Miquez Cegin, a Welsh recipe journal

Welsh Cooking Without Vegetable Oil

Menyn gyntaf, bob amser. Butter first, always.

From the cawl pot to the bakestone, we cook the way Welsh kitchens always have: with good butter, proper lard and patience. No seed oils, no shortcuts, nothing from a plastic jug.

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A pan of food cooking on a home stove

Menyn

O'r pentan i'r bwrdd, from the hearth to the table

Six Welsh Recipes, No Seed Oils

Every recipe below is cooked with butter, lard or another traditional fat. Pick a tab and get cooking.

A rustic pot of slow-cooked meat and vegetable stew

Cawl

The national dish of Wales: lamb and root vegetables simmered slowly until the broth turns rich and the meat falls apart. Many families insist it tastes even better the next day.

  • 2 hr 30 min
  • Serves 6
  • Easy

Ingredients

  • 900 g lamb shoulder or neck, cut into chunks
  • 2 tbsp butter
  • 3 leeks, sliced, white and green parts kept separate
  • 4 potatoes, peeled and cut into large pieces
  • 1 small swede, peeled and diced
  • 3 carrots, thickly sliced
  • 1 onion, roughly chopped
  • 1 parsnip, diced
  • 2 bay leaves
  • Sea salt and black pepper

Method

  1. Melt the butter in a large heavy pot and brown the lamb in batches until well colored on all sides.
  2. Add the onion and the white parts of the leeks, and cook gently for 5 minutes until softened.
  3. Cover with cold water, add the bay leaves and a good pinch of salt, and bring to a gentle simmer.
  4. Skim any foam, then simmer partly covered for 1 hour 30 minutes, until the lamb is tender.
  5. Add the potatoes, swede, carrots and parsnip, and simmer another 30 minutes until soft.
  6. Stir in the green leek tops, simmer 5 final minutes, season well and rest 10 minutes before serving.
A cooked salmon fillet plated with herbs

Welsh Butter-Poached Salmon

Wales has a long river fishing tradition, and this is the gentlest way to treat a good fillet: poached slowly in salted butter with leek and bay until just set.

  • 35 min
  • Serves 4
  • Intermediate

Ingredients

  • 4 salmon fillets, skin removed
  • 250 g salted butter, cubed
  • 1 small leek, finely sliced
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 6 black peppercorns
  • 1 lemon, half juiced, half in wedges
  • Small bunch of fresh parsley, chopped
  • Sea salt
  • 500 g new potatoes, to serve
  • 2 tbsp water

Method

  1. Boil the new potatoes in salted water until tender, then drain and keep warm.
  2. Put the water in a wide pan over low heat and whisk in the butter a few cubes at a time until creamy.
  3. Add the leek, bay leaf and peppercorns, and let them soften in the butter for 5 minutes.
  4. Season the salmon, lower it into the butter and poach gently for 8 to 10 minutes, spooning butter over the top. The butter should barely bubble.
  5. Lift out the fillets, add lemon juice and parsley to the pan, and taste for salt.
  6. Serve the salmon over the potatoes with the leek butter spooned generously on top.
Fresh green vegetables prepared in a bowl

Welsh Leeks in Butter

The leek is the emblem of Wales, and it needs nothing more than slow butter and patience. Braised until silky, this is a side dish that often steals the table.

  • 25 min
  • Serves 4
  • Easy

Ingredients

  • 4 large leeks
  • 60 g salted butter
  • 2 sprigs of fresh thyme
  • 3 tbsp water
  • Sea salt
  • Black pepper, freshly ground
  • 40 g Caerphilly cheese, crumbled (optional)
  • Squeeze of lemon
  • Crusty bread, to serve
  • Chopped chives, to finish

Method

  1. Trim the leeks, split them lengthwise, rinse out any grit and slice into thick half-moons.
  2. Melt the butter in a wide pan over low heat until it just starts to foam.
  3. Add the leeks, thyme, water and a pinch of salt, and stir to coat everything in butter.
  4. Cover and braise gently for 12 to 15 minutes, stirring now and then, until completely soft but still green.
  5. Finish with pepper, a squeeze of lemon, the chives and the crumbled Caerphilly if using, and serve warm with bread.
A warm bowl of creamy soup served with bread

Welsh Onion and Cheese Soup

Sweet onions cooked down in butter, a light broth, and a generous handful of crumbly Welsh cheese melted in at the end. Hearty valley food for cold evenings.

  • 55 min
  • Serves 4
  • Easy

Ingredients

  • 5 large onions, thinly sliced
  • 70 g butter
  • 1 tbsp plain flour
  • 1.2 L chicken or vegetable stock
  • 150 g Caerphilly or mature cheddar, crumbled
  • 1 tsp English mustard
  • 2 sprigs of thyme
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 4 thick slices of bread, toasted
  • Sea salt and black pepper

Method

  1. Melt the butter in a heavy pot and add the onions with a pinch of salt.
  2. Cook low and slow for 25 minutes, stirring often, until deeply golden and sweet.
  3. Stir in the flour and cook for 2 minutes, then add the stock, thyme and bay leaf.
  4. Simmer gently for 15 minutes, then remove the herbs and stir in the mustard.
  5. Off the heat, stir in most of the cheese until just melted, and season to taste.
  6. Ladle into bowls and top each with toasted bread and the remaining cheese.
A rustic homemade loaf on a wooden board

Bara Brith

The famous Welsh "speckled bread": dried fruit soaked overnight in strong tea, baked into a fragrant loaf and always served in thick slices spread with salted butter.

  • 1 hr 45 min, plus overnight soak
  • Makes 1 loaf
  • Intermediate

Ingredients

  • 300 ml strong hot black tea
  • 350 g mixed dried fruit
  • 100 g dark brown sugar
  • 1 large egg, beaten
  • 280 g self-raising flour
  • 2 tsp mixed spice
  • Pinch of salt
  • Butter, for greasing the tin
  • 1 tbsp honey, to glaze (optional)
  • Salted butter, to serve

Method

  1. The night before, pour the hot tea over the dried fruit and sugar, stir, cover and leave to soak.
  2. Next day, heat the oven to 160°C and butter a 900 g loaf tin well.
  3. Stir the beaten egg into the soaked fruit along with any tea left in the bowl.
  4. Fold in the flour, mixed spice and salt until no dry patches remain.
  5. Scrape into the tin and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.
  6. Brush with honey while warm if you like, cool fully, then slice and serve with plenty of salted butter.
A stack of small round griddle cakes

Welsh Cakes

Little spiced griddle cakes cooked on the bakestone, made the traditional way with half lard and half butter. Crisp edges, soft middles, warm sugar on top.

  • 40 min
  • Makes about 20
  • Easy

Ingredients

  • 450 g plain flour
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp mixed spice
  • 110 g cold butter, diced
  • 110 g cold lard, diced, plus extra for the griddle
  • 170 g caster sugar, plus extra to dust
  • 110 g currants
  • 1 large egg, beaten
  • Splash of milk, if needed
  • Pinch of salt

Method

  1. Sift the flour, baking powder, spice and salt into a large bowl.
  2. Rub in the butter and lard with your fingertips until the mix looks like fine breadcrumbs.
  3. Stir in the sugar and currants, then add the egg and just enough milk to bring it into a firm dough.
  4. Roll out to about 6 mm thick and cut into rounds with a 6 cm cutter.
  5. Heat a bakestone or heavy pan over medium-low heat and grease lightly with lard.
  6. Cook the cakes about 3 minutes per side until golden, then dust with sugar while still warm.

Good Welsh food was never complicated. It was a pot over the fire, butter from the churn, and whatever the valley and the coast could give that week. That is the cooking we keep alive here.

Miquez Cegin is an independent recipe journal dedicated to the traditional cooking of Wales. Every dish we publish is tested in a home kitchen and made entirely without vegetable oil, using butter, lard and other fats Welsh cooks have trusted for generations.