Wood Roasted Vegetables with Anchovies, Garlic and Walnuts

Method

1. Place the anchovies, the garlic and the milk in a cast iron pan and pop in the open door of your wood oven to gently cook and reduce until the garlic is nice and soft and the milk is fully reduced.
2. Add most of your wine – reserving a drop or two to finish the sauce – and reduce by about ¾. Place in a food processor with a splash of water and the anchovy mixture. Blend on full speed and slowly drizzle in the olive oil until slightly thickened and emulsified. Finish with a squeeze of lemon juice, the reserved red wine, plenty of cracked black pepper and adjust with salt if necessary. Keep warm.
3. Cut the carrot tops off and split the carrots into two, cut the chicory into 6 through the root trying to keep them intact, trim the ends off the asparagus and cut the romesco and cauliflower into large florets. Wash the spring onions and keep them whole.
4. Toss all the veg together with a good glug of olive oil and season well with salt and pepper. Let them sit at room temperature for 10 minutes or so for the salt to draw out some of the moisture from the veg and help it wilt slightly. Spread evenly onto a large flat oven tray that will fit in your wood oven and roast until the edges are blistered but the vegetables still retain some of their texture.
5. Serve warm on a platter, sprinkled with the chopped toasted walnuts with a bowl of the warm Bagna Cauda on the side.

This dish was roasted in the Alfa Forni 5 Minuti. For more information and prices, click here.