The Greasy Spoon

Mario and Franco and London's Trattoria Revolution

I've just heard Alasdair Scott Sutherland talking about his interesting new book on BBC Radio London. It's called The Spaghetti Tree: Mario and Franco and the Trattoria Revolution and looks at the growth of Italian restaurants in Sixties London, and in particular, the careers of Franco Lagattolla and Mario Cassandro; former waiters at The Mirabelle who opened the starry La Trattoria Terrazza in Romilly Street, Soho, in 1959; subsequently patronised by the likes of David Bailey, Michael Caine and Princess Margaret (I'm finding that "Princess Margaret ate here" is fast becoming a favourite mantra).

Franco Lagattolla published his own cookbook (with illustrations by Enzo Apicella) in 1978. It's called: The Recipes that Made a Million.  Here's his recipe for Salsa Verde.  Do you remember all the trouble and angst I had to go through when I attempted to make Elizabeth David's walnut sauce? Franco's version leaves out the walnuts, and is quite definitely served cold:

"Soak two tablespoons of fresh, white breadcrumbs in vinegar and then squeeze them out. Work one hard-boiled egg yolk to a paste, mix together with the bread and add four tablespoons of very finely chopped parsley, one finely chopped garlic clove and one teaspoon of chopped capers. Blend in one cup of olive oil. Season with salt and milled black pepper. If necessary, sharpen with a little more vinegar. Let this piquant sauce stand for at least one hour."

Italian Walnut Sauce

The Girl's asked me to re-create an Italian dish she had the other day at some restaurant in Chelsea. It's Gnocchi with Walnut Sauce. The gnocchi's pretty straightforward- like you, I've often made it before: riced potatoes held together with eggs and flour, seasoned with salt and pepper and then fashioned into tiny 'lumps', and simmered in boiling water until the gnocchi float. The walnut sauce however, is more unusual.

For some reason, I've got this idea that walnut sauce should be a bright green. Elizabeth David's version (salsa di noci) is exactly that. She recommends pounding up softened walnuts, parsley and salt in a pestle and mortar, until they form a paste. Next, you mix in some butter, and then stir in breadcrumbs and oil, until the paste thickens. You finish off the sauce with some milk or cream. I'm guessing that (like a mayonnaise) this sauce will split if you heat it up?  Maybe you might get away with warming it gently? Dunno.

I've trawled the net, and discovered that most of the walnut sauce recipes out there in cyberspace are variations on this method: walnuts ground up into some sort of paste, and then bound in oil. I'm going to try the Elizabeth David method, and report back.

Over and out.

Ragù Bolognese

This in-between period between Christmas and the New Year is always a bit weird. You're still got the holiday spirit, but have, more than likely, returned to the Kafkaesque slog of the Blacking Factory. Here in The Big Smoke, it's cold and frosty, and I'm in the mood for some hearty, warming food. An authentic Ragù Bolognese would be just the ticket.

I'm not talking about that awful tinned stuff; that thin, processed sauce you boiled up in your student days. No, I'm writing about the authentic, slowly cooked, rich and dark sauce, served in Bologna with lasagne verdi.  It's okay, of course, to serve it with any type of pasta, I'm not that fussy. Here's one way of making it:

Chop up some onions and fry them in a mixture of butter and oil in your favourite pan. When the onions are soft, add some crushed garlic. Add a diced carrot and some thinly sliced celery. Chop up some streaky bacon, and fry this with the onions, garlic, carrot and celery. So far so good. Transfer the onions, garlic, bacon, carrot and celery to your casserole dish.

Now start frying some minced pork in the frying pan. Use the oil and butter left over from the onions and bacon. If you need to, add a bit more butter or oil to stop the pork burning. Here's a useful tip: rather than stirring the mince around, it's a better idea to let it brown in lumps. If you stir it about, you run the risk that the meat will start to poach, rather than fry.

Transfer the pork to the casserole. Fry some minced beef, and transfer to the casserole. Next, chop up some chicken livers into small pieces, fry them very briefly, and transfer them to the casserole pot.

Tip in a tin of plum tomatoes, a good dollop of tomato purée, and half a bottle of red wine (though strangely, white wine is probably more authentic). Season with salt, pepper, nutmeg, and some finely chopped basil. Cook the ragù on the lowest heat you can manage, for up to four hours.  You will need to check the ragù now and again, to make sure it doesn't burn.  

According to the great Elizabeth David in her seminal work, Italian Food: "some Bolognese cooks add at least 1 cupful of cream or milk to the sauce, which makes it smoother".  Who am I to argue with that?

Brandy Butter

Essential with Christmas Pudding or Mince Pies. 

Place 8oz (225g) unsalted butter into a bowl with 6oz (175g) icing sugar. Mix them up well, and then slowly pour in three tablespoons of cognac or brandy. Add the grated peel of an orange, and a small splash of fresh orange juice.  Pat into a jar, and keep in the 'fridge.

Gravlax

Gravlax is the Scandinavian way of pickling Salmon.  In Norway, it's called Gravet Laks. In Iceland, Graflax, and in Denmark, Gravad Laks. This means, literally, "Grave Salmon", and refers to the Medieval practice of curing the raw fish by burying it in the sand above the level of the high tide. It's probably the perfect first course for the Christmas season. I like it's simplicity- and it's fun to make too. I've based this method of making it on a Jane Grigson recipe mentioned in Paul Levy's The Feast of Christmas.

You start off with a tail piece of salmon, weighing approximately 1 kg. Get your fishmonger to slice it in half, lengthways, and to remove the backbone, so that you end up with two slices of fish. Remove the remaining 'pin bones' with a pair of tweezers. Gravlax is usually made with the skin of the fish left on, but if you prefer, you can remove it.

Next, you need to mix up 'The Cure". Combine the following ingredients in a bowl: one heaped tablespoon of sea salt, one tablespoon of brown sugar, one teaspoon of crushed black peppercorns, and one tablespoon of cognac, schnapps or vodka.

Take some tin foil, and lie it down, flat. Spread some of the cure onto the foil. Lie one of the salmon pieces down onto the foil. Spread more of the cure onto the upper side of the salmon. Next, sprinkle lots of fresh, chopped dill on top of the salmon. Take the second piece of salmon, spread it with the cure, and place it directly on top of the first piece of salmon, so that you end up with a sort of salmon sandwich, with the dill and cure mixture filling up the middle. Does that make sense?

Fold over the tin foil, and crunch it tightly around the salmon pieces, so that it forms a package. Lie this in a shallow dish, and press some weights down on top of it.  I use some heavy iron weights from my grandmother's old-fashioned scales I've got lying around in my kitchen. Keep the salmon in a cool place for up to five days, turning the fish over once or twice. You'll find that juices from the fish will run out and mix with the cure and the dill. In effect, you're curing the salmon.

To serve the Gravlax, take it out of the tin foil, drain away the juices, and slice it thinly. I like it with dark rye bread and Dill Sauce.

You make Dill Sauce in a similar way to mayonnaise. Crack an egg yolk into a bowl, and mix in a dollop of French Dijon mustard and a tablespoon of white sugar. Whisk, and start to add Grapeseed Oil, drop by drop- as you would with a mayonnaise. The emulsion will thicken. Keep going until you're happy with the consistency. I like it thick. Flavour the sauce with two tablespoons of white wine vinegar, and season with salt and pepper. Finish it off by mixing in a decent amount of fresh, chopped dill.  It's best if you remove the dill stalks, and then chop the feathery bits of the dill plant finely.

Sage

One of the fun things about writing The Greasy Spoon is thinking up new ways of describing the various tastes.  On wikipedia ("it's in wikipedia so it must be true) Sage (Salvia officinalsis) is described as having a peppery taste.  I'm not sure that's right?  I've been a bit off-colour for the last week (with what women call "Man Flu") and The Girl (God Bless 'Er) cooked me up a divine chicken stew laced with copious amounts of sage.  The sage and chicken combination worked well. with the velvety, aromatic, oniony and slightly sweet flavours of the sage helping to create a rich, smooth sauce.

Traditionally, sage was used in the cooking of Merrie Olde England. It works well with pork, beautifully in stuffings, is the perfect match for onion and an essential ingredient in bread sauce. I love it.

Here's my recipe for bread sauce. In England, we serve bread sauce with game, such as partridge or pheasant. It really is the genuine taste of this country, with the rather Medieval flavours of sage, nutmeg, mace and cloves. It's also a good 'un with poultry. Some strange people out there like their sauce thick. Personally, I prefer my bread sauce to be a bit sloppy.

Add the following ingredients to a saucepan: 300ml milk, 50g butter, a chopped small onion, a crushed garlic clove, a bayleaf, two cloves, a blade of mace and some chopped fresh sage. Heat. Once the mixture is warm, stir in 75g of fresh white breadcrumbs and cook until thick and smooth, stirring the whole time.

When you're happy with the consistency, remove the bay leaf, mace and cloves, and pour in 150ml of single cream. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper and grind in a decent amount of nutmeg.

Reheat the sauce, but to stop it going thick- mix in a knob of unsalted butter and some more milk, to taste.

Still on the subject of sage, a simple Italian sauce I'm rather fond of is Sage and Butter Sauce. This is just butter, heated until it turns a golden noisette colour (ie not burnt), lots of fresh chopped sage, salt and pepper and a decent squeeze of lemon juice. Very simple. I like it.

Colonel Skinner's Mango Chutney

At Dotheboys Hall, I remember being fascinated by an ancient copy of Hobson Jobson which I found hidden away in the school library.  First published in 1903, Hobson was an etymological glossary of Anglo-Indian words and language. A study of words such as Pajama, Veranda, Bungalow, Tiffin, Kedgeree and of course, our very own Curry.

Anglo-Indian food is another fascinating study, in its own right.  One of the best books on the subject is David Burton's The Raj at Table, published by Faber & Faber.

Here's a recipe for Colonel Skinner's Mango Chutney.  Today, there are various brands out there using this name. Actually, Colonel Skinner's Mango Chutney is something that you will find in the old Anglo-Indian cookery books and the original recipe involved leaving the chutney outside in the backyard to fester under the hot sun for a few days.  I tried to find out who the original Colonel Skinner was (sounds Irish?), but without success.

Chop up the following ingredients in your Magimix or otherwise trendy food processor: twelve ounces of dried mangoes, half a pound of  brown sugar, ginger, rasins, chillis and garlic to taste. Once they're chopped up, spoon the mixture into a large preserving pan.  Add two and half pints of vinegar and season with salt.  Bring to the boil and simmer for an hour. Transfer into sterlilised jars and store in a dark cupboard.

Piccalilli

Piccalilli is one of those slightly weird British "delicacies"- if that's the right description. Frankly, the stuff's almost radioactive; it's bright yellow in colour, and potently acidic; utterly out of fashion too, evoking the world of Austerity Britain: all the glamour of Dad's allotment, prize marrow competitions and Brown Windsor soup.

I spent a few minutes researching its history on the internet. Apparently, the first known Piccalilli recipe was by a Mrs Raffald in 1772, when it was also known as English Chow Chow. That sounded about right. It had to be connected in some way with eighteenth century India, and I'm assuming that the rather odd sounding name is just a play on the word, pickle. Anyway, here's The Greasy Spoon's recipe for making your very own piccalilli:

First prepare the vegetables. Break up a small cauliflower into small florets, peel a cucumber, de-seed it, and chop it into small cubes. Finely chop up two onions. Place the vegetables in a bowl, sprinkle them with salt, and leave to stand overnight. The salt will draw out lots of water and help to keep the vegetables crisp. Pour off the water, rinse the vegetables with cold water, and pat them dry.

When you're ready to make the piccalilli, get hold of a large preserving pan and pour in about 500ml of cider vinegar. Add 250g of sugar and the following spices: a dollop of Colman's English mustard, turmeric, ground ginger, ground cumin, mustard seeds, chili flakes, nutmeg, and a pinch of cayenne pepper.  Warm it through until the sugar dissolves, add the vegetables and then bring the mixture to the boil.  Season with chunky black pepper, reduce the heat and simmer away for about ten minutes.  It's unlikely that you'll need to add any more salt, as you've already used it at the beginning of the recipe. The turmeric and mustard will turn the mixture a bright yellow colour.

Finally, thicken up the piccalilli with some cornflour: in a separate bowl add some of the cooking liquid to a tablespoon or so of cornflower and whisk it up until it forms a paste. Reduce the heat and slowly mix this paste into the piccalilli. Simmer for a further five minutes (until the cornflour is cooked properly) and then decant into sterilised jars. It will need to mature in a dark cupboard for about a month before use. Excellent with cold beef and oily fish such as mackerel and herring.

Sweetcorn Relish

After all this talk about finger sandwiches, Eton Mess, and avocados, it's time for something a bit more robust. I've got a secret yearning for sweetcorn relish. It's American white trash, diner food at its best. Bick's, the Canadian brand, does a great range of "relishes" and I love the retro packaging, too.

A few days ago, I decided to create my own sweetcorn relish, in true diner style. It worked well, and was similar to the stuff you buy in jars. Here's how I made it:

First, I chopped up some shallots, and cooked them in oil. Next, I tipped a tin of sweetcorn into a bowl, and mixed in some green and red peppers (chopped into tiny cubes), a splash of white vinegar, a spoonful of sugar, a teaspoon of garlic powder; seasoned it with sea salt and pepper, and finished off the job with a spoonful of starchy cornflour.

I added the cooked shallots to the mixture and heated the thing slowly in a small pan, so that the cornflour cooked properly. The finished result was pretty darn authentic. For extra heat, you could also add some red chilis, sliced very thinly into strips- I hesitate to use the French term julienne, as in this case, it just doesn't seem appropriate. Perfect with burgers, even better with fried chicken.

Avocado

I don't think I've yet written about the ubiquitous avocado. It's hard to remember, but not that long ago, avocados were seen as exotic and sophisticated and usually known as avocado pears.

Nowadays, of course, they're all over the shop, and probably seen as a little bit passe; the staple fodder of dubious bistros and pretentious, second-rate restaurants. So, I've decided to have a closer look and see if there's more to them than initially meets the eye.

The avocado (Persea americana) (from Nahuatl Aguacatl: agua-kah-tl), is native to Mexico, Central and northern South America, and classified in the flowering plant family Lauraceae. Avocado trees were cultivated in pre-Incan settlements with archeological evidence dating to 750 B.C.

The avocado of choice is the Hass variety, which grows in California. That's the one with the dark green knobbly skin (pictured above). It has a lovely, creamy, nutty taste and is, in my opinion, superior to the smooth skinned varieties.

Avocados are full of fat, but the good news is that this fat is a monounsaturated fat, which is supposed to be good for you.

One of the best things you can do with avocados is to make guacamole. Originally an Aztec dish, it's easy to make, and goes brilliantly with things Mexican. Here's my own recipe for it. I prefer the texture to be a bit chunky, rather than completely smooth.

In a bowl, half-mash up some hass avocados and then gently fold in red tomatoes (chopped into small pieces), a minced red onion, lime juice, finely chopped red chili, sea salt, a dash of Tabasco sauce, paprika, black pepper and some chopped fresh coriander.

And finally, a useful tip: when preparing avocados, immediately sprinkle the exposed flesh with lemon juice. This will stop the avocado turning brown.