The Itinerant Epicure

NEW BLOG! NEW ADDRESS! BOOMARK NOW!

2010-08-16T15:22:00.001+01:00

Hi guys, The Itinerant Epicure has moved and can now be found at

http://itinerantepicure.wordpress.com

HAPPY EATING!!!

Awana Malaysian Satay Bar - Awana Eat Somewhere Else

2010-08-13T11:10:00.006+01:00

"Oh Dear!" I thought as I opened the wine list and saw that the cheapest bottle in the "monthly promotions" was £27. Then I looked at the next page and my eyes spotted the £480 Chateau Mouton Rothschild. Wow, I thought. This place must really be something to have a wine list where 80% of the bottles are over £50. Maybe I'm just out of touch since I eat in budget places like Polpo and Koya and have rarely seen a wine list of this calibre outside of an enoteca where the wine list is the size of a bible and caters for every budget or a truly exceptional restaurant of the Michelin variety.

Nevermind, I thought, clutching my Toptable 50% off food offer - the cuisine here is going to knock my socks off so it is deserving of a great wine to go with it. Then I (happily!) found the £19 bottle of Argentinian Malbec at the very back of the wine menu. The waiter comes around and it is too warm. We ask him for a bucket to cool it a couple of degrees. He nods, then pours out a glass for everyone ignoring our request then leaves looking vaguely bewildered. We never see him again.

So far, we have staff with a ridiculous wine list and no clue how to serve wine.

The menu is tantalising, lots of great authentic dishes, a good handful of street food dishes - satay skewers, grilled meats, roti etc. Mains average about £10-£20 which makes the exorbitant wine list all the more baffling. Then the food arrives.

Our three starters are unremarkable. Spring rolls with very bland flavour, zinged up a bit by sweet chilli sauce. Ayam Cincang Wonton (little crispy parcels of chicken) are a touch greasy, not too crispy and taste of... bland chicken (a recurring theme, despite its "corn fed" status paraded all over the menu. Perhaps the corn was of a particularly crap vintage that year?) again zinged up by the sweet chilli sauce. My daging kerabu - strips of beef marinated in oyster sauce and palm sugar mixed with salad and sambal sauce was the most exciting of the three, nice smooth flavours, a little kick, but so far I hadn't been bowled over by anything. The sneaking suspicion that the quality of the food was probably lower than Busaba eathai (which is a third cheaper) was beginning to grow.

Four mains later and I was less and less thrilled. My tiger prawn stuffed corn-fed chicken with sambal belacan and stir fried pak choi came with no pak choi, but two tiny strands of baby broccoli, non-existant sambal belacan, the ever present sweet chilli sauce and zero flavour. I couldn't distinguish the prawn from the chicken, nor could you tell the meat had been anywhere near a chargrill (perhaps if I'd smoked a cigarette first or licked a lump of coal it might have improved things). Kung Fu noodles looked like a Mr. Wu £5 eat-all-you-like buffet noodle dish and tasted like one too, but cost £18. The other two might well have been the same dish except one came in a pineapple and one had a vague element of chilli which imparted some sort of flavour. Hooray! An achievement!

Thank god for the second bottle of Argentinian Malbec, so far my favourite dish of the evening.

The saving grace was the desert. I had a scoop of lemongrass and chilli sorbet which oozed delicate flavours and was cool and refreshing, sweet then tangy. Dadar coconut filled pancakes were incredibly morish and Kec Kakang chocolate cake was gobbled up so fast I didn't actually get to taste any.

With 50% off, four of us ate for £104. Decent, but when I think it would have cost £208 otherwise to eat something I could have picked up in Wagamama - but more flavourful, I balked.

Awana needs to buck up on its spices or introduce a decent affordable wine list as well as reduce its prices, right now it looks, feels and tastes a bit Hong Kong Phooey.

"Udon" know what you're missing 'til you eat at Koya

2010-08-10T14:59:00.009+01:00

Every blogger, his wife and their three children has written about Koya - all glowing praise and with the kind of prose reserved for edwardian love letters that make broad-bosomed women swoon.

And on that note I have little to add to such fantastic reviews such as the ones from TomEatsJenCooks or LizzieEatsLondon but like them, I went for the full on Udon shebang and was rewarded in so many stomach-satisfying ways. There are noodle shops coming out of your ears in London, and you could spend ridiculous amounts of money faffing about in mega posh Japanese dining establishments, or slurping sub-standard rubbish in Chinatown but Koya, at the heart of Soho on Frith Street, is both moderately priced and exceptionally good with all the Udon made in house and served either hot or cold in either hot or cold broth or sauce for pouring.

Before even going in to the deliciuos side dishes, including the now stratospherically famous Onsen Tamago - or "hot spring egg" an egg poached slowly at 60 degrees and served cold making your dashi deliciously creamy and silky.

Esti had the Kinoko Hiya-Atsu, udon in a hot walnut miso with wild mushrooms, suffice to say the walnuts were a genius idea. My Buta MIso Hiya-Atsu, or udon with pork and miso paste was a touch too sweet for my liking but I somehow finished it anyway and the special of the day, clams steamed in sake, were being enjoyed by an amorous couple sitting beside us whose "mmmms" of delight I put down to the exquisite clams, rather than their furtive footsie under the table...

KOYA:

49 Frith Street

London

W1D 4SG

The Compass, Islington. Gastrogrub.

2010-07-30T13:17:00.007+01:00

Those that know me know that little piggies, and any possible edible derivative of them, are things that I like very much. Possibly a bit too much in fact as I regularly dream of the day when a prosciutto Spa opens in London where I can be wrapped in slices of Parma and be fed tidbits of Coppa by some semi-naked Lothario dressed in a loincloth made... of pork loin...

Now, stick the words "ham hock" beside the word "rillettes" (yum, oozing salty goose fat!) and I pretty much start hearing wedding bells a-ringing and need to whip out my secret drool bucket I keep stashed in a back pocket somewhere.

Well, the drool bucket certainly made an appearance at The Compass where I devoured ham hock rilletes with picallili on fresh bread before demolishing half of my friend's silky, pungeant chicken liver, wild mushroom and truffle oil pate with cornichons (gotta love those cornichons...).

The Compass sits on a rather unassuming street, and in fact doesn't really stick out much. Inside is not exactly award-winning decor either, with simple, but tasteful wooden tables and a curved bar beside the open kitchen at the front. For being a Gastropub, its slightly lacking on the pub side of things as the whole room is devoted to restaurant seating. But they make rillettes with ham hock, so after my third glass of Tempranillo Cabernet from Spain and having licked my fingers clean of any possible trace of pate de foie, I was ready to forgive them. In fact I nearly assaulted the waitress with my over eager praise of the spreadable delight.

I enjoyed a crispy seabream with squash and cockles in a soft, creamy sauce, but looked enviously at Alberto's prettily pink roast spiced lamb with couscous and tzatziki.

I somehow ended up having a Laphroaig with my cheese, not entirely sure why but Alberto seemed keen on hitting the smokey stuff so went along with it.

Cheeseboard contained a totally unremarkable Isle of Mull cheddar, a lovely Colston basset stilton, and my favourite, the rather nutty Tunworth soft rind. With cranberry chutney.

Those who only fancy barsnacks can head in almost any gastronomic direction here from "chip butty" to grilled crab on toast or chorizo in wine. Had pay day been yesterday I could have gone into these further, but sadly, I'm a lass on a (pretty rubbish) budget.

The Compass. Hopefully you won't need one to find your way there. Pronto.

Song Que for your Supper

2010-07-26T21:20:00.006+01:00

Lying half-way up Kingsland Road, fifteen minutes from Old Street tube station the mint green cantine-style interior of Song Que heaves with hungry diners. There are several other vietnamese restaurants and cheapo cafès along this road, but this is the only one with the serious queue at the door, and don't let that put you off, the waiter would free a table up for you if it costs him his daughter. This is no-frills, no trimmings, good-quality comfort food. Mains cost an average of £6 and are extremely generous. Flavours are bold and service is fast with some pretty witty banter coming from the staff. Don't expect to be fussed over and to lounge about once your plate's been cleared, there's others waiting behind you. Do, however, expect friendly and efficient service and a tasty and extensive menu.

Tried and tested:

Spring rolls - crispy and golden but a tad greasy for my taste
Vietnamese summer rolls - these were divine, full of fresh flavours and good texture
Pho Tai (rare beef noodle soup) - heart-warming and delicious, but could've been just a teensy bit more generous with the meat.
Pancake with prawn and chicken - light fluffy egg pancake with crispy beansprouts and very tender prawns
Grilled squid with ginger and spring onions - the squid was fresh and not at all rubbery
Chilli salted squid - this was a strong dish, popping with chilli
Lemongrass chicken with peppers - again, a real fiery kick of lemongrass and crunchy peppers for texture
There's jasmine tea and a varied selection of Vietnamese bottled beers as well as the regular beers.

Cost: about 14 pounds per head for two courses and a drink.

134, Kingsland Road
London
E2 8DY
Closed Sundays
Children Welcome

Jedi Nights at Gordon's Wine Bar

2010-07-26T16:17:00.008+01:00

Continuing my foray into the world of internet dating... its amazing how fast two humans can arrange a second "date" once they've discovered a mutual affection for lightsabers (note: this is not an innuendo - I really am talking about Jedi techy stuff here).

So, not quite the Mos Eisley cantina, but dark, stuffy and sufficiently cavernous to pass for a distant Tatooine cousin, the Gordon's Wine Bar near Embankment station was the setting for an evening of too much (good) wine, too much (good, smelly) cheese but just the right amount of good conversation.

I love Gordon's. The cosy alcoves smell a bit like musty old port barrels, which is exactly what the place should smell like, the entirely French and Italian staff are mostly useless but somehow totally appropriate, the slabs of cheese are humungous and there's cornichons "a volonte" clearly, they know me well. They serve a really good selection of port, sherry, manzanilla, red, white, rose and madeira and also have a decent hot food buffet. Best in the summer months is the hog roast at the end of the long thin strip of patio/garden that stretches outside the wine bar along the Embankment gardens.
Shoddy lighting outside does mean that after sundown you're somewhat falling into/over people, although that might also just be the port talking. Cheese-wise, we enjoyed some Port Salut, a dolcelatte and some Stinking Bishop. I think. Divine.

A. drank something or other, E. drank something or other different, both choices were yum. A. and E. then both shared a bottle of Rose which was crisp and refreshing (yes, I sound as knowledgeable as a Wetherspoon's wine list) then A and E proceeded to demolish the leftovers of someone else's wine, thus proving we really are about as classy as those egg-headed creatures in the Star Wars cantina band.

With all that it's rather a miracle A. and E. didn't break out into an all out demented Ewok-dance fest on the tube.

Cracking good time at Prix Fixe bistrot.

2010-07-08T14:16:00.007+01:00

Meandering through the wierd and not so wonderful world of the post-break up, heart still a touch battered and appetite on a whirlwind of ups and downs, I decided to amuse myself by exploring a little light-hearted internet dating.

Call it part social experiment, part desperate attempt to move on, part insanity.

So, blind date number one (and this is in no way meant to sound like there's hundreds of them lined up!), let's call him "A" to preserve the poor guy's anonymity, was at Prix Fixe Brasserie which is only appropriate as my date was French (anyone seeing a trend here?) and, thank heavens, not vegetarian.

Last time I ate here I don't think I'd ever even earned a pay check, although not much has changed, except they now serve Atlantic Rock Oysters (hurrah!) of which I ate five as my starter. Plump, sweet, large, perfectly good and not horrendously overpriced.

A opted for roasted foie gras (you can keep 40 virgins and God, when I die I want a bathful of this stuff) on toast. Actually, since we were too busy discussing my traumatic friday (neighbour jumping off roof, coma, police etc. average Brixton night) I never actually asked to taste it, but since he finished the lot, and hey, its roasted foie gras, I'll make a stab at it and say it was very good.

Mains were slow-roasted pork belly for me, with sauerkraut and apple relish. The slab of belly was humungous and the crispy skin so thick I nearly swerved it off my plate a few times, but quite scrumptious, although a smaller portion might have made me feel less like a hog myself.

A. had simple entrecote and frites on recommendation of the waiter who seemed to snub the filet. Again, yakking away as I do when I'm nervous, I totally missed the food exchange opportunity. So... probably a decent steak...

The fun came at the cheese course, where for almost ten pounds I got served a wedge of cheese small enough to mistake for a postage stamp but accompanied by enough cheese crackers to build a second leaning tower of Pisa. How I was supposed to divide my teeny cheese wedge onto so many crackers was beyond me, and I could see A. (scientist) eagerly making calculations in his head, but the mathematical conundrum that this cheese to cracker ratio presented was beyond all of us. It did provide quite a few laughs though, and the cheese, though small, was very good.

I won't bother telling you what A. had for pudding because AGAIN I failed to try any. Poor show on the Itinerant Epicure's behalf I must say...

But anyhow, the lot was washed down with a rather good New Zealand Jibe 2006 Pinot Noir and conversation flowed very nicely and we both have problems with mice in our houses and an inevitable Strasbourg connection (small world, getting smaller by the minute). So all in all a pleasant evening.

Which is good since I'm heading to Prix Fixe next week for my birthday dinner, which means I can try the steak and the foie gras and the dessert and actually report back properly as a good food blogger should and even take annoying photos of my dishes!

Now, must go and read that article on French Basque cuisine in the Guardian... the mind tries to move on but the heart doesn't so quickly...

PRIX FIXE
39 Dean StreetLondon
W1D 4PU
020 7734 5976

Dehesa - pinxos that pinch your pocket

2010-06-28T19:03:00.005+01:00

Would you believe I ended up at Dehesa because at the street festival "A Taste of Spain" (taking place on Regent Street) you couldn't get a single glass of bloody wine ANYWHERE and in order to nab the most microscopic piece of jamòn you had to queue for 45 minutes at one of endless regional stands whilst anxious ladies thrust brochures up your nose under the sweltering sun. Taste of Spain? Waste of Spain if you ask me.

So anyway, Dehesa.... well they certainly saw the Brits coming. One of an endless newish crop of pinxos, tapas, cicchetti, over-priced tiny grilled things on plates that in Europe cost about 2 euros - type bars. The classic tortilla is £4. Yes, a combination of egg and potatoes. £4. For a quarter slice. Good? Hmm... if you can't knock this one up better at home...

The food is good, don't get me wrong, it's just far from exceptional and lacks the heartiness and richness that real Spanish tapas can impart despite the small portions . A bowl of hard boiled quail's eggs with rock salt and paprika at £5.50 was a bit too gimmicky for me, when they could have done something incredible had they poached them and burst them over some fresh asparagus for example. The salt to quail's eggs ratio was enough to have the health police rushing round for a cholesterol check too, you could have baked a whole fish in the salt, there was that much of it.

I had mozzarella with olive tapenade and crostini. The sort of little dish that you get in Europe for about 5 euros and comes with a giant oozing cheese and four or five thick slices of grilled bread slathered with the black stuff. This was all twee and dinky, wee mozarellas of ok quality and two tiny crostini on a slice of bread that could double for a wheat thin spread with what can only be described as a "dainty smattering" of tapenade. As though it were marmite.

The biggest joke was the drink however. Davy's wine bar knows its stuff when it comes to serving sherry. A decent glass can be obtained there for a fiver with little fuss or show. Here it took a good 15 minutes for a glass of fino to arrive and when it did, Raquel, who'd ordered the more expensive Manzanilla Pasada, had almost a third less in her glass than I did with my Ximenez . When she enquired as to the reason, we were fobbed off with a pretentious "its about the intensity of flavour and how it is imparted in a smaller quantity." To which Raquel, a Spanish born-and-raised lady with considerable experience in the wine deparment simply scoffed "so, I pay more, and get less?" Then looked at me as it to say "can you imagine a waitress saying that to some crusty sherry-producing farmer in a smoky Andalucian bar and getting away with it alive?" TO which I could only cringe...

Now Polpo on Beak Street on the other hand... super cichetti!

FROMAGE

2010-06-22T10:27:00.004+01:00

VERSUS

Just a note to respond to many demands made to me by various French compadres I have met over the years about Britain's "lack of cheese". It turns out Britain produces over 700 varieties of cheese. We have 14 "Protected Origin" cheeses. So the French can stop complaining, we can wheel out the fromage just as well as they can. Stick that in your reblochon and smoke it! Merci.

Light summer supper..

2010-06-13T17:48:00.003+01:00

Two light, Salad Club-inspired dishes, and a classic Italian starter for a light summer supper with friends. I've watched Ellie from Salad Club cook many similar things and have finally succumbed to the lure of the delicious looking lentil dishes she churns out and have made my own little version, borrowed heavily I admit. All my recipes are for 3-4 people.

Green Lentils with Chorizo and Red Onion

You'll need:

200 g green lentils

1 small spicy cooking chorizo

1 red onion

a few small tomatoes

handful fresh coriander

handful flat leaf parsley

3 cloves of garlic

salt and pepper

Add your lentils to a pan of cold water, bring to the boil then simmer for as long as the pack instructions require. I like my lentils with a bit of bite for a salad dish, not mushy. Dice your onions and chop your garlic and fry gently in a deep frying pan in some olive oil until soft. Add the chopped chorizo and fry. once the oil has taken on a reddish colour, add the small tomatoes and mush them into the oil with a spatula. Drain your lentils and add them to the chorizo and onions, season to taste and add the chopped herbs. Serve cold or warm.

Bulgar Wheat with Butternut Squash, Feta and Asparagus.

You'll need:

200 g bulgar wheat

1 red onion

1 butternut squash

1 pack British asparagus tips

1 small courgette

100g Greek feta cheese

fresh dill

fresh mint

Cook the bulgar wheat according to pack instructions. Drain and let it cool. Roast some small chunks of peeled butternut squash in the oven (160°) for about 40 minutes with olive oil, salt and pepper. Remove from the oven and put aside. Steam the asparagus tips for 6-8 minutes and set aside. Fry half the red onion in some olive oil in a frying pan, add the courgette, sliced, to the oil and fry until golden brown. Drain and set aside.

Place your bulgar wheat in a bowl, add the courgette, asparagus, butternut squash and the thinly sliced remainder of the red onion. Crumble in some feta cheese, pour over the olive oil from the pan (add more if needed), add the chopped fresh herbs and serve!

Mozarella and Tomato salad.

You'll need:

A mozzarella di Bufala, the one in the posh packaging, or preferably from a trusted deli. If you can, get a burratina - even creamier!

1 box of Isle of Wight tomatoes or Kent tomatoes in season.

Fresh basil.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil.

Chop the tomatoes roughly, tear up the mozzarella, coat the lot with olive oil and sea salt. Turn with the hands and dress with torn basil leaves. Serve immediately.

Dos Tortillas Para Ti

2010-06-13T14:55:00.008+01:00

Well, technically speaking, one of them is more of a frittata, but let's not get lexically over-analytical over a few eggs...

Easy to knock up, wonderful to wolf down and probably far too high in cholesterol content, these eggy, summery delights are perfect to accompany a barbecue, or a light supper, or to slice up and pack for a picnic. You can put whatever you want in a frittata, and tortillas are filling enough to be a lunch all on their own so start experimenting. Excellent use of fridge leftovers too...

Tortilla de Patatas con Pimientos

You'll need:

6 eggs

1 onion

1 pepper

salt

pepper

olive oil

Heat 3/4 inch of olive oil in a deep frying pan and put in the peeled potatoes diced into smallish chunks. Sprinkle with salt. Let these simmer slowly on a low heat until they start to go mushy. They absolutely must not burn or go crisp. In a bowl, lightly beat the six eggs and season.Once the potatoes are done, drain off the excess oil and place the potatoes into the egg mix. Mush with a fork to amalgamate the mixture (a few chunks of potato are always nice).Heat whatever remaining oil is left in the frying pan and fry your onions and peppers. Once soft, add the potato and egg mixture. Cook, tilting the pan occasionally and pulling the cooked egg mix towards you with a spatula and filling the gap with still runny egg. Once the top is more or less cooked, place a plate over the tortilla and flip the tortilla onto it. Slide the tortilla, uncooked side down back into the pan and cook the other side. After a minute or two it should be done.Sldie back onto a clean plate, let it cool and serve...

Frittata with Sweet Potato, Tomato and Dill

You'll need:

6 eggs

3 small sweet potatoes

10 small tomates

half a white onion

1 clove of garlic

handful of fresh dill

parsley

salt

pepper

olive oil

Chop your sweet potato into small chunks and bake in a hot oven (160°)for about 4 minutes until soft. Whilst you're doing that, break eggs into a bowl and beat lightly, season and put aside. Fry your onions and garlic in a deep frying pan until soft, then add the tomatoes, cut in halves and fry those until soft. Season the lot. Add the cooked sweet potato to the pan, the shopped parsley and dill and then top with the egg. Use the same principal for cooking as the above tortilla.

Serve when warm or cool. This is the point where a cold beer should be offered to the chef.

12-hour wine braised shin of beef

2010-06-05T17:49:00.003+01:00

I stole this from the River Cafè cookbook and it must be the most fool-proof, hassle free and delicious way to pot roast a beef I have ever come across. You'd be hard pressed to mess this recipe up, and it sunds impressive enough to ellicit "ooohs" of wonder from your friends.

First arm yourself with a 2.5 kilo piece of beef shin, with the bone still in it. Then go and purchase a couple of bottles of Chianti, doesn't need to be the best at all, but Chianti has good flavours to marry with the beef.

Pre-heat your oven to 70 degrees, the lowest setting you can get. After seasoning generously, plop your beef shin in a deep, heavy-bottomed cast iron pot - one that can go in the oven eventually - and pour over one bottle of wine. Add about 30 cloves of garlic, a handful of herbs of your choice, such as thyme, rosemary and parsley. Bring to the boil rapidly for 2-3 minutes, then turn off the heat.

Pop the beef in the oven and leave it for twelve hours, checking every four hours or so to see if the wine needs topping up. Best to do it over night.

Once cooked, take the beef out and put it on a carving plate, wrapped in foil to keep it warm and succulent. Pieces should literally be falling apart by now.

Reduce the wine by boiling it vigorously on the hob, add onions if you want. Once it has reduced by a third, strain it, mush up some of the garlic cloves into the strained jus and serve with your sliced beef, and some roasted root veggies. Aye carumba!

Le Bouchon Bordelais - Un vrai bordel...

2010-05-30T16:48:00.005+01:00

Le Bouchon Bordelais in Clapham boasts a great location, comes equipped with young, athletic, tanned, study-abroad-type waiters in crisp aprons, the requisit 10 irritating Parisians sat at the table at the back and the most ridiculously over-priced bar-snack menu this side of the Thames.
Yes, they show all the rugby you could possibly hope for. Yes, Ricard afficionados and expat Frenchies will lap it up and yes, it's probably the highest concentration of good-looking people you can get in Clapham, but this does not justify £9.50 for a plate of cheese consisting effectively of 5 shavings the size of a 1/4 Babybel and a single fig, quartered to give the illusion of abundance.
Similarly a plateau de charcuterie at a cool £10.50 - and by cool I mean the rillettes were rock solid and compacted together in a frozen lardy lump, also wasn't the best showcase of a country whose every village produces at least one variety of heavenly cured pig/goose/duck/animal poached in butter and fat until it becomes an unctuous patè from Paradise.
Maybe it was the fact yesterday's Clermont-Perpignan top 14 final was particularly boring. More than likely my spritely mood was scuppered by the constant drunken bellowing of one lone, hyper-active Clermont fan with severe ADHD and a 1000 decibel voice who not only felt it necessary to pound his own table with his feet/arms/head every time anyone with a yellow rugby shirt appeared on screen, but also everyone else's, resulting in shattered glass, sprays of beer and spittle and a slightly terrified looking Perpignan fan huddling under a wall-hanging hoping not to be found.
Indeed, it is hard to enjoy good-looking staff, sub-standard charcuterie and deep rugby analysis amongst friends when a gurning idiot is having a brain aneurism/epileptic fit brought on by extreme Clermont fanaticism right behind you.
Did I mention the £8.50 Moules (we're talking a starter portion here, and no, this isn't Chez Gérard)? Did I mention the Croque Monsieur at £6.50? I know the French claim that their version of a cheese toastie is some sort of gourmet culinary feat of immense achievement, but let's be honest: bread, ham and bechamel shoved in a toastie-maker should only cost £6.50 at the Savoy if it's served on a silver platter or drizzled with truffle oil.

AND YET! I shall no doubt return. Since they do have very good-looking waiters. And show rugby. And it's French. And I'm a sucker. And even sub-standard charcuterie can make me smile. As long as Clermont aren't playing.

United Sandwiches of America

2010-05-20T15:56:00.016+01:00

A while back on www.iknowagreatplace.com I did a list of top five Italian sandwiches... I'm now heading across the pond to the U.S of A, land I hold dear to my heart, to bring you exciting adventures in noshland and some great bread-cheese-meat-filling combos to get your nashers slobbering...

1. The Philly CHeese Steak, Philadelphia.

When in Philadelphia, head to Jim's Steaks at 4th and South Street and order a Philly Cheese Steak and cold beer.
What, pray, is a Philly Cheese Steak, you ask, eyebrows aquiver...?
My dears, it is but the most divine, sloppy, gooey, cheesy, meaty, greasy and calorific food wonder. The premise is this: get a good cut of steak, fry it, slather it with Cheez-Whizz (spray can orange gloop), melted Provolone or American cheese (that all-encompassing product of dubious origin) and stick the whole lot in the middle of a bread roll dripping with steak grease. Add pickles if you wish, or jalepeno peppers. I guarantee you orgasmic food heaven within minutes of narfing your first mouthful.

Jim's Steaks was my joint of preference, largely for the black and chrome 50's streamline deco and nifty neon lighting, but Philadelphians will fall over themselves to recommend any number of "The Original Philly Cheese Steak" house, including Pat's or Geno's.
Since the thing usually drips and oozes, people have perfected the "Philadelphia Lean", a tactical action which involves bending over your sandwich rather than bringing it to your mouth...
Eating a cheese steak... it's a science.

2. The Lox and Cream Cheese Bagel, New York City.

New York could merit a sandwich top ten of its own, but this is one of my favourite NY portable foodstuffs. There are many great places to sample this wonder of New York Jewish cuisine, the smoked salmon (Lox) and cream cheese bagel. Head to Katz's, where Sally famously yelled her orgasm to Harry in front of unsuspecting diners in the ultimate rom-com. You can sit in the movie-moment booth and indulge in some pretty spectacular bagels that may well have you hot under the collar.

Head to Coney Island or Little Odessa for some authentic smoked salmon from any number of the small Polish, Russian or Ukraianian delis. Head to Williamsborough in Brooklyn for a slice of Yiddishe Heimishe (good old fashioned home-comfort Jewish) bagels and rub shoulders with an historic Jewish community.

Then many rave about the offerings at Russ and Daughter's deli in SoHo. 179 East Houston Street New York, NY 10002. WHat a fantastic spread of smoked fish, caviar, and a huge slab of Gravadlax (where the term Lox is derived from) Salmon which they slice in front of you. Add some sour cream or cream cheese, red onion, capers and oodles of black pepper on a poppy seed bagel. THe variety and choice of salmons is incredible and the quality is fresh as fresh can be...

So don't be shmuck, schlep to Russ's, the staff are real mensches.

3. The Oyster Po'Boy, New Orleans.

For anyone thinking the the terms oyster and po' boy (poor boy) are mutually exclusive, think again. For many a long time, oysters were a staple food of Luoisiana workmen as they were bountiful and filling. THe key to a po'boy however, is the quality of the bread, a variant on the french baguette that should be crispy on the outside and very light, airy and fluffy on the inside, a reminder of the strong French presence and influence on Louisiana life and history.

A "dressed" oyster po'boy will be a bread sub filled with fried oysters, lettuce, tomatoe, mayonnaise and if you like, onions and pickles. SOme like hot creole mustard too, YUM YUM!

Head to the French Quarter of New Orleans for any number of po'boy shops and hunker down. If you're not keen on the fried oysters, try fried shrimp, soft shell crab or beef with gravy po'boys.

4. The Corn Dog, Texas.

Technically not a sandwich, but street food all the same... In fact, the corn dog is the quintessential State Fair food, conjuring up images of mullets, dodger cars, monster truck rallies and local rodeos in the sprawling midwest.

Essentially, the corn dog is a deep-fried, battered hot dog. Just what your arteries need before hitting a shooting range, mini-golf park or "the largest pumpkin" competition at any number of middle-America country fayres. Slather it with ketchup, mayo or American mustard (that sort-of-sweet yellow goo in a squeezy tube) and be sure to have a napkin ready for the dribbles!

I would dare say the corn-dog alone makes a detour to the midwest worth your while... And for the veggies out there, the Veggie dog does exist, but I'd ask for it quietly when surrounded by beefy cowboys with spurs on their feet, chewin' tobacco at the Minnesota Farmer's Rally.

5. The Lobster Roll, New England.

Oh lordy! Fresh shellfish REALLY rocks my boat and New England boasts slurpaliscious lobster, crab and shrimp - any combination of which usually gets me salivating and in need of a bib.

The rule of thumb as I see it is: Lobster in Maine. Clams in Massachusetts. Crab in New Hampshire.

The Lobster roll is simple enough, but if done right, contains all the necessary pzazz and shebang and holy-maloney to make all your seafood-y dreams come true. A pound of fresh fresh fresh lobster meat is steamed and diced, tossed with creamy mayonnaise and stuffed into a soft white roll with diced celery or spring onion and a squeeze of lemon. If you don't give a damn about calories and weight-loss, might I recommend a douse of melted butter over the top too!

As for the best place to eat Lobster roll, I sadly wouldn't know. Probably a best bet is to head down to the harbour and ask the lobster fishermen where they'd go.

Risotto con Asparagi e Verdure - Asparagus and Broccoli Risotto

2010-05-10T17:00:00.007+01:00

Everyone's cooking risotto at the moment it seems, and since pasta now sits in the negative column of my diet plan I am increasingly turning to rice as a way of getting that satisfactory carby bloated feeling of gastronomic satiation. British asparagus is in its prime right now and broccoli is nice for a bit of crunch too. I unfortunately can't have parmesan or butter, but frankly they aren't wholly necessary if you're working with a tasty stock, and doing without is that little bit healthier! I used the leftover stock from my chicken and chickpea casserole and just added some more water.

For two people you'll need:

4 handfuls of arborio or carnaroli rice
1 bunch of British asparagus, discard the tough end of the stalks
handful of broccoli florets
handful chopped cabbage
1 sliced leek
3 chopped sage leaves
1 onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 litre of good strong chicken or vegetable stock
1 glass of white plonk
salt and pepper
olive oil

Heat a glug of olive oil in a heavy bottomed frying pan, add the diced onion and garlic and soften until transluscent. Add the rice and coat evenly with the oil, stirring for about 2-3 minutes. Add the chopped sage and stir in. Add a sprinkle of salt and pepper. Add the glass of wine and start stirring the rice grains, cook until the wine has evaporated.

Turn the heat down under the pan to a simmer. You can now start adding your stock, soup ladle by soup ladle, stirring slowly. After the third ladle of stock, throw in the asparagus tips, broccoli, cabbage and leeks. Only add another ladle once the previous one has more or less been absorbed by the rice. This is usually every 45 seconds or so, but you can tell just by looking.
After about 18 minutes, taste your rice for bite. Good risotto should have bite, not be completely cooked to a mush, but the amount of bite is a purely personal taste. Keep adding stock until the rice has the right level of bite for you and the consistency is creamy but not runny and the rice slides off the back of your wooden spoon in a gloop.

Taste and season further if necessary. If you want cheese, stir some in just before serving. Eat in the company of a delicious man and a good movie.

Hung Parliament? Hung Weather... "Spring" Chicken and Chick Pea Casserole

2010-05-07T17:49:00.007+01:00

It would seem the May weather is about as undecided as British voters and following the intriguing, confusing and generally messy general-election last Thursday and the ongoing bickering over who gets to to form a government today I thought it was as well to cook something warming and simple, unfussy, straightforward and pleasing in every sense. I know a casserole is hardly the stuff of spring lunchtimes, but frankly, it's colder than a witch's tit outside, the sky's as dense as Bisto and there's a good call for a meal based around chicken stock, the all-curing Jewish penicillin.

The key is all in the quality of the chicken, so go out and buy a good grain-fed, organic birdy, with nice corn-yellow flesh and a thick coating of fat. I prefer the thighs, wings and legs for making casserole as they all have considerably more flavour than the breast and the bones add substance to the broth too.

You'll need, for two:

four legs/thighs of free range, corn-fed, organic, super eco-friendly chicken
1 can of chick peas
3 carrots
fresh thyme
fresh parsley
two bay leaves
crushed black peppercorns
sea salt
one onion, finely diced
two-three cloves of garlic
olive oil

Equip yourself with a Le Creuset heavy-bottomed iron cast pan if you can, or any solid, serious looking deep casserole dish.
Cut incisions in the chicken and stuff them with fine slivers of garlic, then season generously with salt and pepper. Heat some oil in the pan, throw in the onions and let them soften. once this occurs, turn up the heat and place your chick in the pan to brown it, say about five minutes on each side. Toss in the thyme, parsley chopped up and the bay leaves and the remaining garlic cloves. Stir the lot to coat the chicken in all the oil and juices then pour over enough hot water to cover the chicken by about half an inch. Put on the lid and simmer for 40 minutes, checking once in a while to make sure the water hasn't boiled to nothing.

As you wait, peel and roughly chop the carrots and open the can of chickpeas. Once the chicken has been brewing for 40 minutes, add the chickpeas and a little of their water, and the carrots. Cover the pan again and simmer for another hour as low as possible. Taste the stock and season accordingly.

This is a meal that keeps on giving, you can keep simmering as long as you like, until the meat falls off the bone, but two hours is enough to make it tasty as hell if you can't wait any longer!

Serve with wild rice, or some new potatoes and lots of good bread to mop up the juice!

Tabbouleh - Moroccan Bulgar Wheat Salad

2010-05-06T16:38:00.005+01:00

Day two of the new diet, I suddenly realise I can eat Tabbouleh, something I could gorge on until kingdom come and a perfect spring dish full of zest and fresh flavours! Based on bulgar wheat and parsley, the ideal proportions are 2 parts parsley to one part bulgar, but I need sustenance and am eating this as a main dish, so I've upped the quantity of bulgar wheat somewhat. You can play around and see which you prefer!

To make enough for four people:

2 cups bulgar wheat (or about 200g)

one massive bunch of flat leaf parsley

one bunch of fresh mint leaves

two lemons

a lime

olive oil

3-4 spring onions

1 red onion

1 fresh red chilli

box of cherry tomatoes or 4 fat tomatoes on the brink of going soft

salt and pepper

dash of cayenne pepper

First prepare the bulgar wheat. Add two parts boiling water to one part bulgar wheat. Cover and simmer gently until the bulgar has absorbed all the water. let it rest and cool down, then fluff up with a fork, like making couscous.

Whilst the bulgar wheat is simmering, chop your parsley, mint, onions, chilli and tomatoes into tiny bits. Mix together in a bowl with the lemon and lime juice and the olive oil. Add the bulgar wheat to this mixture in a large salad bowl. Season generously. Taste, add whatever you think is missing, especially if the mixture is too dry. Finish off with a spot of cayenne pepper. If you're not on a wheat free diet, serve with pita bread and my garlicky hummus for a spring meze...

The Bad News

2010-05-05T17:28:00.009+01:00

For the last three months, I've been suffering what are most likely stress-related digestion problems. Without wanting to get too personal with everyone let's just say my life is currently unpleasantly full of little "surprise" moments and the kind of excruciating stomach pain I presume you usually associate with childbirth. And it ain't babies I'm giving birth to...

So, after fiddling with the self-medication counter at Boots to no avail, I turned to a nutritionist, or rather Naturopath at the John Bell and Croyden Pharmacy in London (a marvel if one can possibly get excited about pharmacies). She looked at my fingers, my tongue, my eyeballs and poked me in various parts of my body before declaring me essentially "worn out, unfit for service, exhausted and suffering from visible anxiety". Now this may have had something to do with narfing a scrumptious and huge burger at the Ebury wine bar about a half hour before hand, although I feel she has a point. I have not been good for a while, and I knew the bad news that was coming next as she started drawing up a diet plan to not only sort out my "hideous colon" but also my skin, my hair, my nails, my spine, my liver, my kidneys and, thank heavens, my karma.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the dreaded words have been uttered: No wine. No cheese. No dairy. No wheat. No alcohol of any kind. Ever. No excuses. Essentially, "Emma, why not just eat quinoa and soy for the rest of your life and die a miserable mess in the furthest reaches of gastronomic hell".

The sheet is taped to the fridge door. It's looking at me with a beady eye and a mirthful chuckle. Bastard.

Not even potatoes and tomatoes are allowed! Not even aubergines! What the hell is amaranth when it's at home? Burdock? Can I buy that in Sainsbury's? Lotus root? Thank god I moved to Brixton or I'd be wondering around Hurst Green hunting down obscure chinese herbal concoctions between the danish pastries and the economy cheddar.

So tonight begins the first no wheat, no dairy, no fun whatsoever meal. Oh and a plethora of pills worthy of a mafia drugs baron. My simple aim: Kick ass at this diet and emerge looking fabulous, feeling awesome, learning how to cook quinoa and eventually getting a job as my karma magically soars to astronomical heights! Hurrah! Oh, and perhaps avoiding any more surprises...

Garlic-Fest Hummus

2010-05-04T12:40:00.004+01:00

I love garlic. Almost as much as cheese, in fact. Garlic makes the world taste better, it wards off vampires and it is good for your heart. What more do you want???

Plus, with garlic, you don't need to worry about kissing your French boyfriend/girlfriend as it's more than likely he/she loves the stuff too.

I also love hummus and if you have a blender, there is no reasonable excuse not to make your own hummus instead of buying that bland pap from the supermarket...

To knock up this stinker of a hummus, you'll need:

1 can chickpeas in salt water

3 tablespoons of tahini (sesame cream)

2 tablespoons of good olive oil

4-5 fat cloves of garlic

handful of pinenuts

pinch of paprika/dried chilli

handful of fresh coriander

bung the lot in a blender, press the "whizz" button until you achieve the consistency you prefer (I like it chunky, some like it smooove). If its too dry, add more tahini or olive oil, as you prefer.

Serve with toasted pitta bread, a plate of roast red peppers and some grilled aubergine and courgettes for a full dinner! Breathe on people for fun...

Fresh Egg Ravioli stuffed with Pumpkin

2010-05-04T12:07:00.006+01:00

I dug out the pasta maker on day two in the new house and set about making my first batch of proper egg pasta. I nicked Jamie Oliver's recipe but tweaked it as he failed to mention one thing that makes stuffed pasta all the better... adding a teaspoon of milk for every egg you put in the mix makes your pasta much more malleable and smooth than it would be otherwise, especially useful when you are stuffing shapes and trying to stick the ends together!

For 4 people you will need.

250 g durum wheat flour

250 g semolina flour

3 eggs

8 egg yolks

8 teaspoons of milk.

Sift the flour together and pile onto your work surface then make a well in the centre. Put the eggs and yolks in the well, start beating gently with a fork to amalgamate the lot. Once you have a roughly sticky solidifying dough, dump the fork and start to work into a dough ball with your hands. Knead thoroughly until the ball is smooth and elastic and shiny.

Wrap in cling film and pop in the fridge whilst you prepare your stuffing (or just leave for 15-20 minutes until you're ready to cut into shapes).

For pumpkin stuffing you'll need:

1 quarter pumpkin

three fat cloves of garlic

1 bunch of flat leaf parsley, chopped roughly

a nice grassy olive oil

salt

pepper

veggie or chicken stock

Slice your pumpkin nice and thin and crush and chop your garlic. Heat a pan, add a good thick glop of oil and start to soften the garlic. Once translucent, add the pumpkin and coat evenly. Turn up the heat and fry for a couple of minutes, then add a bit of stock and simmer. Only add enough stock to stop the pumpkin burning, you don't want a soupy stuffing.

Be generous with the pepper, add salt to taste and throw in the chopped parsley towards the end. Mash the pumpkin up occasionally with a fork or wooden spoon until you have a pasty, smooth consistency. Take off the heat and transfer to a bowl to let it cool.

Get out the pasta maker, or equip yourself with a rolling pin! I start with the pasta maker on a low setting like 1-2 and feed small balls of dough through two or three times until it starts to become pliable and warm up. Gradually make the settings higher and higher until you have a sheet of pasta about 2 mm thin. Lay out your sheets of past, cut into squares. Add a spoon of stuffing in the centre of each pasta square, damp the edges of the square with milk and fold one corner over the other. At this point I recommend the following handy link for making pasta shapes, as I would be a disaster at explaining them without sounding like a poorly translated Ikea assembly booklet.

Stuffed pasta can keep in the fridge for a day or two, but frankly its more fun just to eat it as soon as possible! Boil some water, place the pasta in the boiling water for about 3-5 minutes depending how al dente you like it. Serve with a bit of melted butter in which you have fried some sage leaves.

Enjoy!

OFFICIALLY A LONDONER!

2010-04-30T14:50:00.004+01:00

Dear readers,

as of tomorrow morning I sign a tenancy agreement, pack my bags and move into a fantabulously lovely house in brilliant Brixton with one half of awesome food-blogging duo Salad Club. And so begins a whole new life and a whole new chapter and a whole new food adventure as I am now free of the constraints of living at home and not eating or cooking whatever the hell I please!

I have Brixton market on my doorstep, the buzzing haven of activity that is Brixville in the Granville Arcade, some ace pubs and bars and a wonderful variety of cultures and gastronomies just waiting to be discovered. I've realised this blog - which started as a place to share recipes, instead became a restaurant review site - which is fine as I am always game for eating out, but it's not what I had really wanted it to be. So as of tomorrow, when I am once again master of my own eating and have the joy of a great kitchen to cook in, the recipes shall return.

I am imposing a set of rules on myself, that I hope to maintain as much as possible, even if it may become harder once I get a job. They are as follows:

1. As much food as possible to be sourced from Brixton market.

2. As much in season produce as possible

3. Meat no more than twice a week

4. Meat must be organic and form a sustainable source

5. Fish must be from a sustainable source or MSC certified

6. Increase intake of pulses and grains

7. Waste as little as possible - I am very conscious of being wasteful with my food... not recession-friendly, or very green!

The above (except for number 1) also apply to eating out. It is also my serious aim to start learning more about wine. Properly. Hence I am packing my guide to the wines of Italy for a bout of study.

So voilà! New house. New mentality. New approach. New adventures. Bon voyage I say!

Chais Nous - Le Blinding Bifstek.

2010-04-28T15:52:00.007+01:00

If you're looking for crisp white tablecloths, stalker-like service and Chateau Lafite, look away now, book a cab to Pètrus and be prepared for an evening of smears, reductions and waiters who appear to have rods up their arses. If, however, you are looking for a melt-in-the-mouth, buttery, juicy, dribble-down-your-chin, fat Angus bavette, cooked to bloody perfection at a non-heart-attack inducing price, let Jérôme, the suitably unimpressed patron of Chais Nous, usher you in to his wee French haven tout-de-suite.

The great thing about this place is, a lot of English people think its "not French enough" precisely because it DOESN'T contain those horrendously twee bits of crap that most London French-style "bistrots" contain. In the same way as Irish pubs abroad all look suspiciously similar, and nothing like the spit and sawdust hovel you went to in deepest Limerick, so do most "cafè français" in London look like they came in an ikea box with the requisite "Pastis" posters and wicker chairs.

Chais Nous is so unadorned and unfussy and lacking in any kind of effort at selling itself as a French bar that it actually feels exactly like sitting in a street corner bar in a not very thrilling quartier of a small French town.

The telly will inevitably be showing some third division football game between two teams from places you've never heard of and in the corner, scarf-bedecked fans will be nodding and mumbling into their glasses of Ricard as another group of students behind you, probably from the Lycée Français round the corner, moan about how terrible everything in London is and discuss at length the best way to cook endives. How can you not love this!?!?!

There's a menu du jour and a plat du jour and if you don't like it you can stuff it. There's things like gizzard salad, "salade de gésiers", escargots swimming in garlic butter and tête de veau. Fred and I opted for the Bavette d'angus, and, joy of joys, when I asked for it "really saignant" they offered it to me "bleu" and I thanked the gods someone in this green and verdant land understands that cow should be served still mooing when it comes to the table and not fried to a crisp or blackened into a charcoal brick.

Sunny had a rather divine looking Filet Mignon de Porc in a mustard sauce that I'd have salivated over had I not drunk too much plonk and guzzled my steak like a starved beast.

So, instead of spending squillions at Le Gavroche (yeah, ok, I know there's no contest...) go and fill the modest coffers of the South Ken francophone community, catch up on all the latest gossip of the Luzenac FC, and get your nashers around a big plate of snails. Go on, you know you want to.

Chais Nous

21 Bute Street
London SW7 3EY

Tel: 0207 589 7311

Brixton Cornercopia "local open-sauced foods"

2010-04-27T20:10:00.008+01:00

I promised more on Brixton Village!

Brixton Cornercopia is run by husband and wife Ian and Anne Fairbrother, a small cornershop, deli and cafe serving delicious simple food made from tasty seasonal ingredients at reasonable, recession-worthy prices.

Located in unit 65 of "Brixvill", you'll notice it from the pretty red and white tablecloth bedecked tables garnished with fresh flowers and fashioned out of upturned crates. Oh, and the constant buzz of people wanting to eat there...

The point of Cornercopia is not just about using the resources of a market within the market space, but sharing the food experience with locals, interacting with the local community around the table and encouraging the people of Brixton (and beyond!) to invest in their markets and be part of a community in an active, invested way.

I ate here on a gloriously sunny Saturday, although I was really looking for a place to park myself for a quick coffee and a read of the paper, the menu caught my eye, as did a couple of very content looking customers enjoying a brilliantly green looking bowl of soup.

Despite having tucked into pasta only half an hour earlier, I decided to make some space in my bottomless gullet for more food and sat down.

A charming, very attentive waiter came whizzing out with a menu. Two courses for £9 or three for £12, generous sized portions, but not exaggerated and everything in season and bought locally. I had a cox's apple juice and ordered poached egg with leek vinaigrette and bacon. A yummy combination of unctuous yolk, crispy salty bacon and the tangy leeks and mustard seed went down a treat.

This was followed by a sweet cured salmon fillet, served just warm on a bed of English asparagus (cooked to perfection), green beans, rocket and a saffron and orange sauce with orange segments. It was perfect for the weather, with spring colours, good flavours, not too heavy and enjoying my nosh whilst watching both the chef and the waiter chatting away to the locals and catching up on the Brixvill gossip was very enjoyable. In fact, I pretty much ignored my paper and just sat back to enjoy everything going on around me. Which I suppose is the point of a relaxing lunch in your local market.

I'll definitely be back, and would encourage local business people to take advantage of their cheap lunch deals, which include Meze platters for £4.50. Oh and they serve yummy jars of preserved lemons and jams and chutneys and all sorts too...

Catch up with all their activities and read the latest menu online at their Ning network site:

http://brixtoncornercopia.ning.com/

Other Brixton restaurants include: Bellantoni's pasta shop.

Toronto Foodie Adventures... continued!

2010-04-22T18:47:00.011+01:00

Now I'm on a roll, a spring roll that is!

Browsing through my photos from that long ago trip to Toronto, I came across a delightful duo of pics of Abi (of the mighty gastro-literature Literonomy blog) and I slurping our way through big steaming bowls of Phō at Kensington market's branch of cheap n cheerful Vietnamese chain Phō Hung. $CD 5 got you a heaving bowl with generous slivers of raw beef, barely poached in the delicate, coriander-laced noodly broth.

Behold the cheap formica, squeezy Sriracha sauce bottles and those über-cheap chopsitcks that give you splinters as you prize them apart. Hunker down for tasty, cold vietnamese spring rolls

and pho, if you're feeling unoriginal - as I was - you'll still be delighted with the results. Otherwise the menu of over 100 dishes is split aptly into sections (seafood, vegetables, beef, etc.) and the sweet ladies running the place, no English here, will engage joyfully in the grand art of menu-pointing and dubious scribbly-looking bill writing before serving you within about 3 nano seconds of you having ordered. I do so like speedy service!

Oyster Shmoyster in Toronto

2010-04-22T16:17:00.006+01:00

I can't write a post about lobster and then forget to tell you about Rodney's Oyster House in Toronto. It's been well over two years since I was there, but the memory lingers on. I do love my oysters...

Rodney's is a paradise designed especially for me and my bottomless gullet.

You walk in through a sober enough entrance: it's candle lit, with mariner's memorabilia all over the place, a huge tub of live crab and lobster on display and a gentleman's club-style horse-shoe bar where you sit and drink stout, or champagne, and in front of you are racks upon racks of crates filled with oysters from all over Canada and America; nova scotia tumthamps, british columbia flat oysters and prince edward island rock oysters. Point at the ones you want, and the number you want and the staff will prepare an ice platter for you, with lemon, fresh grated horseradish, seaweed salad and shallot vinegar and serve it up at the bar. They also do clam chowder, roast scallops on soda bread, pickled swedish herring on rye bread, and spicy vongole soup. To die for.... We had 12 oysters, and the herring and some prosecco and it came to about £23, and sat in the 26 degree evening sun (!!!) watching Torontonians go by...

Rodney's Oyster House
469 King Street West.
Toronto

Get Ready for LobsterFest at Belgo!

2010-04-21T13:34:00.003+01:00

Lobster, that fine fellow of a crustacean! Delicious served simply with melted butter, delicious cold with homemade mayonnaise, delicious full-stop... June sees the arrival of LobsterFest at Belgian moules-frites-bières chain Belgo and the Itinerant Epicure is signing up for the feast.

The preview menu is here:

STARTERS:

Lobster Bisque

£4.95

A rich lobster and brandy bisque served with cream and chives

Lobster Thermidor

£8.75

Half a Canadian 1lb lobster, grilled with a light cheese, mustard

and Orval beer sauce

Red Thai Lobster

£8.75

Half a Canadian 1lb Lobster baked with a lightly spiced and nutty red

Thai curry sauce

MAIN COURSES:

Grilled Whole Lobster

£16.95

A whole Canadian 1lb lobster, halved and grilled with garlic and Pernod

butter. Served with frites and salad

Surf & Turf

£16.95

Half a Canadian 1lb lobster, grilled with garlic and Pernod butter and

served with a 6 oz* ribeye steak, frites and salad

Whole Surf & Turf

£23.95

Whole a Canadian 1lb lobster, grilled with garlic and Pernod butter and

served with a 6 oz* ribeye steak, frites and salad

Lobster Salad

£16.95

A whole lobster salad with crisp spring onions, green beans and carrots

tossed in a light port and lemon dressing

Broadway Market and the First Swim of 2010!

2010-04-19T14:44:00.010+01:00

I took a trip to London Fields this weekend, up Hackney way to explore the Broadway Market and get my fix of sunshine in the park there, which boasts one of the few heated lidos in London. Whilst strolling through the charmin market, with its preponderance of double bass-playing doo-wop buskers, I managed to pack away a Damascan felafel wrap with pickles and lemon tahini, a tangy seasonal veggie curry with cumin rice and a couple of portuguese custard tarts as well as some proper cloudy apple and rasberry juice from Chegworth Farm.
All that before plunging into the cool waters of the lido for the first splash around of 2010, and very welcome it was too, if only to soothe the sunburn (yes!!!) aquired whilst snoozing under the plane-free sunny skies. More volcanic ash please Iceland, the skies over London have never been so peaceful!

To get to London Fields, I took the 26 bus from Liverpool St to St. Joseph's Hospice then walked down Westgate Street to the edge of the market. Or you can take the National Rail service to London Fields train station...

Who Says I Can't Bake?! Olive Oil Lemon Cake

2010-04-15T15:28:00.008+01:00

If I have to sit through the election TV debate tonight, I want a good hunk of sweet cake to indulge in to keep my bulls**t detector levels alert and my mood levels chipper.

This recipe is filched from Mark Hix's version in the Independent, although I've made a few changes... It uses olive oil rather than butter, which is not only healthier, but adds a lightness and slight nuttiness that suits the lemon flavour really well. Plus I couldn't find any butter in the fridge...

My version used the following ingredients:

300g brown muscovado sugar

3 eggs

300g self-raising flour

Grated zest and juice of 1 orange

Grated zest of 1 unwaxed lemon

120ml extra-virgin olive oil

100ml milk

Pre-heat the oven to 180ºC/gas mark 5. Beat the sugar and eggs together until light and fluffy, which might not happen with the brown sugar, but as long as it's well amalgamated and smooth as a mixture, it's fine - use a food mixer if you prefer. Add the juice and zest of the orange and the lemon zest and then stir in the olive oil and milk, slowly, bit by bit. Gently fold in the flour and transfer to a lightly greased (you can use olive oil if you wish) round tin about 20-24 cms in diameter (you can use a square or a loaf tin of similar size). I used a Kugelhopf dish...

Bake for 40-45 minutes until golden brown, use a skewer to test if it's cooked all the way through.

I glazed my cake with a lemon glaze, using a random mix of icing sugar, lemon juice, milk and lemon zest. I made a thick paste with the icing sugar and lemon juice, then added a dash of milk and the zest at the end. Dust with icing sugar too if you're a sucker for icing like me.

Upcoming Projects

2010-04-15T09:41:00.005+01:00

My unemployed days stretch ever on before me, and between scrawling through hundreds of jobs I seem either over, or under-qualified for, comfort-snacking, and trying to find a flat for £450 a month in London that isn't an anonymous prison cell or a converted toilet, I have been busy signing up for some interesting projects.

The month of May will see me:

- abseil down the side of Battersea Power Station for charity.

- Fly to Abruzzo in Italy for three days of culinary masterclasses, visiting cheesemakers and salumifici (cured meat manufacturers) and apparently bathing in donkey's milk.

- Audition for a spot on ITV's Britain's Best Dish.

In the meantime, I've got a couple of recipes brewing under my hat and need your suggestions for a few tricks to try for my audition, so thinking caps on!

Isle of "soft White" Cheese

2010-04-12T12:47:00.007+01:00

I just got back from three days camping on the Isle of Wight, a treat if ever there was one and a haven for happy looking animals galavanting all over the glorious countryside.

At a rather fine delicatessen in Yarmouth on the way home, I picked up some Isle of Wight gourmet goodies to take home and chanced upon a goooorgeous cheese (think divine ooze of creamy deliciousness streaming forth from a silky smooth shell) by the name of Isle of Wight Soft, produced by the Queen Bower Dairy (also a campsite) near Sandown. Their motto is "We Love Cheese", so they instantly became idols of mine. More oozy than Camembert, but on the Brie end of taste, I narfed a large hunk of this godlike dairy delight on a fig cracker as soon as I got home and melted into cheeselicious paradise.

Go forth and buy online if you can't make it over there yourselves!

Queen Bower Dairy

Spicy Toms Fish Compote

2010-04-12T10:52:00.008+01:00

This is a nifty little tomato compote that can be whipped up with minimal effort and packs a punch for any roast fish dish.

You'll need (for three roast fish):

a box of small cherry tomatoes, pick the best you can it will make all the difference.
bunch of flat leaf parsley, chopped roughly
two huge cloves of garlic, chopped
tablespoon of capers
half a tin of anchovy fillets in olive oil, chopped
the olive oil from the anchovy tin
two or three small dried red chillies, depending on your tastes
sea salt
dribble of balsamic vinegar

slice the tomatoes in two and put in an oven-proof dish. Coat in the olive oil, add extra oil if you feel it needs it. Add all the other ingredients and stir the whole thing up. Pop in a hot over, gas mark 5, for about 40 minutes until the whole concoction has roasted to a bubbling tomatoey paste. Serve with roast fish and lemon wedges. Yumbles!

Rhubarb, rhubarb

2010-03-19T15:36:00.008Z

Today I learnt the fundamental lesson. Not only am I not a sweet tooth - in fact, I can't imagine a day when I'd ever pick cake over salami or cheese - but I also, therefore, am a totally cack-handed baker. I can follow a recipe with clockmaker's precision, I can rub shortbread pastry until my fingers are raw and read macaroon and cupcake blogs until they're are coming out my ears. I will never, ever, be able to bake a truly successful cake.

As demonstrated today as I tried to recreate the yummy rhubarb tart I had a couple of weeks ago at Pâtisserie Paul.

I channelled every ounce of Frenchness I could muster, massaged my rhubarb like a rich lady in a beauty spa, whispered sweet nothings into the dough as I kneaded my pate brisée and it still went balls up. And I know its not the recipe I followed that was the problem. But never a to do. The gods of baking look unfavourably upon me.

Still, burnt crust aside, what I salvaged was at least edible. If a tad watery. Oh rhubarb, I love you so, why oh why will you not be nice to me in a tart!!!

Thank heavens I get to drown my sorrows over a plate of duck rillettes and a good Riesling at La Trouvaille.

Jean Christophe Novelli's Burger à la Michelin Star.

2010-03-18T11:00:00.014Z

Yours truly chilling with "J.C"

Oui my little croissants, yesterday was spent in a glorious flurry of champagne-quaffing and celebrity chef hob-nobbing, whipping up a meat storm with cookery TV's Mr. Handsome: Jean Christophe Novelli.

J.C, as we call him, ("we" being the 20-odd starry-eyed journalists swooning over cheddar cheese cubes) was at L'Atelier des Chefs

being "the face" of a new campaign by Flora to promote healthy heart awareness in Britain. Now, I'm always sceptical when it comes to celebrity chefs flogging supermarket food stuffs. Witness Marco Pierre White trying to convince me that the Knorr stock cube was his saving grace.

The idea of Jean Christophe Novelli making roux at the Four Seasons using a pack of Flora marge just seemed wrong, in so many ways. That was until I nabbed one of the sugar-dusted biscuits proffered to us at the reception and experienced a blissful moment of orgasmic butteriness. Surely this delight couldn't have been made with dreaded margarine, could it? But yes! Evidemment!

So, it took precisely one biscuit and three words issuing from the mouth of Jean Christophe to convince me that Flora "butter" is nectar of the Gods and that I will forever more keep it within my arsenal of dastardly cooking must-haves.

Maybe not. But we did learn a lovely little trick for cooking mushrooms. Which is to NEVER use olive oil, as the mushrooms simply soak it up like a sponge, then release it all again in a river once they're on your plate. To cook a perfect mushroom, place them in a searing hot pan, coat with a teaspoon or two of melted butter (or Flora...) and shoogle them about to coat them thinly and evenly. Cook for about a minute like this, then add a soupspoon of water and cover, allowing them to steam and the butter to evaporate leaving only a delicious taste and moistness... C'est parfait!

On to the recipe! What did Michelin-starred Jean Christophe Novelli rustle up? Un hamburger, naturellement! No froths, jus, or glazes for us, mes amis, no wine reductions or fiddly stacks of julienne veggies. just a good, hearty, juicy, cheesy and oozing-goodness burger.

Jean Christophe Novelli's Family Favourite: Cheese and Mushroom burger.

Ingredients:

1 x 400g lean beef mince

1 medium onion

60g reduced fat cheddar cheese, diced

2 tspn English mustard

1 tblspn Worcestershire sauce

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

cracked black pepper

Combine all of the above ingredients in a bowl, knead well and divide into even-sized burgers.

2 beef tomatoes cut into four slices

1 small bread stick

2 tblspn Flora Buttery, melted

8 large portobello or flat cap mushrooms

cumin seeds

balsamic glaze

2 cloves garlic

fresh thyme

Cook the tomatoes in a very hot pan with a little Flora, seasoning with salt, pepper and garlic. Turn once and finish with a little balsamic glaze to sweeten.

Remove from the pan and leave to one side.

Trim the underneath of the mushrooms so they have a flat base. Season with pepper and melted Flora. Cook these in a hot dry pan, flat side down to start with, adding a little cumin seed if required. Turn over and cook on the other side but add a splash of water and voer with a lid. Keep warm.

To cook the burgers grill them for about 6-8 minutes turning a couple of times until cooked through.

Toast the flattened slices of bread in a hot dry pan or toaster.

Stack your burger like this: slice of bread, mushroom, tomato, burger, tomato, mushroom, slice of bread. Skewer to hold it in place until ready to eat.

Brixton Follies: Bellantoni's Pasta Shop

2010-03-17T08:50:00.008Z

This is the first of what I hope will be an exciting little series of reviews of eateries in the newly revamped, renovated and rejuvenated Granville Arcade in Brixton, AKA Brixton Village. Left abandoned and dilapidated for the last ten years or so, a creative arts agency by the name of Space Makers took it over just before Christmas and invited artists, thinkers, entrepreneurs, chefs, writers, cineasts and more to take over the empty stalls and transform them into usable spaces, thus reviving the back of the market with a series of pop-up shops, cafès, even a tiny cinema and street theatre, DJ booths and children's reading clubs.

The Space-Makers end of the market has only been opened a couple of weeks and yet already a few places are making waves in the national British press. Time Out, who recently made it its mission to track down London's best coffee, riled a few readers by failing to include Federation Coffee, by the Coldharbour Lane entrance to the market. More on that later...

The first eatery to catch my eye, not surprisingly, was an Italian one. Bellantoni's is a tiny shop, with dark wood panelled front and large windows which seats about 5 (at a squeeze) people inside and has two tables outside. Behind his small counter, Dario Bellantoni a young chef from Genova, whips up fresh hand-made pasta daily, along with a small selection of tasty bites and, of course, coffee. On the Monday I popped in, there were two baked pasta dishes with spinach and rocket, or shiitake mushrooms, as well as cannelloni stuffed with meat.

Good wholesome warming food, full of flavour and perfectly comforting given the sub-zero temperatures outside. My meal came to £5.50 with coffee, which is less than you'd spend on a dubious Big Mac meal from hell up the road. A few locals from the market strolled in for a chat and a bite as Dario busied himself twisting tagliatelle into nests and dishing out relationship advice to anyone who'd listen. Once he plonked down a small dish of homemade twisted bread beside me and a large jug of olive oil to drizzle I felt teleported back to the Bel Paese all over again. "Tomorrow, he said as I shovelled creamy spinachy deliciousness into my mouth, I will make stuffed tomatoes". There was also noise about a possible baked apple cake.

At the deli counter, a small selection of well chosen cheeses, including the sinful and divine Burratina - a sort of softer mozzarella oozing buttery cream - and smoked Scamorza which is perfect grilled until soft and served on a bed of rocket with thin slivers of parma ham. Neither of these cheeses are easy to find in the UK, so jot Dario's address down now!

The warm red walls of Bellantoni's are strung with chilli peppers and small framed anecdotes and quotes from the Chef, doling out such nuggets of wisdom as "If you know, you know, if you don't know, you don't know". Failing the messages on the wall, Dario's entertaining stories will pepper up your lunch as will the excellent coffee.

Bellantoni's is opposite the art gallery and the Enter the Field pop-up shop

Gufaa? Load of Guff

2010-03-15T14:06:00.003Z

I'm not sure at what point the meal turned sour. Was it possibly the £9 for five half-charred poppadoms and chutney? Yes, I double checked my poppadom hadn't been lacquered in gold-leaf and no, the chutney hadn't been hand-milked from the breasts of mermaids either. It could possibly have been the rosé wine, which conformed so delightfully to that futuristic E.U vision of bored French viticulturists mixing dreg-ends of white and red bargain-bin plonk together in industrial-sized vats and shipping the resultant vinegar off to the ignorant "rosbif".
Or maybe it was the 45 minute wait for a collection of identical dishes swimming in a ubiquitous lukewarm almondy goop: whether ghosht pasanda, korma or tandoori, you could bet it was going to be yellow and devoid of any kick whatsoever.
The crispy burnt onion bits at the bottom of my dish were the elements that elicited possibly the only excited groan of the evening. The indignant look of the near-comatose waiter when we tried to remove the service charge from our exorbitant bill at least provided entertainment value, as did the grand debate on the possible provenance of the aforementioned "creamy sauce". Best not to think too long about it, and head somewhere else.

Gufaa

39 Upper Street
London N1 0PN
020 7354 5465

Melanzane M'Mbuttanate - Cilento Stuffed Aubergines by the Itinerant Epicure

2010-03-10T20:21:00.009Z

Three goats eye me suspiciously as I slice a plump, sweet aubergine in two and stuff it with a thick, creamy mixture of their own soft cheese, some egg yolk and bread crumbs. Behind me, Signora Cerullo, a portly mamma in clogs and black skirts, clatters a thick iron pot over the open brazier in her backyard, stewing wild greens picked this morning behind the farmhouse.
I'm sweating under a timber awning at a vast wooden table, hand crafted by Zio who sits on a stool in front of me, in complete silence, observing me pensively - the first inglese he's ever met. Mamma is teaching me to make melanzane 'mbuttanate, Cilento dialect for stuffed eggplant. For each slice I make, I am fed something impossibly delicious off the table to the sound of orgiastic groans from the small crowd of villagers who have come to ogle my rustic Italian cooking skills, or lack thereof.
This makeshift outdoor kitchen, with its battered copper pots swinging from the rafters, rusty old weights and cavernous stone bread oven look like they've been here for centuries. Less than two generations ago, however, the Cerullo family lived lì sopra, or "up there" says "Zio", finally opening his toothless mouth and shrugging in the direction of the brittle grey mountain behind him.
The jagged, crumbling outline of a stone and whitewash ghost town juts out from the summit at awkward angles, barely visible from down below. Row upon row of houses lie empty atop the mount, broken windows and hollow doorways gaping at the wind that howls constantly, hurtling like a banshee through the "gola del diavolo" or devil's gorge that splits the mountain down its middle. There had been a thriving merchant settlement here, uninterrupted, since the Norman era, with some evidence even of iron age burial sites.The poverty which devastated post-war southern Italy forced farmers to abandon San Severino and wind their way downhill to settle in Centola, in the shadow of their former village, where Mussolini had a train track built to carry their sons and daughters away to the economic powerhouse of the North.

The slow food trendies have begun to trickle down to these rural backwaters, although the term here is obsolete: the Cilentani know no other kind of eating. Rafaello Cerullo, who owns the farm, hopes this new income will allow the villagers to reclaim San Severino and rebuild it to its former glory. Until that happens though, I smile privately at the joy of being the first Brit to taste this unctuous, warm ricotta, drink Zio's heady, syrupy wine and be given the eye by the Godfather of all goats.

Eric Lanlard - Gateaux pour gâter, cakes to spoil you!

2010-03-10T15:39:00.012Z

Being unemployed, I have rediscovered the background drone of daytime television. On my third day of jobless drudgery, as the sound of Prime Minister's question time slowly dissolved into two couples arguing over which dilapidated Yorkshire cottage to buy, I tapped away at my keyboard, engrossed in application form filling.

That is until a familiar gentle gallic lilt drifted in over the airwaves, whispering sweet words like "calvados" and "tarte normande" and "slowly spoon ze creamy chocolate into ze hazelnut caramel mixture". My eyes diverted from my laptop for a brief second only to find themselves face to face with not only totally divine human creature in the form of Normandy Master Patissier Eric Lanlard, BUT he's totally divine tv chef totty who bakes luscious, unctuous, devilishly seductive cakes to boot. Good lord, daytime tv has really gone up in the world.

The show is called Glamour Puds and airs on Channel Four, Mon 2:25pm, Tues-Fri at 2:55pm.

A good tip I've learnt, aside from how to wear a chef's jacket and make it look like an Armani suit, or fondle a palette knife like a catalogue hand model, is that when making tarte aux pommes normande, you should flmabée the apples in calvados after slow cooking them in butter. A fundamental flaw in my existing recipe that I shall instantly rectify.

He runs a small patisserie and cafè by the name of Cake Boy, where Mads and Guy Ritchie have been known to purchase their bijou tortes from, as have other celebs and politicos. I promise to make an excursion to discover this haven of Gâteaux and Gorgeousness. Until then, I advise you to take a sick day, turn over to 4 and appreciate a handsome man getting his hands covered in whipped cream in the name of fine patisserie.

Cake Boy

Unit 2 Kingfisher House
Battersea Reach (Off York Rd.), London SW18 1TX
020 7978 5555

Polpo - aperitivo a go-go

2010-03-08T16:21:00.005Z

Polpo touts itself as a Venetian bacaro in London. I've never been to Venice, so far be it for me to say how authentic it may or may not be, but frankly it looks just like an enoteca to me... It serves the Italian equivalent of tapas, "cicheti" the kind of small, taster dishes you'd find in any good wine bar in the major Italian cities.

The place is always buzzing, it's worth booking from Thursday to Saturday and don't expect to find a quiet table. The one truly authentic Italian element to this place is the noise level, and that's without the massive family christening parties with screaming babies.

I visited in the quieter hours after three, with a vague hangover that needed nursing. One Aperol spritz later and I was struggling to decide on only three dishes (these are hard economic times) from the menu as it frankly all sounds good.

I began with Spratti in Saor - marinated sprats in a citrussy, salty sauce served on small crostini. Gone in a flash, they whet my appetite perfectly. C. had the wild mushroom piadina, which was stuffed to the gills with a variety of funghi, although the bread was a touch chewy and dry.

For some reason that confounds me, I opted to follow with cotechino, essentially a type of sausage made from pork, fatback and pork rind, usually stuffed into a pig's trotter. I've yet to meet an Italian who eats this outside of New Year's eve where it is considered traditional and symbolic of good luck. It was probably since I'd missed out this New Year on my pig's trotter helping that I felt a twinge of nostalgia. It was, in fact, delicious. Nothing like the squidgy, boiled-to-misery salted mush I'm used to having in a drunken state towards midnight on the 31st, but delicate and handsomely flavoured with pine nuts and savoy cabbage and mustard.

C. had the pork belly, with radicchio and hazelnuts to balance out the sweetness and add bite. Equally tasty.

The big mistake? The fritto misto. Not that it was bad, it was crispy enough and not terribly greasy. But after narfing through all the rest, the portion just didn't seem so small anymore and the squid, inevitably, had that rubber band texture that I couldn't really stomach after pig's feet and, yes, another Aperol spritz.

Neverthelss, between the two of us, we pretty much polished our plates. No sign of a venetian either in the kitchen or in the bar though, which made me wonder at the tenuous connection to the city of water... But the wine list told another tale, with a great selection of big and lesser-known northern Italian producers. Shame the hangover had me stuck on the Aperol, but I shall return to get my nashers round a Tocai soon...

Prices are around £3-£6 per dish, three dishes makes an ample meal.

Polpo

41 Beak Street
London W1F 9SB.
020 7734 4479.

La Trouvaille - A Great Find in the Heart of Soho

2010-02-25T17:17:00.007Z

A friend of mine introduced me to La Trouvaille a few months ago and since then, I seem to have wound up here once every two weekends, as if a large magnet lay at the heart of Carnaby Street and I was dressed in metal.

A slice of France in the heart of London there is nothing phoney or twee about this cosy retreat. The staff are all French, the wine list is serious, the food is simple and good with proper French dishes and they do a lot to promote organic wines from the South West regions of France through organised wine tasting evenings which are always very well attended.

I have only eaten in the downstairs wine bar which has a short menu perfect for sharing with friends. Prices are perhaps a little over what you'd normally pay but the food is of a high standard. £10.50 gets you a delicious and abundant assiette de charcuterie and two kinds of fresh baked bread. Or choose from a cheese platter served with truffle honey. The tartiflette, an indulgent oven-baked dish of potato slivers topped with creamy, pungeant reblochon cheese and cubes of bacon is perfect for winter.

The wine list offers plenty of choice by the glass and the staff are knowledgeable about the regions and types of wine and how to pair them.

If you drop your business card in their box at the entrance you're in for a chance to win an evening of wine tasting. However, you can also simply book a spot, although places go very quickly as it is an especially popular event. Hosted on Monday nights, each month will explore a different region or vineyard which specialises in biodynamic, organic wines. You'll learn about organic wine production as well as the characteristics of each tipple.
£15 gets you six wines and canapés.

This is a great place to take a date, or for a wine, cheese and charcuterie sharing with friends. It's perfect for unwinding after a heady shopping session on Oxford or Regent Streets as it is literally around the corner, but quiet and removed from the rush. One to add to your "slow food" London restaurant list.

La Trouvaille

12A Newburgh Street
London W1
020 7287 8488

The Celtic Connection - La P'tite Folie in Edinburgh

2010-02-23T16:27:00.013Z

I may be a distant descendant of the Pictish warriors that made up Clan Gunn, and my mother might hail from the more insalubrious districts of Glasgow, but this couldn't stop the Jamieson family venturing as far as Scotland's capital only to wind up lunching in a Breton restaurant. There we were, falling over ourselves to impress the waiter with our gutteral "r" rolling, making those knowledgable grunts of satisfaction only fine connoisseurs can muster as we perused the wine list and freezing our backsides off as we'd been placed by the front door.

La P'tite Folie on Frederick Street is a small, intimate affair, but its airy high-ceilinged room means you don't feel you're sitting on your neighbour's lap. It bears enough gallic memorabilia on its walls to appear genuine rather than those "buy in a box" rustic Provençal places where you can barely take a step without bashing your head against a hanging empty wine flagon or low-flying Bayonne ham.

Dad ordered le steak frites, cooked "medium" - shudder! The meat was tasty and tender, despite being far too brown much for my liking (if it ain't still mooing, don't bring it to my table). The frites were nothing to write home about, but crispy and freshly made and overall perfectly satisfying.

I started with a mini steak tartare, topped with a quail's egg. It felt for a moment as if the sole purpose of a quail's existence on Earth was to provide eggs conveniently small enough to top miniature versions of this bistro classic. The meat was of excellent quality, with just enough chopped cornichons to add a bite but not overwhelm. The egg was just enough to soften the consistency and not transform the meat into beef mayonnaise.

I continued with haddock poached in white wine au beurre blanc. This was frankly a tad disappointing as the fish was clearly right off the boat that morning, but had been slightly overdone giving a rubbery quality that didn't match the smooth sauce. It was full of flavour however and well matched with the lemoniness of the beurre blanc. Potatoes and mange-tout accompanied the lot.

Mum got the pick of the bunch with her confit de canard poached in red wine, the meat was falling off the bones before she even picked up the fork and the punch of the wine enhanced the sweetness of the duck. The mussels she started with would have been more exciting with the garlic butter and toasty breadcrumbs they were supposed to come with, but that's what Weight watchers will do to you, make you deny the joyous sins of BEURRE in all its forms - mum shunned the garlicky normandy butter salé and the result was a bowl of acceptable, but tame Moules Marinières.

We washed the whole lot down with a bottle of Chilean Cabernet Sauvigon then proceeded to dessert. I had crème brulée which was good, but not more. Dad had a dubious looking mint sponge which I admit to not trying (funny how that damn small quail's egg tipped me over the edge of the cream/dairy/egg content of the day).

All in all the meal was proper french food the way I remember it, with not a whiff of phoniness, of trying too hard or with dodgy wall stencils of men in berets wheeling baguettes about on bicycles.

They also have a branch in the West End at Tudor House, with a slightly tweaked menu and an expansive wine bar for the pre-theatre crowd.

La P'tite Folie

0131 225 7983

61 Frederick Street

Edinburgh

0131 225 8678

Tudor House, 9 Randolph Place

Edinburgh

SPONSOR ME!

2010-02-08T10:58:00.005Z

I am participating in the London Battersea Power Station Abseil for the Mines Advisory Group, raising money to help train de-miners, purchase mine-clearing equipment and give medical assistance to those wounded by mines.

Visit my page to read more and donate!

Thank you!

Countryside Alliance Rewards Local Food Heroes

2010-02-03T14:23:00.009Z

The Countryside Alliance handed out its “Rural Oscars” at a Parliamentary reception on Wednesday 3rd February. British titles have gone to businesses from Cumbria, Yorkshire, Worcestershire and Dumfries, political awards went to Sir Alan Beith MP and Philip Dunne MP and the Rural Hero of 2009 Award went to Lincolnshire’s Agricultural Chaplain, Rev Canon Alan Robson. The fifth annual Countryside Alliance Awards were launched in September and attracted a record 2.500 nominations from across Britain. Regional winners were declared in December and those winners went forward to the grand final, judged by Countryside Alliance Chief Executive Simon Hart along with Clarissa Dickson Wright, Farmers Guardian Editor Emma Penny, Daily Telegraph commentator Charlie Brooks and British Food Fortnight Director Alexia Robinson. Simon Hart announced the winners at a packed reception which was attended by all regional winners, keen to add a British title to their regional one.

Winners in the food and agro-produce departments are as follows:

Local Food Award: Beadlam Grange Farm Shop and Tea Room, Pockley, Yorkshire. 01439 770303.

Simon Hart says: “This Award goes to a family run farm with total commitment to local produce, the surrounding community and the future of farming. To help their children have a career in the industry, this family gave them the best possible start, converting the foldyard into a farm shop and tea room which is now a much-used for a variety of different events, from Young Farmers Club parties to craft fairs and local schools’ days. The produce speaks for itself and is truly the best: all beef and sheep are from the farm and the local abattoir is only four miles away, meaning all meat can be hung on site and butchered by the resident butcher. The tearoom serves a huge variety of traditional dishes and you can be assured a huge Yorkshire welcome whenever you visit from owners Mark and Jenny Rooke.”

Highly Commended: White Haywood Farm, Herefordshire.

Daily Telegraph Traditional Business Award: The Greyhound Inn, Grizebeck, Cumbria 01229 889224 Simon says: “A unique initiative, this is a community-run pub which I think can provide a model for other struggling village pubs. Rather than see their local pub falter, Grizebeck’s locals pulled together and saved it. This is especially impressive when you consider how many local pubs are closing every month. Initially run totally by volunteers, it is now once again a thriving traditional village pub which forms the centre of the community, running events such as quiz and music nights and serving local produce. Saving the Greyhound has brought together people from different parts of the local area to work with a common focus, and in doing so they have saved something which, if lost, may never have been revived.”

Highly Commended: SW Doughty Butcher, Doddington, Kent.

Rural Hero of 2009: Canon Rev Alan Robson, Market Rasen, Lincolnshire. Simon says: “This year’s Rural Hero is someone for whom serving the countryside isn’t so much a job as a calling, having been Lincolnshire’s Agricultural Chaplain for the past 10 years. He formed the Lincolnshire Farmer Support Group, which is run by a group of volunteers with a wide understanding of farming issues and offers a confidential telephone helpline. As well as this, Reverend Canon Alan Robson works with local groups to support the migrant worker population which contributes significantly to the area. Alan’s most recent achievement is the Epic Project, a centre for innovation to explore new technologies and responses to global warming. The centre was his brainchild and through his determination the £6.2 million building which was opened last summer. Alan Robson is a heroic character with a passion for agriculture, food production and pastoral care.” Highly Commended: Tim Rollings, owner of Fishers Farm Park in West Sussex, for employing and encouraging over 30 young people a year at his rural educational park.

St Lawrence Food Hall - Toronto

2010-01-30T18:12:00.005Z

St. Lawrence food market is a traditional covered city centre market with a permanent food hall with deli foods from all the different ethnicities represented in Toronto (hundreds! its fantastically diverse) and a Farmer's Market on Saturdays in an adjoining hall.

THe first is exciting because you'll get a hold of great ethnic foods and all the stalls allow you to taste and try things out, check out the hot chipotle dips at the mexican counter, or Bubble TEa at the Japanese diner...

The latter is exciting because it showcases local Ontario farmer's produce, including some incredibly shaped and coloured gourds (Oh my gourd! exclaimed my friend...), purple peppers, emu oil (as you do...) and of course, peameal bacon, sizzling hot and slathered in wholegrain shallot mustard from a counter which sells over 100 varieties of the condiment!!!

Chat with local farmers, hear some great buskers and organise a great packed lunch to take with you to the lake-front.

Edenbridge and Oxted Agricultural Show

2010-01-15T13:27:00.008Z

I just came across a few pictures I took of insanely big veggies and huge coos at the Edenbridge and Oxted Agricultural Show in September of last year. Some wonderful beasts and terrifying looking carrots!

Du Tracteur: Making Boursin Yummy Again!

2009-12-23T11:07:00.005Z

I grew up with the Boursin adverts in France and yes, cheesy was pretty much the only way to describe them. The genius of Steve Hudson, who revisited the classic Du Pain, Du Vin narrative in 2009 deserves a medal.

What to do with leftover pigeon! Merci Elizabeth David.

2009-12-06T18:24:00.012Z

I absolutely adore game, from duck to venison, to wild boar to capon, to hare to partridge. I spent my childhood holidays among Devon farmers every summer who, alongside raising and slaughtering their own sheep, cows, hens and chickens, also went hunting to provide game for local butchers. Kids growing up on farms seem to have such a better understanding of and respect for good food, the proper treatment of livestock and animals, and a greater pride in local produce.

Some of the best meals I've ever had were game based. A thick, almost syrupy wild boar stew in a hunter's retreat in the Andalucian mountains near Jerez, venison sausages with sage mash at home, rabbit and cider stew in Devon. 

This weekend mum bought a brace of pigeons from a good game butcher in Sevenoaks. We stewed them in the oven and ate them with bitter cranberry sauce, nutty mushrooms sautéed in butter and swede mash. 

Not wanting to throw the bones out, I made a rich pigeon stock with some chopped celery, carrot and onion, two tomato halves and a half tub of tomato passata as well as chopped fresh parsley. The result was a thick, rich, very meaty stock and I wasn't sure what to do next with it.

Enter Elizabeth David, doyenne of British cooking and absolute Expert (note the capital E) on French cuisine. I whipped out her bible of french provincial cooking and, since I had a pack of fresh beetroot in the fridge and had always wanted to cook it from fresh, I looked beetroot up in the book.

Beetroot consommé using a thick game broth. Perfect! My prayers answered!

I diced up three beetroot into small chunks and added them to the simmering pigeon broth for 30 minutes, before skimming the fat from the top of the broth, straining the broth to remove the beetroot and ending with a clear, ruby red, pungeant consommé with just a few beads of golden fat glistening on the top.

Served topped with a few chives, or some parsley and a dollop of crème fraiche and voilà! 

Magnifique!

Da Betto e Mary - a Roman culinary legend

2009-11-23T10:45:00.005Z

This is a very old posting filched from the Italian version of this website as I sat dreaming this morning af zucchini carbonara made by the wonderful hands of Betto and Mary at this legendary Roman trattoria.
Betto e Mary is housed in a semi-dilapidated ex-farmhouse in the backstreet working class Roman neighbourhood of Casilino, where, frankly, you could feel as if you were in a neo-realist movie by Visconti trudging about trying to find the entrance and/or a parking space.
A few years ago this was all farm land and the surrounding buildings are low lying houses with gardens, strings of washing on the lines and sheds piled high with wood logs.
It's not the best trattoria in the world, but its exactly everything you want a trattoria to be. Inside it's loud, warm, buzzing with Italian families and their kids, a roaring open brazier at the back on which are grilling steaks, spatchcock poussins, quails, sausages, and lamb.

Paper tablecloths, pitchers of ruby red insanely heady wine slosh about the room, people mingle, there's no dressing up and no fussiness. People are here to eat, have a good time, eat, drink and eat some more.
Occasionally a couple of guys will come in off the street and start playing music and Betto or one of his minions will let em go with a plate of something hot and a mug of wine.
You'll rarely pay more than €15 for a full meal with desert and yes, they make the best damn zucchini carbonara on the planet.

Thick, rich golden egg pasta, called "gramiccia" in romano dialect is handmade and simmered in stil runny egg with slightly burnt slivers of zucchini toasted in garlicky olive oil. Add to this the grilled quail or excellent abbacchio with just a drizzle of lemon juice and plate of chill garlic ciccoria and I'm in heaven.
Not to be missed either are "puntarelle" a type of samphire usually cooked in garlic and lemon with anchovies, or the "carciofi alla giudea" a traditional Roman-Jewish recipe of deep fried crispy baby artichokes. Delicious!

On another note, here is a summary of one of my "best lunches ever" (which was attached to this post in the original Italian blog). Simple is always best at the dinner table and this lunch was no exception:

Still-warm rustic bread from Lariano, a runny Brie de Meaux, moroccan dates, finnochiona salami from Tuscany, some slived fennel salad and a Ruddles County Ale from Suffolk. Who needs restaurants?!?

Mince Pies 2009 - They're HERE!!!

2009-11-22T15:44:00.005Z

YES people,
It's that magic time of year again where Emma starts getting Christmas fever and feels the urge to make mince pies! Last year I made excellent suet-free mince pies, compensating with butter. This year, I've gone one further and taken out the butter which I frankly feel is wholly unnecessary, instead ensuring that the mincemeat is kept moist and delicious thanks essentially to splashings of brandy. Let's face it, we all agree, anything splashed with tons of brandy can only be divine...

If you make your mincemeat now and let it macerate for a couple of weeks in a cool place, preferably an outdoor larder, they'll taste all the richer when you come to baking them, just in time for the first week of the Christmas period.

I don't do measuring, so the following ingredients were simply added in quantities that looked decent enough. The trick is to keep the moisture balance smooth and creamy: not liquid but not stodgy either. If the mixture gets too runny, add a touch more flour. If it gets to stodgy, throw in some more brandy!
Voilà!

Ingredients for AWESOME MINCE PIES 2009:

Dried figs, chopped
Candied Lemon peel and orange peel
Chopped walnuts
Sultanas or raisins
1 large chopped sweet cooking apple
two table spoons flour
Lots of French brandy (don't bother using expensive stuff, it'll be wasted in the cooking. Morrison's does a decent smallish bottle perfect for cooking at £5.60)
two large handfuls of soft brown sugar
2 large teaspoons of cinnamon
2 large teaspoons of allspice
1 teaspoon of nutmeg
1 teaspoon of ground ginger

1 pack shortcrust pastry (or make your own, even better if you have the time!)

Mix all the mincemeat ingredients together in a large bowl, cover with a cloth and leave for a couple of weeks in a cool, dark place, taking it out and turning it occasionally.

When it comes to baking them, roll your pastry out and cut 16 large circles and 16 smaller circles. Butter a cupcake baking tray, place your large circles in the spaces, fill with a generous spoonful of mincemeat then cover with a smaller circle of pastry and pinch together into a mince pie shape.

Bake the whole lot in a pre-heated over at gas mark 5 for 15-20 minutes until golden brown on top. Serve with a dusting of icing-sugar and cinammon, and some crème fraiche or brandy butter.

Enjoy with people you love, beside a log fire and accompanied by as many cheesy carols as you can bear. Alternatively, I find Andy Williams singing Sleigh Ride is always hilarious after a couple of eggnogs...

What's the Beef on Brussels?

2009-11-11T16:15:00.007Z

Just returned from a jolly jaunt in Brussels, catching up with a good friend of mine and her boyfriend in their gorgeous "apartement Bruxellois" in the quaint frenchified Place du Chatelain. I quickly made it abundantly clear that in a city such as this, it wasn't the art galleries I was wanting to explore, but rather the endless opportunities for absolute food sin. Much like french cuisine, the Belgians rarely shirk from copious amounts of butter, cheese, meat and cream. Add to that some excellent seafood and indulgent chocolatiers on every street corner and you have yourself a neat slice of foodie pie. I enjoyed my first steak tartare, which bizarrely is called "filet american" over here, although I fail to imagine many Americans raving about a huge portion of raw beef sitting on a plate. The beef is hashed finely with spices and onions, giving it a slightly sweet flavour, then topped with salty capers and, blissfully, homemade creamy bearnaise sauce. Eat with a generous serving of hot, crispy Belgian frites and you'll soon be weeping tears of joy into your frothy Duvel beer. I ate this at Les Brassins, a quaint, backstreet, authentic eatery with a small, typical menu, rude waitresses and a crammed bar with excellent choice of ales. Sublime!

New York Times review of Les Brassins here!

Rick and Treat in Padstein - Cornwall

2009-09-29T16:33:00.010+01:00

Cornwall was a week of gastronomic bliss. Aside from discovering the delicious Mill House Inn at Trebarwith Strands near Tintagel (review coming soon!), we dined at one of Rick Stein's umpteen million establishments in and around Padstow, which, love him or hate him, have done nothing but bring money, tourism and a good sprucing up to this exquisite little village overlooking a sandy estuary dotted with sailing boats. We chose the Rick Stein Cafe, which is the lower-range priced offering, but still a proper restaurant. The place was informal, cosy and family-friendly with kids enjoying proper grown up food without the stuffy environment and hawk-eyed waiters. A small, shady garden outside can accomodate about 15 people. Despite the relaxed cafe feel, the menu is serious, making the most of local, ridiculously fresh fish and boasting cornish ales and cider alongside the wines. I started with the salt and pepper prawns which were crispy and spicy on the outside but soft, sweet and fleshy on the inside and although I licked my fingers profusely afterwards, it wasn't because they were oozing grease. The helping was generous for a starter, eight prawns for a price that usually sees you being served four. We continued with devilled mackerel which was absolutely divine. Mackerel is not a fish that has me slobbering at the gills, like, say a roast monkfish or chargrilled black bream, but this was popping with flavour simply because of how fresh it was and how unfussily it was prepared. Served with a bright red tomato and white onion salad I couldn't have asked for more. Francesco get his chops into a lather over a steaming bowl of grilled fillet of haddock with laksa noodles and sambal blachan, a malaysian condiment which contains a large amount of chillies and toasted shrimp paste which created a creamy smooth, sweet curry taste with a pungeant kick right at the end, perfect for fleshy, plump haddock. My wine was nothing spectacular, although I did order the cheapest thing off the menu. Francesco's local ale, produced up the road (by Rick Stein, of course!) was a far better choice, especially as he was having curry. Puddings came next. Francesco's profiteroles were sadly the one disappointment of the meal. Stodgy and sickly sweet they lacked the lightness of touch an experienced french chef might have brung to it. On the other end of the spectrum, my sunken chocolate cake with excellent cornish cream was the dessert equivalent of Mills and Boon sex. Had I been wearing one, my bodice may have ripped, both from the fat content and the shear excitement. All in all, we paid £53 for two for michelin-quality food in a bright, pretty cafe. Beats a pasty, I'm afraid to say.

Last of the Summer Lunches

2009-09-29T16:10:00.006+01:00

Just a few happy snaps I took of a couple of lunch parties we cooked for chez moi. The dishes more or less speak for themselves, simple, fresh, colourful and tasty. Just a few tips to make your buffets a success:
a) Ensure at least two vegetarian options as well as a fresh leafy salad.
b) Offer one hot salad - maybe a variety of steamed veg with a soy/lime dressing and one cold salad with as many different leaves you can find, some fresh herbs and juicy olives.
c)Don't offer cheapo cheese, it's easy to make an impressive cheese platter with two or three good choices and some freshly baked bread, sliced pears or figs and a pot of homemade chutney or honey.
d) If you don't want to serve alcohol, then instead of the usual orange juice, water or coke as alternatives try making a fruit punch, home made lemonade or pomegranate and elderflower spritzers. You can find exciting juice mixes in almost every supermarket now! e) If you want to serve bubbles but don't have a lot of cash, try a supermarket brand Cava. Bottles are generally around the £5-6 mark and the quality is high. Sainsbury's Cava is a good choice, as is the 2004, Best Vintage Cava by Morrisons at £6.99 a bottle.

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL FARMER'S MARKET

2009-09-24T13:20:00.006+01:00

A new farmer's market opened up near my home in the small Kent village of Westerham, every Sunday lunchtime. Its only a few stalls at the moment, but there's a great spirit of cameraderie already being fostered and Sundays see the market bustling with shoppers. It's already grown quite a bit since I first went and its well stocked with fruit, veg, local meats, Kent wine and even some Portuguese treats and a great olive vendor. There's also a stall that sells fleece for spinning. Slow food AND slow-clothes knitting!
Find your local market and not only save money but mingle with neighbours and support the men and women who grow delicious local food on your own doorstep!

Autumnal Squash Soup

2009-09-14T19:33:00.009+01:00

Leaves are falling, the days are getting shorter and early mornings have taken on a misty, golden hue. Autumn is here and in a month or so we'll be stomping through piles of red leaves in our wellies.

To celebrate the turning of the seasons and to warm my old cockles until it's cold enough to merit a log fire, here's one of my favourite autumn soups. Its warm, smooth, spicy and sweet with a fantastically strong orange burst hue to brighten your dinner table.

You'll need:

A selection of squash or one large pumpkin - I used two local varieties.

1 onion

Clove of garlic

1 square inch of grated fresh ginger

Bunch of fresh coriander

1 generous teaspoon of ground cumin

1/2 litre of vegetable stock

1 birds eye chilli - whole

olive oil, salt and black pepper

A great trick for peeling squash is to let it soak in a big tureen of boiling hot water for an hour, this softens the outer layer of flesh, making it easier to cut off the skin. Some people also like to slowly roast the squash in the oven then scoop the inside flesh out with a spoon, this imparts a slightly sweeter flavour, so you can try it both ways!

Chop your squash into large-ish chunks. Thinly slice your onion and chop up your garlic clove.

Heat a spoonful of olive oil in a large wok or deep saucepan. Add the onion, garlic, cumin and chopped ginger and cook until softened.

Throw in the chunks of squash and stir to coat the chunks with the spice and onion mix. After a few minutes, add enough stock to cover the chunks, bring to the boil then turn the heat down and cook the squash until soft, about an hour.

Use a blender to smooth into a creamy consistency, add more stock if necessary to thin down. If you like your soup chunkier, mash with a fork. Add some freshly ripped coriander, a dollop of yogurt or creme frèche and serve with hunks of warm bread. Either that or pour into a mug and sip in front of the telly.

Pasta con gli Asparagi - Pasta with Asparagus

2009-04-20T15:38:00.009+01:00

It's asparagus season in Italy and we got a kilo of the good stuff from Terracina to whip up a good lunch with. To make this easy and delicious pasta dish for 2, you'll need:

200 g pasta, go for the tube type or the flat bow-ties.

150 g of asparagus tips

1 huge clove of garlic, bashed

glug of good olive oil

big knob of unsalted butter

freshly ground black pepper

two teaspoons of anchovy paste or fresh anchovy fillets

Heat a shallow frying pan with an inch or two of salted water and bring to simmering point. Blanche the asparagus tips in the water for 3-4 minutes (5 if they're really fat) then drain the cooking water from the asparagus into a saucepan. Keep the asparagus to one side.

Top up the saucepan with more hot water and bring to the boil. Drop in the pasta and stir. While your pasta is cooking, take the frying pan you used before and pour in a good tablespoon of olive oil and a knob of butter and heat until the butter froths, then drop in the bashed garlic clove and swirl around in the butter.

Add 3-4 anchovy fillets or the anchovy paste

and stir until dissolved in the oil/butter mix.

Once this is done, add the asparagus tips and cook on a low heat, stirring occasionally. Add a generous dose of black pepper.

Drain the pasta once cooked and add to the pan with the asparagus, coating the pasta in all the butter and oil. If necessary add a tablespoon of the cooking water to help coat everything. Add just the tiniest amount of grated parmesan if you want.

Fave e Pecorino

2009-04-20T15:17:00.005+01:00

Fave e Pecorino is the dish that foir me kicks off the spring season. Fresh fava beans, still in their shells are heaped in vibrant green mountains at every fruttivendolo (greengrocer) in Italy and the best way to offset their ripe, sweet, crispy green flesh is with slivers of salty, mature pecorino.

Plonk a basket of fava beans in their shells on the table, a slab of pecorino with a knife and good bottle of crisp dry white wine and you've got yourself the ideal spring aperitivo. Simple, informal, and tasty as hell.

Leicester Arms Hotel, Penshurst SURREY

2009-04-06T14:18:00.011+01:00

I usually visit the Leicester Arms on Boxing Day when villagers of Penshurst and the surrounding area flock under the awnings of this cosy country retreat clutching mulled wine and excitedly await the start of the Hunt.

I've always enjoyed my visits here, especially in winter where the log fires, squishy old arm chairs and wonky oak beams combine to create that oh-so-cherished country pub atmosphere you expect in a dainty, sparkling hamlet such as this.

This is the first time I've actually had a three course meal here, in a large, airy restaurant at the back, traditionally furnished with large glass-paned windows giving over a view of the pub's pretty gardens and the valley below.

The Sunday menu is pretty much meat-and-two veg, with few surprises and rather unimpressive vegetables. Portions are very generous however and the slow-roasted meats did fall off the bone in soft, satisfying chunks as well as being steeped in rich, homemade gravies.

I made the mistake of ordering the crispy fried prawns with sweet chilli sauce, a daft choice considering our position (far from both the sea and a decent fishmonger). The prawns were watery and tasteless, the batter oozing oil and the sweet chilli sauce out of a Blue Dragon bottle.

Dad had the duck and orange patè, which although not made on the premises, was delicious, creamy and served with a thick red onion chutney and hot, crispy toast.

For mains, Dad had the roast beef, two rollicking great slices that hung over the edge of the plate glistening with gravy and an overly tough and crunchy yorkshire pud. Mum and I opted for slow-cooked lamb shank, mine was both slow cooked and over-cooked (I know, should be impossible), by which I mean that the edges had become gnarled, hardened and chewy, yet inside they were absolute perfection!

Roast potatoes were HUGE and soft, squidgy and oily. Carrots and beans watery and insipid. So far, not winning.

Then we got to the puddings! Hurrah for puds!

My Rich chocolate sponge with Bailey's and Belgian Chocolate sauce was light and fluffy with just a hint of gooey, rich interior and a thick, slightly honeyed sauce (the Bailey's I presume).

Mum's Dark Chocolate pot was worth licking the plate for, silky smooth and not too much.

Dad's rasberry tart and custard went down a storm, and since he was unable to comment as he was too busy shovelling it into his mouth, one assumes it was as success!

Presentation was simple but elegant. Had I only come for dessert, I'd be happy as Larry!

Drank a very scrumptious and fruity red Urrugunda from Chile too...

Spring Greens with Chilli Oil

2009-04-06T12:13:00.007+01:00

Part of my 100% British Menu!

Dead easy to prepare, healthy and with a little spicy kick! To prepare (for 4), you'll need:

500 g Spring Greens

1 tbs good olive oil

2 small dried chilli peppers

1 fat clove of garlic, bashed with back of a knife

salt

handful of pine nuts

Method:

Heat a tiny frying pan without oil. Toss in some pine nuts and toast over a hot flame until golden brown.

Put to one side. Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil, toss in the spring greens and boil vigorously for 3-4 minutes. Whilst you do that heat the olive oil in a frying pan and add to it the garlic and the crushed chillies, stirring to flavour the oil. When the garlic has turned golden brown, discard it. Strain the greens from the water, get as much liquid out as possible.

Toss the greens into the hot chilli oil, coat evenly and serve sprinkled on top with toasted pine nuts.

Serve with the Oven-Baked Chicken with Red Wine sauce.

Oven-Baked Chicken with Rosemary, Shallot and Red Wine Sauce.

2009-04-04T15:09:00.007+01:00

For the main course of my 100% British menu, I did Oven-Baked chicken in a Red Wine, Rosemary and Shallot sauce, Roast Portabello Mushrooms and Spring Greens in chilli oil. Simple, yummy, anyone can do it!

For the chicken you'll need,

Ingredients (for 4):

- 4 legs of chicken

- two fat sprigs of fresh rosemary

- 4 fat cloves of garlic

- one large chopped shallot

- 2 glasses of red plonk (wine)

- hot water

- mixed dried herbs

- freshly ground black pepper and sea salt

- olive oil

Method:

Heat your oven to gas mark 7

Line a thick large pan with oil and gently fry the chopped shallots and a large sprig of rosemary until the shallots soften. Meanwhile lightly score the chicken legs and rub with salt, pepper and herbs, sticking in some finely sliced garlic slivers here and there.

Once the shallots are soft, turn up the heat and brown the chicken legs on both sides to seal in the flavours. Once browned, remove the chicken legs and place in an oven-proof baking dish.

De-glaze your pan by sloshing the glass of plonk into it, getting it to a slow bubble and scraping the yummy caramelised shallots away from the edges and into the sauce. Keep the rosemary sprig in there to get the most flavour out of it.

Once the wine sauce has reduced a fair bit, pour it over the chicken legs, add a fresh sprig of rosemary among the chicken legs and pop the whole lot into the oven. If there's not enough wine to go around, add a teensy bit of hot water...

Bake uncovered for 10 minutes then reduce the heat to gas mark 4, baste the chicken legs with the sauce and cover with foil before popping back into the lower shelf.

Bake for a further 50 minutes.

Remove from the oven, pour the gravy into a gravy boat, and thicken with a teaspoon of cornflower if necessary.

Serve with Roast Portabello Mushrooms and Spring Greens in Chilli Oil

Jamie-inspired "100% British" dinner. The supermarket way...

2009-04-04T14:24:00.007+01:00

This week saw Jamie Oliver cooking up a storm at the G20, with a very British menu showcasing the best of our own homegrown, home-reared produce. Whilst the Guardian food blog saw a few discontented foodies bemoan the choice of "trendy" Jamie for chef and wailed at the simplicity of the menu/this ingredient/that ingredient etc.

Well, I thought the boy done good, the dinner was simple, wholesome food (the type Italy gained its fame for), using fresh British veg which doesn't make it onto our tables nearly as often as it should, such as samphire and sea kale.

He also uses several ingredients which have PDO (Protected Destination of Origin) status (clotted cream, Jersey Royals), which we should be showing off as we have so few of them compared to France and Italy. For the full menu click on the link:

Jamie Oliver's G20 Menu

Not that I'm a hardcore fanatical about this: you'd struggle to live entirely on UK homegrown food unless you had an allotment, lots of time on your hands, lots of money, great weather or a huge love of potatoes. Somerset tomato, anyone? Nah, didn't think so... I did want to stress, however, that to make a great meal, you don't need to rely on imports. I also prefer to support our local producers wherever possible, even if it means spending a tiny bit more.

Inspired by all this, I headed to my local supermarket to shop for ingredients to create a Best of British dinner using only UK produce to get an idea of how a normal family of three or four could feed themselves on good-quality produce for less than a fiver a head. All without relying on Argentinian plums and New Zealand lamb, or dubious economy 90%-breadcrumbs sausages.

The rules:

-all ingredients MUST be UK.

-no economy range/additive-filled stuff

- less than a fiver a head

Naturally, I'd love to do all this at a local farmer's market or local shops, and I would encourage that and repeat this exercise at one of my local markets. This time round though is for the benefit of those who have difficulty in getting to a farmer's market.

Carbonara con Prosciutto di Parma e Zucchine

2009-03-30T15:58:00.006+01:00

What do you do when you've got one egg, a "going-mouldy" courgette and a half-eaten pack of Parma ham sitting in the fridge? Leftovers carbonara!

To make this nifty little lunch (for one) you will need:

1 egg

one small courgette

three or four slices of Parma ham

salt and pepper

a clove of garlic

olive oil and a small dry chilli pepper

100g of good spaghetti

Method:

Heat a tablespoon of oil in a pan and gently fry the crushed garlic and small chilly pepper until the garlic starts to turn brown.

Discard the garlic and the pepper and turn the heat down. Add the thinly sliced courgette and fry slowly on a low heat until they start to turn mushy (10 minutes).

Boil up a litre of water in a saucepan and add a teaspoon of sea salt. When boiling, throw in your spaghetti. While the spaghetti cooks, mush up the courgettes with a wooden spoon andf add the shredded Parma ham. Break the egg into a bowl and whisk, adding freshly ground black pepper.

Once your spaghetti is cooked, drain it and pour the spaghetti into the pan with the courgettes and Parma ham. Pour over the beaten egg and mix altogether until the egg is just cooked.

Plate up and serve with grated Grana Padano or Parmesan.

This week Beau eats... Moules Marinières!

2009-03-30T15:08:00.009+01:00

WOOF WOOF!

Ah, ladies and gentledogs! This week I bring you a classic favourite of mine which reminds me of my youth, holidays beachcombing in Brittany, hoovering crèpes and cider in cosy kennels up and down the Normandy coast. Moules are also an inevitable element in any trip to Brussels (some might argue the BEST reason for going to Belgium, beers aside...). Frites are a great accompaniment, as is good, fresh piping hot baguette or pungeant soda bread to dip in the sauce.
The best "Moules" I ever had were served to me on my last night in Dublin, after losing all my money and spending a night sleeping at Dublin airport. My friends and I scraped together the last remaining coins we had and headed back into the centre looking for a celebratory last meal and pint. The pub name escapes me, but it was near the Temple Bar, in the first year of the euro, before Dublin went hyper-crazy. The wiater brought us a steaming bucket of mussels, in white wine, garlic and fresh parsley with a chewy sourdough soda bread hunk and three creamy pints of the black stuff. With diddly-diddly music, the combined love of 35 drunken tourists and the warmth of the pub log fire, we nearly died and went to Moules heaven.

Here is the simplest recipe, for fool-proof Moules Marinières:

CLEAN YOUR MUSSELS (even better, buy them cleaned, or get the fishmonger to do it for you!)
-pull off the beard-like hairs sticking out from the mussels, and scrub them with a nail brush under running water.

Ingredients:

2 kg of fresh mussels
one fat clove of garlic
two shallots, chopped finely

2 large glasses of dry white wine
a big bunch of flat leaf parsely
freshly ground black pepper
large knob of salted butter

optional (but absolutely unnecessary): large dollop of crème fraiche or double cream

Method:

Heat the knob of butter in a large casserole ( we have a Le Creuset, only the best for hip dogs like me!).

When the butter starts to foam gently, throw in the garlic and shallots and the glass of white wine. Cook until the shallots soften and become translucent. Bring the whole lot to the boil and toss in the mussels, mix around to coat the mussels in all the juice. Cover and steam for 2-3 minutes, until the mussels open up. If any mussels haven't opened, throw them out, DO NOT force them open or eat them!!!

Strain the liquid and set aside, put the mussels into a serving dish.

Return the liquid to the pan, heat again and add the fresh parsley and if you really want, a dollop of double cream (mucho fatty and seafood snob dogs will look down upon you...)

Pour the liquid back over the mussels and bring to the table!

Serve with great bread or crispy, golden frites!

CHOW DOWN DOGGIES!

Dirty Martini - A Jamieson tradition

2009-03-25T16:59:00.007Z

One of the most popular phrases uttered in the Jamieson household is "Gosh, I need a drink". When Mum and Dad were both working full-time, you'd hear it stammered at around about 6.30 p.m as they fell in through the door after a gruelling day's work. These days, with Mum down to a 4-day week and Dad a relaxed retiree, these magic words, and the clinking ring of a silver cocktail shaker start to reverberate in the hallway at about 5 p.m, when most genteel Brits are still having their afternoon tea.

I am not one to negate afternoon tea, by a long shot. But if there's one tradition that I shall surely maintain, like a Montgomery-inspired retired-colonel stereotype in some wretched Hollywood war movie - it'll be the Jamieson 5 o'clock Martini. Spiffing.

After a year in New Jersey, where I was finally able to indulge in the luxury of nearby Manhattan's sickeningly slick bars and nightspots and dreamt of evenings accidentally spilling caviar onto my bosom in the lobby of the Plaza only to have it delicately plucked off by the slightly too-young son of a Vanderbilt before some reckless elevator nookie, I have become a bit of a fan of the dirty martini. Its nothing glam, or spectacular, but it sounds good, and the olive juice really does give it that little extra something...

Plus the delight of a vermouthy olive at the bottom of the glass is like a treat at the end of an already good day.

Dirty Martini:

(for a classic dry martini simply omit the brine)

2 parts gin

1 part vermouth (Noilly Prat or Dry Martini)

green olive

a dash of the olive brine to taste.

shake vigorously and pour into a frosted glass.

Trotta all'Acqua Pazza e funghi - Rainbow Trout all'Acqua Pazza with mushrooms

2009-03-25T11:16:00.004Z

Cooking all'acqua pazza (literally crazy water) is very popular in trattorias and fish restaurants in Italy, and best suited to sea bass or sea bream, I am doing it with rainbow trout simply as a money-saving move, call it "credit crunch in crazy water"! By poaching the fish in the water, you retain all the moisture and the fish takes on all the flavours of the fresh basil and chilli peppers in the water. The sauce is great for mopping up afterwards with fresh bread, or a side of wild and long grain rice.

The choice of adding mushrooms was inspired by chef Alberto at my friend's Mediterraneo restaurant in Rome. He served my friends and I a two kilo sea bass in acqua pazza with fresh porcini mushrooms, which just gave an edge to the sauce, making it richer and earthier which contrasted nicely with the fish. Being in Surrey right now, I do not sadly have great access to fresh porcini mushrooms, but we do have rather tasty, nutty British chestnut mushrooms so I added those to the mix. When getting the fishmonger to clean your fish or make fillets, always ask to keep heads, tails and anything else in a separate bag to make fish stock.

Ingredients (for 4):

4 rainbow trout/sea bream/sea bass - gutted and scaled.

large bunch of cherry tomatoes or fat, red, mature tomatoes.

15-20 button mushrooms/chestnut mushrooms, or 5-6 porcini mushrooms.

fat bunch of fresh basil

fat bunch fresh flat leaf parsley

fat cloves of garlic to taste

2-3 dried bird's eye chillis

1 pint of fish stock

olive oil

salt and pepper

Method:

As ever, pour yourself a generous glass of white wine and stick on classic fm... Now. Whip out a large, deep frying pan, big enough to hold all your fish in it (you may have to cook them in two pans). I like the presentation of the whole fish, but if its easier, or you don't like your dinner looking at you, have the fish filleted.

Salt and pepper the fish. Put the pan on the gas and pour in a tablespoon of olive oil. Crush your garlic cloves and smush up the dried chillis and cook them in the oil for a minute or two. Make sure the garlic doesn't brown, if it does, remove it form the oil with a slotted spoon. Add the mushrooms and slowly cook in the oil.

Chop up your tomatoes and the fresh herbs and plop those in the pan too, lowering the heat. Cook until the tomatoes start to go mushy. Now add your fish and seal on both sides. Pour over the heated fish stock, cover the whole lot with a lid or some aluminium foil and lower the heat to a slow simmer. Poach the fish about 10 minutes on each side.

To serve, remove the fish with a slotted spoon, arrange on the plate and cover with some tomatoes and mushrooms. Pour a generous glug of the stock over the fish and in the plate. Serve with rice, salad, or fresh crusty bread. And the white wine. If you haven't drunk it all already...

Sahara - Eritrean Restaurant (ROME)

2009-03-18T18:47:00.005Z

Sahara - Eritrean Restaurant

43, Viale Ippocrate

Rome 00161

tel: +39 06 4424 2583

Rome boasts a fair number of Eritrean and Ethiopian restaurants, but this one has both the better interior (and exterior terrace) and spicier, better presented food. Run by an Italian and his Eritrean wife, this bright and sunny restaurant offers diners a choice between elegant seated area or more traditional wicker basket tables and low pouf seats, and, in the summer under a lantern-lit canopy on the terrace.

The waitresses all wear traditional white linen robes with colourful headresses and, dazzling smiles aside, are polite and efficient the service is speedy. There are plenty of vegetarian options, including a tasty, if slightly sweet couscous and spicy hot lentil or chickpea purèes. Meat abounds, mincet abish is tender ground beef very lightly cooked in butter and simmered in ginger, cardamom and white pepper. Zighini, Francesco's favourite is a stew made either with beef or lamb and its pungeant sauce has a spicy start but a rich sweet finish, the name itself is that of the particular spice mix of about 25 different spices used to rub and stew the meat in.

Most of the dishes are served on injera a sort of light, fluffy very wide pancake made of tef, a grain similar to millet, and you scoop the food up by tearing off a piece of injera and dipping it or wrapping it around the various tidbits on your injera. Its fun, and feels good to dispense with the niceties of (and unnecessary) cutlery. Only word of warning is it's very filling, so unless you're into eating loads of bread with every meal or are absolutely ravenous, don't order a starchy starter, or dip into the breadbasket before your mains!

There are South Africa wines on the menu, nothing dazzling, but perfectly suited to the hot, spicy dishes on offer and just what you'd expect from a decent, budget ethnic restaurant. It is possibly in the Eritrean food department that Rome offers its best shot at ethnic cuisine, because frankly, the other imports are sorely lacking in quality!

Fonduteria Lucifero - (ROME)

2009-03-18T18:39:00.004Z

Fonduteria Lucifero

Via dei Capellari, 28

00186 Rome

This tavern-like restaurant offers every type of fondue imaginable, from swiss, to chocolate, via bourguignonne, including the mouth-watering Piemontese special: A Tomino cheese fondue laced with the highly prized White truffle of Alba, which, in the week we dined there, was checking in at a cool 6 euros per gram.  This is not a place to bring even open minded vegetarian friends, unless they want to be stuck munching on the delicious but limited range of vegetable appetizers as you wrap your teeth around any one of the delectable cuts of beef on the menu, all of which can also come sprinkled with a few shavings of said truffle… This is a strictly meat and cheese parlour. 

We started with a generous antipasto of less common and therefore more interesting salamis, good quality mozzarella (both unusual for a relatively cheap Roman eatery) and a full platter of grilled, roasted, fired and stuffed fresh veggies all of which are laid out nicely on the bar as you walk into the joint.  The portion was just right to leave room to actually finish the main course rather than feel guilty over leaving half of it. Despite the host not showing us the wine list, claiming it was as long as the Bible and he could offer us the Reader‘s Digest format from memory, we didn’t get rumbled on the wine and enjoyed an excellent Nero D’Avola which conformed exactly to the type of wine we had asked to drink and at E 17.50, knocked the socks off value-wise of the usually acidic house wines most other places offer at around 11 euros a pop. 

The only black note was the music, there’s enough good ambiance in the place to be able to do without any at all, or at least something befitting the simple whitewashed cavernous walls and checkered tablecloths, rather than the commercial radio pap, however, we were at the only table in the vicinity of the speakers and would’ve been quite undisturbed in any other part of the restaurant. I finished full, content, merry and not in the least bit stuffed or under the impression of having filled my gullet my face with ten tons of cow. All in all, a jolly night out!