These playful ‘tacos’ from David Taylor use brined beetroot as shells, and are filled a tart mixture of rhubarb and creamy goat’s curd. At his restaurant, David serves them as a snack but at home they would work well either as substantial canapés or as a light starter. The lacto-fermented chillies take a few days to make, but you can use shop-bought fermented chillies instead.
Prepare a barbecue or grill for grilling the chillies
Take your favourite chilli – mine is lemon chilli – and grill it on the barbecue until scorched, or use a blow torch to char the skin
Chop up the chillies and and weigh them, then mix them with 2% of the weight of the chillies with salt. For example, if you have 50g chilli add 1g salt
Place the chillies and salt into a sterilised Kilner jar and leave at room temperature for 5–10 days. The length of time will depend on your room temperature
Lift the lid on your ferment (known as burping) every day to release excess gas build up. When your chilli takes on a pleasant sourness you know you're ready
For the salted beetroot, whisk together the salt and water until the salt dissolves and put to one side
Peel and slice the white beetroot on a mandolin to the thickness of a 50p coin
Take the beetroot slices and punch them with a ring cutter that is as close to the full size of the beetroot as possible
Place the beetroot slices in the salt brine and leave for at least 6 hours and up to 24
Once brined, drain the beetroot, wash and place into a covered container in the fridge, until needed
Take 200g rhubarb juice and whisk in the 3g agar agar. Bring to a gentle simmer for 1 minute to cook out the agar. Pour into a tray and allow to set in the fridge
Once set, turn out onto a board and chop the jelly as finely as possible before putting it back into a container in the fridge
Cut the stalk and leaves away from the chard. Slice the stalk into thin slices and cut small enough strips of the leaves that they can be used to garnish the top of the beetroot snack. Place in the fridge in a covered container
Slice the remaining rhubarb into thin slices. If you have a particularly thick rhubarb stalk, quarter it and then slice it. Put the rhubarb in the fridge in a covered container
Whisk together the rapeseed oil and remaining 25g of rhubarb juice and put to one side
Whisk the goat’s curd in a bowl. If it doesn't hold its shape, place it in some muslin cloth and leave to hang in a colander over a bowl for a couple of hours to release some of the moisture. If your curd is very dense you can add a splash of cream to loosen it. Season the goats curd with black pepper, a teaspoon of lacto-fermented chilli and a little salt
Spoon or pipe the curd into one half of the beetroot discs, leaving a gap around the rim. Spoon over the chopped rhubarb jelly and smooth off
Dress the leaves and chard stems in the rapeseed dressing, season with salt and place over the top of the rhubarb jelly, completely covering it. Add a few slices of rhubarb in between the leaves and stems and serve
Please sign in or register to send a comment to Great British Chefs.