My mum came round for dinner last week. Those of you who learned their love of food at mother’s apron strings will be familiar with the leap of excitement and dread those words can summon. Because if there’s someone you want to impress, it’s your mum.
And so there was much scratching of head and leafing through books. Italian was out, my mum loves Italian, and she’s much better at it than me. Time to look to my own strengths and influences. In this case the Eastern Med. (more…)
I first discovered tagines on a short trip to Marrakech and I was immediately entranced by their full frontal flavours and the combination of sticky sweet dried fruit and slow cooked tender meat. It was a revelation – fruit and meat? It was like having pudding and a main course all at once, and you can’t go wrong with that. (more…)
The thing about cooking curries, tagines and other big pot dishes, particularly if there are only one or two people eating, is that there is a minimum amount that you can realistically make. So I often – with varying degrees of success – have to find other uses for those bits and bobs. This is particularly true of Thai curry pastes. They act as a kind of counterbalance to the law of diminishing returns, in that past a certain point, the less you make, the more effort you have to put in to get good results. (more…)
Having dined on Thai for lunch I had a hankering for more fresh and spicy SE Asian flavours. Also, as part of an ongoing January clear out, I wanted to use up some of the bits and pieces sitting unnoticed at the back of the cupboard. You know, those things that looked like a great idea in the shop, but then somehow just never got used.
Delving into the fridge netted me a pack of raw prawns, some poached chicken and a couple of slightly tired stalks of lemongrass (left over from Wednesday’s cleansing chicken soup), basil, mint, half a cabbage and a lime. The store cupboard meanwhile served up a pack of dried rice spring-roll wrappers. Add to that some Indonesian chilli and ginger sauce I got for Xmas, peanut paste, sweet chilli and crusty old bottle of fish sauce and I had the beginnings of a mini-feast. (more…)
Essentially, this is a chicken poached gently in water with added bits and bobs. The chicken and its meaty juices are the base upon which you can build all sorts of exciting concoctions. If you want a real savoury hit then add an onion, celery, parsley, carrot, tomato, peppercorns and a bay lef or two, just like a stock. You’ll end up with a lovely meaty clear soup.
But tonight, I wanted something different, more cleansing than heavily flavoured. I’ve been working hard these last couple of days and i needed something as a pick-me-up. A soup with a bit of zing, a bit of excitement, but one that also left me with the same relaxed feeling you get after a particularly long walk in the crisp air. (more…)
Having read Fernandez & Leluu’s mouth watering recipe for roast chicken, I was determined to recreate it for last night’s dinner. Accordingly I assembled all the ingredients and fished out of the freezer some drumsticks and wings left over from various fowl dismemberings, and two quail that were lurking at the back.
The only thing missing was Teppanyaki marinade. So I improvised. Adding a dash of this and glug of that, tasting and adjusting is one of the most fun things about cooking. It feels like alchemy – turning seemingly unrelated ingredients into a coherent and tasty whole. (more…)
For the new year I’m trying to move away from focusing all (foody) things Turkish. We live in area of London chock full of Anatolian grocers full of fresh herbs, cucumbers & peppers galore, and about a billion different types of feta, halloumi, yoghurt, tahini, olives etc. Consequently 2009 has had a definite Levantine flavour.
However, with an austere new year beckoning, it feels right to explore all the cuisines i’ve been neglecting, and bring more variety and excitement to the plate. Far eastern food has a purifying effect suitable to post-excess January, in particular the strong flavours of Thai, the simplicity of Japanese and the warmth of Sichuanese.
Accordingly last night’s dinner was Sichuanese dry fried chicken, sticky rice with peas and green beans with ginger and chilli. (more…)
