Chef Joe Otway has shared four early autumn recipes built around British seasonal produce, with each dish designed to let a single ingredient at its peak do most of the work. The Guardian published the recipes on 14 October 2026, covering a buttery cheese tart, a sweetcorn salad with soured cream, roast squash with ‘nduja, and a radicchio salad lifted with elderflower vinaigrette.
Otway describes early autumn as one of the most generous times of year for British produce. Sweetcorn is at its peak, squash begins to sweeten as temperatures drop, and bitter leaves such as radicchio offer balance against the season’s richness. Each recipe uses a small number of components, chosen to keep the focus on the vegetable.
The four dishes
The cheese tart makes four individual portions using a cheddar-enriched shortcrust pastry and a custard of eggs, milk, double cream and English mustard. The pastry is blind-baked before the custard is poured in and the tarts are returned to the oven for 15 to 25 minutes, until just set with a slight wobble in the centre. Otway suggests serving them with a bitter leaf salad or one of his two accompanying sides.
The corn salad can be made with four fresh cobs or a 400g tin of sweetcorn. The dressing combines soured cream, extra-virgin olive oil and lemon juice, with a blended oregano oil spooned over the corn before it is arranged on a bed of the soured cream mix and finished with parmesan shavings.
For the squash dish, Otway recommends uchiki kuri, though butternut works well. The wedges are roasted at 220C (200C fan) for 30 to 40 minutes until tender and caramelised, then served over lemony Greek yoghurt with a warm dressing of ‘nduja, honey and olive oil, scattered with toasted pumpkin seeds and flat-leaf parsley.
The radicchio salad keeps things simple: bitter leaves (radicchio, treviso, chicory or endive all work, Otway notes) are dressed in an elderflower cordial vinaigrette made with white-wine vinegar and Dijon mustard, left to marinate for five to ten minutes, then finished with shavings of hard sheep’s cheese or pecorino. Otway acknowledges that elderflower is an early-summer flavour, but argues that cordial allows the fragrance to be used year-round.
About Joe Otway
Otway is chef and co-owner of Higher Ground, Bar Shrimp and Flawd, all based in Manchester. According to Higher Ground Manchester, in April 2024 the restaurant was associated with Cinderwood, described as a one and a half acre market garden in Cheshire built on a relationship between Otway and a team of growers.
All four recipes are available in full on The Guardian’s website.