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

The Power of DNA

Our cousin from the Land of Oz visited us with his girlfriend last week. The last time we'd met was three years ago at my wedding. In the intervening period, while I remembered that my cousin and I shared an interest in music and guitars, I had kinda forgotten that we shared a passion for food as well! My cousin, Musical Chef (an engineer in real life), and his brother are fantastic cooks, and it turns out that his girlfriend, Foodie Doctor, is too. By a stroke of luck before their arrival, I had planned (as our first sight-seeing outing) a trip to Borough Market, one of London's famous food and produce markets. I myself hadn't been to Borough Market in more than two years, so it was great to see some of my old favourites again.

It's amazing how much looking at London with visitors can open your own eyes to it. Suddenly, I wasn’t feeling so blasé about being 20 minutes away from a sprawling market nestled under criss-crossing bridges near the Thames. We strolled amongst large iron pans with rabbit casseroles cooking over flames, steel drums of mulled wine, shelves of bottled beers and ales from around the world, elaborate displays of fresh seafood (including an octopus clinging to a rock, below a crayfish whose claws swayed from side to side), mountains of fragrant chocolate brownies and loaves of bread, wheels of cheese boasting various months of ageing, bright berries tumbling out of their punnets, extensive displays of vegetables and enormous mushrooms, frying chorizo and grilling bratwurst… all while Foodie Doctor snapped pictures of the food, the crowds and of us.

It was a heady morning. We tasted various samples on offer, and we slowly collected a feast for breakfast the next day. And thus it was that, on Saturday morning, after enjoying a few cups of tea from our wedding china, we settled down to the breakfast you see in the photo. (In our defense, I will say that we had gone to bed at 3 a.m. the night before, after a memorable jamming session with Musical Chef on acoustic guitar, me on electric guitar and my sister Rice Krispie on keyboards. So, we were hungry!) We had assembled: a 22-month aged Comté and a melting Époisses from France; slices of Parma, a large ball of Mozzarella and an Ubriaco matured in red wine from Italy; good old British sausages (curiously named ‘Boston sausages’) and a pork pie; sweet German mustard to accompany the sausages; a variety of mushrooms (which Foodie Doctor sautéed with butter, garlic and sage); and a dulce de leche from Argentina. To all of these treasures from Borough Market, we added Gentlemen’s Relish (an anchovy paste I’d picked up last week from a nearby deli), Pain de Campagne from my local French bakery, Irish breakfast tea (purchased in Dublin in the summer), and orange juice from Florida.

The Époisses is one of my favourite cheeses. It’s an unpasteurised cow’s milk cheese from Burgundy, which is washed in the local brandy (marc de Bourgogne) as it matures. This leaves it with an alluring, sharp nose, and a flavour that’s part brandy and part sweet garlic. Take it out of the fridge about half an hour before eating and spread it over toasted crusty bread. I’m also a fan of Comté, another unpasteurised cow’s milk cheese. This hard cheese is good with almost any bread, but you might go for something white, so that you can appreciate the grainy texture of the Comté. Imho, the best Comté has a firmness closer to parmesan than to edam or cheddar.

While the weekend was wonderful for all the experiences we shared, it also made me slightly sad that so much of my family lives so far away. Cases in point being Musical Chef living all the way away in Sydney and Cinnamon being in North Carolina. Just imagine the weekly cooking and jamming sessions we could all have if we lived in the same city! I was also amazed that, despite Musical Chef and my sisters and I not having met each other all that often (a few times as children and a grand total of three times as grown-ups), all of us just connect. Not least on the planes of food and music. There you have it, I thought, the power of DNA.

Love

Truffle

A Taste of British Food

What my dear sister means when she says "Coleslaw and Yorkshire Pudding was one of the blog names we considered" is that it was one of the names she considered. I wasn't having anything to do with Yorkshire Pudding! However, I must admit that her description of the eggy, stretchy sails (almost panettone-like) made me start thinking about some of the simple pleasures of British cuisine.

Nowadays, in Britain (as in many other countries) the food being cooked daily in the kitchens from London to Edinburgh and Belfast to Cardiff is Italian pasta, Indian chicken curry, Spanish tortilla omelette and Chinese stir fry. But there is a tradition of British cooking that involves more than just fish and chips. I thought I would introduce some of my favourite dishes to our friends across the Pond.

1. Welsh Rarebit - I always have to start off explaining that this does not contain small, furry animals. This is a slice of toasted bread, topped with a smooth mixture of cheese, Worcestershire sauce and mustard (the exact ingredients can vary), all of which is then grilled. The magic is in the contrasts: the smooth, bechamel of the topping vs. the firm, crunchiness of the base; the mustard sharpness of the cheese vs. the rounded wholesomeness of the bread.

2. Steak and Ale Pie - I love English pies! And, for me, nothing beats this one. Come to think of it, it's almost a one-stop roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. Tender cubes of beef with caramelised onions and mushrooms, in a hearty stew, topped with perfect pastry that you can dip into the gravy.

3. Sausages and Mash - British sausages are famous for their low meat content and high everything else content, but it's hard to beat the taste. Try them with buttered mash and a satisfying onion gravy.

4. Treacle Sponge with Custard - Why miss out the amazing desserts? Soft sponge soaked in dark syrupy treacle, and served swimming in hot custard. This is the height of comfort food.

5. Eton Mess - This dessert does look like it sounds (if you saw an Eton private school boy, you'd know what I mean). It's a mashed up mix of meringue, strawberries and cream. (And a dash or two of Campari doesn't hurt for the adults.)

It's not easy to come across good versions of tasty British dishes. But there are a few enterprises that are working to keep the cuisine alive. One of them in London is Canteen, which operates ... wait for it ... a chain of restaurants! (Hey, I'm all for people with good food concepts multiplying them! And they don't all have to be Wendy's, right?)

I'll leave you with a bit of trivia on the name 'Elephant and Castle'. This is an area of London, South of the Thames. There is sometimes confusion about what it could have to do with pachyderms and fortified structures. However, folk legend has it that the name is a corruption of the original name, which was 'Infanta de Castilla', the princess of the Spanish region of Castilla y Leon sent across the seas to marry King Edward the First.

Love

Truffle