Cookery and Dodgy Pop (or how Vegetable Crumble was inspired by Unit 4+2)

Last night I had a lot of bits of leftovers wot needed eating up and I was inspired by this song which I heard on the radio that was a hit for Unit 4+2 in 1965, coincidentally the year in which I was born.

The oatflakes and the wheat
The carrots and the peas
When exposed to heat turn into crumble
But love will never die
You know we’ll eat the veggie crumble
Before we say goodbye
My love and I will be
Back home in time for tea
And that’s the way
That’s the way it’s meant to be

I think those were the words anyway.  The long and the short of it is that I decided to make a vegetable crumble and this is how I did it.  You can use any vegetables that you fancy for this – root vegetables, beans, broccoli, cauliflower, peas, sweetcorn, leeks, mushrooms, anything – the more the merrier.  This was so tasty and warming and very, very filling.  I served it on its own last night and had the remainder tonight with good sausages and peas.  My kind of grub.

Because (all together now) you should never put the oven on just for one thing, I popped in a Pineapple Upside Down Cake for pud.

VEGETABLE CRUMBLE

Utensils:
1 x medium ovenproof dish
1 x medium saucepan
1 x medium mixing bowl

Ingredients:
Cheese sauce
4oz / 120g butter
1 large onion – chopped
2 heaped tablespoons wholemeal plain flour
¾ pint / 500ml milk
4-6oz / 120-180g hard cheese – grated
cooked vegetables – I used carrots, sweetcorn, broccoli, cauliflower
Crumble
4oz / 120g butter
3oz / 90g wholewheat plain flour
3oz / 90g oats
3oz / 90g of something else – I used crumbled bran flakes but you could use seeds or crushed Weetabix, Shreddies or All Bran – experiment

Method:
Pre-heat the oven to 180 / 350 / 4
Melt 4oz / 120g butter in the pan
Add the chopped onions and cook over  low heat until soft but not browned
Stir in the flour and turn up the heat a little
Slowly add the milk, stirring constantly until  it thickens
Stir in the cheese and season to taste
Put the vegetables into the casserole dish and pour over the sauce
Now make the crumble mixture
Put the butter into the mixing bowl and rub in the flour
Rub in the other ingredients until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs
Spread the crumble evenly over the vegetable mixture
Put the dish into the oven and bake for 30 minutes or until the top has gone nice and crunchy

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