Stocking your cottage kitchen the Dales way

Half the pleasure of a self-catering break in the Yorkshire Dales is the shopping. Start in a market town — Hawes, Leyburn, Settle, Kirkby Lonsdale — and build your basket around what is actually in season. You want a wedge of proper crumbly Wensleydale, ideally two: a young, moist one for eating and a firmer, sharper one for cooking. Add local milk and double cream, a slab of salted butter, free-range eggs, dry-cured bacon, and a bag of flour which will almost certainly be stoneground and nutty.

Weekday markets are quieter than Saturday ones, and the last half hour is when stallholders are happiest to chat about what to do with a cut of meat. Keep a short storecupboard list for the cottage itself:

• Plain and self-raising flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda
• Oats, soft brown sugar, golden syrup, black treacle
• Mustard powder, cayenne, dried thyme, a whole nutmeg
• Stock cubes or a jar of good paste, and a small bottle of rapeseed oil

Proper Wensleydale cheese scones

Scones are the fastest way to make a rented kitchen feel like home, and they take twenty-five minutes start to finish. Heat the oven to 200°C fan (180°C conventional, gas mark 6) and line a baking tray.

Rub 75g of cold butter into 350g self-raising flour with a teaspoon each of baking powder, mustard powder and cayenne until it looks like rough breadcrumbs. Stir through 150g crumbled Wensleydale, then add 150ml milk and bring it together with a knife. Turn onto a floured surface, pat to about 3cm thick, and cut with a sharp cutter pressed straight down — twisting seals the edges and stops the rise. Glaze with milk, scatter a little extra cheese on top, and bake for 12–15 minutes until deep gold.

Eat them warm with butter and a slice of cold ham, or split and filled with chutney for a walking lunch. They freeze beautifully, so make a double batch on your first morning.

A soup for a drizzly afternoon

Dales weather rewards a big pan of something. Soften two sliced leeks in 30g butter with a pinch of salt until sweet and slippery, add 400g diced floury potatoes, 700ml stock and a few sprigs of thyme. Simmer for 20 minutes until the potatoes collapse, then blitz roughly — leave some texture rather than making a purée.

Now the important bit: take the pan off the heat before you stir in 100g grated Wensleydale. Boiling cheese hard makes it grainy and stringy; gentle heat keeps it silky. Season with black pepper and a scrap of nutmeg, and serve with the scones above. If you have leftover roast vegetables in the fridge, fold them in instead of the potatoes.

A hearty cheese, leek and potato plate pie

This is proper Dales comfort food, and it uses up whatever cheese is left in the fridge. For the pastry, rub 100g cold butter into 200g plain flour, then mix in 50g finely grated Wensleydale, an egg yolk and a splash of cold water. Rest it in the fridge while you make the filling.

Slice 450g waxy potatoes and boil them for eight minutes. Meanwhile, soften two sliced leeks in butter, then combine with the drained potatoes, 150g crumbled Wensleydale, a tablespoon of double cream, thyme leaves, salt and plenty of pepper. Line a buttered pie dish with two-thirds of the pastry, tip in the filling, top with the rest, crimp the edges and cut a steam hole. Brush with beaten egg and bake at 190°C fan (170°C conventional, gas mark 5) for 35–40 minutes until the crust is biscuit-brown. Let it stand ten minutes before cutting, or the filling will flood the plate.

Seasonal puddings and the classic Dales pairing

From late April, forced rhubarb gives way to the outdoor stuff, and a crumble is the obvious move: 600g chopped rhubarb tossed with 100g sugar, a knob of stem ginger and the zest of an orange, topped with 150g flour, 75g butter, 75g oats and 75g brown sugar, baked at 190°C fan for 35 minutes.

In autumn, make parkin. Warm 100g butter, 200g golden syrup, 50g black treacle and 100g soft brown sugar until liquid, then beat in 100g self-raising flour, 200g medium oatmeal, a teaspoon each of ground ginger and mixed spice, one egg and 150ml milk. Bake at 150°C fan (130°C conventional, gas mark 2) for 50–60 minutes and leave it in the tin to cool — parkin improves for days and travels home in a cake tin.

And do try the local habit of serving a wedge of young Wensleydale alongside a slice of rich fruit cake. Sharp, salty cheese against sweet crumb is one of the great Yorkshire mouthfuls, and it needs no cooking at all.

Cottage kitchen practicalities

Rented ovens run hot, cold and lopsided. Buy a cheap oven thermometer on your first shop, and treat every timing here as a guide rather than a rule — rotate the tray halfway through and trust your nose. Take a sharp knife, a roll of greaseproof paper and a decent tin if you are driving, since cottage cupboards are often a lucky dip.

Store cheese wrapped in greaseproof paper rather than clingfilm, which makes it sweat, and bring it to room temperature half an hour before eating. Cook double portions of the soup and pie; both reheat well on the second evening after a long walk, when nobody wants to do more than warm something through and put their feet up.