Throw a relish on it!

Two punchy summer toppers to transform any simple cook-up

You might think my ultimate goal is to get you spending endless hours in the kitchen. And while that’s not entirely untrue — I am deeply passionate about showing people the ease and joy of cooking (which hopefully does inspire more time over a chopping board) — I’m also passionate about sharing tips and tricks that can help you spend less time in the kitchen and more time actually enjoying yourself. Especially in these summer months, when hosting is all about that sweet spot between effortless and impressive.

Enter: throw a relish on it.

This simple concept is your secret weapon to spending minimal time cooking while still delivering maximum flavour and excitement. The idea is almost disarmingly straightforward: take any protein — steak, fish, lamb chops, chicken thighs, whatever you love — cook it simply (think pan-fried, barbecued, or roasted with just olive oil and salt), and then crown it with a punchy, bright, flavour-bomb relish.

But here’s the catch: the relish has to be special. It needs to pack a serious punch — think bold flavours, contrasts, texture, that unexpected pop that makes it so moreish! And no, this doesn’t mean complicated or fussy. It’s about creatively combining a handful of interesting and effective flavours to take a humble piece of protein and elevate it into something genuinely exciting, without breaking a sweat.

I love coming up with different relish ideas and so this will be the first two relish recipes I’ll be sharing with you but certainly not the last. You can expect 2 per week for the next few weeks, hopefully arming you with a sufficient amount of exciting ideas to take you through the next few months of summery gatherings.

Today, we’ve two of my favourite ones to date. They’re both absurdly easy and totally marvellous. We’ve got a matchstick ginger and green chilli relish with lots of spring onion, sesame oil, soy and lemon and the second is a unique showstopper! I love her! Fresh cherries, pickled green chillies, parsley and lemon.

The ginger one brings so much warmth, punch and saltiness and worked brilliantly on this piece of steak but would be phenomenal on fish too. Think crispy skin sea bass or salmon! Yum! And the cherry one is the perfect combination of sweet, sharp, herby and spicy. Also fantastic with the bavette but would be equally great on barbecued lamb chops.

So that brings me to the protein. I used bavette as the gorgeous, meaty conduit for both of these relishes that I filmed earlier this week and I was reminded what a great cut of meat it is. So if you’re going to do recreate these with bavette steak as well, I’ll share the breakdown below of how to cook a perfect steak at home.

I hope you love these as much as I do!

GINGER, GREEN CHILLI AND SPRING ONION RELISH