Endings and Beginnings

Assuming it’s not too late to ring in the new year (hey, it’s still January), happy 2011 everyone! So, I hope you guys had nice holidays. Mine sure were tumultuous. I know it can seem like the new year’s just an arbitrary point at which we humans decide that the Earth has completed another round of the Sun. But December, amazingly, was a month of endings for me – it was as if the Universe was determined to shake out all the old baggage it didn’t want me to carry into 2011 – and January has been a month of new beginnings.

I have so many things to share with you guys. Honestly, I have a list of at least 20 things to talk to you about, so I’m going to get cracking. The first is a discovery I made in my local bookshop: the latest book from Jamie Oliver (provider of perfect roast chickens and emancipation for undergrads boiling canned beans). Called Jamie's 30-Minute Meals, each recipe provides step-by-step instructions to preparing a full sit-down meal in half an hour. My first attempt consisted of tray-baked chicken with pancetta, mashed potatoes, an out-of-this-world creamed spinach, and a strawberry drink-dessert. The next time I tried a sausage ragú with penne, a zesty chicory salad, and a batch of mini frangipane tarts. Admittedly each meal took me an hour, but I was still impressed at what a short time that was to have made so many dishes in.

And everything tasted great. Having tried a fair few of his recipes now, I’m starting to realise what Jamie’s genius consists of – he has an instinctive feel for ingredients and where they can take a dish, and by combining just 3 or 4 flavours, he creates something really special. For example, the creamed spinach is flavoured with just spring onion, garlic, thyme and nutmeg, but those 4 things elevated the simple spinach and cream to a whole new level. The other major hit was the frangipane tart, with which we ended the wholesome penne and salad meal. Who knew that almond, orange zest and vanilla paste could become something of such heavenly, fragrant warmth.

‘Making a difference’ is one of the topics that’s often on my mind. So, I wanted to say: thanks, Jamie, for making such a difference to my new year, and for showing me that endings don’t always have to be sour and that some can be sweet and fantastically frangipane.

Love

Truffle

A spoonful of sugar

The humble sugar has been abused in the recent past and continues to be downtrodden in the West. A South Asian native, it has been vilified and pilloried as the cause of diabetes, heart disease and obese Americans. Sugar is not to blame, but our self control.

I was brought up adding a spoonful of sugar to most drinks- chocolate milk, coffee, tea. I could never get into artificial sweeteners even in the fattest of times, due to its metallic aftertaste as well as the thought of adding chemicals to my beverage. Having been introduced to brown sugar in its multiple forms, in particular muscovado and demerera, by a Lebanese French friend, I am in the habit of having nothing but brown sugar in my kitchen. I learnt that a spoonful of muscovado can be a delicious topping to a bowl of yogurt and sliced banana. The wonderful thing about these soft brown sugars is that they actually have lower caloric values than an equivalent amount of white sugar due to the higher amounts of minerals, molasses and water content. Molasses, also known as treacle, is what is left when the sugar is removed from sugar cane juice and is quite conveniently high in iron and calcium.

A couple of weeks ago, my Ohioan cousins from my mother's side came to visit. As an expression of my affection for them, I wanted to serve lunch purely from recipes from my mother's side of the family, and so I made the following: spiced meatballs (grandmother/mother's recipe), family-style chicken curry, sauteed potatoes, and my mother's cousin's spinach recipe, all served with rice and pappadoms. This cousin of my mother, a lovely lady who always wears lots of jewelry with her big smile, has actually published a recipe book - in Tamil.

I read the spinach recipe very slowly that day (as I can only read Tamil very slowly) and it seemed to say to boil the following in a small amount of water:

2 packs frozen spinach
10 peeled whole shallots
2 cloves unpeeled garlic
2 green chillies
1 tsp sugar
A pinch of salt

After 10 minutes or so, fish out one or both chillies and blend. Too easy to be true? Well, it really was delicious! The amazing thing about it was that even after a couple of hours, the blended spinach remained as green as a bed of crushed emeralds.

I found out the next day that a spoonful of sugar has traditionally been added in cooking through history to retain the beautiful color of vegetables. This simple ingredient can be a wonderful addition to your life - in moderation of course.

Cinnamon