The Greasy Spoon

Omelette Baveuse

 

I've got a thing about omelettes at the moment. The "runny" variety, as made in France. I'm not sure if I'm a bona fide Francophile (I veer between a wild enthusiasm and an Anglican suspicion), but I do think that, apart from the Euro, there are many things that the French get right, and omelettes are most certainly one of them. 

This is classic, Sunday night food: you take a non-stick, lightly oiled heavy saucepan, and heat it on a medium flame. Three eggs are beaten up with a dollop of crème fraîche, a pinch of salt and a pinch of white pepper. Add a knob of butter to the hot pan, turning the heat down to low. Swirl the butter around the pan as it froths.

In goes the egg mixture. Shaking the pan as you work, draw the runny mixture into the centre of the pan with a spatula or a fork. As the omelette cooks, the liquid egg will fill in the empty spaces. Carry on shaking the pan to make sure the edges don't stick.

I like my omelette to be soft- and that is indeed the aim of the Baveuse. To serve, fold over the omelette from both sides towards the middle and turn out on to a plate.

That's how to make a classic omelette. The secret is to use a lowish heat, work with speed, and keep it runny. Once you've mastered the technique you can start experimenting with fillings- chopped tomatoes, bacon, herbs and of course, cheese.

Incidentally, I'm currently experimenting with grated cheese and a dash of cognac; both added to the egg mixture before the beating stage. I like the sophisticated combination of cognac and eggs, although I appreicate that this is not going to be everybody's cup of tea.

There's also the question of when to add the salt. In researching this post, I found a video on Youtube featuring a certain Mr Gordon Ramsay teaching Joan Collins how to make an omelette. There was a scary frisson between the two of them, the "bat's squeak of sexuality", as Evelyn Waugh put it so brilliantly in Brideshead. Gordon reckons that if you add salt to the egg mixture it will turn the omelette "a bit grey". I'm definitely not convinced by this- and bet my bottom dollar that in a blind tasting (or indeed viewing) he wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

 

 

If you're interested in classic recipes and how to get them just so, may I recommend to you Felicity Cloake's Perfect- 68 Recipes for Every Cook's Repertoire. Ms Cloake writes a column for "The Guardian". The book does exactly what it says on the tin. 

 

 

 

Chinese Chicken in a Black Bean Sauce

 

Last night I dreamt again of Chicken in a Black Bean Sauce. Nothing special, just the ordinary, slighty tacky dish you get delivered from a Chinese takeaway, the sort of thing you might eat with chopsticks in front of the television, straight from the tin-foil carton. Strips of chicken, bound in a starchy, slightly piquant, peppery black sauce, stir fried with crunchy green peppers. Always crunchy green peppers.

As with Indian food in this country, I expect that Chicken in a Black Bean Sauce is about as authentic as a pizza cooked with pineapple; not of course that I am recommending you add pineapple to your pizza; that would be a heresy. But just sometimes, there's something comforting about re-creating simple, bastardised dishes: I think they've become modern classics in their own right.

Researching the recipe, I found all sorts of versions on the net. Some were spicier than others; one even used grated orange and ginger. I've come up with a simple, relatively authentic recipe you can easily make at home, although I admit that I have no idea if this is exactly how your local Chinese take-away makes it. Please feel free to add your own twists. You'll see that I have deliberately avoided using that pre-made black bean sauce you can buy in a tin. You can buy packets of fermented black beans (soy beans which have been dried and fermented in salt and spices) and from Chinese grocery shops. We're lucky enough to live relatively close to London's China Town. If you don't, I think you can buy these on the net. Incidentally, they're a different thing from the black beans used in Mexican or Caribbean cooking, which you can buy tinned from supermarkets. Here's how you make Chicken in a Black Bean Sauce:

First, you will need to make up your own black bean sauce mixture. In a bowl, combine the following ingredients: two heaped tablespoons of Chinese fermented black beans (rinsed and mashed), two cloves of minced garlic, one tablespoon of dark soy sauce, one teaspoon of Chinese oyster sauce (from the bottle), one teaspoon of sugar, two teaspoons of cornstarch, 1/2 cup of chicken stock, and a dash of rice wine or sherry. Put to one side.

Heat up your wok over a medium heat, and add a dash of toasted sesame oil. Warm for about thirty seconds. Add a teaspoon or so of minced garlic and your home-made black bean sauce. Cook, stirring for thirty seconds.

Add some chicken (which you've previously cut into thin strips) and cook through. If the sauce gets too thick (or there's not enough of it) add some more chicken stock or water. Cook, stirring occasionally so that the sauce doesn't stick to the wok.

When the chicken's almost cooked, add diced onion, sliced spring onions, green pepper (cut up into chunks), a further generous dash of soy sauce (this will help to turn the sauce a darker colour) and lots of fresh black pepper. Cook quickly (so that the vegetables are still crunchy) and serve. Steamed rice would be just the ticket.

 

Last Dinner on The Titanic

 

 

Like so many others with slightly macabre sensibilities, I have a near obsession with The Titanic. And I've had this for as long as I can remember, long before all the recent media hype and the James Cameron blockbuster of 1997.

I've got a very real problem with the latter: am I alone in thinking that this film is an example of the worst possible taste?  A very tragic real-life disaster, in which over a thousand people died, is reduced to a simplistic, anachronistic teen romance, fermented by a trite, retarded script; the Titanic's passenger list reduced to "them" and "us": "them" being the 'orrible upper classes- all cruel snobs with phoney Oxford accents and twirling waxed moustaches, and "us" being the brave, true, noble, kind, hard-working, down-trodden working class, on their way to create a Brave New America- except that they don't, 'cos they all drown at the expense of the cowardly toffs who dress up in drag to get to the life-boats before the women and children.

An interesting historical fact by the way- before we all get too revolutionary here- is that around double the amount of men in Third Class survived when compared to the poor old burghers in Second Class who suffered, I think, the worst survival rate of all, a terrifying 8.33 per cent.

And then there's all that bizarre cruciform spread-eagled arm waving stuff going on in the film, Leonardo and Kate at the bows of the great ship, offset by corny Irish folksy flutey music (why does modern day Hollywood have a thing about this? Although I'll grudgingly admit that the Titanic was made in Belfast) and the wailings- nay, shrieking- courtesy of the Franco-Canadian diva, Ms. Celine Dion.

 

 

Nope, I don't like "Titanic". Instead, have a look at William McQuitty's excellent A Night to Remember, directed by the late Roy Ward Baker and starring Kenneth More and a very young Honor Blackman (aka Mrs Gale). Yup, it's in black and white, yup, it was made in 1958. Yup, it requires a bit of effort to watch. Yup, it's got Kenneth More with a plummy accent, and it's all very Stiff Upper Lip. These are good things.

The Times today ran an article entitled "The other last supper". The byline said: "...inspired by the final Titanic meal, chefs around the world are serving variations of its first-class menu". Again, although fascinating, isn't this just a little dubious?  Not the Times article, which was interesting, but the idea that restaurants all around the world are staging "Last Dinner on The Titanic" banquets?

In the spirit of all this fun, one of my more recent second-hand buys has been, yes, you guessed it Last Dinner on The Titanic...Menus and Recipes from the Great Liner, by Rick Archbold and Diana McCauley, with a forward by Walter Lord. Walter Lord, by the way, wrote the book on the Titanic disaster, which I would recommend without hesitation.

 

So why not amuse and entertain your boss and his lady wife by inviting them to a Titanic dinner party?  If they're first class guests you could serve them eleven courses, consisting at a glance of: Oysters à la Russe, Poached Salmon with Mousseline sauce, Vegetable Marrow Farci, Chậteau potatoes, Asparagus Salad with Champagne-Saffron vinagrette (I like the sound of this one), and Waldorf pudding. If your guests warrant the second class menu, there's a choice of Baked Haddock with Sharp Sauce, Curried Chicken and Rice, Turnip Purée, Wine Jelly and American Ice Cream. Steerage gets, amongst other things, Roasted Pork with Sage, Vegetable Soup, Green Peas and Plum Pudding with Sweet Sauce.

Here's the recipe for the Asparagus Salad with Champagne-Saffron vinagrette (courtesy of "Last Dinner on The Titanic"):

Snap off the woody ends of the fresh asparagus stalks, and chuck them away. Plunge the asparagus into salted boiling water and cook them for 3 to 5 minutes until tender. Drain them under cold water- which will help to set the colour and will stop them cooking.

Meanwhile, soak some saffron strands in a few teaspoons of boiling water, and let it stand for a few minutes, until the saffron softens (you'll find that the water turns yellow). Stir in about a tablespoon or so of champagne vinegar, half a teaspoon of smooth Dijon mustard and a good pinch of white sugar. Whisk until smooth, and drizzle in three tablespoons of olive oil, until it forms an emulsion. Season with salt and white pepper. Toss with the asparagus and red and/or yellow peppers, finely diced. Arrange on a plate with a selection of designer lettuce leaves- those things in plastic bags you can buy from the supermarkets.

 

It's a wild world

 

 

It's wild garlic time. We get ours from the Pimlico Road Farmer's Market on Pimlico Green. £1.50 a bunch. I like this time of the year; when the boredom and horror of steely grey Feburary suddenly turns into the promise of a raw Spring. The Boat Race...The Grand National...Easter...Daffodils...Chocolate Eggs...Hot Cross Buns. And the whiff of raw garlic in the hedgerows. A few years ago, I was driving along a lane in South Oxfordshire and suddenly, there it was- a distinctive whiff of garlic coming from the grassy verge.

I'm very keen on a simple risotto made from English wild garlic. You'll find that the taste of wild garlic is much more subtle than the standard stuff, so dismiss any worries about any overpowering garlicky tastes. By the way, the look of wild garlic is a bit different too: it comes in the form of slightly limp, green leaves (not entirely unlike spinach) and you use these chopped leaves, rather than the bulb. You'll find that the wild garlic will keep if you stick it into a vase of water. I've just posted two helpful videos on The Greasy Spoon page on Facebook: they'll tell you all about wild garlic; how to find it and how to use it.

Here's how I make a delicious wild garlic risotto: I chop up a small onion and sauté it in hot butter, before adding Carnaroli rice (allowing the rice to soak up the hot butter). Ladle in a small quantity of hot, steaming vegetable stock and stir like mad, until the rice has absorbed the stock.

Carry on ladelling in the hot stock until the Carnaroli rice is ready: this is the art of risotto making. You want the rice grains to remain firm (with a "bite") yet, at the same time, to be bound up in a creamy, starchy, slightly soupy liquid. It might take about half an hour to make it properly. I find that it always takes longer to make than recipe books suggest.

And do beat the rice like mad- as this releases the starch from the grains. I'm currently in favour of Carnaroli rice: I find that this makes a slightly creamier risotto, although of course, arborio rice would be fine too. 

 

Anyway, back to the recipe. About ten minutes from the end, I add the chopped up wild garlic. Wild garlic has a very subtle taste, so I would recommend that you add quite a bit of the stuff: the risotto can certainly take it. I was also keen on the idea of turning the risotto a green colour- this will happen if you add enough. Check the seasoning and when you reckon the risotto's ready, add a small dash of white wine. This will stop the risotto from cooking.

Finish it off with a small helping of grated Parmesan- or indeed, a British cheese. This is Anglo-Italian food at its best.

And last, and certainly not least, I have started writing for The Dabbler. Some of you may know this site- it's an excellent (and slightly quirky) Culture Blog, well worth subscribing too. I was amazed to discover that I had won a Dabbler prize- a bottle of Ten Year Old Single Malt Glengoyne Whisky...

Lazy Spinach and Prawn Biryani

 

 

I'm going to deviate from the path with this one. Normally on The Greasy Spoon, I try to cover classic food and get to the bottom of authentic recipes. Hand up, I admit that the recipe I'm about to give you ain't a proper biryani- it's undoubtably a bastardised version, but so juicy, quick and delicious, I couldn't resist posting it. It's based on a recipe from allrecipes.co.uk, but I've unashamedly changed it in various ways.

What is a biryani?  I'm afraid many people in Britain just assume it's "Indian"- whatever that means. The story of the biryani, however, is far more complex. It originated in Persia, the name coming from the Persian word beryā(n) (بریان) which means "fried" or "roasted" and was brought to South East Asia by spice traders. It's a popular dish in India (many different versions), Pakistan, Burma, Thailand, Sri Lanka, The Middle East (including Iran and Iraq), Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia.

It's a combination of rice, spices, vegetables, fish eggs and meat. For an authentic biryani, the rice and curried sauce should be cooked separately, and then combined together at the end in layers, forming a contrast between the lightly spiced rice, and the intense flavours of the sauce, meat or vegetables. It's similar in a way to our very own kedgeree- which, of course, has its roots in the British Raj.

My "after-work" version is more of an Anglicised pilaf, I suppose. You could of course tweak it to become a proper biryani- by steaming basmati rice (with the lid on) and cooking this separately, creating some sort of a spicy sauce, and then combining it all together before serving. Fried crunchy, sliced onions would be an authentic and delicious garnish.

 

His Highness The Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, GCSI, GCIE, GCVO, GBE

 

Heat up a saucepan and add a dash of cooking oil. Add a thinly sliced onion, a sliced red chilli, and a knob of fresh ginger, (peeled and chopped). Cook on a medium heat for a few minutes until soft.

Now it' time for the spices. You're going to use cumin, coriander, turmeric and nutmeg. I would suggest that you buy the cumin and coriander as seeds, and then grind them up in a pestle and mortar until they become a fine powder. A tablespoon or so should be fine. I'm afraid that the turmeric came from the jar (about a teaspoon). The nutmeg was grated directly into the saucepan: I've got a little nutmeg grater which my mother-in-law (Gawd bless 'er) gave me for Christmas. Cook on a lowish heat for a few more minutes, so that the spices are cooked properly. The aim is to cook the spices, but not to burn them.

Stir in 225g of Uncle Ben's Long Grain Rice. This cheat's rice has had the starch removed, and so won't go mushy in the cooking. It's excellent for pilafs, in my opinion. If you were planning to use Basmati rice, you would need to rinse it first, and then "steam" on a low heat for about ten minutes with the lid on.

Stir in a tin of chopped tomatoes, and top up with hot fish stock. Add a pinch of sugar, and a pinch of salt. By the way, further cheating at this stage, as I added a dollop of Umami paste, the mysterious "fifth taste sensation" (a sort of cross between anchovies and tomatoes in flavour). Simmer the biryani on a low to medium heat, until the rice has cooked. If you think it needs it, top it up with boiling water now and again.

When the rice is cooked, stir in two packets of plebby prawns (these are those pre-cooked tiny, shrimp-like pink things you can buy in the supermarket). Take the birayni off the heat, and stir in a packet of spinach. You'll find that it wilts easily in the heat. Finish the dish off with a generous helpings of chopped fresh coriander.

If you want to research biraynis further, have a look at this video in which master chef Padma Lakshmi cooks a Royal Biryani for two hundred children in Hyderabad.

 

 

Salad Olivier

 

 

Remember this old favourite?  Otherwise known as the Russian Salad, it was invented by Lucian Olivier, a Belgian chef who ran the fashionable Hermitage restaurant in Moscow during the late nineteenth century. Olivier's salad, apparently, became quite a cause célèbre with le gratin; and enjoyed the patronage of the grand matrons of Muscovite Society. The Hermitage restaurant closed down in 1905, and Lucian Olivier died at the relatively young age of 45. If you're so inclined to pay your respects, he's buried in the Vvedenskoye Cemetry. And the closely guarded secret recipe for his famous salad went with him to the grave. Or did it?

What's in it, I hear you ask?  That's a very interesting question and much open to debate. There's quite a bit of stuff about it on the net; the subject's almost becoming a sub-culture in its own right. The original recipe included all sorts of exotic lovelies: grouse, veal tongue, caviar, crayfish tails, capers and even smoked duck- this was a fabled dish from Pre-Revolutionary Russia after all; nothing like that awful Heinz Russian Salad thing that came in a tin, and looked suspiciously like Oskie the Cat's sick.

 

Nicholas II and Alexandra, in 17th century fancy dress for the Winter Palace Ball, St Petersburg, 1903.

 

Anyway, a certain- and enterprising- Ivan Ivanov, a sous-chef at the Hermitage restaurant, plucked up enough courage to steal the recipe. Look upon his dastardly plan as a late nineteenth century pension pot. Now Olivier prepared the wretched salad himself- and only by himself. No other chef was allowed anywhere near him while he made it. Fortunately he was suddenly called away to deal with some emergency. While Oliver was gone, Ivan sneaked into the kitchen and managed to work out, at the very least, how the secret dressing was made.

Ivan left the Hermitage and went to work for Moskva, a local restaurant with an inferior clientele. A few weeks later, low-and-behold, a new salad appeared on the Moskva menu- the "Capital Salad" which, most suspiciously, looked and tasted very much like the original Olivier salad from the Hermitage restaurant. Naughty old Ivan.

The story goes that Ivan then sold the recipe to various publishing houses. One of the first printed recipes for Olivier salad, by Aleksandrova, appeared in 1894. It included grouse, potatoes, gherkins, lettuce leaves, crayfish tails, capers and aspic. All bound in a Provençal dressing.

Here's my take on Salad Olivier, based on a recipe from the fanastic Taste of Russia by Darra Goldstein. It will serve about eight people. "A Taste of Russia" is one of my favourite cookery books. It rediscovers the cuisine of Pre-Revolutionary Russia; the food from the days of the Romanov Tsars. It's a terrific book.

 

In a large bowl, mix: 225g cooked potatoes (cut into dice), a large cooked carrot (cut into dice), two apples (chopped into dice), one peeled orange (membranes removed, and cut into chunks), two spring onions (chopped), and 120g peas.

Mix in 225g of cooked chicken (which you have previously chopped up into bite-sized pieces.

Make a dressing: Press three hard-boiled egg yolks through a sieve into a small bowl. Mix in two dollops of olive oil and stir, to form a smooth emulsion. Add two tablespoons of cider or wine vinegar and eight tablespoons each of mayonnaise and soured cream. Season, and pour over the vegetables and the chicken, keeping some of the dressing back.

Let it chill in the 'fridge overnight. To serve, form the salad into a neat mold or mound, and pour over the remaining dressing. Garnish with fresh dill. You could of course, for a more piquant taste, ditch the orange and include diced gherkin. An authentic addition. I think it would work. 

The Graham Greene Cocktail

 

 

Graham Greene discusses a script with film director, Carol Reed: Life Magazine Archives

As a long time fan of Graham Greene, I was amused to discover that he had a cocktail named after him. There was always something slightly raffish about Greene: the crumpled Burberry, his Citroën Maserati SM (one of my all-time favourite dream machines and a self-indulgent excuse for a photograph, below, plus early Seventies dollybird), the apartment in Antibes, the French mistress, his collection of rare Victorian Crime Fiction, his adolescent games of Russian Roulette- all these things tempered by Catholic Guilt.

The Graham Greene Cocktail was invented at the Metropole Hotel, Hanoi, Vietnam in 1951. Greene was a correspondent for Paris Match. It's essentially a classic Dry Martini with a dash of Crème de Cassis. Being a Martini purist (and reared as a sproglet on John Doxat's instructive "Stirred not Shaken- the History of the Dry Martini") I had my doubts about this; it didn't sound that hot, to be frank; but I am sipping on one as I write, and it's surprisingly good- the blackberry flavours of the Cassis balancing the dryness of the gin and the vermouth rather well. Refreshing too. I would suggest that you serve it very cold- and very plain. No olives, no lemon peel. And use those tiny frosted tumblers, like the ones they use in Harry's Bar.

Shovel generous amounts of ice cubes into a glass Martini pitcher. Add a dash of Noilly Pratt (to rhyme with Cat), and a dash of Crème de Cassis. Swirl around the ice, and shake off the excess. Pour in a decent slug of Dry London Gin. Stir. Strain into iced tumblers and serve.

 

 

 

 

 

Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemons and Green Olives

 

 

As promised, here's a recipe for a classic Moroccan Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemons and Green Olives. I've based it on a dish from the 280 year old Riad Enija- this was a mouth wateringly hip establishment in Marrakesh we were lucky enough to stay at for our honeymoon a year or so back, lovingly restored by a Swedish UNESCO architect, his slightly Gothic wife and their slinky Pharonic stray cats. 

My last post described how to make the Preserved Lemons. First, you will need to make a marinade. In your favourite mixing bowl combine: lemon juice, the pulp (ie interior flesh) from the Preserved Lemons, salted butter, chopped onions, minced garlic, saffron strands, pepper, chopped and peeled ginger, sea salt, chopped parsley and "ras-el-hanout".

 

 

"Ras-el-hanout" is a spice mix or paste, which you can easily grind up yourself in a pestle and mortar. There are no rules, per se, but it the mix could easily include cardamom, clove, cinnamon, ground chili pepper, coriander, cumin, nutmeg, peppercorn and turmeric, all according to your own taste or whim.

Marinate the jointed chicken for about half an hour. Next, heat the base of a tagine on your stove. A tagine (as I'm sure all you Sunday Times and Observer readers know only too well) is a decorative Moroccan clay cooking pot, which you should be able to buy easily enough online, or of course, from Morocco itself. It's a sort of cross between an earthenware cooking pot and a clay pan. Please bear in mind that it's essential to buy a metal "heat diffuser" to place underneath it, otherwise the tagine will almost certainly crack. The conical funnel bit (or lid) heats the food from all sides.

The tagine will get blisteringly hot: you bring the piping hot tagine to the table and your friends will be amazed and delighted as you whisk off the top to reveal the sizzling chicken tagine beneath. The tagine is then served directly from the pot. I'm also tempted to buy one of those rather chic, but pricey, Emile Henry tagines, which you can buy on amazon. Expensive, but much more convenient, as there's going to be no need for the diffuser.

Add a dash of sunflower oil to the base of the tagine and warm it through. Throw in the marinated chicken and brown. Rinse the Preserved Lemons, scrape off any remaining pulp from the inside and cut the skin into thin strips. Scatter over the chicken in the tagine.

Add a little water. Place the lid over the tagine and leave to simmer for an hour. Check from time to time that it has not dried up, and if it's in danger of doing so, add some more water. About fifteen minutes before the cooking time is up, add the de-stoned green olives. Check the seasoning and scatter with freshly chopped mint. Serve with cous cous. 

An extremely simple, but effective dish, courtesy of Azziz of the Riad Enija, Marrakesh.

 

 

Patrick Lichfield (1939-2005)

Paul and Talitha Getty, Marrakech, Morocco, January 1969, for American Vogue, from an edition of 50.

Preserved Lemons

 

 

Preserved lemons are an essential ingredient in an authentic Moroccan tagine. You can't really use ordinary lemons, as the taste of preserved lemons is different: sour, fragrant and salty. They would make a fantastic present for someone; I can't think of anything more cheerful than a jar of home-made preserved lemons.

Making them is easy enough, and fun; wash the lemons thoroughly, then take a lemon and slice it downwards, in quarters, but leaving the bottom intact (ie finishing the cut an inch or so from the stem), so that your cut forms an X shape.

Open up the cut lemons and pack them with generous amounts of coarse sea salt. Pack the lemons into a clean glass kilner jar. Pack them tightly, so that the juices from the lemon fill the jar. If you're in the mood, you can add some dried spices to taste: bayleaves and coriander seeds would be good; a dried chili is another possibility. I tried adding thyme once, but it didn't really work. The brine turned the fresh herb a bit brown and it didn't look as aesthetically appealing as it should have done.

Store away in the larder for a few days. Take it out and have a look at the jar. Ideally, the juice should cover the lemons. If not, pour in some fresh lemon juice so that the lemons are covered. 

The preserved lemons will be ready to use in a month's time, and should keep for a further six months if stored in a cool place.

To use them, wash the salt of the preserved lemons, scrape out the pulp and pith and cut up the skin into strips. 

For my next post, I'll put up a recipe for a genuine Moroccan Tagine with Preserved Lemons.

 

The Ivy's Hamburger

 

 

Rummaging through some old newspaper cuttings from the '90's, I found this old photograph of the famous Ivy restaurant (founded 1917), with a super-imposed photograph of Charles Laughton in the 1933 picture, "The Private Life of Henry VIII".

This is how The Ivy used to be- the favourite playground of the luvvies of the silver screen: Larry, Vivien, Noel, Ivor and Sexy Rexy. I love the wood panelling, the Tudorbeathen leaden lattice windows and the naff neo-classical statues. How I would give my teeth (what's left of 'em) to go back in time and enter those hallowed portals!

 

In 1990, Caprice Holdings "restored" and relaunched the restaurant; supposedly to its "former glory". I've got mixed feelings about the new Ivy. By then the restaurant, it is true, had become a shadow of its former self, semi-derelict, and in desperate need of a makeover; but the 1990's re-incarnation was, with hindsight, a bit Footballer's Wives, (to be fair, a reflection of the then fashionable age of one Mr Anthony Blair and the cringe-inducing Cool Britannia); service was impeccable, but the whole place lacked the elan and dash of its previous incarnation. 

 

Back in the 90's (as with Terence Conran's "Quaglino's"), it was extremely difficult to get a table; these days, I gather, it's an easier ticket, and reservations can be booked on a few weeks notice. 

If you're still interested, A.A. Gill's The Ivy, The Restaurant and its Recipes is the definitive guide. I've already covered The Ivy's Chicken Masala (which is included in A.A. Gill's book)- an excellent and delicious dish, which has the slightly unusual trait of being thickened with chopped aubergine.

Here's A.A. Gill's take on the Ivy's Hamburger. I've always had a slight problem with my own home-made hamburgers: I make a delicious mix, but then add too much liquid (or too much beaten egg), so that when it comes to the "pan-frying" bit, the meat crumbles, and doesn't hold together. This is the official Ivy version. Admittedly, it's pretty basic, but I think it's worth publishing online:

Mix up a good quality minced beef, and mould into balls or patties. Put the burgers into the 'fridge to set. Whisk together tomato ketchup with American mustard (French's mustard would be ideal) to make the sauce.

Lightly toast some baps, and keep them warm. Cook the burgers on a griddle or a smoking hot pan (not under a grlll, as this could boil the meat). 

Serve the burgers in the warm baps with slices of red onion, gherkin, beef tomato and the Ivy hambuger sauce.

 

 

It's Christmas Pudding Time...

 

 

Believe it or not, it's time to make your Christmas Pudding. Here in London, Christmas seems to start earlier and earlier. The television advertising spree has begun, and suddenly our screens are full of earnest, eager types wrapped up in noddy hats and woolly scarves, grinning kiddywinks, and beaming Old Dears. Teflon snowflakes are having a field day. The lights have gone up in Sloane Square too, yet the leaves are still on the trees. Look, I love Christmas, please don't get me wrong: I'm no Scrooge; but often the expectation is, truthfully, more enjoyable than the actual event itself. But London is particularly pretty in those two weeks leading up to Christmas, and I can't think of a better place in the world to be at this time.

Right now is the time to start making your Christmas Pudding; and if anything it may even be a bit on the late side. Traditionally, the Christmas Pudding was made on "Stir-Up Sunday", which was the last Sunday before Advent, (about four to five weeks before Christmas Day), but in our family we used to make it as early as late October. I love Christmas Pudding. The way your spoon plunges into the moist (you hope!), rich, fruity mass; and the contrast with the smooth, rich, alchohol infused brandy butter.

Here is my tried and tested recipe for Christmas Pudding. It's based on our age-old family recipe (which I suspect was nicked from Cordon Bleu), but I've "improved" it with the addition of Guinness and Black Treacle. It went down extremely well with my brother-in-law, who gobbled down the lot, and apparently, declared it "one of the best Christmas Puddings he had ever tasted"; in fact- "never was there such a pudding". Incidentally, as an experiment last year, I added Scotch Whisky instead of the traditional brandy- and it sort of worked, although the resulting smoky taste was not really that appropriate. So back to good old Cognac it is.

 

 

Here's the recipe:

Stir up all the following ingredients in a pudding basin:

350g Mixed fruit and peel (this means crystallised peel, dried apricots, currants, saltanas, raisins, grated lemon rind, and grated orange rind)

50g Chopped glacé cherries

25g Flaked almonds  

50g Dried suet (you can't get the proper stuff anymore- the EU has made it illegal)

35g White breadcrumbs 

35g Plain flour 

70g Moist dark brown sugar 

50g Grated apple 

A dash of mixed spice and grated nutmeg. Some weirdos add carrot- but very sensibly, I leave this one out.

Once you've stirred all the ingredients together, mix in the following ingredients:

Two beaten eggs

The juice of half a lemon and half an orange

Two tablespoons of a dark stout (ie Guinness)

A tablespoon of black treacle 

A dash of decent Cognac (ie Brandy or Armagnac)

Stir it up like mad. Now's the time to add the mixture to a basin. Recently, I've had this thing about those old-fashioned ball-shaped puddings- the ones you see in the Victorian illustrations of Phiz and in Walt Disney. A few years ago, I managed to track down a ball-shaped pudding mould from Divertimenti in the Fulham Road, and used that- but a traditional ceramic pudding basin is just dandy.

Smear the inside of the basin with butter. This will stop the pudding sticking to the side. Pour in the mixture. Top off with a piece of buttered greaseproof paper, ideally cut down to fit. Finally, place a cloth over the basin, and tie it off at the top with a bit of string.

Steam it for five to six hours. This means getting hold of a large pan, filling it about a quarter full with water and bringing it to the boil. Place the pudding in the middle of the pan, and put the lid on. The steam will rise up within the pan, and cook the pudding. Once it's cooked, leave it in a cool place with a piece of tin foil on top. It will mature in the run-up to Christmas. On the great day itself, you will need to steam it for a further three hours.

Beef Stroganoff

 

 

 

Remember Beef Stroganoff?  Many moons ago, my mother had a fledgling enterprise selling pre-cooked dinner party food to local housewives who couldn't be bothered to cook. Dishes were rustled up ahead of time, frozen, and then delivered to her clients in our rusting Lancia. I suspect there was quite a bit of fibbing going on, and the naughty dinner party hostesses would pretend that they had cooked it themselves. It was all very Stepford. From memory, Beef Stroganoff was one of the best-sellers on her menu. Strips of filet beef, cooked briefly, and bound in a mustardy sauce.

What exactly is Beef Stroganoff?  That's a very good question. In the authoritative The Prawn Cocktail Years, Simon Hopkinson and Lindsey Bareham reckon that the origins of the dish are suspect, and about as Russian as I am Chinese. My own guess was that it might have had something to do with that fascinating post-Revolutionary period in America, when Hollywood was awash with dubious Russian counts and every exile worth their salt was cousin to the Tsar. Wikipedia, however, is a mine of information on the subject, pin-pointing the birth of the dish to Elena Molokhovet's classic Russian cookbook of 1861: "Beef à la Stroganov with mustard, a simple concoction of fried beef cubes in a mustard and sour cream sauce". Stroganoff also appears in the 1938 edition of Larousse Gastronomique, but with the addition of onions and the option of tomato paste.

Here's my recipe for a classic Beef Stroganoff. I'm of the opinion that you need to cook the beef very quickly; the steak needs to be tender, rather than chewey. It's not really a stew. This should make enough for about four people.

You take 600g or so of filet steak, and cut it into slivers. The meat is seasoned and fried very quickly in a hot frying pan, until it's browned, but still relatively rare. Don't crowd the pan, otherwise the beef will stew, rather than fry; for the best results it could be a good idea to fry the meat a few pieces at a time. Take out the browned meat, and set aside on a plate.

Add a knob of butter to the pan, and cook some finely sliced onions until golden. Take them out of the pan and set them aside. Add a further knob of butter to the pan and add 350g of sliced button or baby mushrooms. Once cooked through, remove and add to the onions.

Turn down the heat, and carefully spoon 400ml of soured cream into the pan. Mix in a generous dollop of French mustard, and a small spoonful of tomato paste for colouring. Simon Hopkinson and Lindsey Bareham add paprika at the mushroom stage (cooking the spice in the hot butter for a minute or so), and there's nothing wrong with that. But The Greasy Spoon version is, perhaps, the more authentic and I don't think the dish should be too spicy. Is it possible to make a virtue of the bland?

Warm the sauce through, and combine the cooked mushrooms and onions back into the pan. Simmer the Stroganoff very gently for around ten minutes. I really do prefer the beef to be rare- but I understand that this is very much a matter of personal taste.

To finish off the dish, check the seasoning, and stir in generous amounts of freshly chopped dill and a squeeze of lemon juice. You serve it with plain rice.

 

From left to right: Maria, Alexandra, Alexei, Tatiana, Nicholas II, Olga, Anastasia, 1911

Céleri rémoulade

 

 

 

You may have had céleri rémoulade in France- it's that ubiquitous (but delicious) salad dish you'll find in charcuteries up and down the land; frankly, not dissimilar to the American coleslaw. The "celeri" bit is shredded celery root. The "remoulade" is a mustard-flavoured mayonnaise or dressing.

Celery root is also called celeriac. They're those knobbly, bulbous, earthy things which look a bit like large turnips. Making céleri rémoulade is straightforward enough:

Take a large, sharp knife and slice off the brown, knobbly skin. You'll find that the celeriac turns yellow with exposure to air, so you will need to work relatively quickly. Cut the celeriac into large chunks and then shred it in your food processor. I've finally mastered the art of working mine, and like to shred things very thinly, so that you end up with delicate, tiny strands. It's very satisfying for some reason.

Dump the shredded celeriac into a bowl, and immediately mix in some fresh lemon juice and sea salt. This will stop the celeriac from turning yellow, in effect, keeping it white in colour.

Now for a bit of conjecture. How to make the rémoulade dressing? Some recipes call for a simple mayonnaise, seasoned with salt and pepper, and flavoured with a large dollop of Dijon mustard. And that's what I used the last time I made céleri rémoulade (adding a tablespoon of boiling water to the mayonnaise to lighten the colour and give it a lift). But to be completely honest, even then I found my home-made mayonnaise to be too rich, too thick, even slightly cloying in taste, swamping the subtle taste of the celeriac.

In his excellent blog, Living the life in Saint-Aignan, Ken Broadhurst suggests that to achieve that genuinely authentic charcuterie taste, half the dressing should be made from the mustard-mayonnaise and the other half from crème fraiche. This might well be the solution.

I've also noted that Julia Child used an eggless mayonnaise, by slowly dripping boiling water into a dollop of warm mustard (so that it forms an emulsion), and then adding the oil (in the usual way) bit by bit, finishing it off with a tablespoon or so of white vinegar, and a seasoning of white pepper and salt. This eggless "mayonnaise" is then mixed in with the shredded celeriac, with chopped parsley and sour cream added to taste. I like the idea of this version.

By the way, I found that the céleri rémoulade improves if left over-night to marinate in the 'fridge. The lemon, salt, and mustard helps to "cook" the celeriac and removes that raw taste.

Rum Butter Shrimp

 

 

Oh Jiminy Cricket, this is truly delicious! You get hold of some raw, peeled shrimp (as it's a Southern dish, I'm not going to call them prawns), season them with salt and pepper, and fry them briefly in butter, until they turn pink. Personally, I like mine slightly underdone, and the moment they turn, I call it a day. Using a slotted spoon, you take the cooked shrimp out of the pan, leaving the butter behind.

Next, you add a further dollop of butter to the hot pan, let it bubble and in the meantime chop up some fresh tarragon leaves (picked off the stalk) with some spring onions (otherwise known as scallions). Cook these very briefly in the butter.

Deglaze the pan with a slosh of rum (I used Mount Gay- alas, recently re-branded into some awful corporate bottle, but the rum's still the same), flambé to burn off the alcohol, and toss the shrimp back into the pan with the sauce. Bubble for a minute or so, check the seasoning and serve.

The interesting combination of shrimp, butter, rum and tarragon is fabulous.

 

 

Waldorf Salad

 

 

 

"You're the Top! You're a Waldorf Salad!"

Hands up who doesn't love a Waldorf Salad? Named after the Waldorf Hotel in New York, it's supposed to have been invented in the 1890's. By the maitre d'hotel, Oscar Tschirky- who also laid claim to that tantalising breakfast dish, Eggs Benedict. The original Waldorf Hotel was on the site of what is now the Empire State Building, and demolished in 1929.

 

Anyway, it's a simple old thing, and easily made from a combination of sliced celery, diced apples (I leave the skin on), walnuts, and raisins.

You bind the salad with mayonnaise (or just possibly a simple dressing) and serve it on a bed of peppery lettuce leaves, as the whim takes you. Nothing more, nothing less.

 

Zucchini Fritters

 

 

 

I like the word "Zucchini". It rolls off the tongue. Here in England we call them "courgettes". Anyway. If you've got the time and inclination, zucchini fritters are the perfect thing to serve with drinks, and especially with a Dry Martini.

I'm currently keen on the idea of tiny fritters; the size of a small coin: slice up some baby courgettes very thinly, put the slices into a colander, and sprinkle them with sea salt. The salt will draw out enormous quantities of water. Your friends will be thrilled and amazed.

Next, beat an egg white until frothy, and dip the courgette slices into the egg white. Shake off the excess, and then dip them again into strong flour which you've previously seasoned with salt and white pepper.

In a deep-fat fryer, heat some peanut oil to about 375 F (190 C). If you don't have a fryer, use a wok. As nut oil burns at a higher temperature, it's an excellent choice for this sort of operation. Drop the courgettes into the oil, a few at a time, and fry them until they are crisp. Watch them like a hawk, and make sure they don't burn.

Incidentally, when frying, it's always best never to overcrowd the pan; if you do, you run the risk that your food may steam or boil, which, of course, is a different technique all together.

Drain the fritters on kitchen paper, and sprinkle them with more salt and pepper. Okay, this means that your fritters are going to pretty salty, but I think that in this case, it provides a perfect balance with the dry oiliness (is that a word?) of a classic Martini cocktail.

I also quite like the idea of cutting up the courgettes into wider slices, and serving them in that simple way, as a side dish. Baby yellow courgettes could be an interesting concept, too. Lots of ideas.

Avocado and Tomato Ice with Horseradish

 

 

Cordon Bleu Cookery Course, 1970

I've always had a thing about late summer. It's fun to try and pin-point the exact time summer changes into autumn. Often, it's around September 10th or so; marked by a whiff of bonfire smoke, a sudden chill in the air, or the blustery gales of the September equinox. Mind you, here in London, it feels like autumn started in June, and I'm writing this looking out onto a grey, damp and slightly foggy street.  

It's also the last chance saloon for summer food, or at least, food with summery pretensions. Here's my recipe for a delicious Tomato Ice. If you think that it reeks of 1970's dinner party food, you would be utterly correct, as I've based it on a recipe from No. 69 of the Cordon Blue Cookery Course, published by Purnell as a part-work in 1970; but with the addition of grated horseradish which I think would work well with it, and the hot flavour of horseradish can be an excellent combination with the intense, sweet taste of the tomato. It's a pretty dish, and I like the colour of the tomato ice. Canadian, apparently.

You tip two tins of plum tomatoes into a pan, and then add two teaspoons of salt, a generous pinch of white pepper, four tablespoons of golden caster sugar, the zest and juice of two lemons, and a generous helping of freshly grated horseradish, and stir until the mixture comes to the boiling point, pushing the tomato pulp against the side of the pan with a wooden spoon to help it break down. Add three sprigs of fresh mint, cover the pan and allow to simmer for five to ten minutes. Rub the contents of the pan through a sieve, making sure that you extract all the juices. Add a few drops of Tabasco to taste. You should now be looking at a bowl full of a lovely red-coloured, very thin juice.

Chill this mixture in a deep freeze, and mash it up with a fork just before it starts to set. Return to the deep freeze, and repeat the process, and again, until you have formed a smooth ice in the sorbet manner. You could, of course, acheive the same effect in an ice-cream machine.

To serve, cut an avocado in half (I like the hass variety with the knobbly green skin; slightly nutty in taste), rub the exposed flesh with lemon juice (to stop it turning brown) and fill the cavity with a generous scoop of the Tomato Ice. To make the avocado stand upright on the plate, turn over the half, and slice off a thin wedge, so that it makes a base.

The important thing to remember is to flavour the tomato ice reasonably well, as the freezing process can often kill off the stronger tastes. Some out there might garnish it with mint, but I'm currently bored of garnishes, and think simplicity is often the best way forward. I like the idea of updating these classic, unfashionable recipes to more modern tastes; simplifying them if necessary, and presenting them cleanly, discarding those outrageous garnishes of yesteryear. That, at least, is the goal.

By the way, a tip: when you're grating a fresh horseradish root, make sure you grate it across the grain (rather than downwards). We keep a horseradish root in the deep freeze, and find that it keeps for ages; providing us with "fresh" horseradish whenever the mood takes us.

 

The English Marrow

 

 

When was the last time you enjoyed a helping of marrow?  That's exactly what I'm talking about- the ever so 'umble, green-skinned English marrow, and it's currently in season. Right now. As a vegetable it's more or less disappeared from our plates; usurped by the courgette- the once trendy, now ubiquitous "zucchini" (the darling of the gastropub and aspirational bistro) and the various squashes and pumpkins of the American East Coast: the autumnal butternut squash (now beloved of the British supermarkets) immediately springs to mind.

But there's something attractively nostalgic, and unpretentious about the common marrow isn't there? The whiff of Dad's allotment, the village fete, garden potting, vintage Dandelion Wine '53, musty pigeon-racing sheds, home-made piccalilli, and crushing up the laburnum pods to get rid of the nagging missus. I'm sure my grandmother used to serve it up in an early Victorian Mason's Ironstone tureen. The marrow- you understand- not crushed laburnum. It's all so incredibly English.

I love marrow, its subtle watery taste and all the summery assocations that go with it. I heard Allegra McEvedy (of Leon fame) singing its praises on the radio a few days ago; and she's absolutely right. Not only is it nutritious, it's also extremely cheap, and, amazingly, still available at the dreaded Sainsbury's- although you'll find that Waitrose doesn't stock it. Far too upmarket.

 

In my last post I wrote about an excellent marrow dish I enjoyed at the Canton Arms. I went back there a day or so ago and had it yet again. This time round I've now worked out more or less exactly how it was made. I'm calling it "Gratin of English Marrow with Cannellini Beans and Rocket Pesto". An Italian take on an English classic.

First, you need to make a simple Tuscan style white bean stew. Chop up some shallots and sweat them in olive oil and butter until soft. Crush a clove of garlic and cook for a few mintues. Add the cannellini beans (I admit to using tinned) and vegetable stock, and simmer gently for an hour or so (or until the stew is reasonably thick and starchy) with a bayleaf and a few chopped up small tomatoes. If you're using uncooked beans, you'll need to soak them overnight in cold water, and then cook them for a longer time; quite possibly for up to two hours.

When the time's up remove a few spoonfuls of the beans, and purée them into a paste along with a tablespoon or so of the cooking liquid. Add this purée back into the pot: this will help to thicken up the stew. Check the seasoning and remove the bayleaf.

In the meantime, cut the marrow into large chunks, keeping the green skin on, but spooning out all the seeds and stuff you'll find in the middle bit of the vegetable. Steam the marrow until tender. 

To assemble the dish: take an oven-proof gratin dish and ladle in the cooked bean stew. Add the cooked marrow to the dish, making sure that it's well covered by the stew. Sprinkle the top with white breadcrumbs, and dot with rocket pesto. This might be a combination of rocket leaves (sans the stalks), garlic, parmesan, walnuts, olive oil, sea salt and black pepper, which you've previously whizzed up in your Magimix or food processor.

Check the seasoning and flash the gratin under a very hot grill. Serve it piping hot straight from the dish. I'm not a vegetarian by any means, but sometimes it makes an enjoyable change to ditch the meat and eat something like this. It's an excellent dish.

The Old Original Bookbinder's Restaurant Cookbook

 

 

I've just bought this book for the princely sum of £4.50. From a little bookshop in the quaint Cotswold town of Chipping Camden, of all places. It's the 1961 edition of the official "Old Original Bookbinder's Restaurant Cookbook", by Charlotte Adams.

Bookbinder's was a distinguished American restaurant, first founded as a Philadelphia oyster saloon back in 1893. It's wikipedia entry describes its 1950s' heydey as ''a hot spot where red-jacketed waiters scurried through dark-panelled rooms festooned with photographs of VIPS; redolent of cigar smoke tinged with shellfish." This sounds very much my sort of place. I gather that the restaurant fell on hard times, lost its exclusive allure, became a tourist trap, and is now quite probably defunct. A pity, because I miss this sort of joint: the type of restaurant where a fawning mess-jacketed waiter might flamb-ay something jaw-droppingly expensive at M'sieur's very own table.

 

I've picked out two recipes at random, which I haven't tried yet, but, I think, with a bit of tweaking, could be good. The first one's for the obscene sounding "Crab Balls". I would suggest that you make these very small in size, and serve them as canapés- perhaps with some sort of a dipping sauce to go with them:

In a bowl mix together: one tablespoon of chopped green pepper, one tablespoon of finely chopped onion, one tablespoon of finely chopped celery, one tablespoon of minced pimento (ie sweet red pepper), and a teaspoon of fresh thyme leaves. Season with salt, black pepper and a dash of Worcestershire Sauce. Sweat in butter over a lowish heat for about ten minutes.

Sprinkle in four tablespoons of flour (this sounds like quite a bit, even too much; so I would suggest that you go easy on this) and stir in to the vegetable mix. Cook for a further five minutes. Next pour in a cup of milk, and stir until thickened (in effect you've made an old-fashioned white sauce). Then add a pound of crabmeat. Take off the heat, mix in well and chill the mixture in the 'fridge.

When it's cold enough, you take out the crab mixture and roll it into small balls. The balls are then dipped into beaten egg, coated with breadcrumbs- or even more authentically Yankee- crushed up cream crackers, and fried in deep fat until golden brown.

The second recipe is for "Bookbinder's Shrimp Chowder":

Sweat chopped onions in butter until golden, and put to one side. Make a smooth white sauce in the usual way from butter, two tablespoons of flour and four cups of hot milk. The sauce is then placed over a bain-marie, seasoned with salt, pepper and a blade of mace. Pre-Cooked shrimps (large prawns in England) are added and the whole thing cooked gently for twenty minutes. The mace is removed, and the chowder finished off with an extra cup of hot cream and the onion flavoured butter which you've previously strained off. On second thoughts, I'm not exactly sure about this recipe. It could be a bit bland: it's certainly a heart attack in a bowl- not that I'm one of those Cromwellian types pulsating with disapproval at any symptom of a sybaritic lifestyle. I'm not even sure if it's a genuine chowder; I suspect that it isn't.

In complete contrast, I had the most divine thing at the Canton yesterday evening. It was a vegetarian marrow gratin, served piping hot in one of those dinky orange Le Creuset dishes. Half a marrow- cut in half, and scooped out. Covered in Italian Borlotti white beans, and flavoured with a stock, perhaps, and most certainly salt and black pepper. Persillade (ie garlic and parsley finely chopped and crushed together) dotted the top, and the dish was finished off with grated parmesan and butter, before being flashed under a hot grill. At least, I think that how it was made. There may have been tomatoes in there as well. C'etait formidable.

 

Scallop Mousse with Butter and Chive Sauce

 

 

 

This is an excellent recipe, and it works. It's based on a Raymond Blanc dish from his book Cooking for Friends. I first made it for The Girl when we were steppin' out; now she's Mrs Aitch, so I obviously did something right. It's for four people.

First, you need to pre-heat your oven to 330F (160C), Gas mark 3.

Take 150 g of fresh scallops and remove the orangey coral bit. Put these to one side. Purée the scallops in a food processor for two minutes (that's quite a long time, but it's needed to make sure the mixture turns very, very smooth), and then add a single egg yolk, salt and cayenne pepper. Mix, until all the ingredients are incorporated. 

Next, take the bowl of your Magimix (with the purée inside) and stick it in the deep freeze for 15 minutes: this will help to stop the mixture separating when you add cream. When the time's up, take out the bowl and put it back onto the Magimix. Set the motor to medium speed, and slowly pour in 200ml of whipping cream- in a thin stream. Taste and season again, if you think it needs it. 

The mousse is going to be cooked in oven-proof porcelain ramekin dishes, and then turned out. I used a set of 80's Villeroy & Boch ramekins that I happened to have lying around in the cupboard. They were too deep, in my 'umble opinion, as the result was too much mousse on the plate. Maybe tastes have changed?  For a decent First Course, I think less is probably more, and I would recommend either using those shallow ramekins or reasonably small moulds instead: you're not cooking the main event.

Smear the insides of your ramekins with butter, and then fill 'em up with the mousse mixture. Place the ramekins inside a roasting tin, and pour in boiling water, so that it comes up to two-thirds of the ramekin dishes. Cover the tray loosely with some tin-foil and stick it in the pre-heated oven. It's going to take 15 minutes to cook.

In the meantime, you need to make your sauce. Melt 15g unsalted butter in a small pan and sweat a chopped up shallot or two, a few finely chopped button mushrooms and the coral from the scallops. After a few minutes, add a slug of Noilly Prat or Martini Extra Dry Vermouth. Turn up the heat and boil quickly, to reduce by half. Add a few tablespoons of water and two tablespoons of whipping cream. Push the mixture through a fine sieve, pressing down hard to extract as much as the fishy mushroomy juice as possible, into a clean pan.

Next, on a very low heat, gradually whisk 1/2 oz of diced butter into the sauce, so that it forms an emulsion. Taste, season with salt and white pepper, and whisk in a few drops of lemon juice.

Take the ramekins out of the oven. You'll find that the mousses will turn out very easily, as long as you run a knife around the edges of the ramekins. Place the mousse on the centre of the plate, and spoon over the butter sauce. You can either add chopped chives to the sauce at the end of the cooking stage, or when the sauce is on the plate.

A quick note about the chives: don't make the mistake I made of adding far too many chopped chives- it will turn your sauce a muddy green colour. You want your sauce to be a butter yellow. I would recommend that you add the finely chopped chives in small amounts, or even add the chives in tiny piles to the hot butter sauce when it's already on the plate. My other mistake was to swamp the delicate mousse with the rich butter sauce, so that it came up to the very edge of the plate. I would suggest that you go easy on the sauce, and just spoon it over the mousse in a modest way.

Once you've mastered the technique of mousse-making (and the Blanc method as described above is a good one), you can start thinking of other ingredients. I'm considering the idea of a Smoked Haddock Mousse with an Anchovy and Butter sauce. Obviously, you would need to add anchovy essence in very small quantities, otherwise the whole thing would be far too salty. There might be a cleverer way of adding the flavour of the anchovy? Maybe Smoked Haddock Mousse with a Butter and Parsley Sauce might be a better idea? Time to get my thinking cap on. Any suggestions? 

Eggs Drumkilbo

 

 

Last week's Royal Wedding was terrific fun, and here in London we've all had a ball. Hats off to the Middleton family who handled the whole thing brilliantly. Can you imagine walking down that aisle in front of an estimated two billion people? Our Kate looked fantastic, and I have to admit to shedding a manly tear to Parry's beautiful anthem "I Was Glad"- it always gets to me for some reason. A good day for the country, I think.

I was interested in Anton Mosimann's unpretentious menu for the reception at Buck House afterwards. It struck just the right note- as with the wedding, showing just the right amount of understatement (not including, of course, poor Princess Beatrice's bizarre alien fascinator) and included: Cornish Crab Salad on Lemon Blini, pressed Duck Terrine with Fruit chutney, miniature watercress and asparagus tart, quails eggs with celery salt, Scottish langoustines with Lemon Mayonnaise, Bubble & Squeak with Confit Shoulder of Lamb, Smoked Haddock fishcake with Pea Guacmole, Rubarb Financier and Blood Orange Pâté de Fruit. The champagne was Pol Roger NV Brut Reserve. This is Modern British food at its best.

 

The Middletons stayed at the excellent and discreet Goring Hotel (not far from our hovel, I have to admit) and I was amused to see that they have the nerve to serve Eggs Drumkilbo on their menu. Eggs Drumkilbo was a favourite of the late Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother (Gawd bless 'er), and has recently been described by the food critic, Giles Coren, as "so awful it's almost good". It's a splendid old thing, with Lord knows how many flavours going on in there; completely over-the-top and utterly unfashionable. It was served at previous royal weddings. Here's how you make it: 

Eggs Drumkilbo

1 lobster
225 gm (8 oz raw prawns)
8 good tomatoes
8 hardboiled eggs
fresh mayonnaise
a little tomato purée
anchovy essence
Worcestershire sauce
Tabasco sauce
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons aspic powder
white wine or water

Cook the lobster and prawns. When cooled and shelled, dice the flesh of both. Dip the tomatoes into boiling water for half a minute, then skin and de-seed them. Dice the flesh and add to the lobster and prawns. Remove the whites from two of the eggs and discard and discard. Dice all the yolks and the rest of the whites, and add to the mixture. Mix all the ingredients with sufficient mayonnaise, flavoured with tomato purée, anchovy essence, Worcestershire and Tabasco to taste, to produce a good, fairly stiffish consistency. Check the seasoning.

Dissolve the aspic in a little boiling white wine or water, but do not let it actually boil. Stir into the mayonnaise mixture, making sure it is evenly distributed. Pour into a rinsed mould, or a pretty glass dish if you don’t want to unmould. Chill until well set.

Unmould or not, and serve as a first course with brown bread and butter or fingers of mustard and cress sandwiches.

 

Wild Garlic Risotto

 

 

On Saturday I made a deliciously simple Wild Garlic Risotto. The Girl managed to track down some wild garlic (also known as Ramsons) from the Pimlico Green Farmer's Market. If you live in the country, you might be able to find some growing in woodlands. They're currently in season.

I'm very keen on "simple food done well"- it's becoming a mantra. This fitted the bill perfectly.

I chopped up a small onion and sautéed it in hot butter. Next, I added Carnaroli rice and let the rice soak up the hot butter. I ladelled in a small quantity of hot, steaming vegetable stock and stirred like mad, until the rice had absorbed the stock. Then, I carried on ladelling in the hot stock until the Carnaroli rice was "ready".

This is the art of risotto making. You want the rice grains to remain firm (with a "bite") yet, at the same time, to be bound up in a creamy, starchy, slightly soupy liquid. If you make it properly, this might take about half an hour. Beat the rice like mad- as this releases the starch from the grains. 

I'm currently in favour of Carnaroli rice: I find that this makes a slightly creamier risotto, although of course, arborio rice would be fine too. 

We're off to Venice in a few days time, and no doubt we'll bring back some proper Italian risotto rice to add to the larder. I've got a theory that the Italians keep back the best rice for themselves, and fob off the rest of Europe with lesser brands.

 

 

 

Anyway, back to the Wild Garlic Risotto. About ten minutes from the end, add the chopped up Wild Garlic. It comes in the form of slightly limp, green leaves (not entirely unlike spinach) and you use these chopped leaves, rather than the bulb. Unlike the standard variety, Wild Garlic has a very subtle taste, so I would recommend that you add quite a bit of the stuff: the risotto can certainly take it. I was also keen on the idea of turning the risotto a green colour- this will happen if you add enough. Check the seasoning and when you reckon the risotto's ready, add a small dash of white wine. This will stop the risotto from cooking.

I served the risotto with some fried shallots- for extra crunch, but The Girl pointed out that the dish didn't need it- and she was absolutely right, as I have to admit, she often is. I would recommend that you more or less leave the risotto as it is, but top it off with a small helping of grated Parmesan- or indeed, a British cheese. Why not?

 

 

 

Cauliflower

 

Recently the poor cauliflower seems to have come under quite a bit of bad press. First there was Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall announcing to the world that he doesn't like the stuff; and then there's the worrying fact that recent sales of the vegetable have slumped by 35%.

Well, I do like it. And I'm also a fan of the fascinating Romaine or Romanesco variety, as pictured above. Even if the rest of the world isn't- because it looks like a UFO, or a sinister organism from John Wyndham's "Day of The Triffids".

 

 

My dear old grandmother used to cook cauliflower in the traditional English way- and this is how I prefer to serve it:

The cauliflower is not broken up into florets, but steamed whole (for about 20 minutes, or so, until done), drained well and then served in a porcelain tureen (with a lid), and coated with a traditional white (or cheese) sauce, with a subtle seasoning of nutmeg and black pepper. I haven't seen cauliflower served like this for a long, long time.

The other, more popular way, is for the cooked cauliflower to be broken up into florets, and served in a dish, with a cheese sauce and breadcrumbs, and flashed under the grill for a minute or so, until brown.

Raw cauliflower's got a peppery, crunchy taste. It's not so great when it's over-cooked, so make sure, if anything, that you under- rather than over- cook it.

Tom Ripley's Venetian Lemon Chicken

 

 

I bought an amusing little book yesterday. It's called Recipe for Murder: Frightfully Good Food Inspired by Fiction by Estérelle Payany. The blurb on the back says: "Allow yourself to be lured into the kitchen by the great gourmet-villains of popular literature, from Lady Macbeth to Dr. Jekyll, to the Marquis de Sade and Hannibal Lecter". It's enormous fun, and there are lots of stylish illustrations by Jean-François Martin in the manner of Richard Hamilton.

I like the look of Count Dracula's "Paprika Hendl" and Fantomas' "Truffled Eggs without Truffles". But the recipe that immediately leapt out of the page was "Tom Ripley's Venetian Lemon Chicken". I'm a massive fan of Patricia Highsmith's "Ripliade"- the five crime novels published between 1955 and 1991, featuring the cultured and sophisticated Mr Ripley- the reluctant con-man, murderer and art fraudster.

 

I made this dish last night and the results were fabulous. A worthy candidate for "The Best of The Greasy Spoon" - when (and if) I ever publish it.

You take a chicken breast and beat it out flat to form an escallop. You fry the escallop in hot olive oil until it is cooked on each side, flipping it over in the process, which should take a minute or so on each side.

The fried chicken is then removed and put to one side. You chop up half a large red onion into dice and sweat it in the oil (with the heat turned down to low) until translucent. The juice of two large lemons, the zest of half a lemon, and a tablespoon or so of honey are added.

You return the fried chicken to the pan, and cook it gently in the tangy sauce for about five minutes. Finally, fresh thyme leaves are sprinkled over the sauce (making sure that the leaves are pulled off the woody stalks), and the dish is seasoned with salt and pepper, in the time honoured tradition.

It's a remarkably pretty dish: rose-pink in colour (from the red onions); studded with the fresh green of the thyme, and it has a deep citrusy taste; healthy too: just fresh lemon juice and honey. No stock, no cream; fast cooking. Ideal for a quick summer lunch al fresco.

Incidentally, I've got no idea if this is indeed a genuine Venetian recipe (I couldn't find anything similar in any of the books I've got on Venetian food), or actually features in any of the Ripley books; although I have a vague memory of Tom eating this in the last few pages of "The Talented Mr Ripley". An excuse to re-read the entire Ripley series over the coming summer.

 

Avocado Bering

 

I've had great fun re-discovering the Roux Brothers' old 1980's television series on youtube: Roux Brothers. For anyone wanting to learn the techniques of classic French cookery, this is the series for you: no background music, no trendy hand-held camera shots, or an emphasis on style over content; this is television aimed at viewers who have an attention span longer than three minutes, and just want to learn how to cook properly.

That's exactly right- it's just two middle aged chefs, both at the top of their game, Albert (he's the fat one from Le Gavroche) and Michel (he's the thin one from the Waterside Inn at Bray) standing in a badly lit (by today's standards) studio and talking directly to camera. And Mein Gott, in just a few minutes you can learn infinitely more from those two, than from any of the over-produced cheffy programmes I've seen on television recently.

 

 

 

I liked Albert's "Avocado Bering". You take an avocado pear (I think the hass variety with the knobbly skin tastes the best) and slice it in half. You brush the exposed flesh with lemon juice to stop it going black. You slice a small wedge off the bottom of the avocado, so that it stands up straight on the plate.

Next you mix up some fresh crab meat with a rose-marie sauce made from mayonnaise, tomato ketchup, Lea & Perrins, Tabasco, salt and pepper and a spoonful of cognac. You spoon the crabmeat and sauce into the cavity of the avocado, and then spoon further unadulterated rose-marie sauce over the crabmeat and sauce. More sauce on top of the crabmeat and sauce combination, if that makes sense.

Albert garnished it with half a black olive so that it ended up looking a bit like a nipple- but if you've read my previous post, you'll know all about my current feelings on garnishes, and I would recommend that you avoid this. Avocado Bering! Incredibly old-fashioned (even then; back in the 1980's), very simple, relatively unsophisticated- and strangely satisfying.

 

 

The Greasy Spoon's Swedish Style Dressing

 

 

Recently, I find that I'm looking for increased simplicity in food. I've said this before, and there's no guilt in saying it again. Classic dishes, cooked properly (using the correct techniques) and presented simply- and not too much of it, either. Less is more. The dreaded garnishes are out too: nothing worse than those two ridiculous chive snippets placed at jaunty right angles to each other on top of a dish, forming a cross- I'm sure you know what I'm getting at. The sort of thing you see in "gastro-pubs", where it's all about poncy presentation, rather than flavour and technique. In fact, I'm currently rather in favour of ditching garnishes all together. Nothing More, Nothing Less.

I'm keen on lighter dishes, too. It's interesting that Scandinavian food is currently all the rage. Mrs Aitch gave me a signed copy of the Noma cookbook for Christmas, which was a terrific present: it's all ligonberries and wild flowers served up on stone palettes. I like this a lot.

 

 

So I've come up with my own version of a light Swedish dressing. It's water based and there's no oil in it. I suppose it is fat-free, though as it's also packed with salt and sugar, I would have thought that one evil has been ruled out by another. Or vice versa. But it's definitely light and delicate in taste, and I think your guests will love it; especially the girls.

I tipped several tablespoons of white sugar into a small pan and then spashed a rather expensive balsamic white wine vinegar we happened to have in the cupboard over the sugar. You'll need to experiment here: I found that I needed to use quite a bit of sugar (and less of the vinegar) to end up with a balanced taste.

Warm the pan, so that the sugar dissolves in the vinegar and forms a syrup. You want to thicken it up, but you definitely don't want to caramelise it. Cook it very gently for a minute or so. As there's going to be no oil in the dressing, this syrup, in effect, replaces the oil and needs to have body. Remove the pan from the heat.

Add a few pinches of salt, and a generous squeeze of fresh lemon juice. Whisk in several tablespoons of water and serve cold. You could also steep the dressing in fresh dill for a few hours before serving, which I think would taste delicious.

Wild Garlic

 

 

 

We've just come back from an invigorating five day trip to South Cornwall. It was warm enough to enjoy a simple lunch al fresco at the ever-wonderful Tresanton Hotel in St Mawes. The slightly Agatha Christie-ish ambience of the upper terrace (with its ocean-liner metal railings, sea views and steamship loungers) remains unchanged: fans of "Peril at End House" (first published in 1932) will know what I'm talking about.

 

 

On Monday we dropped in at Rick Stein's Seafood Restaurant in Padstow and enjoyed an intensely flavoured bouillabaisse (Cornish style) with crutons, red pepper aioli and grated cheese; roasted Hake (served in a piping hot earthenware dish with puy lentils) and a pretty concoction of lobster and crab wrapped up in puff pastry and served with a pinkish lobster sauce.

The Seafood Restaurant at Padstow has to be one of my all-time favourite restaurants and, in my 'umble opinion Master Copperfield, remains consistently excellent. The discreet service is of the highest professional standard: raise your eyebrow and in an instant there will be a helpful waiter at your side; tables are spacious and the atmosphere is relaxed. The food is unpretentious and utterly delicious.  I can't recommend the place enough.

I've always had a thing about Cornwall- as a child, we used to spend our summer holidays at the charming sea-side town of St Mawes. It really is the most romantic destination: 

 

The mysterious St Michael's Mount.

 

Caerhays Castle: "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again..."

 

The Cornish lanes and hedgerows are full of wild flowers, (including violet coloured wild orchids) and at this time of the year, daffodils. A thought occured to me on our drive home over Salisbury Plain and past Stonehenge: the verges of Wiltshire's main roads are barren; and in the case of South Buckinghamshire, I regret to report, littered. Does an enlightened Cornish county council have an active policy to encourage wild flowers?  Or is it that in counties such as Wiltshire and Oxfordshire, with large-scale and mechanised farming, wild flowers are killed by the spillover from intensive crop spraying?

It's the time of year to pick and use wild garlic (Allium ursinum). It can be found in damp woodlands and hedgerows, and gives off an evocative, garlicky smell which can't be missed. I love its subtle taste. Funnily enough, unlike the standard variety in which you use the bulb, with wild garlic you eat the green leaves. In London we have to buy it from specialist shops, the superior supermarkets (such as Wholefoods) or your local farmer's market.

I'm going to make a creamy and simple risotto, flavoured with my favourite wild garlic. If I chop up the leaves small enough, I'm hoping that this will make the risotto turn a pale light green colour.

Perfect Madeleines, Time and Time Again...

 

 

I've suddenly got a craze for Madeleines- those delicious French tea-time treats; similar to little cakes, but shaped into scallop shells: fans of Proust will I'm sure, agree. I made a batch yesterday afternoon, and I think I've got the recipe almost exactly right. Here's how to do it:

First, heat up your oven to 200∘C. Crack three eggs into a bowl, and add 150g of white sugar. Using an electric beater, whisk until the eggs and sugar form a white, creamy and reasonably stiff "cream".

 

In a small pan, melt half a pack of butter, and then set aside to cool down. Sift 150g of white flour into the beaten eggs and sugar, and pour in the melted, liquid butter. Using a spoon, very slowly and gently fold in the sifted flour and butter to form a batter.

Now's the time for the flavouring. Last week I used a teaspoon of vanilla extract and that worked reasonably well. You could also use lemon juice. However, yesterday I decided to give my Madeleines an orangey tang- and this seemed to work best of all. So, mix in the finely grated zest and juice of half a small orange.

Next, you'll need a Madeleine baking tray.  I managed to find mine without any problem- and any decent, reasonably upmarket kitchen shop should sell one. It's a tin baking tray with twelve scallop or shell shaped molds. Brush the molds with melted butter (I dipped my brush into the butter I had previously warmed up). Pour the batter into each mold. Surprisingly, you will find that the Madeleines don't expand that much during baking, so I would level off the batter in each mold, making sure that the "scallops" are properly filled.

 

Bake in the hot oven for about nine minutes- until the Madeleines are a light brown and golden colour. Take the molds out of the oven and let them cool down slightly, before turning out the Madeleines onto a plate. Sprinkle them with sifted icing sugar. I found that as the Madeleines cooled down, the outside bit became crunchy and slightly caramelised, while the insides remained soft and slightly moist.

Mrs Kennedy's Green Risotto

 

 

I bought an entertaining second-hand book the other day. For a few pounds on abebooks.co.uk. It's called (hilariously) "Cooking for Madam". Marta Scubin was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis's private cook, and her book tells the story of her career with Mrs Onassis, and shares the secrets of their Fifth Avenue kitchen.

Now I've currently got a thing about simplicity in food. Classic dishes cooked properly, with attention to detail and using the correct techniques. Arranged artistically on the plate. The right size of helping too; veering on the belt-tightening side of restraint, and avoiding the vulgarity of excess. Mrs Onassis appears to have been very keen on this sort of food. Simple dishes such as "Roast Lion of Veal with Morel Mousse", "Pear Sorbet", "Tarragon Chicken", "Mousseline Sauce" and "Mussel Salad". I like the sound of the last one. It's a plain green salad, with mussels removed from the shell, and served with a saffron flavoured creamy viniagrette and an empty mussel shell or two for decoration.

 

 

I'm also enjoying her "Green Risotto". It's a simple risotto flavoured with puréed spinach. The latter turns it a lovely, vivid green colour.

You heat some olive oil in heavy saucepan and sauté some chopped onions. Next, you add about 1½ cups of arborio rice and let the rice grains coat themselves in the hot oil. I'm sure you all know how to make proper risotto: add a splash of white wine to the rice and let it evaporate. Ladle in the steaming hot stock bit by bit, until the rice absorbs the liquid; stirring and beating away at it like mad, so that the starch is released from the rice. Carry on stirring until the rice is cooked.

The trick is to get the rice al dente (ie slightly firm) yet bound in a starchy, creamy sauce. It will take about twenty five minutes. Then it's time to add the spinach. 

In her book, Marta puts ten fresh wet spinach leaves into a blender and whizzes them up into a paste. Having tried it myself, I'm not sure about this method. What you end up with is thousands of very tiny uncooked spinach particles suspended in water, and your risotto will end up flecked with green. Instead, try steaming your spinach leaves briefly before-hand, and then when you come to whizz them up, they should make a much smoother purée. If neccessary, add a bit of water to the mix.

Stir the green spinach purée into the risotto, and serve with shavings of parmesan cheese.

 

Jerusalem Artichoke Soup

 

 

We served this soup to our lucky guests on New Year's Eve. Jersualem Artichokes are currently in season. They're nothing to with artichokes by the way: bizarrely, they're actually the tuber of a species of sunflower, Helianthus tuberosus; Winter root vegetables. They look a bit like small, knobbly potatoes, with a pinkish coloured skin, and were grown by the Native American Indians long before the arrival of the European settlers. I love their subtle, slightly earthy taste.

And there's something else about Jerusalem Artichokes you need to know: apparently they make you "windy", whatever that means. Every time some television chef mentions Jerusalem artichokes on screen, they suddenly "come over" all coy (the otherwise excellent Nigel Slater was a recent culprit), it's slightly bugging; my theory is that if you cook them well enough, you shouldn't have any problems.

Here's how I made the soup. It was velvety smooth; and utterly delicious:  Chop up some an onion or two and fry gently in butter and oil with some chopped celery. In the meantime, take your Jerusalem Artichokes and using a peeler, remove the skin. You might find it easier to cut off the knobbly bits first. Plunge the peeled artichokes into a bowl of cold water into which you've given a good squeeze of lemon. This will stop your artichokes turning grey. You'll find that they start changing colour very quickly if you don't.

Chop the artichokes into small pieces, and add them to the hot pan. Stew them gently with the onions and the celery for about fifteen minutes. When they're soft, pour in some stock (I used an excellent, slightly salty ham stock), and simmer for a further twenty or so minutes.

When the artichoke pieces are cooked (ie soft), transfer the contents of the pan (the artichokes and the hot liquid) to your magimix or blender, and puree the mixture until smooth. The soup will be a creamy-white colour. Push through a sieve into a clean pan (this will help to make the soup velvety-smooth), check the seasoning (I used an oak-smoked salt from Waitrose to give the soup a slightly smokey flavour, lots of freshly grated nutmeg and some white pepper) adding a decent squeeze of lemon juice, and stir in several tablespoons of double cream to taste. Stir carefully and simmer gently for a few more minutes until hot enough.

Serve with crisp croutons and garnish with fresh dill.

Miniature Blini Canapés with Herring, Keta Caviar and Dill

 

 

 

I came up with this idea for canapés on New Year's Eve, and they went down a treat.  I expect someone's thought of them before, but they were utterly delicious, and I would, without any hesitation, serve them again.  

First, you need to get hold of some miniature blinis. Mine came in a packet from Sainsbury's, but they were fine. You'll find that they have been pre-cooked, so you will need to heat them up in the oven for about five to ten minutes.  Grate some fresh horseradish into several spoonfuls of sour cream (making sure you grate across the base of the root) and add a squeeze of lemon juice.  

Spread the blinis with the sour cream, horseradish and lemon juice. Cut up some cured herring (ie marinated roll-mops) and place a small "square" of the herring onto the blinis. Top up with a teaspoon of keta caviar (that's that wonderful juicy orange stuff from H. Forman & Sons) and arrange the blinis on a serving plate.  Finish the canapés off by sprinkling freshly chopped dill over the canapés and the plate.  Happy New Year!

Chestnut Stuffing

 

 

 

Where have the London roasted chestnut street sellers gone? Not that long ago, they were all over the place- in Piccadilly, outside The Ritz, several in the Charing Cross Road; quite a few near Oxford Circus. I liked the way they stacked up their hot chestnuts on their grimy braziers- in rows, and in little paper bags.

I love Chestnut Stuffing.  Buy a packet of peeled chestnuts. Cut them in half, and then fry 225g of chopped streaky bacon. Turn up the heat, and add the chestnuts.  Fry them on a high heat. Remove the chestnuts, and add 50g of butter to the pan, so that it mixes in with the bacon.  Add 110g fresh brown breadcrumbs, and fry until brown. In a separate bowl, mix up the chestnuts, the breadcrumbs and bacon, a bunch of chopped watercress, a beaten egg, and season with lots of sea salt and pepper, and a tablespoon of caster sugar.

Still on the subject of chestnuts, if you've ever wondered, here's how they make marron glacés in France: the chestnuts are blanched in lightly salted water to loosen their membranes. The membranes are removed. Next, the chestnuts are simmered in a vanilla flavoured sugar syrup for up to twenty four hours. Finally, the marron glacés are dried out in a hot oven.

Chicken Véronique

 

 

 

Last week I managed to save a complete set of the 1968 Cordon Bleu Cookery Course, all 72 of 'em in a near mint condition.  A friend at work was about to chuck them away into the skip.  They make fascinating reading: a time-warp into a familiar, but very different age.

I'm amused by the photograph from the very first issue, which I've posted above.  A youngish couple are having the in-laws to dinner.  For the first time at the new flat?  There's bound to be a bay tree and carriage lamp outside the glossy front door.  Daddy's very much the silver-haired roué, the clubbable chairman (something in plastics?)  Bet you anything he drives a Jag, and keeps a mistress holed up in a tiny flat in Dolphin Square.  He's holding forth while his long-suffering wife (Jackie Kennedy shift-dress and pearls), sits patiently "Yes, Dear, No, Dear, Three Bags Full, Dear". 

Youngish Hubbie looks like an International Man of Mystery; probably a thrusting young exec.  If he plays his cards right, Daddy might get him a directorship at the family firm.  Our heroine's a secretary at some fashionable advertising agency somewhere.  J Walter Thompson?  Though God Knows how she finds the time to cook: the Cordon Bleu Cookery Course is quite clearly aimed at women who don't go out to work; the draconian instructions include a precise timetable for operations: 8.43am  Light the Oven,  9.59am  Truss the Chicken.  That sort of thing.  The couple's London pad is slightly trendy- the Victorianesque French Horn print is very Conran.  And what is she gazing at so proudly?   It's none other than our old friend, Chicken Véronique!

 

 

Here's how to make the dish, with precise instructions from the Cordon Bleu Cookery School, 1968.

First, you need to season the inside of a trussed chicken, but are not allowed to season the outside, as the salt will "draw out the juices, and prevent browning".  (Hang on!  Is this really true?  Simon Hopkinson does. Not sure about that one).  The trussed bird will keep its shape, and be easier to carve. (Yup, that sounds right).

Next, you rub the chicken with butter, and put 3-4 sprigs of tarragon inside, along with a further nut of butter.  The chicken is placed in a roasting tin, with ¼ pint of chicken stock, covered with buttered paper, and roasted for an hour at 400 F.  After the first 15 to 20 minutes, the chicken should be removed from the oven and basted; and then basted again after another 15-20 minutes, turning the chicken around, each time.  The buttered paper should be removed a few minutes before the end of the cooking, to brown the bird. 

The hot chicken is then removed to a wooden board, jointed and carved.  The remaining juices in the roasting tin are reduced over a steady heat until "brown and sticky".  Another ¼ of a pint of chicken stock is added to the pan to make a gravy, which is then strained into a small saucepan and thickened with ½ teaspoon of arrowroot mixed with a tiny bit of water.  (Add the arrowroot mixture away from the heat, and then stir until boiling).  Two tablespoons of double cream are stirred into the gravy.

Peel and pip some white or muscat grapes (you can blanche them in boiling water to help the process), and drop them into the gravy.  The chicken pieces are arranged on a silver-plated oval-shaped serving dish, the gravy is spooned all over it, and the grapes arranged all over the chicken.  The remaining gravy and grapes (not sure about keeping the grapes in the gravy, very odd) are served separately in a sauceboat.  

Hmmm.  Chicken with Gravy.  Served with Grapes.

What do you think?  The way forward, or a definite step backwards?

 

Potatoes Dauphinoise

 

 

 

There's a knack to getting this old classic right, as the acid in the potatoes tends to make the cream curdle. To avoid this, you need to blanche the potatoes in milk, and make sure that the oven doesn't get too hot. You can also add a tiny bit of flour to the mix, and if you use waxy potatoes, the starch content will help to stop further curdling.

Incidentally, the Dauphiné area in the French Alps is known for its rich dairy pastures- and that's why the dish is called Dauphinoise. Nothing to do with the French Monarchy or the Revolution.

Pre-heat the oven to 160C. Line a baking tin with greaseproof paper, and butter the paper.  Slice a raw garlic clove in two, and rub it over the paper.

Peel and slice your potatoes. For this dish, I infinitely prefer the waxy varieties, and if possible, I would avoid floury varieties at all cost. Slice them very thinly. I use a Magimix for this.

Boil some milk in a saucepan, whisking to stop it burning. "Blanche" the sliced potatoes in the milk for five minutes; this will help to remove the acid from the potatoes. In another pan, pour 150ml of full-fat milk and a 142ml carton of double cream and add a sprig of thyme. Blend two teaspoons of flour with a splash of  milk, and mix thoroughly, so that there are no lumps. Mix this into the creamy milk. Bring to a near boil, and put to one side.

Layer the baking tin with the potato slices- so that they look a bit like fish scales. Season with sea-salt, black pepper and nutmeg. Arrange another layer on top, but with the shapes facing in the other direction. Season. Five or six layers should be about right. Pour over the milky cream mixture (first removing the thyme sprig) and then grate fresh parmesan all over the top.

Bake for about an hour, or until the potatoes are properly cooked, and the top is golden. Take out of the oven, leave to stand for a few minutes, and then cut into squares.

Vodka Bullshot

 

 

Snow in November! Here in London. It's seriously cold. The Blacking Factory is currently unheated, and I'm praying that this year my Christmas stocking will include a pair of those fingerless woollen gloves. Those Bob Cratchitty things; I can't remember what they're called: mittens?

On Sunday afternoon we made steaming glasses of Vodka Bullshot- and I couldn't get them down fast enough. It's a great cocktail. Not the sort of thing you would want to drink everyday of course, or even at a party, but for a raw winter's evening it's just the ticket. It's very similar to a Bloody Mary, except you substitute the tomato or clamato juice with beef bouillon.

Here's how we made it.  Into a heatproof mixing jug, pour: a decent slug of vodka (Stolichnaya is the current brand of choice), a few shakes of green Tabasco, Lea & Perrins' Worcestershire Sauce, a good pinch of celery salt, freshly ground pepper, a squeeze of lemon juice and a few tablespoons of a decent dry sherry.  Mix, and top up with hot beef boullion (we used tinned beef consommé).

 

 

 

You don't want to boil the drink, as this will evaporate the alcohol and may even shatter the glass.  Warm to steaming hot is the goal. Surpisingly good. Try it.

 

 

 

Chicken Maryland

 

 

 

Mrs Aitch is going to hate this one.  She's not normally fussy; not fussy at all, but she really hates bananas. In the same way that I loathe mashed potato.  If you are ever lucky enough to invite us to dinner, the worst scenario would be shepherd's pie as a main course, and banoffee pie as a pudding.  

To us Brits, American food can sometimes seem a bit Gothic.  I would include Chicken Maryland in this category.  Or, if not Gothic, certainly slightly weird.  A bit white trashy, perhaps?  Duelling banjos, denim dungarees and mobile homes raised on bricks.  Scrap metal yards and ravenous doebermanns. Maybe I'm being horribly unfair? Any observations are certainly not meant to be critical. After all, we're the nation which tucks into haggis, jellied eel and stargazey pie.

 

 

In America, Chicken Maryland is served with "gravy"- what we call in Blighty a "white sauce", or in The Great Republic, "Béchamel Sauce".  I suspect that the addition of banana fritters may be a British interpretation, and if so, I apologise.  If any Southerners out there in cyberspace think that the following receipe is inaccurate, please email me, and I will gladly post up a correction.

Okay.  That's that one out of the way.  Here's The Greasy Spoon's take on Chicken Maryland.  I've based this version on the recipe in Simon Hopkinson and Lindsey Bareham's excellent book, "The Prawn Cocktail Years".  I can't recommend it enough:

Take some chicken thighs (an excellent and affordable cut, by the way), rip off the skin and dip them into seasoned flour, and then again into a bowl of beaten egg.  Shake off the egg, and dip them into the seasoned flour for a second time.  In a deep frying pan heat up 100g of unsalted butter and 75ml  of sunflower oil, until frothy.  Put in the floured chicken piece, and fry gently.  The secret here is not to crowd the pan.  If you do so, your chicken will start to stew, rather than fry, because of the fall in temperature.  So, fry the chicken a few pieces at a time.  On a lowish heat.  It should take about half and hour.  Make sure you turn the chicken pieces about half way through the cooking time.

In the meantime, mix together 100g sweetcorn (tinned is absolutely fine, to be frank, I can't detect any difference), two small egg yolks, and salt and pepper.  Beat two egg whites until frothy, and gently fold them into the mixture.  Add a tablespoon of baking powder, and about 50-75g of breadcrumbs, until it forms a thickish batter.  Place to one side.

Take out the chicken pieces and keep them warm in a rack in a hot oven.  Strain off the hot chicken oil, leaving just enough in the pan to fry the sweetcorn fritters.  Drop tablespoons of the sweetcorn batter into the reserved hot oil, and fry for a couple of minutes on each side, until puffed and golden.  Drain on kitchen paper, and keep warm in the oven with the chicken.

Take 100ml of chicken stock, and reduce it by three-quarters.  Fry four small sliced bananas in unsalted butter, until golden, sprinkling them with some brown sugar as you do,  so that they begin to caramelise.  Grill some rashers of streaky bacon, until crisp.  Pour 100ml of double cream into the reduced chicken stock, and bring it back to the boil.  Reduce until slightly thickened, and squeeze in some lemon juice.  Check the seasoning and stir in some freshly chopped flat parsley. 

Arrange the fried chicken on a large plate with the sweetcorn and banana fritters, and crispy bacon pieces.  Spoon the "gravy" over the fried chicken, and serve the rest in a sauce boat.  Garnish with chopped flat parsley.  That's it.  Quite a lot of bother, in some ways; but strangely satisfying.  A perenniel favourite.

Coca-Cola Glazed Ham

 

 

 

Last Christmas or so, I wrote a post about a slightly weird recipe: "Ham Glazed in Coca-Cola".  It's still one of my most popular posts, and as I'm currently getting increased hits (no doubt because of Thanksgiving), I'm going to give you the recipe again.

It doesn't sound that great, does it?  However, as Coke is really just a very sugary, brown and fizzy syrup, there's no reason why it shouldn't work nicely with a lovely, juicy ham.  And the recipe's an old favourite from the American Deep South, too- which is no bad thing.  So, here's how you make it:

Put in a medium sized unsmoked gammon into a large pan.  Add a peeled onion (for flavour), and then pour in a litre of coca-cola.  Bring to the boil, put the lid back on, and turn down the heat.  Let the ham braise in the liquid for 2 ½ hours.

Take the gammon out of the pan, and let it rest.  Remove the skin and preheat your oven to 210˚C.  In the meantime, mix up a glaze from 100g breadcrumbs, 100g brown muscovado sugar, two tablespoons of French Dijon Mustard, and a tablespoon of Colman's Mustard Powder.  With a sharp knife, scour the gammon to make a criss-cross pattern. Stir in a spoonful or so of coca-cola into the sugar and mustard mixture, and then slap it onto the gammon. 

Roast the gammon in the hot oven for about ten minutes, or until the glaze has cooked.

 

The Mexican Day of the Dead

 

 

I think I first became aware of the Mexican Day of the Dead after reading Malcolm Lowry's novel, "Under the Volcano". There was also a film with Albert Finney and the She-Who-Can-Do-No-Wrong Jacqueline Bisset, in which Finney plays a drunken British diplomat.

 

Mexicans celebrate the Day of the Dead on November 2nd. It's an extraordinary festival: families pray for the souls of the departed, and death is celebrated with dancing, sugar skulls, flowers, colourful altars and carnival.

I love authentic Mexican food, and it's only recently that the proper thing has begun to arrive in London. Up until now, we've had to put up with Tex-Mex restaurants (as beloved by students and the disenfranchised); the sort of places where they make you wear silly hats and pour Margaritas down your throat; not the same deal at all. Incidentally, I once had a fantastic chivichangas (fried burritos) at a drive-in gas station in San Diego, a few miles from the Mexican border. You paid a dollar or so through a grill, and then a few minutes later a tanned hairy hand appeared through a hole in a wall with your hot food. Fast Food in the best sense.

 

 

We're going to cook something Mexican tonight. I like Elizabeth Lambert Ortiz's book "The New Complete Book of Mexican Cooking". "Fish in Almond and Coriander Sauce" (Pescado en Salsa de Almendra Verde) is on the menu. 

First, you simmer some non-oily white fish (cod?) in stock. Normally, I would place the fish in the cold water or fish stock, and then bring to the boil. Once it's simmering, I immediately turn off the heat and put on the lid, and then leave the fish to "cook" in the hot water for about five to ten minutes. You'll find this is an excellent way to cook fish, and will give you perfect results every time.

 

Remove the fish, and set aside. Pour the hot fish stock into a jug. In a small frying pan, heat up a few tablespoons of olive oil, and fry a clove of garlic with a slice of white bread, until the bread is golden on both sides. Remove the garlic and chop up the fried bread, coarsely. In your food processor, whizz up the chopped fried bread, 50g (2oz) finely ground almonds, two jalapeno chillies (de-seeded and chopped) and half a cup of fresh chopped coriander leaves; and then thin it out with the reserved stock. Heat, check the seasoning and pour over the fish. Serve with rice.

I've got no idea what this is going to be like, but it sounds interesting, and the cooking techniques are relatively simple.

Devilled Quails Eggs

 

 

 

I'm writing this as the gloom descends on a Hallowe'en afternoon.  I've always been fascinated by Hallowe'en: as a child in England, it was barely celebrated, apart from a few cartoons on the BBC and a spooky tale or so read out aloud at nursery school.  I've been reading up on Hallowe'en and according to the Oxford Dictionary of Folklore, it's quite possible that all that pagan stuff about Celtic fire festivals and the like is a fantasy, invented by Sir James Frazer in the "Golden Bough", and that Hallowe'en's origins are, indeed, Christian and Scottish, where it was known as "Nutcrack Night".  During the 19th century, Hallowe'en was associated with fortune telling and love divination: young girls would learn who their future husbands would be.

My grandmother taught me how to carve lanterns, but from turnips- rather than pumpkins.  Recently, under American influence, Hallowee'en has become much more popular in England.  We've just barricaded our front door and battened down the shutters in preparation for the annual onslaught: London street urchins hammering on the door and rattling the letterbox: "'ere, mister!  we know you're there!"

Hallowe'en food should be spicy (especially with the Mexican Day of the Dead just around the corner) and I gather that in the American Deep South, devilled eggs are traditionally served.  But I'm not keen on the idea of serving up stuffed chicken's eggs as a canapé. They're too large, and I think would be a bit clumsy, and even slightly Gothic.  So I've adapted the idea, but using tiny quail's eggs, instead.  This works much better and they were utterly delicious.  We scoffed a plate of them this morning.

Place your quails eggs in a pan of cold water, and bring to the boil. Turn off the heat, put back the lid, and let them stand in the hot water for four minutes. Plunge the cooked eggs into a pan of cold water. To shell them, gently roll the eggs on a hard surface, so that the shells crack. You will find that the quail's eggs have a tougher membrane than chicken's eggs, and once you've carefully removed it, you'll find the shell easier to remove.  But it's delicate work.

Slice the cooked eggs in half, and spoon out the cooked yolk and place in a mixing bowl.  Add a light mayonnaise, a few dashes of Tabasco, a dollop of Dijon mustard, cayenne pepper and celery salt for seasoning. Whisk up the ingredients together until smooth.  Using a piping bag, pipe the devilled mixture back into the quails egg halves.

Arrange on a plate, and sprinkle with finely chopped chives.

Butternut Squash and Chorizo with Roasted Tomatoes

 

 

 

Butternut squash turned up in our Abel and Cole vegetable box last week, and I was wondering what to do with it: this recipe worked well. It's simple- and that's often a good thing.

First you need to slice up a red onion and fry it gently in oil and butter. When the onion's soft, turn down the heat to a low setting and add some chorizo sausage, chopped up into cubes.  The chorizo should take about ten to fifteen minutes to cook.

In the meantime, remove the skin from a butternut squash, and cut it in half.  You will find that butternut squash is quite hard in texture, and sometimes needs a bit of effort to cut up. Chop it into small chunks and cook it gently in a separate pan with butter, first seasoning it with a few pinches of nutmeg and some decent black pepper.

Go back to the chorizo and add some crushed garlic. This will take a few minutes to cook. Make sure it doesn't burn.

Finally, remove the cooked chorizo, red onions and garlic and place them into a clean pan. Add the cooked butternut squash, and some baby tomatoes, which you've previously roasted whole in the oven. Warm the pan through, check the seasoning and finish the dish off with some chopped coriander and a squeeze of lemon.

The secret with this recipe is that the three main ingredients are cooked separately (ratatouille style) in their own juices, and then just gently folded together at the end of the cooking. Butternut squash has a delicious, slightly musty, autumnal taste and you don't want that to be overpowered by all those spicy paprika flavours going on in the chorizo.

Irish Stew Revisited

 

 

 

There's a sudden nip in the air, and with October just around the corner, I think Irish Stew could be just the ticket. 

Traditionally, Irish Stew consists of just lamb or mutton, onions, potatoes and water. Purists will tell you that carrots should not be added, but I was having a chat with an Irish friend about this recently, and she insisted that she includes carrots in her version. The secret with Irish Stew (as with any stew), is to cook it for a long time at a low temperature. You want the meat to break down, and the potato to disintegrate slightly- so that it thickens up the sauce.

Take a neck of lamb, and chop it up into chunks. Neck of lamb has to be one of my all-time favourite cuts. It's cheap, and cooks beautifully, becoming soft enough, after an hour or so of slowish cooking, to cut with a fork.

Brown the lamb in a pan with a knob of unsalted butter and a teaspoon of oil. The oil will help to stop the pan burning. Transfer the browned lamb to a casserole dish. 

Next sauté some sliced onions in the butter, and once they've cooked add them to the casserole. Peel some carrots, and slice them into quarters, lengthways. Add them to the casserole- on top of the onions. The aim is to build up your vegetables in layers. Add another layer of onions. Finally, add some peeled potatoes, which you have chopped into quarters, lengthways. Season with sea salt and ground black pepper.

Now pour in some stock (ideally lamb stock if you have it, other meat stocks will be fine) and add a sprig of thyme. Cook the casserole in a low to medium oven, until the lamb is tender and on the point of breaking down. You want the potatoes and carrots to remain intact, but yet at the same time, to become slightly soft around the edges. On a low heat this could take up to two hours, so check the stew from time to time.

When you reckon its done, take the casserole out of the oven, and have a look at it. There's a strong chance that you will have a thin sauce, so I would suggest that you thicken it up: spoon out the meat and vegetables and reserve. Pour the sauce through a sieve into a clean pan and mix in a beurre manié (flour and butter mixed into a ball), until the sauce is smooth and velvety. Bubble away for a few minutes. The sauce will thicken.

Pour it back over the lamb and vegetables. Check the seasoning, and add more salt and pepper if it's needed. Finally, serve with generous handfuls of chopped parsley.

Simple, but utterly wholesome and surprisingly satisfying.  Don't stint on the parsley: it can take it.

Cream of Tarragon and Vanilla Sauce

 

 

 

 

 

You know, there really isn't such a thing as a brand new recipe. It's all been done before. The other day, I "invented"- or at least, thought I did- a delicious new piquant sauce based on the licorice flavours of tarragon, combined with the creamy, slightly sugary floral flavour of vanilla; and hey presto! I see that one of the top 50 restaurants in the world already has it on their menu.  Shucks. I think it would work brilliantly with chicken, and perhaps, even better with a meaty fish, monkfish, perhaps- even salmon?

Before I tell you how I made it, here's a brief look at the two main ingredients, tarragon (Artemisia dracunculus) and vanilla. I'm quite keen on growing herbs in our London garden (sometimes it's an uphill struggle), but I've never managed to grow tarragon properly. I gather this is a difficult one. Rather splendidly, Tarragon also goes under the alternative name of "Dragon's Wort". The serpentine shape of tarragon's roots made herbalists believe that it could cure snake bite, hence the Latin "dracunculus", meaning "Little Dragon". There are two varieties of tarragon, French and Russian. Russian tarragon is easier to grow but doesn't taste as good as French tarragon.

Vanilla comes from an orchid native to Mexico and after saffron, is the second most expensive spice in the world. The Spanish word "vainilla" means "little pod". Originally cultivated by Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican peoples, the Spanish conquistador Hernán (or Hernando) Cortés is credited with introducing both vanilla and chocolate to Europe in the 1520's. 

 

 

Here's how to make Cream of Tarragon and Vanilla Sauce, courtesy of The Greasy Spoon:

Melt some unsalted butter in a smallish pan; chop up about three of four shallots and sweat them gently in the butter. Turn up the heat and add a generous slug of a dry vermouth such as Noilly Prat (rhymes with cat). Bubble away to burn off the alcohol. Add a dash of balsamic white vinegar and let the sauce bubble for a minute or so. 

Next, pour in some decent chicken stock, add a scraped out vanilla pod and seeds, and a handful of chopped tarragon leaves. Reduce on a high heat, until the broth is reduced by about half- and starts to thicken. Strain through a seive into a new, clean and cold pan, discarding the tarragon leaves, vanilla and shallots. Alllow the sauce to cool down for a few minutes. 

Very carefully (so that it doesn't curdle) mix in a small tub of double cream. Turn your stove up to a high heat and reduce (with only the very occasional stir) until the sauce is reasonably thick. Check the seasoning and if necessary add some Maldon Sea Salt and White Pepper. For that extra vanilla kick, you could always substitute the Maldon Salt with a pinch or two of Vanilla Fleur de Sel, the delicious (and expensive) vanilla flavoured sea salt you can buy from French delis. Stir in some freshly chopped tarragon leaves. Warm through and serve. This sauce is really about four flavours: aniseed (from the tarragon and the vermouth), vanilla, salt and the sweet-sharp taste of balsamic vinegar. I think it works, and I like it.

Anton Mosimann's Courgette and Thyme Risotto

 

 

 

We've just got back from a quick sojourn around the Italian Lakes; Lugano to be more precise, on the Italian-Swiss border. If you've never been there, I would urge you to go- the area is of course, stunningly beautiful, the food is excellent, and the place is relatively easy to get to, being only an hour or so's drive away from Milan.

 

Lake Como amused me. We had pistacchio gelati, sitting out on the terrace of the excellent Villa d'Este, watching playboys zooming around in Riva speed boats (all varnish and chrome), and flying boats taking off from the lake. It was very Talented Mr Ripley- a throwback to the 1950's. I gather George Clooney lives in the Villa Oleandra nearby. I also got to drive a Lancia again for the first time in twenty years. A trip down memory lane this was, as the car I first learnt to drive was my grandfather's highly unsuitable 1969 Lancia Flavia: all fuel injection and retro teak dashboard with an interesting array of coloured knobs and satsifying buttons to fiddle with. Anyway. Risotto.

I've got a theory that the Italians keep back the best risotto rice for themselves. Has anyone else noticed this? A year or two ago, we bought some arborio rice from a little shop in a backwater in Venice, and my god, it tasted so much more authentic than the imported stuff you buy from Sainsbury's. Having said that, I've discovered that Tesco sell an excellent arborio rice under their own name which seems to give very genuine, top notch results, and I would recommend this without reservation.

One of the best risotto recipes I've come across is in Anton Mosimann's "Cooking with Mosimann".  Remember old Anton?  He was that Swiss chap with the moustache, who elevated precision to a fine art, and had something to do with nouvelle cuisine back in the 1980's. You don't seem him on television much these days, and I assume he's gone into semi-retirement, which is a great shame, as I've been re-visiting his books and finding his recipes to be comparatively straightforward by today's standards and of course, as you would expect, technically excellent. Here's his recipe for a simple risotto cooked with courgettes and thyme. The addition of turmeric thickens it up and turns it an interesting, yellow colour, although I would be tempted, by way of experiment, to substitute the turmeric with a few saffron threads instead.

Melt 25g of butter in a hot pan. Chop up a small onion into fine pieces and cook it in the butter with a sprig or so of fresh thyme. Cook until soft, but not brown. Stir in 200g of arborio rice with a decent pinch of turmeric, and make sure the rice is coated in the hot butter. Again, do not brown. Pour in 150ml of steaming hot vegetable or chicken stock. Stir like crazy. The rice will release starch. Starch is what makes the risotto creamy. Over a medium heat, carry on adding 250ml of hot stock in small quantities, until the rice has absorbed it. You know how to do this, I don't really need to tell you: add a bit of stock, stir until most of the stock has been absorbed, add a bit of stock, stir.

As you're stirring, mix in 250g of courgettes, cut into small diced cubes. I tend to cut up my vegetables for this sort of thing into fairly small dice, as I think, visually at least, it looks neater, and it will take less time to cook. It's important not to overcook the rice. The Italians like their risotto rice to be reasonably firm, yet bound in a creamy, fairly sloppy sauce. This is the great art: firm rice, wet sauce; and it's not especially easy to get right the first time you make it.

Just before you reckon the rice to be ready, pour in 50ml of dry white wine. This will stop the cooking. Stir in a knob of butter, check the seasoning, and serve with freshly grated parmesan cheese.

 

Soused Mackerel with Cider and Thyme

 

 

 

Recently, Lucas Hollweg wrote about a similar recipe in The Sunday Times style magazine. Soused Mackerel is a North European classic.  "Sousing" means to pickle.  I've used mackerel in this dish, but, typically, you could use any other oily fish such as herring ("maatjesharing" in Dutch or "matjes" in German and Swedish), and it might be an intriguing exercise to try the dish out with smoked haddock, instead. I think it would work. 

In my version, I've used cider; as many of you will remember, I favour the use of cider in my cooking over white wine (it also gives this particular dish an added North European slant); but you could of course, use a dry white wine instead. The following recipe will serve four hungry people:

First, you'll need eight mackerel fillets. Living in central London, I bought my mackerel from the local supermarket and filleted them myself, as the so-called "fishmonger" behind the counter told me that he "hadn't been trained to fillet, had he?".  I raise my eyes to heaven. Filleting is pretty straightforward, and would make a good subject for a future post. I managed to do a reasonable job- even without a proper filleting knife: our kitchen is currently in chaos.

Clean the mackerel fillets and arrange them in a flat dish. Sprinkle them with sea salt, and leave them for at least half an hour.

In the meantime, heat up your oven to 220C.  Into a saucepan put: two thinly sliced red onions, one thinly sliced carrot, three cloves of peeled whole garlic, several sprigs of thyme, two bay leaves, two cloves, a small handful of black peppercorns, 500ml of a decent dry cider, and 120ml of cider or white wine vinegar. This will make your brine. Add 150ml of water and bring it to the boil. Simmer for ten minutes, add three small slithers of lemon peel, and simmer away for a five further minutes.

Wipe the surplus salt away from the fish, and pour over the hot liquor. Cook in the hot oven for up to nine minutes or so- until the fish is just about cooked through. Cool in the 'fridge and leave overnight. You will find that the red onions make the liquor go a subtle tinted rose-pink colour.  

Check the seasoning, and serve cold with a generous amount of chopped parsley and hunks of warm bread to mop up the juice. If you're fussy about presentation, it might be an idea to remove the lemon peel and the cooked thyme (which will have gone a bit soggy and brown during the cooking), replacing it with a few fresh sprigs. Incidentally, I served my fish with the silvery skin of the mackerel intact; you could of course, remove this after cooking.

Ideal for a summer buffet in the garden.

Egon Ronay

 

 

 

Sad news about old Egon Ronay, who has just died at the grand old age of 94. A year or so ago, I wrote this post:

Remember Egon Ronay?  He was that rather dapper Hungarian who published a series of restaurant guides; in vogue a few years ago. One of the favourite books in my modest cookery library is Egon's "The Unforgettable Dishes of My Life', published in 1989. If you're interested in getting hold of a copy, you should be able to get track one down from either amazon.co.uk, or that marvellous antiquarian book website, abebooks.com.

The book's very much a personal thing, with recipes that have held meaning to him for various reasons over the years. That's something I like about food: the way a certain dish can bring back memories, or have some literary or historical connotation. Without, I hope, getting too hyper-intellectual, wasn't that what Proust was all about?  You know, the madeline dipped into the lemon scented tea and all that?

Anyway, here's his recipe for "Roast Red Mullet with Cumin Sauce". Hopefully you will be able to buy one from your local fishmonger- if you have any left in your neighbourhood that is.  In London, they're more or less gone, and have been replaced by the fish counters of your local supermarket. And Sainsbury's ain't nearly as good as it used to be.

Clean and gut a red mullet, keeping back the bones and the livers. Cut off the heads and the tail. Put the heads, tail, and bones into a saucepan, and add leeks, shallots, white wine, and salt. Pour in two pints of water, and bring to the boil. Skim off the scum as it floats to the top. Cover the saucepan, and simmer for about twenty minutes. Hey presto! You will have a fish stock.

Add two teaspoons of cumin seeds and reduce three quarters of a pint of the stock, until the it takes on a syrupy consistency. Add half a pint of double cream and the red mullet livers, and boil for fifteen seconds. Liquidise in your magimix or blender, and then pass it through a sieve. That's the sauce finished.

Brush the cleaned mullet with oil, and wrap it in foil, first seasoning it with a generous amount of sea salt and chunky black pepper. Place the fish on a baking tray, and cook in the oven at 220C (425F) until the fish is cooked. The flesh will flake up a bit when it's done. Arrange the cooked fish on a plate, and pour the sauce around it.

Clear Gazpacho

 

 

 

Clear Gazpacho is one of my favourite summer recipes. It's very easy to make, though slightly time consuming- but could be made in advance and then assembled at the last minute. It uses similar ingredients to a traditional gazpacho soup, but, instead, has as a base a mouth watering, flavour infused, clear, tomato "consommé".

Take a largish quantity of ripe red tomatoes and blitz them in your mixer with some sea salt. The riper the better, as the salt helps to draw out the juices. Next, line a sieve with muslin or coffee filter paper, and fill it up with the tomato pulp, placing a large bowl underneath. Stick it in the 'fridge and let the "tomato water" drip slowly into the bowl. When I'm in the mood, I sometimes add some crushed mint leaves to the pulp as well.

The next morning you'll have a bowl full of an amazingly clear, rose-coloured, light but flavour-rich, tomato stock. The first time I made it, I was amazed. Add a bit more salt to it, if it needs it.

Pour the cold tomato water into bowls. Garnish with thinly sliced radishes, cubed avocado, sliced baby tomatoes, crispy apple cut into tiny batons, red chili cut into wafer thin julienne, red, yellow and green peppers, courgettes, and chopped basil. The secret is to try and cut the ingredients into the smallest shapes you possibly can: these can include batons, diamonds, cubes and thin strips, as the mood takes you. If they're small enough, they should float on top of the soup with ease. Serve it chilled. That's it.

Skate with Black Butter Sauce

 

 

"Skate with Black Butter" is a classic French working man's dish. The sort of thing (or so I imagine) they used to eat in the cafés and bistros of the old Les Halles market in Paris. Back in the old days. In the early hours of the morning. I don't cook it as often as I should, but it's incredibly easy to make, and quick off the mark, too. The "Black Butter Sauce" is another old-fashioned classic, which you can use with any white fish, and is excellent with fried eggs too- but more of that later.

Back to the skate. You will need to buy "skate wings" from the fishmonger. Skate are those rather primeval looking fish, which are members of the Ray family (family Rajidae in the superorder Batoidea) and because they have low reproductive rates, are vulnerable to over-fishing: so be aware that currently there is an ethical debate going on out there about whether indeed, you should be eating the critters at all.

 

The flesh of the skate is delicate and delicious. I'm still not entirely sure about the bones, and I'm no fuss pot, I tell you. You scrape the flesh off the bones with your fork, leaving behind a skeletal frame on the plate, which for some reason, reminds me of a pterodactyl carcass. It's all terrifyingly pre-historic.

This is how you cook it: clean the skate wings, and dust them lightly with seasoned flour. Heat up a frying pan and when its hot, add butter and grapeseed oil. The oil will help to stop the butter burning. Crank down the heat, and fry the skate for a few minutes on each side. Take out the cooked skate, and set it aside.

The so-called "black" butter sauce is easy. Heat up a decent knob of butter on a low heat until it begins to turn brown. You want it to be a caramel brown colour, not in fact, black, which would mean that it had burnt. The recipe title is misleading, I know. When it's brown, add a squeeze of lemon juice, some chopped flat-leaf parsley and some capers. The hot butter has a tendency to split when you add the acid, so it might be a good idea to turn the heat down even further when this happens. Arrange the sauce over the fish, and serve.

You can also pour the black butter sauce over a fried egg (ouefs au buerre noir), though if doing so, I would use a white balsamic vinegar, instead of lemon juice. According to David Ogivily in his autobiography, "Confessions of an Advertising Man", this was the chefs' favourite late night snack at the Majestic Hotel, Paris.

Maryland Crab Cakes

 

 

This is one of the all-time great American recipes, comfort food at it's best; and it's relatively easy to make too. Traditionally, the Blue Crab from the Chesapeake Bay area is the one to go for, but I have to accept, reluctantly, that living this side of the pond, other varieties of crab will have to do.

Die-hards might also want to add Old Bay Seasoning, which is an American herb and spice mix. As we don't seem to be able to get it here (maybe I should try the excellent Wholefoods in Kensington High Street?), I've substituted my very own, very similar spice mixture which will have to do for the time being.

Back to the crab cakes. Take some juicy crab meat and put it into a mixing bowl. Add a cup of mayonnaise, a tablespoon of mustard powder (its got to be Colman's), a beaten egg, a teaspoon of Lea & Perrins, the juice of a lemon, and some chopped parsley. Combine everything together. 

Now for The Greasy Spoon's very own "Old Bay Seasoning" recipe. Grind up some celery salt, mustard seed, cinammon, powdered ginger, peppercorns, and a bayleaf until you have a reasonably fine powder. Add a teaspoonful to the crab mixture.

Next you need to add some breadcrumbs. Instead of crumbling up a slice of bread, I find it easier to use about seven crushed Saltine Crackers, and I have a feeling that this could be more authentic. Put the crackers into a plastic bag, and then bash them with a hammer. Add the crumbs to the mixture and then chill it for about two hours in the 'fridge.

To cook, drop each crab cake into some hot oil (say, in a wok), and fry until they are golden brown. Serve with the classic American Tomato and Horseradish Ketchup. Utterly delicious, and very appropriate, I think, for a hot Saturday afternoon in June or July.

Melon Sorbet with Iced Bison Vodka

 

 

 

I'm a big fan of sorbets, especially as they're so easy to make; even for those living with tiny kitchens, and without the luxury of expensive ice-cream makers. All you need is a deep freeze (however small), a terrine-shaped metal container, a blender, and lots of patience. Once you've mastered the technique, the sky's the limit, and great fun can be had by one and all inventing interesting new flavour combinations.

Here's an idea for a melon sorbet, seved with Polish bison vodka. The grassy taste of the vodka works well the summery flavours going on in the melon.

Take a cantaloupe melon and remove the skin. Cut it into chunks and take out the seeds and any pith. Put it to one side.  You could of course use any melon you liked the look of; experimentation is the key. In the meantime, dissolve three quarters of a cup of white sugar in three quarters of a cup of water, and heat gently to make a syrup. When it's properly dissolved, pour it into the metal terrine, and stick it into the 'fridge to cool down.

Whizz the melon up in your magimix or blender, until it's smooth. I happen to prefer my sorbets to be very smooth, and I don't like nasty bits floating around in it, so I would then push the blended melon through a sieve. Once that's done, pour the blended, sieved melon into the metal terrine and mix it around with the cooled syrup, adding a squeeze of lemon juice as you go. Stick it into the deep freeze.

Now it's a matter of patience. Wait until the sorbet is almost frozen, and then take it out of the deep freeze and mash it up with a fork. Put it back into the freezer. Wait again until it's almost frozen, take it out and mash it up. To finish it off, wait until it's almost frozen, take it out, but this time whizz it up in a blender, return it to its container and re-freeze.

To serve the sorbet, I pour iced Zubrowka bison vodka over it. Zubrowka vodka is curious stuff, which has a very distinctive grassy taste ( a bit like that evocative summer smell of freshly cut grass and petrol lawn mowers). To quote from the hilarious marketing blurb on the label: "In a remote corner of Poland in the North Podlaise Lowland lies a mysterious place called Bialowieza, the last primeval forest in Europe, home to Europe's last remaining herd of bison and to a distinctively, aromatic plant- Bison grass...since the 14th century, Bison-grass has been used to infuse a unique vodka, Zubrowka, a singular spirit of supreme smoothness..."

I'm not sure I like Zubrowka as a neat vodka, but I think it works brilliantly when used in conjunction with other foods. (Incidentally, there's no point adding vodka directly to the sorbet mix, as the alcohol won't freeze properly).

For the bibliophiles amongst you, it might be worth your while tracking down a copy of Elizabeth David's "Harvest of the Cold Months: The Social History of Ice and Ices", edited by Jill Norman, and published by Michael Joseph in 1994. I've got a feeling that this book was published in a small print run, and several years ago, scarce used copies were scarily expensive. But that was before the internet, and there's now a reasonable selection of copies available on Abebooks.

 

Hot Cross Buns

 

 

 

"Hot cross buns, Hot cross buns, one ha' penny, two ha' penny, hot cross buns. If you have no daughters, give them to your sons, one ha' penny, two ha' penny, Hot Cross Buns"

I love Easter, I really do. Don't get me wrong, I like Christmas too, and would hate to be considered some sort of a tight-fisted Scrooge; but I think it's the combination of chocolate, breezy fresh air, Spring sunshine (if you're lucky), and, as an added bonus, its proximity to the Grand National; which does it for me.

My grandparents used to celebrate the holiday in style, and as well as the ubiquitous chocolate, Easter Egg hunts, and daffodils, we used to have wrapped-up presents too, and a massive turkey. It was just like Christmas, but without the hassle.

"Hot Cross Buns" have an evocative taste. What is it about them?  The combination of buttery, yeasty tastes with the sweetness of the currants? Maybe that's it. Hot Cross Buns are one of those traditional dishes whose origins have been lost in the mists of antiquity. The "crosses" were supposedly meant to ward off evil spirits, and the buns, apparently, were banned by the Protestant church for being too popish. Anyway, you eat them tomorrow, on Good Friday. I've adapted the recipe from Sara Paston-William's definitive book, "Christmas and Festive Day Recipes".

 

Mix up half a pint of milk and water, and warm it up to blood heat. Stir in 22g of fresh yeast, let the mixture get frothy and let it stand for ten minutes.

Sieve 450g plain flour, a teaspoon of salt, a teaspoon of mixed spice, a teaspoon of cinnamon, and some grated nutmeg into a mixing bowl. Stir in 50g of caster sugar. Rub in 50g butter with your fingers. Make a well in the flour mix, pour in the yeasty milk, two beaten eggs, and 175g of currants. Mix it all up to make a dough. Use your hands!

Turn the dough onto a floured board, and knead it with your hands until the dough is elastic. Place it in a warm, greased bowl; sprinkle with flour, and cover with a kitchen towel. If you leave it in a warmish place, the dough should rise.

Once it has doubled in size (this might take over an hour), knock it down, and leave it to rise again for another half an hour. Form the dough into smallish buns. Reserve some of the dough, and roll it out flat. Cut the dough into strips, and place on the top of each bun to form a cross. Set them aside to rest for about fifteen minutes.

Bake them in a pre-set oven at 425F (220C). It might be a good plan to place a tin of water at the bottom of the oven to create a steamy atmosphere. After twenty minutes, the buns should be cooked.

Finish the buns off with a sugar glaze. This is just sugar-water which you have boiled rapidly to form a syrup. Once the syrup is thick enough (and very slightly brown), brush it over the buns.