Geography is a flavour
I have just retrieved this Ideas suggestion from my list - from a long time ago I think. That's all it says so I have no idea where the idea came from, but I thought it intriguing enough to tackle. And coincidentally I have just finished reading Kate Atkinson's latest novel Our Noble Selves, which is a sort of combination whodunnit/meditation on the state of Britain post war at the time of the Festival of Britain as well as her usual mordantly funny reflections on life, the
Sep 30
September 28th - a first recipe
"We are not here for long. So, let's at least make ourselves something good to eat." Nigel Slater Sorry - Nigel again. But he's next on my first recipe trawl through the bookcase with volume three of his Kitchen Diaries which he called A Year of Good Eating. And September 28th is obviously not the first recipe - but it has a kind of relevance - mostly because that's today's date and as usual in my investigations here I have rambled into three or four different areas. Firs
Sep 28
"Probability not possibility"
"Hell, it's only food. Just enjoy it." Jill Dupleix I have a long list of ideas for blog posts in my little notebook, and of late I have been making an effort at getting rid of some of the older ones. This one comes from one that I called 'Confidence/reality - Rachel Cooke' -Rachel Cooke being a most thoughtful contributor to The Guardian, and actually the daughter of Katherine Whitehorn - one of our favourite columnists of the 60s. Alas Rachel died recently - last year I
Sep 27
Duchess potatoes - posh or humble?
"a rather precious way of serving mashed potatoes." Elise Bauer/Simply Recipes I think the above version of Duchess potatoes are as served on the Orient Express from a recipe by Escoffier no less on a website called Tasting History with Max Miller. I'm featuring it first because it's the polar opposite of the Duchess potatoes I remember my mother making in her tiny kitchen in a 50s gas-fired oven as a treat for us kids. Or maybe it was a way of getting us to eat mashed pot
Sep 26
That postponed 'review'
"There's a quiet confidence in recipes that have so few ingredients, take so little time and yet promise so much." Alison Roman Hello, Again - these are the first words of this book - well the first words from the author - which are sort of relevant to this post because I suppose in a way I have reviewed this book already. I have mentioned it a few times, but today I am in tidy up mode and it's been sitting on my desk, waiting for its official 'review' for a while. When re
Sep 25
Carottes râpées - too simple to mess with?
"it’s one of those things, the simpler the better. Simple restaurants like Chartier just toss a plate of carrots at you with a wedge of lemon." David Lebovitz I don't think that's quite true because of the above picture on the left which I found. The lemons here seemed to have been whipped into a slightly eggy looking sauce. I suspect he was really talking about something like the one on the right from Leite's Culinaria. And this is something else again - Sesame and Aleppo
Sep 23
Preserving capsicums
"It is not possible to have too many sweet peppers." Hank Shaw/Hunter, Angler, Gardener, Cook Oh yes it is. Yesterday I stupidly bought this - a bag of - in my case - red capsicums. A kilo of them. So at the moment I feel that yes it is possible to have too many of them. I mean they go off fairly quickly don't they? But they are expensive - really pretty expensive, when they used to be cheap, so finding some that were cheaper - not exactly cheap - was too much of a temp
Sep 22
Poffertjes, puff-puffs, doughnuts ...
"the yeasted drop doughnuts that many different food cultures seem to have a beloved version of." Jimi Famurewa/The Guardian I marked this page in the latest Coles Magazine because of (a) its reference to Dutch poffertjes and (b) its mention of 'trending brekkie bites' as well as the fact that Coles has decided on this as a product to develop. I thought there might be something to investigate. And indeed there is - well too much really. If you look up poffertjes in Wikiped
Sep 21
Putty in their hands
"Let us be grateful to people who make us happy." Marcel Proust This is a first recipe and the book is Toast: the story of a boy's hunger, by Nigel Slater - his memoir about his childhood and youth. So not really a recipe book, but rather than disregard it I checked the first short piece - it is really a collection of chronologically arranged pieces - and I thought it was so wonderful really that I would go with it. The piece is called Toast 1 and it's about burnt toast an
Sep 20
COVID's Caramelised shallot pasta
"Pasta that takes half an afternoon to cook. A pasta that can – should – be cooked in pyjamas. And a pasta that is on a whole other level of amazing. Two-hat Italian amazing." Robby Dog Cooks The collage above from Alison Roman's own website on a page headed Click to watch me cry is of some of a dish of Caramelised shallot pasta made by literally thousands of people. She calls the collage 'Beautiful children'. For it is a selection from those ordinary people who have p
Sep 19
Disappearing fish
I have been immensely frustrated of late, about the disappearance of two of my very favourite fish from the supermarket shelves. At first I just thought it was a temporary shortage but it's now been at least two, possibly more months since their disappearance. So today I tried to find out what happened. With mixed success. First the above - Sole Mare sardines in extra virgin olive oil. They are my favourite available - well not now - sardines after a bit of a taste test o
Sep 18
Menemen, Ottolenghi and cultural appropriation
"something hot with eggs on it" Itamar Srulovich For Ottolenghi fans the 3rd of this month was a big day - the publication of his next book - this time with long-time colleague in the OTK (Ottolenghi Test Kitchen) Verena Lochmuller - Simple Too. For me the big day was yesterday when the book arrived here. I realise that this is not necessarily a big thing for any of you, but for me it certainly is. And this is the first recipe in the first section Breakfast/Brunch - Meneme
Sep 7
Gremolata - to reduce into grains
"you can't have a fancy food blog without a recipe that has something topped with gremolata." Culinary Lore Or reduce into a few words, and even fewer recipes. It's curious is it not, how some foodstuffs, which are so vital to a particular cuisine, have so little to say about them? Gremolata is fundamental to Italian cooking - particularly in Milan from where it seems to have originated. Well nobody knows really. Suffice to say that one writer - Danny Palumbo on The Take
Sep 6
Sweet and sour pork
"its fame has spread worldwide for the very simple reason that it hits all the right notes, wherever you are. Savoury and crunchy, sweet and tangy: it’s addictive stuff. Treat with caution." Felicity Cloake Sweet and sour pork may well have been the first Chinese food that you ate. I think it was mine anyway - although I suppose it could also have been lemon chicken, chow mein or chop suey. And it probably wasn't all that good but as my Felicity Cloake quote at the top of
Sep 5
Some Charmaine classics
"I love cooking but I'm bored stiff by the idea of preparing the same kind of food day in, day out. For me, and I hope for you, the excitement of cooking is to be found in creating new dishes, playing variations of old and familiar ones, and in trying recipes from other countries." Which just about sums up my attitude to cooking too. Particularly the boredom of same old, same old, which was a bit of a thing when my sons were teenagers and I was working. Partly because of t
Sep 3
Boring - but it's Neil Perry!
Neil Perry is one of Australia's earlier celebrity chefs I guess. I don't know whether he still cooks in an actual restaurant or just manages his restaurant and business empire. But he is indeed much admired. However, somehow or other I have never really encountered him through books. Maybe he just doesn't put himself out there like Jamie Oliver, Curtis Stone and the rest. Maybe he just stuck to being a restaurant chef writing the occasional cookbook - and indeed he has
Sep 2
Veal on a skewer - old-fashioned
Lucky dip time - and I'm sitting here wondering where to start. I spent a little time wondering which recipe to choose - there were six on a double page spread of veal recipes, but then I noticed that there was a photograph of one of them, on a different page, so I decided to go with that - Spiedini di vitello alla Romana. And here it is photographed in a way that somehow looks old-fashioned. But what is it that makes it look old-fashioned? Maybe it's the faint yellowish c
Sep 1