The Soul of the Sole Cake

From Asha Poyzer, on location in Austin, Texas.

‘Two days ago I cooked a meal at home, something that has been happening less and less since my wife and I moved to Austin, Texas. It was such an enlivening process that I want to share the experience and the meal with you. When it was time to cook I knew that I was going to make fish cakes (requested by my wife!) and a salad. She’d bought me a garden in a local community gardens scheme a few months ago, we planted it with a good selection of herbs and greens, so I headed out down through the neighborhood, walking under the huge and winter bound trees that line the quiet streets to pick out a selection of super fresh homegrown leaves and herbs. Having a community garden is really nice, it might be small but it is surrounded by lots of other gardeners, wisdom and inspiration. There is also a basketball court and I have made friends with a father and son who play together nearly every night, so going to the garden often involves a good conversation. There is a voice inside me, getting louder and more firm by the day, saying that being in touch with my life in such ways as growing food is the direction I need to be heading.

I had decided to cook the cakes using the oven. There is quite a discrepancy of grandeur between the hob and oven. The oven being a very cheap and microwave combination and the hob being a hardcore commercial burner! We have made a few experiments with the combi oven recently, now it is *technically* winter in Austin, and it seems to work well enough, producing roast veg and even a loaf of bread. For the fish cake I used mostly dover sole and then a little salmon, purple potatoes, white onion, garlic, dill (from the garden) and a spicy homemade apple-cider grain mustard. I had been given some persimmon by a neighbor who has a tree in his garden and so I made a persimmon chutney to accompany the cake using, red onion, nutmeg, cardamom, red chili, clove, a little rice syrup all cooked down in cider vinegar. It produced a wonderful and warming flavor! I used fresh red kale from the garden with onion carrot and red cabbage stir-fried in a toasted sesame oil and made a garden salad from homegrown pak choi and two different red lettuce mixed with cucumber and red radish all marinated in a homemade parsley (from garden) almond and chickpea miso sauce. To bite through some of the heavier and oily flavor of the meal I steeped a little white onion in umi vinegar. Finishing the look of the plate with a fan of ripe avocado, it was ready to eat. Alongside good music and conversation we both felt very satisfied after eating! I loved cooking and experimenting with such wonderful ingredients, it is certainly my new years resolution to home cook a lot more!’