Being a mean beast who cuts things very fine (Ratty in Wind in the Willows) I don't like to use the oven for just one thing, especially as ours is one of those with a double-sized space one side and a mini version (only ever used to warm plates) the other. So I try to remember to include a few unpeeled onions to give the makings of a simple onion with cheese veg dish, some beetroot, or baking potatoes, or most often a gratin.
The one-flame cookery idea easily incorporates such economy, as why should one flame mean on dish only? Saturday's party (very enjoyable thanks) included a 6lb brisket dry rubbed with spices and sugar roasted at about 120C for nearly eight hours. That would have been a profligate use of the oven had it been just for one dish. So I also did a big potato gratin, loads of onions, loads of cheddar, slow cooked for two and a half hours, and a toffee-crumb apple and quince pudding, conscious assuaged.
Gratins are such a simple thing to do as I was explaining to hopefully-soon-to-be student Sternest Critic. What they do need is time and thus patience. It's not something to throw together for a quick snack. And they can be very cheap filler-uppers. That was secondary in my thinking for the bonfire bash for which its forgiving nature was uppermost in my thoughts: it was ready a good half an hour before I took it out, but didn't spoil at all (if anything the cheese got a nicer browning) for being left longer, and could have remained at that heat without damage for another hour. Again it could have been cooked at 180C and been ready in less than half the time.
It's also the sort of cooking I love - no recipe, just a basic idea and method. If you have to weigh the ingredients for a gratin you're trying too hard. Just peeled and sliced spuds and onions (the latter very thin), grated cheese, layered onion-spud-cheese then repeated, a bit of salt and pepper, and cooking liquid (hot) which can be milk, milk and cream, stock or at a real pinch just water. The alchemy of baking turns these basic staples into a meltingly delicious whole. We have lots of celeriac on our allotment, another grateful for the gratin treatment, and parsnip likewise, so I have no excuse for not doing more and bringing in more variations as autumn turns to winter.
Monday, 4 November 2013
Thursday, 31 October 2013
Bonfire Night Bash
For some reason not entirely unconnected to my date of birth we regularly have a party near Bonfire Night. There was no intention to make it an annual thing when we started, but it has become that way and I'm not complaining. Traditions can be enjoyable. Apart from anything else it gives me the chance to force a small crowd with no alternative sustenance to hand to try what I think should be eaten on such occasions.
One of those dishes is inevitably pumpkin-based, as we grow stupidly large ones for Halloween and then need to make the most of the flesh they yield. I bet that 95 per cent of all the pumpkins shifted by the supermarkets this week will make lanterns and nothing more, a sad waste. Pumpkin soup or curry, and almost definitely pumpkin pie will use some of ours, plenty more bulking out stews later on.
Another dish, and this is one with serious repercussions, will be Lancashire Pea Soup made with two boxes of dried peas and about a pig's worth of bacon ribs. Bacon ribs which have become expensive now, joining the ranks of lamb shanks and monkfish in my whinge-list. It's something I associate with Bonfire Night bashes, my Lancastrian-family-in-exile in Norfolk in the Sixties and Seventies adhering to such culinary traditions I guess more than those who remained in the county. Home-made bonfire toffee always featured too, made by my dad as the soup often was, and parkin (again, not shop-bought).
Maybe the third planned dish will become something my son will want to make a tradition of his own in the future. There's a good chance as his culinary ideal is large pieces of flesh. I'm nicking the Man v Food thing of a slowly-cooked dry-rubbed brisket served with BBQ sauce, the brisket ordered well in advance as it's not something always on the butcher's counter. The house on the day will be filled with the smell of herbs, spices, sugar and steaming-roasting beef.
Traditions start like that, being taken up without being purposely created. At my first university, which was a post-WWII creation and very wonderful too, some twit tried to make an instant tradition by having 'Fresher's Gate' painted over one small entrance beside a huge one. No takers, whereas borrowing refectory trays when it snowed, the polished wood becoming a perfect makeshift one-man sledge, certainly was adopted. Which may mean Sternest Critic goes for the pumpkin pie instead when he rules his own roost.
One of those dishes is inevitably pumpkin-based, as we grow stupidly large ones for Halloween and then need to make the most of the flesh they yield. I bet that 95 per cent of all the pumpkins shifted by the supermarkets this week will make lanterns and nothing more, a sad waste. Pumpkin soup or curry, and almost definitely pumpkin pie will use some of ours, plenty more bulking out stews later on.
Another dish, and this is one with serious repercussions, will be Lancashire Pea Soup made with two boxes of dried peas and about a pig's worth of bacon ribs. Bacon ribs which have become expensive now, joining the ranks of lamb shanks and monkfish in my whinge-list. It's something I associate with Bonfire Night bashes, my Lancastrian-family-in-exile in Norfolk in the Sixties and Seventies adhering to such culinary traditions I guess more than those who remained in the county. Home-made bonfire toffee always featured too, made by my dad as the soup often was, and parkin (again, not shop-bought).
Maybe the third planned dish will become something my son will want to make a tradition of his own in the future. There's a good chance as his culinary ideal is large pieces of flesh. I'm nicking the Man v Food thing of a slowly-cooked dry-rubbed brisket served with BBQ sauce, the brisket ordered well in advance as it's not something always on the butcher's counter. The house on the day will be filled with the smell of herbs, spices, sugar and steaming-roasting beef.
Traditions start like that, being taken up without being purposely created. At my first university, which was a post-WWII creation and very wonderful too, some twit tried to make an instant tradition by having 'Fresher's Gate' painted over one small entrance beside a huge one. No takers, whereas borrowing refectory trays when it snowed, the polished wood becoming a perfect makeshift one-man sledge, certainly was adopted. Which may mean Sternest Critic goes for the pumpkin pie instead when he rules his own roost.
Tuesday, 29 October 2013
Unreal Christmas Cookbook IV
According to the publishers this is one of the culinary events of the decade, the book the most anticipated tome of the year. The owner and inspiration behind Boshbolics, the already legendary chain of Carolingian restaurants with outlets that now spread from Chelsea to Chiswick, has finally after weeks of pressure agreed to provide her army of fans with the secrets of this magnificent cuisine.
A few selections from the book tell the story.
'When I first has a stopover at Carolingia's airport and tasted the food I knew I would have to dedicate my life to bringing this cuisine to Britain. It was a struggle until my husband who is a merchant banker gave me £1m as seed capital.'
'I'd like to dedicate this book to all the people who have helped me on this journey since mid-April, especially the design team.'
'For me it is still incredible that it's taken so long for Carolingian peasant classics like lamb's heart boiled with dried cod and preserved lemons to become established in this country. Bitkrep is just a wonderful blend of textures and flavours, and at only £35 for a portion with grey rice is a great way for ordinary people in Chelsea to get a taste for this unbelievable cuisine.'
The Complete Boshbolics Cookbook is now on sale for £45.
A few selections from the book tell the story.
'When I first has a stopover at Carolingia's airport and tasted the food I knew I would have to dedicate my life to bringing this cuisine to Britain. It was a struggle until my husband who is a merchant banker gave me £1m as seed capital.'
'I'd like to dedicate this book to all the people who have helped me on this journey since mid-April, especially the design team.'
'For me it is still incredible that it's taken so long for Carolingian peasant classics like lamb's heart boiled with dried cod and preserved lemons to become established in this country. Bitkrep is just a wonderful blend of textures and flavours, and at only £35 for a portion with grey rice is a great way for ordinary people in Chelsea to get a taste for this unbelievable cuisine.'
The Complete Boshbolics Cookbook is now on sale for £45.
Tuesday, 22 October 2013
Serendipity and the Death of Creation
The title is my entry to this year's pompous and pretentious git awards [three time winner here]. But it does mean something, namely that the classic combinations of ingredients that cooks come to know can stop the arrival of new ideas. Don't get me wrong, I hate the sort of experimental cookery that pairs totally incompatible things - in my view at least - like steak and blackcurrants. Turbot and coffee foam (foams collapse the instant you touch them anyway and are the epitome of cheffy pointlessness) . It is good to try new directions though.
I thought about this while planning this evening's starter. We have just harvested the last of our beetroot before the slugs become interested in it, so I have about 4kg to use up in the next week or so, beetroot keeping well. Our hens are for some reason laying without pause at the moment, thus I have eight eggs to hand. Eggs, beetroot = to this cook a lovely salad with the cooked root, thin rings of raw onion, and slices of boiled egg (with or without anchovies - this evening with).
A bit predictable, almost an automatic choice. That won't take away from it being tasty and healthy, but there is a corner of my brain that says 'branch out', as I will need to do if the rest of the stuff is not going to be wasted.
Such default choices - or signature dishes as some would prefer - include seeing leeks, carrots and spuds in the rack and immediately thinking potage bonne femme. Again, lovely but not exciting. Or having chicken stock and mushrooms, which signals a risotto.
I don't always follow these obvious choices, but now I'm in my late thirties (the 25th year of that decade actually) they tend to rush to the front of the brain and try to crowd out other more creative impulses. At some point the consistency of such tried and tested things has to morph into boring, for me even if wife and son are too polite or hungry to say so. Yet.
I thought about this while planning this evening's starter. We have just harvested the last of our beetroot before the slugs become interested in it, so I have about 4kg to use up in the next week or so, beetroot keeping well. Our hens are for some reason laying without pause at the moment, thus I have eight eggs to hand. Eggs, beetroot = to this cook a lovely salad with the cooked root, thin rings of raw onion, and slices of boiled egg (with or without anchovies - this evening with).
A bit predictable, almost an automatic choice. That won't take away from it being tasty and healthy, but there is a corner of my brain that says 'branch out', as I will need to do if the rest of the stuff is not going to be wasted.
Such default choices - or signature dishes as some would prefer - include seeing leeks, carrots and spuds in the rack and immediately thinking potage bonne femme. Again, lovely but not exciting. Or having chicken stock and mushrooms, which signals a risotto.
I don't always follow these obvious choices, but now I'm in my late thirties (the 25th year of that decade actually) they tend to rush to the front of the brain and try to crowd out other more creative impulses. At some point the consistency of such tried and tested things has to morph into boring, for me even if wife and son are too polite or hungry to say so. Yet.
Monday, 21 October 2013
Unreal Christmas Cookbook III
Victoria Beckham’s Food for the Stylish
We’re pretty sure this is unreal (it’s utterly unreal), just
as we are generally convinced that anything where the word celebrity is used is
the fantasy of some PR creative committee (do those last three words go
together?). Perhaps like so much of Dallas (takes you back) and indeed
celebrity culture (now those words are really incompatible) this is all a bad
dream. But here goes. As the blurb promises, for just a few tens of thousands
of pounds you can eat like multi-talented Victoria and other such multi-talented celebrities.
Multi-talented Victoria’s secret (hmm) is a disarmingly simple one: she
employs a team of talented chefs (poor things, only one talent) who for example hand carve a variety of lettuce
leaf, chicory and celery salads to her precise instructions, blending four
drops of single estate Tuscan olive oil and one of rare vintage balsamic vinegar personally blessed
by Pope Francis to dress them. A stylist then arranges each leaf according to a
plan devised by the multi-talented Victoria herself! Start your meal with her
fabulous pea soup, made with the freshest pea in Harvey Nicks and mineral water
flown in from Switzerland, and end it with her witty take on the chocolate
fudge sundae, a sun-warmed Revel garnished with half a cashew nut.
The beautifully photographed non-existent tome has images detailing how
each dish is constructed, and is ideal for the hard of thinking, using less ink
than one of multi-talented hubby David’s tattoos. This could completely change the way we
think about food, or it could be so ridiculous that even the British public won’t
go for it in spite of the planned TV series and the exclusive launch in Fatuous!
Puerile! Vapid! and Brain-Dead! magazines this December. Like this book they don't exist either, but it's just a matter of time.
Friday, 18 October 2013
The Vital Ingredient
If there is a secret society dedicated to rewarding the makers of superb lasagne I am in for a major windfall. I've not heard about such a group, but if it's secret I wouldn't have. Last night's effort was per Sternest Critic, not easily pleased in such matters, a personal best. And the ingredient that made it so was time.
I can make a lasagne from scratch in an hour, 40 minutes of that time being what it spends in the oven. But then the meat ragu has not had time for the flavours to cook down and blend, and the bechamel is not going to be bechamel but a plain white sauce.
Yesterday's schedule gave me free time in the middle of the day, when I prepared the milk for the sauce, heating it with a quartered onion, bay leaves pepper and nutmeg, plus chunks of carrot and celery, then leaving the lot to infuse for another four hours. After basic browning the ragu was simmered for about 45 minutes to dry it out - one recent version of the dish was more soup than solid - and again left for the flavours to mix and mature.
Time is clearly something in short supply for many - working from/at home and my own boss (if Ruth says so) I'm lucky - but surely not so rare that the vile Just Eat (fast food dross) campaign can be excused? Is it over the top to suggest our society is doomed if the fast-foodsters win? Yes. But still.
My conscience pricks me: there was another vital ingredient in the probably-not-award-winning lasagne, about 150g of cheese. Cheese in the bechamel, cheese on top of the meat layers, and a thick layer of finely grated parmesan on the top that came out of the oven at the Goldilocks moment.
I can make a lasagne from scratch in an hour, 40 minutes of that time being what it spends in the oven. But then the meat ragu has not had time for the flavours to cook down and blend, and the bechamel is not going to be bechamel but a plain white sauce.
Yesterday's schedule gave me free time in the middle of the day, when I prepared the milk for the sauce, heating it with a quartered onion, bay leaves pepper and nutmeg, plus chunks of carrot and celery, then leaving the lot to infuse for another four hours. After basic browning the ragu was simmered for about 45 minutes to dry it out - one recent version of the dish was more soup than solid - and again left for the flavours to mix and mature.
Time is clearly something in short supply for many - working from/at home and my own boss (if Ruth says so) I'm lucky - but surely not so rare that the vile Just Eat (fast food dross) campaign can be excused? Is it over the top to suggest our society is doomed if the fast-foodsters win? Yes. But still.
My conscience pricks me: there was another vital ingredient in the probably-not-award-winning lasagne, about 150g of cheese. Cheese in the bechamel, cheese on top of the meat layers, and a thick layer of finely grated parmesan on the top that came out of the oven at the Goldilocks moment.
Wednesday, 16 October 2013
Unreal Christmas Cookbook II
As we near Christmas it's time for another Nigel Slater creation to appear in a bookshop near you. Not sure if this one is out this year or next, but it does sound like another sure fire winner: let's hear it for Nigel Slater's Book of Comfort Food. Actually it should really be books, this being a seven-volume magnum opus featuring more than 3500 of Nigel's favourite favourite tried and tested recipes.
Volume the first (the cheeky little aesthete) is devoted entirely to mashed potatoes, the highlight among the 500 or so suggestions being his brilliant take on mash with gravy - you put the gravy beneath the mash, changing the dynamics of the dish entirely.
Bound in hand-tooled leather and using a font derived from an 18th century hermit's laundry list, and oh so thoughtfully sold with a trolley, this is destined to be a massive Christmas hit.
'It's the book I want for Christmas' - the world's strongest man
'Cookbook of the year - available at a special price' The Observer
'Where's my bloody forest gone?' Sven Svenson
Volume the first (the cheeky little aesthete) is devoted entirely to mashed potatoes, the highlight among the 500 or so suggestions being his brilliant take on mash with gravy - you put the gravy beneath the mash, changing the dynamics of the dish entirely.
Bound in hand-tooled leather and using a font derived from an 18th century hermit's laundry list, and oh so thoughtfully sold with a trolley, this is destined to be a massive Christmas hit.
'It's the book I want for Christmas' - the world's strongest man
'Cookbook of the year - available at a special price' The Observer
'Where's my bloody forest gone?' Sven Svenson
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