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Autumn produce has a branding problem. The minute pumpkins, squash, mushrooms and apples appear, we tend to treat them as an instruction to roast everything until soft, add butter and call it comfort food. Delicious, certainly, but by November even the most committed casserole enthusiast can begin to crave something with rather more life in it.
Sebby Holmes has other ideas. At Farang, his modern Thai restaurant in Highbury, British ingredients regularly meet the heat, acidity, sweetness and funk of Thai cooking – an approach shaped by his time at The Begging Bowl and Smoking Goat before he launched Farang, first as a series of pop-ups and supper clubs, in 2016. The restaurant’s cooking is built around ingredients from both Thailand and the UK, with the emphasis firmly on balance and flavour.
These three recipes take some of autumn’s most familiar ingredients and give them considerably more to do. Pumpkin turns up twice: first alongside sticky, collapsing pork belly in a dark, glossy braise sharpened with fish sauce and finished with crisp shallots, and again in a massaman curry with caramelised apple, coconut milk and Thai basil. Wild mushrooms and squash, meanwhile, are folded through a coconut soup fragrant with galangal, lemongrass and makrut lime, with smoked chicken bringing an extra savoury edge.
They are still very much cold-weather food – warming, generous and designed to be eaten with plenty of rice – but none sinks into the beige fug that can descend on autumn cooking. Chilli, lime, herbs and fish sauce keep everything bright. Comfort food, in other words, without the need for a nap afterwards.
Sticky pork belly with salted roast pumpkin and crispy shallots
A dark, glossy braise of pork belly and pumpkin, finished with crisp shallots and plenty of fish sauce (Sebby Holmes/Farang/Payst)
Serves: 2 as a small plate
Ingredients:
300g pork belly, skin removed
100g pumpkin, peeled and cut into 2cm-by-2cm chunks
5g coarse sea salt, plus extra for blanching
2 fresh bay leaves (dried will work)
1 star anise
1 x 4cm piece cassia bark (cinnamon sticks will do)
500g palm sugar (dark soft brown sugar can also be used)
100ml oyster sauce
300ml vegetable stock
50ml dark soy sauce
100ml fish sauce (50ml goes into the sauce, the rest for seasoning at the end)
1 pandan leaf, tied in a knot and torn to release flavour (optional but worth using if you can find it)
2 spring onions, thinly sliced
4 banana shallots, peeled and thinly sliced
500ml sunflower oil, for deep-frying the shallots
Method:
1. Bring a pan of well-salted water to a gentle simmer. Add the pork belly and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes, keeping the water below a rolling boil. A hard boil will tighten the meat and toughen the outside before the inside has had time to relax. After 15 to 20 minutes the pork should be firm to the touch but not cooked through. Remove, leave to cool slightly, then cut into 2cm-by-2cm chunks.
2. In a separate pan, bring salted water to the boil and blanch the pumpkin chunks for 6 to 8 minutes until just starting to soften but still holding their shape. They should take a little resistance when pressed. Refresh immediately under cold running water to stop the cooking and set the colour. Drain and set aside.
3. Toss the blanched pumpkin in the 5g of coarse sea salt while still warm and leave it to sit for 10 minutes. The salt draws out a little moisture and concentrates the flavour before it goes into the sauce.
4. In a wide, heavy-bottomed ovenproof pan, combine the palm sugar, vegetable stock, oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, pandan leaf, cassia bark, star anise and 50ml of the fish sauce. Place over a low heat and stir until the sugar has completely dissolved. Don’t rush this: high heat will cause the sugar to catch on the base before it’s had time to incorporate with the liquid.
5. Add the blanched pork belly pieces and stir to coat in the sauce. Lay a circle of greaseproof paper (a cartouche) directly onto the surface of the liquid and cover the pan. Bring to a very gentle simmer and braise for 30 to 40 minutes, turning the pork occasionally, until the meat is tender and beginning to collapse at the edges and the sauce has thickened and darkened considerably.
6. Add the salted pumpkin and fold in gently, being careful not to break the pieces apart. Simmer uncovered for a further 5 to 10 minutes until the pumpkin is soft and the sauce has reduced to a thick, glossy, dark braising liquor that coats everything heavily. Taste now: the sauce should be deeply sweet from the palm sugar, savoury and slightly bitter from the dark soy and oyster sauce, with a rich saltiness underneath. If it needs more seasoning, add the remaining fish sauce a little at a time. If it tastes one-dimensional and flat, a splash more fish sauce will bring it into balance immediately.
7. While the pork finishes, heat the sunflower oil in a small saucepan to 180C. Test with a single ring of shallot: it should sink slightly, then rise and sizzle steadily. Add the sliced banana shallots in batches and fry for 2 to 3 minutes until golden and crisp. Lift out with a slotted spoon onto kitchen paper. Separate the rings with a fork while they’re still hot: they’ll crisp further as they cool and stick together if left in a pile.
8. Serve the pork and pumpkin directly from the pan, scattered with the crispy shallots and sliced spring onions. Sticky rice alongside to soak up the braising liquid. Som tam if you have it.
Smoked chicken, wild mushrooms, sweet basil, coconut and galangal soup
Smoked chicken, wild mushrooms and squash make for a deeply aromatic coconut soup sharpened with lime and chilli (Sebby Holmes/Farang/Payst)
Serves: 2
Ingredients:
1 chicken breast, skin and fat removed, sliced into rough 2cm pieces (cold-smoked as per method below, or BBQ-grilled and chopped)
¼ butternut squash (roughly 50g), peeled and cut into rough 2cm pieces (pumpkin works too)
8 Thai shallots, peeled and lightly bruised with a pestle
2 green bird’s eye chillies, bruised with a pestle
2 kaffir lime leaves, torn
2 sticks lemongrass, cut into 2cm pieces and bruised with a pestle
10g galangal, peeled, cut into 2cm pieces and bruised with a pestle
2 coriander roots, cleaned and bruised with a pestle
½ tsp coarse sea salt
2 to 3 tbsp fish sauce (soy sauce for a vegetarian version)
200ml chicken stock (vegetable stock for vegetarian)
300ml coconut cream
10g Thai sweet basil (regular basil works)
50g assorted wild mushrooms (enoki, shiitake and shimeji all work well)
Juice of 1 lime
2 tbsp nahm prik pao (Thai fried chilli jam), to serve
Method:
1. Cold smoke the chicken first. Set up a BBQ with a small amount of wood chips. Once the smoke is going, place the chicken breast on the cool side of the grill away from direct heat and cover. Leave for a minimum of 2 hours, or overnight in the fridge for a deeper smokiness. The chicken stays raw, which is fine. It will cook in the soup. Alternatively, grill or BBQ the chicken breast over direct heat until charred and cooked through, then slice into rough 2cm pieces. This gives a different result but still works well.
2. Blanch the squash. Bring a small pan of water to the boil, add the squash pieces and simmer for 3 to 4 minutes until just beginning to soften but not cooked through. Drain and set aside.
3. Build the soup base. Combine the chicken stock, 100ml of the coconut cream, fish sauce, salt, galangal, coriander roots, bruised chillies, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves and Thai shallots in a medium saucepan. Bring to a simmer and let it bubble gently for 5 minutes. The broth should smell deeply aromatic at this point: floral from the kaffir lime, sharp from the galangal. If it still smells raw and faintly sweet, give it another couple of minutes before moving on.
4. Add the par-cooked squash, mushrooms and cold-smoked chicken pieces to the simmering broth. Cook gently for 4 to 5 minutes until the chicken is just cooked through and the mushrooms have softened. Don’t let it boil hard or the chicken will tighten.
5. Stir in the remaining 200ml coconut cream and the sweet basil. Add the lime juice. Taste now: the soup should be properly salty from the fish sauce, with the lime sharp at the back and the chilli building slowly underneath. If the coconut sweetness is dominating everything else, the lime is what brings it back. If it tastes flat, it needs fish sauce before anything else. Don’t adjust casually at this stage. This is where the bowl is made.
6. Divide between two deep bowls. Spoon nahm prik pao over the top at the table. Serve with steamed jasmine rice alongside.
Roast pumpkin and apple massaman curry
Roast pumpkin and caramelised apple bring autumn sweetness to a rich massaman curry with coconut, basil and peanuts (Sebby Holmes/Farang/Payst)
Serves: 2
Ingredients:
100g massaman curry paste (Our Payst massaman curry paste comes pre-seasoned. If not using this, add palm sugar and seaweed or soy sauce to taste)
50ml coconut or vegetable oil
2 makrut lime leaves, torn to release flavour
4 slices pumpkin (100/150g), with the skin on and seeds removed
1 cooking apple, peeled, core removed and chopped into 8 wedges
1 pinch coarse sea salt
1 tbsp caster sugar
1 tbsp soy sauce
200ml vegetable stock
250ml coconut milk
100g green beans, ends removed and chopped into 2
6 new potatoes, chopped into quarters
1 tbsp raisins
100g baby corn, chopped into bite-sized bits
20g (a handful) fresh Thai basil
Steamed jasmine rice, for serving
Optional garnish:
10g crispy shallots
10g roasted peanuts, roughly pounded in a pestle and mortar
2 makrut lime leaves, cut into thin strips
A few Thai basil sprigs
Method:
1. Firstly, prepare all your ingredients and get your jasmine rice cooking. Remember to wash your rice thoroughly before cooking, and use a rice cooker if you can.
2. Next, roast your apple and pumpkin. Pre-heat your oven to 180C. Using your hands, coat the chopped pumpkin and apple in half the oil, and lay out onto a baking tray lined with baking parchment. Sprinkle with a pinch of salt and roast on the top shelf of the oven for around 20-25 minutes, until you can easily push a knife through the apple and pumpkin. When cooked, remove from the oven, sprinkle with the sugar and return to the oven for a further 5 minutes, until the sugar has caramelised on top of the pumpkin and apple. Then remove from the oven and set aside for now.
3. Next, heat the rest of the oil in a large wok or pan to a medium heat. When hot, add the massaman curry paste and the torn makrut lime leaves. Continue to fry the paste for 1-2 minutes in the oil, making sure to scrape from the pan regularly, so it does not stick. When the paste has begun to darken, deglaze the pan with 1 tablespoon of soy sauce, all the stock and half the coconut milk, then bring to a simmer.
4. Once simmering, add all the green beans, baby corn, raisins and potatoes and simmer on a low heat for a further 7-8 minutes, until all the vegetables are cooked. When all the raw vegetables are cooked, add the roasted pumpkin and apple to the curry for a minute or so to reheat if they have gone cold. If they are still warm, arrange them nicely into your serving bowl to serve the curry on top of. Then remove from the heat and finish with the picked Thai basil and the rest of the coconut milk.
5. Serve in a large sharing bowl with fresh steamed jasmine rice. If you like, garnish with Thai basil sprigs, crispy shallots, roasted peanuts and julienned makrut lime leaves.
Dining and Cooking