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Tommy Heaney’s cawl. In Welsh, the word refers to any soup or broth. In English, it means this traditional Welsh soup, often referred to as cawl Cymreig, and as ‘lobscows’ in areas of north Wales.
Tommy Heaney’s cawl: in Welsh, the word refers to any soup or broth; in English, it means this traditional Welsh stew. Photograph: Ola O Smit/The Guardian. Food styling: Sam Dixon. Prop styling: Anna Wilkins
Tommy Heaney’s cawl: in Welsh, the word refers to any soup or broth; in English, it means this traditional Welsh stew. Photograph: Ola O Smit/The Guardian. Food styling: Sam Dixon. Prop styling: Anna Wilkins

Four Welsh recipes for St David’s Day

Four Welsh dishes to welcome the onset of spring: a thick soup-stew, Welsh rarebit, a smoky fish soup and the veggie phenomenon that is the glamorgan sausage

Cawl (pictured above)

This isn’t a traditional Welsh cawl – it’s more a combination of cawl and Irish stew. I like mine cooked just long enough for the potatoes to break down and naturally thicken the stew. I also add a little Worcestershire sauce, because it reminds me of eating stew as a kid – my grandma used to put brown sauce on everything.

Prep 30 min
Cook 1 hr 30 min
Serves 4

1kg diced lamb, neck for preference
2 litres lamb stock (or chicken stock)
2 carrots, peeled and diced
2 onions, peeled and diced
1 swede, peeled and diced
2 leeks, diced and washed
800g waxy potatoes (we use ratte), peeled and cut into roughly 2.5cm-square pieces
2 bay leaves
2 sprigs rosemary and 6 sprigs thyme, tied together into a bundle
1 pinch ground cumin
Salt and black pepper
10ml Worcestershire sauce (optional)

Put the lamb in a large, heavy-based saucepan. Pour in the stock and bring to a boil, skimming off any impurities that rise tothe surface as it bubbles away.

Turn down the heat to a simmer, then add all the vegetables, the bay leaves, fresh herb bundle and cumin, and season generously. Simmer until the lamb is tender and the potatoes are starting to break down – about an hour – then turn off the heat, check the seasoning and add the Worcestershire sauce, if using.

Serve in bowls with warm, crusty bread spread with plenty of salted butter.

Rarebit

More than cheese on toast: Tommy Heaney’s Welsh rarebit.

Prep 10 min
Cook 15 min
Serves 4 as a starter or snack

50g butter
50g plain flour
1 tsp ready-mixed English mustard
220ml-300ml beer – enough to make a thick but spreadable sauce; you may find you need even more to loosen the mix sufficiently (we use our own pilsner, but ale is more traditional)
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
260g Welsh cheddar, grated
2 egg yolks
Salt and black pepper
4 slices sourdough

Melt the butter in a saucepan, add the flour and cook, stirring, for five minutes, until the mix comes together into a roux. Add the mustard, beer and Worcestershire sauce, cook for five minutes more, then fold in the cheese and stir until melted.

Turn off the heat, leave to cool a little, then beat in the egg yolks one by one, until smooth, and season to taste.

Switch the grill to medium-high. Spread the cheese mix all over one side of each sourdough slice – I prefer it quite thinly spread – then pop under the grill and cook until bubbling and browning in places: two to three minutes.

If you’ve any of the cheese mix left over, put it in an airtight container in the fridge, where it will keep quite happily for a few days for when you next fancy a rarebit.

Glamorgan sausage

Tommy Heaney’s Glamorgan sausage.

Prep 10 min
Cook 2 hr
Makes 8, to feed 4

50g butter
100g leek, white part part only, finely sliced and washed
175g caerphilly, grated
225g fresh breadcrumbs
1 tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 tbsp chopped chives
½ tsp thyme
Salt and black pepper
1 egg, beaten
20ml milk
1 tsp wholegrain mustard
Vegetable or rapeseed oil, for deep-frying

For the coating
50g flour, plus extra for dusting
1 egg
40g milk
60g panko breadcrumbs

Melt the butter in a heavy-based saucepan on a medium heat, then sweat the leek, stirring often, until soft but not coloured – about 10 minutes. Turn off the heat and leave to cool.

In a bowl, mix the cheese, breadcrumbs, cooled leeks and the herbs, and season generously. In a second bowl, mix the egg, milk and mustard until well combined, then pour into the cheese bowl and mash everything until it comes together into something resembling a dough.

Lightly flour a worktop, turn out the dough and divide into manageable pieces. Roll each piece into a long, 2.5cm-thick sausage, then cut into 8cm lengths to make about eight sausages in total.

Now for the coating. Get three bowls ready, and put the flour in one, whisk the egg and milk in another, and put the panko in the last bowl. Roll the sausages first in the flour, then in the egg mix and finally in the panko, to coat, and shake off any excess. You can now put them in the fridge until you want to eat (they freeze very well, too).

Fry the sausages, ideally in a deep-fat fryer, at 170C for three minutes, and serve hot with your chosen chutney or sauce – red onion or piccalilli are my favourites.

Potato and leek soup with smoked haddock

Tommy Heaney’s potato and leek soup with smoked haddock.

Prep 15-20 min
Cook 30 min
Serves 4

50g butter
3 leeks, white parts only, diced and washed
1 onion, peeled and finely diced
1 stick celery, destringed and cut into thin slices
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
400g potatoes, peeled and diced – a good all-rounder such as maris pipers or agria (we use Koffmann’s)
400g fish stock or light chicken stock
100g double cream
500g smoked haddock, skinned, pinboned and diced
Salt and black pepper
4 poached eggs, to finish (optional)

Melt the butter in a heavy saucepan over a medium heat and, when it foams, add the leeks, onion, celery and garlic, and saute, stirring regularly, until soft but not coloured. Add the potatoes and stock, bring to a simmer, then leave to cook over a gentle heat for 10 minutes, until the potatoes are soft.

Leave to cool slightly, then transfer to a blender and blitz until the soup is silky smooth. Return the soup to a clean pan, stir in the cream and diced haddock, and cook gently for a further two minutes. Remove from the heat, season to taste – it may not need any – then divide between four bowls. Top each with a poached egg, if you like (and I do), and serve at once.

⁃ The Guardian aims to publish recipes for sustainable fish. For ratings in your region, check: UK; Australia; US.

Recipes by Tommy Heaney, chef/patron of Heaneys in Cardiff.

This article was edited on 3 March 2020, to clarify the amount of beer used in the rarebit mix.

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