Finders keepers: Get outside and start foraging

Foraging for wild food seems to be the new outdoor activity de nos jours – whether it's for mushrooms, wild herbs or vegetables. There is something so satisfying about harvesting food for free. I like to use the Richard Mabey and Roger Phillips books, which are the bibles of wild food – and even though they're now quite old, they are still relevant today.

In our restaurants there's a great demand for wild food – and thanks to Miles Irving, we're able to get our hands on it without having to go out and rummage around the woods, fields and hedgerows ourselves. Miles set up his company Forager (www.forager.org.uk) a few years ago with the intention of making his passion for wild things available to the general public, via the restaurants he sells to. And his constant supply of freshly foraged food – much of it from Kent – has been a revelation to us chefs; even those of us with that built-in foraging instinct.

Miles is an inspiration to us all. Foraging for your own food is a hell of a lot more fun and healthy than driving down to the supermarket and standing grimly in a queue at the checkout. All you have to contend with is the long grass, and perhaps a few barbed wire fences and seaside rocks.

You can forage for wild food during any month of the year if you know what you're looking for, or you could even forage in your own back garden by holding off on the weed killer and encouraging weeds such as bittercress, chickweed, sow thistle, elder – all of which make good fodder for the salad bowl – or borage, which should be dunked into your Pimms.

Steamed cockles with cumin and wild fennel

Serves 4

During my recent weekend in Spain, my partner Clare and I went to a beach-side restaurant for lunch that had been highly recommended to us – alas, it turned out to be a disaster when they served us a not very tasty cockle dish. But I often find that you can get great ideas from bad restaurants, so here's my idea of a better version.

I've used giant cockles for this recipe, which are available from Chef Club Direct (www.chefclubdirect.co.uk; 01275 474707), but you could use normal-sized cockles or clams. Wild fennel is plentiful along most coastal paths at this time of the year and if you have good cockle beds nearby you can also gather them for a virtually free feast.

4 shallots, peeled, halved and thinly sliced
1 1/2tsp cumin seeds
2tsp ground cumin
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
2tbsp olive oil
1.5kg cockles or clams, washed
3-4tbsp chopped wild fennel
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
100ml sherry

Leave the cockles in a bowl covered with cold water for about an hour and agitate them every so often with your hands to help to release any grit from the shells.

Gently cook the shallot, cumin and garlic in the olive oil for 2-3 minutes until softened. Add the drained cockles and fennel, season, then pour in the sherry and the same amount of water. Cover with a lid and cook on a medium to high heat for about 5-6 minutes, stirring the cockles a couple of times, until all the shells have opened. Serve immediately.

Scallops with seashore vegetables

Serves 4

This time of the year is perfect for harvesting seashore vegetables. Depending on what's native to your coastline you can find sea beet and sea purslane all year round, rock samphire now and marsh samphire in a few weeks' time. And if you're really lucky, you could find sea kale, which looks like sprouting broccoli and usually grows between rocks. People used to bleach it to keep it white by piling the rocks up around it. It was a common vegetable years ago, but you rarely see it these days.

12 medium scallops, shucked, cleaned and cupped, shell reserved
A selection of seashore vegetables like samphire, sea beet, rock samphire, sea purslane, sea kale, woody stalks removed, trimmed and washed
A good knob of butter

For the scallop roe butter

The orange roes from the scallops
2 shallots, peeled and roughly chopped
Half a glass of white wine
Juice of half a lemon
150g cold unsalted butter, diced

First, make the scallop roe butter: remove the orange roes from the scallops. Simmer the shallots in the white wine and the same amount of water for a couple of minutes until it has reduced by two-thirds. Add the scallop roes, remove from the heat and blend in a liquidiser until smooth. Return to a pan on a low heat and whisk in the butter to form a smooth sauce. Season, add lemon juice to taste and keep in a warm place covered in clingfilm.

Bring a pan of water to the boil and quickly blanch the sea vegetables separately until just tender, drain and keep warm. Season the scallops, melt a little butter in a frying pan until foaming and quickly cook the scallops for 30 seconds on each side. To serve, arrange the sea vegetables in the warmed scallop shells, place the scallops back in the shell with some of the smaller sea vegetables like samphire and purslane, and spoon the roe butter around.

Elderflower buttermilk pudding with raspberries

Serves 4

I know I used elderflowers last week, but at this time of year when they are abundant it seems a shame not to make the most of them – even if you make cordial (try combining a dash of elderflower cordial with champagne for a refreshing summer cocktail).

12g leaf gelatine (4 sheets)
8-10 elderflowers
700ml buttermilk
70g caster sugar
100ml jersey cream

For the raspberry compote

200g raspberries
60g caster sugar

The day before, wash the elderflowers and dry them. Place them in a pan with the buttermilk and sugar and bring to the boil, simmer for a minute then remove from the heat and leave to infuse for about 5-6 hours or overnight.

Strain the milk through a fine meshed sieve. Soak the gelatine in cold water – a baking tray is ideal – for a few minutes until soft, then squeeze out the excess water. Bring about 60-70ml of the milk to the boil, remove from the heat and stir in the gelatine until dissolved. Stir into the remaining infused milk with the jersey cream and mix well. Pour into moulds like individual pudding bowls or ramekins or a cup and leave to set in the fridge for 2-3 hours or overnight.

To make the raspberry compote, put 60g of the raspberries into a saucepan with the sugar and a tablespoon of water. Cook on a medium heat for a couple of minutes, stirring occasionally, remove from the heat and strain the mixture through a fine meshed sieve into a bowl, pushing the raspberries with the back of a spoon to give the syrup body and colour. Leave to cool; mix with the fresh raspberries.

To serve, dip the pudding moulds very quickly in and out of hot water, then turn out on to serving plates. Spoon a little of the raspberry compote around.

Chicken soup with mousserons

Serves 4

Mousserons, as we call them in the kitchen, or fairy rings, as you might know them, are abundant now. You'll often find them in unexpected places such as grass verges by the roadside. They are tiny grey/brown mushrooms the size of your small fingernail.

About 1.5 litres of chicken stock
4 chicken thighs, skinned
60g butter
50g flour
Salt and freshly ground white pepper
Leaves from a few sprigs of tarragon
60g mousserons or fairy rings
60ml double cream

Simmer the chicken thighs in the chicken stock for 30 minutes, then drain. In a clean pan, melt the butter and stir in the flour on a medium heat. Gradually add the strained stock, one ladle at a time, stirring well to avoid lumps forming. Bring to the boil, season and simmer gently for 30 minutes. Blend the soup with a hand blender or liquidiser to give it a nice silky finish then add the cream, tarragon, mushrooms and chicken meat which you have shredded from the thighs and simmer for a minute or so before serving. Check seasoning and use white pepper rather than black, if you have any. Again, if you are freezing the soup, blend when it's defrosted, then add the tarragon and cream.