Touring Maggie Beer's home and edible garden | Garden Design and Inspiration | Gardening Australia

Sophie Thomson visits legendary cook, writer, and television presenter Maggie Beer, well known for her cooking, she’s also a passionate gardener inspired by fresh produce. Subscribe 🔔 http://ab.co/GA-subscribe

She’s been invited to check out Maggie’s own private veggie garden, describing it as her ‘joy’.

“It’s where I want to be, more and more, until I’m so sore I can’t move,” Maggie laughed.

Armed with her knowledge she’s on a mission to improve the food quality in aged care facilities around the country through her Maggie Beer Foundation.

“For me, it’s about no longer allowing institutionalised food,” Maggie said.

Recognising a lack of specialised training and support in the aged care sector, for the past five years she’s been conducting master classes for chefs.

“We need to give them skills, knowledge, respect and remuneration,” Maggie said.

Her vision is to combine cooking and gardening with veggie gardens as part of aged care facilities.

“Food to me is so simple, it’s just throwing together great ingredients,” she said.

As a parting gift to the keen gardener, Sophie leaves Maggie with some Egyptian walking onions, Larger than a shallot, the unique plants replant themselves by sending up a flower spike loaded with bulbils, the weight of which causes the spike to bend or ‘walk’ over.

Maggie cooks up the distinctively flavoured Tuscan kale with some quince.

Maggie’s other ‘mission’ is to try and convince Sophie to try the distinctively flavoured tall dark and curly Italian Cavolo nero, also known as Tuscan kale. While Sophie doesn’t mind it in juices, she’s not yet a fan of eating it. The quince in the recipe adds some sweetness to the dish for the ‘kale doubters’.

What you need:
A large handful of Tuscan kale
1 quince
Olive oil
1 Pomegranate
Butter
Pinch of salt

What to do:
– Grab a bunch of kale and strip the leaves from the spine, only if it’s older, otherwise leave intact on younger growth. Blanche for about three to five minutes, three minutes for younger leaves. Make sure the colour remains. – Strain the liquid then squeeze out the excess juice by wringing the kale in your hands, then chop it up.
– Cut the peeled quince into bite-sized pieces and fry with some olive oil, butter and a pinch of salt. Make sure you don’t overcook it, then remove from pan.
– Then fry the kale in the same pan. Add the lightly fried quince. Lightly fry together. Add some black pepper and pomegranate seeds.
– Serve with lightly toasted sourdough bread drizzled with lashings of olive oil and fresh ricotta sprinkled with pomegranate seeds.
– Serve together.

Featured plants:
Tuscan Kale or Lacinato Kale or Dinosaur Kale or Black Tuscan Kale
Genus: Brassica
Species: oleracea
Variety: Lacinato
Egyptian Walking Onions are also called Tree Onions, Egyptian Tree Onions, Top Onions, Winter Onions, or Perennial Onions – Allium proliferum

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