RCP: Blackberry-Mint Butter and Minted Red Onion Blackberry Relish

[Jenise]

Everybody has a little recipe book like this in their collection: no one else ever heard of it, you don't even know where you got it, but you couldn't live without it. Mine is: The California Wine Coiuntry Herbs and Spices Cookbook. "72 chefs, winemakers and wineries now share 188 of their best recipes featuring herbs and spices."

When I need an idea, when I need to sort out a menu, this book never fails to offer something that inspires me--even if I don't use their recipe, it leads me to the fit I'm looking for. Just now, it helped me decide to do a butterflied leg of lamb for a dinner party on Saturday night to serve with Francesco's courgette-pesto pasta.

Anyway, while in there, I discovered these two intriguing recipes for mint-based condiments. First, Blackberry-Mint Butter:

2 cups fresh or frozen blackberries (drained)
1/4 cup fresh chopped mint
1/2 lb sweet butter at room temperature

Combine all ingredients in a food processor and pulse a few times to get mixture going. Then, just let the machine run until all the ingredients are well-mixed. Butter will be a rich, dark purple. Serves 10. The recipe is attributed to a Jamie Morningstar for Inglenook Wines.

The recipe does not include any suggestions for use, but I can imagine how delicious it would be as a compound butter on lamb chops.

Another recipe follows for Minted Red Onion Blackberry Relish to be served with "unseasoned beef, grilled, sauteed or broiled."

4 tblsp olive oil
8 cups red onions, thinly sliced
1 cup blackberries
2 tsp fresh mint, finely chopped
1/2 tsp black pepper

In olive oil, saute onions over low heat until coated with oil. Cover pan and cook slowly, stirring frequently until onions are soft and translucent. Add blackberries and cook, mashing them slightly until fruit is well blended. Add mint and black pepper and stir briefly to blend flavors. This recipe was developed for Kendall Jackson's Vintner's Reserve Zinfandel. The wine is bursting with fresh berry flavors and spiced with liberal amount of black peppers...this dish emphasizes these qualities."

Yum. Thanks for posting these Jenise. I love different butters especially.

[Jenise]

Recipe report, sort of:

I decided to do a riff on the minted red onion blackberry relish (substituting huckleberries which I had in the freezer for the blackberries I didn't have) to my Saturday night main course of Mint and Chestnut Honey Roast Lamb (will post recipe separately) and Francesco's pasta with courgette-herb pesto. So on Saturday morning I sauteed the red onions per the recipe and set them aside in anticipation of throwing the relish together shortly before service. I was going to add some vinegar to the mix and didn't want the acidity to kill the lovely color. Well, I needn't have worried--sitting in the pan all day with the lid on took care of the color. Instead of the soft magenta I'd last seen, the contents of the pan were a dull gray. HIDEOUS.