needed.

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Coat the squash in the olive oil, oregano, coriander seeds and chilli or paprika. Roast for 35–40 minutes, until caramelized and tender. Set aside to cool, then combine with the double-podded broad beans.

To pickle the radishes, put them in a non-reactive (china or plastic is ideal) container with the red wine vinegar, sugar and a good pinch of salt. Set aside for 15 minutes.

Put the avocado flesh in a blender with the lime juice and half of the coriander leaves. Blitz to a buttery purée and season to taste, adding extra lime juice if it needs it.

Toast the tortillas in a dry frying pan set over a very high heat, turning with tongs until both sides are toasted and even look slightly charred (in spots). This will take about 1 minute on each side.

Lay the toasted tortillas out on a serving platter or board and top each with a heaped teaspoon of avocado cream, followed by a spoonful of roast squash and broad beans, drained radishes, remaining coriander leaves, spring onions and crumbled cheese. Serve with hot sauce, if liked.

Alice says: This fragrant, popcorn cauliflower, served with sticky sweet chilli, is a delight – and vegan, too. Feel free to deep-fry the dredged florets in hot oil for 5 minutes if you prefer; you’ll need a couple of litres of oil to cook this much in batches. The oven-roasted method below gives excellent results for far less oil and wins out over frying for me. This feels like party starter or snack territory, but could certainly make a main for two or three diners, served with the chilli jam, rice, greens and perhaps some tofu or a fried egg (the latter for the non-vegans).

Serves 4 as a snack or side

Preparation time 15 minutes

Cooking time 30 minutes

Ingredients

• 1kg cauliflower (1 large), trimmed
• 400ml coconut milk
• 4 tbsp soy sauce
• 4 lime leaves, finely shredded or chopped
• 2 lemongrass stalks, trimmed and finely chopped
• 125g cornflour (cornstarch)
• 200g plain (all-purpose) flour
• 5 tbsp groundnut (peanut) oil
• 2 red chillies, finely sliced into rounds
• 1 large thumb of fresh ginger root, peeled and sliced into matchsticks
• 1 small bunch of Thai basil leaves
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

To serve

• lime wedges
• sweet chilli jam

Method

Break or slice the cauliflower into bite-sized florets. Put these florets in a mixing bowl with the coconut milk and soy sauce. Leave for 20 minutes minimum, or for up to 24 hours in the fridge, stirring regularly.

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Have two large roasting pans ready, lined with non-stick baking parchment.

Combine the flours in one mixing bowl with the lime leaves and lemongrass. Season generously with salt and pepper, then transfer half of this mixture to a second mixing bowl. This is to stop the flour getting too ‘gummy’ when dredging the florets. Drain a handful of cauliflower florets above their soaking bowl and lightly toss with the flour in one bowl, jumbling them around so that it sticks evenly, and shaking off the excess. Space out in the pans and repeat to use up all of the remaining florets, moving to the next bowl of seasoned flour once the first one becomes too sparse and claggy.

This is a time when an oil spritzer would come in useful to spray the florets with a light coating of oil. Otherwise, just drizzle them evenly with 4 tablespoons of the oil and toss very gently to coat. Bake both trays of florets for 25 minutes, giving the pans an energetic shake and shuffle halfway through to redistribute the oil and cook out all the flour in the coating.

Meanwhile, place the remaining tablespoon of oil in a cold frying pan (skillet) and add the red chillies and ginger. Set over a medium heat and fry, stirring often, for about 3 minutes until sizzling and frazzled. Scatter over the baked cauliflower with the Thai basil leaves and serve with the chilli jam and lime wedges, for dipping and dousing.