The Greasy Spoon | Food & Culture

Happy Christmas

 

 

The first commercially produced Christmas Card (1843), designed by Henry Cole (1808-1882)

 

Wishing all Greasy Spooners, wherever you are in the world, my very best wishes for a Happy Christmas and Prosperous New Year.

The free range turkey’s in the oven- stuffed with watercress, bacon and chestnuts. Elizabeth David’s Orange Sauce has been made (not at all sure about this one); the ham has been baked, glazed with honey and studded with cloves. I’m going to shred the brussel sprouts and fry them quickly in the wok with bacon and chestnuts and a bit of white wine.

The Greasy Spoon Christmas Pudding is ready to go. It’s already been cooked for ten hours. By mistake. We went to a drinks party, forgot to turn off the stove, and came home at two in the morning to find it still steaming away. It’s either going to be fabulous or a complete disaster. We shall see. And the kitchen lights have just blown and we’re cooking in the London gloom. Luckily, the stove’s still working. 

The other life-shattering event is that yesterday morning, for the first time in my life, believe it or not, I have actually, finally made a cake. A manly Scottish Dundee Cake flavoured with J & B Rare Whisky. I will be reporting back in the New Year with the results. 

 

There Never Was Such a Ham!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Every year I cook a Christmas ham. I don’t care what the foodies say, I’m always amazed what you can do (with a bit of preparation and a decent recipe) to improve a bog-standard supermarket gammon. This year I’ve bought an unsmoked boneless gammon from our local Waitrose, (£15.67), but in previous years I used a cheaper gammon from Sainsbury’s and can truthfully, hand on heart, say it lived up to expectations- and this is coming from somebody who was raised on expensive York Ham from Paxton & Whitfield. 

I use a recipe from Sarah Raven’s excellent “Complete Christmas”. The ham is basted with cider towards the end of cooking, which gives it that added je ne sais. By the way, the original recipe is for a largish 4.5 kg bone gammon but normally I use a smaller one.

First, you take a 4.5 kg boned gammon and soak it in cold water overnight. I’m wondering if it might benefit from a longer soaking? Presumably the water helps to wash out salt, any nasty impurities and keeps the ham moist during cooking?

Remove the ham from the water and wrap it up, with a bayleaf or two, in a loose but sealed parcel of aluminium foil. Preheat the oven to 170 °C and place the ham in a large roasting tin with a little water in the bottom. How long to cook it for? Now that’s a good question. Here’s the mathematical formula, which I have to admit to working out on paper with the help of a calculator. Sad, but true. For every 450g of weight, roast it for 30 minutes. My gammon happens to weigh 2.766 kilos, which means, I think, that I would have to roast it for ?  Answers on a postcard please.

Twenty minutes before the end of the cooking time take the ham out of the oven and put it to one side. Increase the oven temperature to 200 °C. Remove the foil from the gammon and with a very sharp knife strip off the rind, leaving an even layer of white fat on the joint. You will improve on this with practice: the first time I attempted it, I managed to remove half the fat, leaving a very patchy layer. But with any luck, your rind should come off pretty easily. Score the fat to make a ‘criss-cross’, diamond shaped pattern.

Mix up four tablespoons of Dijon mustard with 4 tablespoons of soft brown demerara sugar and spread it over the fat with a palatte knife. Push a clove in the middle of each diamond shape, and return the gammon to the roasting tin. Pour over 200ml cider, and put the ham back into the oven for about twenty minutes. Now and again, take the ham out and baste it with the mingled cider juices, until caramelised. The first year I made it, caramelisation didn’t happen- but it was still delicious. Last year, I managed to get a properly glazed finish.

Utterly divine. If I’ve got time, I’m going to be starting mine tomorrow. Perfect for Boxing Day, especially if eaten with my Indian Apple Chutney. I can live off this for weeks. 

  

Spanish Garlic & Saffron Soup

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve become obsessed with Garlic and Saffron Soup. Do you know this? I think I first tried it at our gastro-local, The Canton Arms. It’s a garlicky, golden-coloured soup, flavoured with saffron, and thickened with bread- Mrs David would approve. The Canton Arms version had a poached egg floating on top. Absolutely delicious. One of those Spanish peasanty dishes, which I think originated in Castile. 

As usual, there are various recipes out there, which are easily replicated at home. I came up with this version, and was quite pleased with the result, although you may find your own way of improving it:

Sweat three large heads of garlic (skins still on) in butter, with onion, celery and a bayleaf, until soft. About 15 minutes. Add a dash of a decent dry Sherry, a decent pinch of saffron threads (previously soaked in warm water) and some chicken or vegetable stock. Bring to the boil, adding a slice of bread, torn up into small chunks. Simmer for a bit, so that the bread is cooked. Remove the bayleaf, and liquidise the whole lot in your Magimix. Strain through a sieve, and put back into a clean pan.

Add a splash of double cream (to enrich) and check the seasoning, adding sea salt and white pepper if you think it needs it (which I am sure it will). Check the consistancy. If it’s too thick, you can always add a touch of milk. If it’s too thin, you can add some more cream- and reduce. 

Now for the poached egg bit. Probably easiest if you poach an egg in a separate pan. Thanks to Richard Olney, I’ve finally mastered the art of cooking the perfect poached egg. It’s really simple. You get a shallow pan, fill it with water, and bring it to the boil. You then crack a fresh egg directly into the hot water. If it’s fresh enough, it won’t spread out everywhere. Turn off the heat, and let the egg cook in the hot water with the lid of the pan on. After a minute or so, you will find that you have a perfect poached egg, especially if you trim it to get a neater effect. That’s it. No swirling the water around and around. No salt. No vinegar.

Serve the soup with the poached egg floating on the top. If you must, sprinkle a tiny bit of Cayenne Pepper on the top. And there’s my Spanish Saffron & Garlic Soup. I love that metallic (petroleoum?) taste of the saffron and the deep yellow colour of the soup. Simple, yet deeply satisfying. There’s that wonderful moment when your spoon cuts into the soft poached egg, and the runny yolk spills out into the soup. Egg and Saffron is a lovely combination. 

 

 

The Greasy Spoon tests...The Coopers of Stortford “Butchers’ Shop Electric Mincer”

 

  

 

This was a kind birthday present from my in-laws, but it would also make a brilliant Christmas present for a keen amateur cook. It’s the “Butchers’ Shop Electric Food Mincer”, as sold by Coopers of Stortford. I had been agonising (in other words procrastinating) over buying a mincer for several years. Visions of home-made sausages, venison chili con carne, home-made minced beef and cognac-infused pheasant terrines filled my dreams. The problem? Getting hold of a decent mincer. Those heavy, cast-metal jobs with the hand-cranks looked the part: you will remember them well (those Mrs Bridges style gadgets you have to clamp to the kitchen work-top), but every time my finger hovered over the buy it now button on amazon, dire warnings from previous buyers leapt out from the screen: “Didn’t work”. Poor Quality”. “Fell to Bits”. So there it remained, until I discovered the above. 

It’s a fabulous machine. One of those old-fashioned butcher’s contraptions reproduced in miniature. It looks great, and, funnily enough, it actually works. With a simple press of the button, a steak is reduced to proper mince, with the nozzle placed at just the right height for a large bowl. It comes with three different nozzle sizes and a gadget, for the making of sausages, of. The only draw back is that you have to give the thing a thorough clean-out in hot, soapy water once it’s been used. But I expect you can handle that. And it’s a bargain at the reduced price of £29.99. If you order one now, you should just about make it in time for Christmas.

And I like the sound of Coopers of Stortford. It’s one of those family-run high-street department stores we all used to know and love- until they closed down. I hope they are doing a roaring trade online. The machine arrived pretty quickly, and with a five pound voucher to spend, too. Have no idea where Stortford is, but I wish them well and they deserve our support.

 

My Other Blogs

 

Pollock’s Toy Theatre Shop & Museum, Scala Street, London, WC. 

 

While I’m here, Greasy Spooners, I thought it worth mentioning my other blogs. I hope you don’t mind? I’m now writing a regular blog for Homes & Antiques magazine and Barneby’s (which is an online auction website). If you’re interested in antiques you might also like my inspiration page on my antiques business website, where I’ve just put up a Christmas post on the fascinating- and enchanting- world of Victorian Toy Theatre.

And last, and probably least, there is The Education of a Gardener. This was a town gardening blog I started a few years ago, and is now most probably languishing in the Valhalla of failed, forgotten blogs, floating out there somewhere in cyberspace. It was all about my amateur attempt to transform our tiny, pocket-handkerchief of a space at the back of our London hovel. Since then, the garden’s actually doing quite well, so if I’ve got the time- and energy- and you find it worthwhile, I might have another shot at resurrecting this. Watch this space.