20 Aug 2020

Recipe request: Lavender's Green Preserved Lemons

From Afternoons, 2:20 pm on 20 August 2020

Lavender's Green in the Wairarapa has shared two of its industry secrets on why its prized preserved lemons are so delectable.

Featherston businesswomen Mary Biggs did so after a listener requested Jesse Mulligan put the squeeze on Lavender's Green to reveal all. The business has also produced a classic cordial in the past.

Lavender's Green Preserved Lemons

Lavender's Green Preserved Lemons Photo: Lavender's Green

The listener says she couldn't find the product these days, but insists it was the best preserved lemons she'd ever tasted.

Mary Biggs kindly obliged sending in Lavender's Green Preserved Lemons recipe and told Jesse Mulligan all about her business too.

"Lavender’s Green was started 21 years ago, not long after we’d moved to Featherston, to this beautiful home that we’re in Te Puhi. It’s a really old house and it’s got a stunning garden and lots and lots of lemon trees." she says.

“When I was sitting idly by looking after my four children I thought to myself, gosh, what a waste, there’s lemons on the ground, someone should do something with them.

“So, we started making a lemon cordial and we put it in a blue bottle and it became quiet a collector’s item, not only because of the taste but because it looked so lovely.

“In fact, I was in Newtown a couple of years ago and there was an op-shop and a bottle of cordial, empty of course, was for sale for $10.”

The preserved lemons was a natural progression from the cordial, a means of diversifying and add more value to her lemon bounty.

“The preserved lemon was a product that came after the cordials. The reason I started making them was because we are doing a lot of country markets and selling them, and I realised that people weren’t going to buy cordial every week, so I needed another product or two that would entice them to keep spending and at that stage, I had a commercial kitchen down at the farm.”

The business has now diversified further, with Mary running the country cooking school at the farm house in Te Puhi, Featherston. She conceived of the idea during the eights years she lived in Melbourne, returning to New Zealand in 2015.

“I was noticing a lot of food trends ahead of New Zealand in Melbourne and I was thinking a beautiful way to come back to work in New Zealand would be to invite people to the farm to enjoy a slice of country without having to get too dirty and that’s where the country cooking school came up.”

The grounds offer a splendid sight for visitors, who also use what's seasonal there in preparing recipes during their stay.

“We have large grounds. Beautiful vegetable gardens and orchards and the idea is you go to the country cooking school you go foraging, you grab vegetables and ingredients that you are going to use in the kitchen and you make your lunch together and eat the lunch together and maybe have a couple of wines from local providers.”

Preserved lemons are made with salt and lemon, which Mary describes as a favour bomb. They enhance flavours already in dishes, she adds.

Two ‘industrial secrets’ account for the unique flavour of her preserved lemons.

“There are two things that we do differently to most preserved lemon recipes. Firstly, we blanch the lemons. That makes the lemons nice and soft, so you can get them into a jar.

“Then the second tip, because we learned when we were creating the commercial product, the key thing was to have consistency. We preserved them in a brine, instead of just in a salt. We actually use a brine and use an overflow method, so that they’re preserved that way, like you preserve peaches.”

Mary recommends choosing a quality lemon. Blanch the lemons in boiling water for a minute and then cut them up and place them carefully into the jar, adding herbs and spices, like bay leaves, so the jar looks good.

Then you top them up with brine, letting them settle so all the air bubbles go and then top them up with boiling brine again, so that you have an overflow effect and you lid them immediately. Carefully wash the jar so you have no brine on the outside.

The preserved lemons will last about two years and the longer they remain on the shelf the better they’ll taste.

Her favourite recipe currently, is using these with chicken, artichokes, olives and lots of olive oil and garlic, roasting it all in the oven. It has made an impression and prolific author and chef Peta Mathias.

“Recently, I served that to Peta Mathias who came to Featherston last month for a wonderful fundraising event… despite Covid, we were able to produce this Words and Winters Series, it’s been amazing to see people come to see New Zealand’s top-class writers in Featherston,” she says.

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