baked haddock with wild garlic and pea puree

... up until a couple of years ago I could only find one teeny patch of wild garlic in the local bluebell woods, it was so lonely and sorrowful that I felt guilty plucking it from the ground and would only cut a few precious leaves from the plant but then one day The Viking came rushing in from a leisurely drive through the country lanes exclaiming that he'd found a huge patch of the stuff flowing freely along a local bank of roadside trees. I was a little sceptical at first and I remember it being quite late in the season but we went off to investigate none the less and not only had he discovered a crop of the beautiful stuff but it turned out to be far more expansive growth than at first he thought... I knew we were in the right place yards before we parked as the fug of garlic wafted into the open car windows and there, running up the banks of a little wood on both sides of the road must be at least an acre of wild garlic... so much of the stuff in fact that I could have quite easily gone wild garlic mad. Luckily we live quite remotely and it's likely this patch of glorious green will remain untouched each spring for many years to come but if you ever visit this part of the world and the right time of the year I may just share my secret location with you...

baked haddock with wild garlic and pea puree
if you're unlucky enough to follow me on instagram or twitter you'll know that I recently had the honour of attending a Norwegian Sea Food 8 course meal celebrating the end of the skrei season... if cooked with this wonderful fish before but I was inspired by the wonderful cooking of Simon Hulstone, the chef cooking for us at the skrei dinner, to create this dish of fish served with a puree of wild garlic and peas... the puree is outstandingly divine and I could eat it by the spoonful and it makes me feel very close to nature that both the peas and wild garlic and from fields around belleau cottage...

for the wild garlic puree
3 or 4 bunches of wild garlic - roughly 100g
80g frozen peas
a little butter and seasoning

for the haddock
2 smoked haddock fillets
half a fennel bulb - thickly sliced
plenty of butter
a sprig or two of lemon thyme
salt and pepper

pre-heat the oven to 1890C

place the haddock, fennel, thyme and plenty of knobs of butters into an oven-proof dish, season well and cover with foil. when the oven is up to temperature bake for roughly 8 mins then remove the foil baste the fish with the juices and then bake for a further couple of minutes

steam the peas and wild garlic for roughly 6 minutes until very tender - set aside in a large bowl with a large knob of butter and season well - blitz with a hand-blender

as you can see i've served these with some mini roasties but feel free to serve with anything that pleases your fancy...

eat and of course, enjoy!