FULL OF FLAVOUR

Sweet and sour onion petals

These onions – sweet inside, charred at the edges and swimming in a tart pomegranate syrup – started their life at Testi, a north London Turkish restaurant that we love, where a similar dish is made by charring onions next to lamb on the grill, then tossing them in ᶊalgam, a juice made from the sour salt brine of fermented purple carrots and turnips, and finally sweetening them with pomegranate molasses. The bitter-sweet onions are served alongside the meat, cutting through its fattiness like a sharp knife. Our onions are made with reduced pomegranate juice instead of molasses and ᶊalgam. They would obviously sit well alongside grilled meats, but we find them totally delicious also in a vegetarian context, with or without the goat’s cheese, which is optional. They will go really well with hummus, an aubergine salad and some bread.

• 500g golf-ball-sized red onions (about 12), peeled, then halved lengthways• 75ml olive• 400ml pomegranate juice (100% pure)• 10g chives, finely chopped• 70g young and creamy rindless goat’s cheese, broken into 2cm pieces (optional)• ⅔ tsp Urfa chilli flakes (or another variety of chilli flake)• Sea salt