Bruschetta first
"How could something so basic be so good?" Nigel Slater First in so many ways - a first recipe, a first dish in an Italian meal, and possibly one of the first foods eaten around the Mediterranean, at least when the skills of making bread and olive oil had been learnt. For, as you probably all know, bruschetta does not involve tomatoes. Tomatoes did not come to the Mediterranean until the 14th/15th centuries and even then were not used for a while. I know I have written abou
22 hours ago
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
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
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
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
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
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
A rambling change of plan
"The cream of enjoyment in this life is always impromptu. The chance walk; the unexpected visit; the unpremeditated journey; the unsought conversation or acquaintance." Fanny Fern Today I was facing the eternal problem - the dual one of what to cook for dinner, and what to do with a problem ingredient or, indeed, ingredients. Nothing new there. The starting point was romanesco, the end point after an enjoyable ramble around the net which encompassed life, the universe and
Aug 30
Beer cheese soup
"two ingredients that don’t immediately scream soup to much of the world" Felicity Cloake Beer and cheese however, are perfectly common and indeed a winning combination. Well I imagine to the experts you have to have the right cheese with the right beer, but to those with no savvy palate like me, most beers and most cheeses are a perfect match. And in Winconsin - famous for its beer, and for its cheese - it's apparently the dairy king of America - they have used their prim
Aug 29
Anna's potatoes - who was Anna and are you up to this?
"the supreme potato dish of all time" Julia Child and Simone Beck I have no idea now how Potatoes Anna, crept into my Ideas list. I thought it might have been a Felicity Cloake 'perfect' dish but no. Never mind I decided I really had to tackle some of these long ago 'Ideas' so here I am with Pommes - or more correctly Pommes de terre - Anna. The picture is from my rather wonderful, but basically ignored by the internet The Cooking of France - published by Bay Books with r
Aug 24
A recipe, Coles and Curtis Stone - this and that
The recipe in question is from Curtis Stone, in the current Coles Magazine - Lemon-garlic fettucine with crisp chickpeas. I started out today thinking I would do a whole post on crisp chickpeas as they seem to be turning up everywhere I look these days, so when they turned up in the Coles Magazine in this very tempting recipe, from a professional chef, such as Curtis Stone - well he does have at least one Michelin star - I'm not sure how many - I thought I might look closely
Aug 23
The joy of the galette
"flat, round and quintessentially French." Great British Chefs This not terribly prepossessing photograph is the remains of last night's dinner - cold from the fridge. I should have taken a photograph last night but didn't. Anyway it was a dish that gave me great joy and satisfaction for a number of different reasons. Perhaps the main reason, was because in complete contrast to my previous night's dinner - the very disappointing pasta and romanesco dish - this was really,
Aug 22
à la barigoule
"One cannot fix one's eyes on the commonest natural production without finding food for a rambling fancy." Jane Austen This is my 'natural production' the Saffron milk cap mushroom - botanically known as Lactarius deliciosus - or the red pine mushroom. But in this case although it is the beginning of the food story here, it is not really the beginning of my ramble today. For this has indeed been a ramble - but it didn't begin with Lactarius deliciosus - no matter how delici
Aug 17
High-low pantry/cooking
"An extended love letter to simplicity, this book is about finding joy and satisfaction in the tiny miracles of cooking - all of the deliciousness that comes from making something from nothing." Alison Roman Yes it's another book, and this was going to be an overview/review of this wonderful book - Something from Nothing by Alison Roman - a cook of whom I was dimly aware via the New York Times I think. It has been sitting on my desk waiting for its moment for a while now, s
Aug 15
Liver and onions - ugh?
"There is rarely a middle ground with liver. Either you've turned the page already, or you're a devotee who gets excited about the idea of the exceptionally savoury exterior of a piece of flash-fried or chargrilled liver and its almost jelly-like flesh." Nigel Slater So true, and I'm willing to bet that when you see that title, signalling that this post is about liver, you will go no further. But I'm going to be true to my lucky dip rules, for this is a lucky dip post. Ran
Aug 5
A British classic - custard tart
"This is not a dessert that can be rushed, either in the execution or the enjoyment." Felicity Cloake This is sort of a postscript to my look at Delia classics. As I was flipping through her books I came across this in book one of Delia's How to Cook, which she calls Old-fashioned English custard tart. I had such a rush of nostalgia when I saw this picture for we sometimes had them at home. I say 'them' because, of course, you can get individual ones as well as large ones
Aug 4
Roasting a cauliflower whole - why?
"for maximum impact" This was going to be whole roast large vegetables - mostly brassicas it seemed - but I quickly found that cauliflower was where this particular thing began, so I am sticking to cauliflower for now. Maybe I'll do celeriac, cabbage, squash ... another time. I confess that even though I have seen an increasing proliferation of the whole roast cauliflower thing I have often wondered why? Surely those leaves, with their thick stalks, and the very thick core
Jul 31
Confused by trends
“Like dogs, foodies wag their tails at the slightest sniff of new and exciting. Then bark at each other on social media. Food is fashion. If you’re into that stuff, it matters.” Perry Haydon-Taylor/The Guardian I was going to call this post two trends in one - illustrated by this Coles recipe for Fluffy Cheesecake with matcha icing sugar from their Food Director, Sarah Hobbs - the two trends being Japanese cheesecake and matcha desserts. The trends were based on the list pu
Jul 29