Too pretty to eat?

Posted on September 26, 2013 by lardersaga

Raspberry divineDebatable it has to be said, this tart is almost too pretty to eat, but not quite! I made it a couple of weeks ago for a ‘tart’ order that had come in from my sister and one of her colleagues at the wonderful ‘Liberty Wines’. Of course it is seriously naughty but the raspberry cuts through the cloying white chocolate and the coulis that I have now perfected with a little cassis seems to balance out what could otherwise be viewed as verging on the ‘sickly sweet’ boundary. English raspberries can still be found in most greengrocers and still have a wonderful flavor.  So if you, like me, are harking on about an Indian Summer, what better way to embrace it than encasing such delectable morsels, the raspberries that is, into this white chocolate beauty of a tart?

At the farm we appear to have a late crop, Autumn fruiting raspberry, that the little people and myself have been feasting on. There is something rather smug about growing raspberries in the last days of summer when one normally thinks of them to be in their prime in June or July. I can’t really account for it and I don’t believe there was any masterplan behind it when we planted the canes but I can certainly recommend it. They taste quite sensational and when much of the kitchen garden is beyond its’ sell by date, especially in the soft fruit zone, it is rather lovely to come across these little treasures.

A tarts tartWhite chocolate and raspberry tart – inspired by Ottolenghi – The Cook Book, but with a few tweaks here and there!

SWEET PASTRY

1 Pre-baked tartlet case

250gms plain flour

125gms butter

2 tablespoons of icing sugar

1 organic egg yolk

A few drops of vanilla extract

1. Put the flour, butter, sugar and vanilla into a food processor and pulse until fine crumbs form. Add the egg yolk to bring the pastry together, it should be soft and pliable a bit like a harder version of play dough! Bring together as a ball.

2. Pop the pastry into the fridge wrapped in cling film to rest for 20 minutes, but if like me you are fighting the clock, roll out the pastry and line your 25cm loose bottomed tart tin and then put it in the fridge to rest for 20 minutes or so.

3. Remove the tart case from the fridge and line with baking paper and baking beans and bake blind in a pre-heated oven at 180c for 20- 30 minutes. After about 15 minutes remove the baking paper and beans to let the tart bottom dry out. Remember this is all the cooking this tart case is going to get so you want to make sure it is ‘shortbread biscuit like’ cooked!

FILLING INGREDIENTS

2 punnets of raspberries

1-2 tablespoons of creme de cassis (optional extra but a very good one)

300gms of white chocolate, broken into fine bits

40gms of butter

200ml of double cream

1. First of all make the raspberry and cassis coulis. Put one punnet of raspberries in a liquidizer and whizz up with 1 – or 2 tablespoons of cassis, until really smooth. Now sieve out the seeds and set aside.

2. Put the white chocolate and butter into a large bowl. Put the cream into a saucepan and bring up to the boil. Pour it immediately over the chocolate and butter and stir until all the chocolate has melted.

3. Now spoon the chocolate into the tart case followed by a swirl of the raspberry coulis, repeat until the tart case has been filled and you are left with a painted picture ! Pop the remaining raspberries into the tart and put it in the fridge to set for at least 1 hour. Serve with additional raspberries.

This recipe may look like a bore but actually once you have done the tart case it is a complete doddle!! And it really is rather good – I have never been a massive white chocolate fan but the marriage of the raspberries does work remarkably well!

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Pantelleria, a few more notes……

Posted on September 16, 2013 by lardersaga

Local shopsTwo weeks on the sun-baked island of Pantelleria and one is transported to a place where the woes and joys of the rest of the world simple don’t matter. In my view it is an island where time stands still. Steeped in history it feels like you have time travelled to a place that maybe existed fifty years ago, or maybe longer. From the moment you depart the rather swanky new and civilised airport, the first thing you notice is the roads and probably most critically the cars. Every car has a dent and is missing a wing mirror or two, that in itself is not so strange, but the island must be the home to the densest population of Fiat Pandas outside their factory birth place. These are the donkeys of the island, haring up absurdly steep inclines on some of the most pot holed and narrow roads I have driven on outside Africa. All of which is strangely charming, and that in many ways is what the island is partly about. It is refreshingly simple and easy on the eye. Don’t be alarmed when you are not greeted by pristine avenues of ‘Cyprus’ and a manicured Tuscan landscape, but do be enthralled by what looks like a truly ancient vista, tidily portioned out by miles and miles of low lying dry stone walls. Dotted in between the painstakingly built walls are ‘Damussi’, the classic farmsteads that Pantelleria is famous for. Greek in origin, the ‘damussi’ feel more Arabic, and in many ways this is not a surprise, after all one can almost scent the proximity of Africa. On clear days one can see across to ‘Cap Bon’ in Tunisia, most evenings the lighthouse can be spotted, flashing its’ beacon from the Dark Continent. All of which I find rather romantic, sitting on a lump of volcanic rock looking across the Mediterranean to the watercolored outline of Africa. It’s decadent, nostalgic, dated and magical, and I haven’t even started on the food!

This is the island where Mr.P famously discovered ‘gamberi rossi’, the delicate little red prawn that is caught in this area of the Med. Surprisingly sweet they are quite divine and a real luxury, coupled with fresh sea urchins, I couldn’t be closer to foodie heaven if I tried. Strangely you don’t see the urchins on the menu ‘per se’, and that’s where Jack Sparrow, showed his true colors and came into his own. A few kind words and off diving he went. 50 or so urchins later, 1 octopus and a star fish and suddenly ‘Francesco’ was my hero, a true pirate stealing from the rich seabed. Beyond the sea the island has the typical array of superb Italian produce one would expect to find elsewhere in Italy. Flat white peaches a plenty, Burratta, Parma ham, olives, the best tomatoes and of course truckloads of capers; I think you are getting the picture, no one was going to starve on this holiday. Lunches tended to be pasta, homemade pizza or spada (swordfish) on the BBQ, dinners a simple salad followed by salsiccia with grilled radicchio, octopus, monkfish (gosh they are ugly) and on one occasion, a whole fillet of beef that had been lovingly tracked down in Trapani in Sicily. Simple, clean, wholesome, surprisingly healthy eating, and very Italian.

Never knowingly happier than creating a ‘salad number’ I was pretty much in my element playing around with the goodies Pantelleria had to offer. The holiday favourites being the all time crowd pleaser, ‘white peach, Burratta and Parma ham’ and a ‘chargrilled courgette, ricotta, rocket and mint’ salad. The latter being the subject of this post. The farm has a glut of courgettes in the garden so this little number has been reworked several times since our sun baked Pantescan holiday, which sadly is fading way too fast into a distant memory. I have tweeked it here and there, the beauty of this salad being that it is quite versatile. Smoked ricotta is my chosen cheese but realistically unless you have a very good Italian deli close by it is going to be hard to track down, fresh ricotta works just as well as does fresh goats cheese. Likewise I have used roasted hazelnuts, walnuts and latterly cobnuts, all equally delicious. Last week I added in chive flowers, and I guess if you have a shortage of rocket, watercress would be a perfectly good substitute. In a nutshell this is just a sublime late summer salad, one to make the most of before the shorter days of autumn take hold and we all start craving hearty soups and slow cooked comfort food, and importantly one that reminds me of warmer climes and the happy, hazy days of a family holiday!

Courgette saladChargrilled courgette, ricotta, rocket and mint salad
Serves 4
2 green and 2 yellow courgettes
4 handfuls of washed rocket
1 handful of fresh mint leaves
50gms of nuts toasted (hazelnuts, walnuts or cobnuts)
1 lemon
6 tablespoons of olive oil
Maldon sea salt
Fresh black pepper
200gms smoked ricotta, fresh ricotta or fresh goats cheese

1. Put your chargrilled pan on to heat up and using a peeler or mandolin, slice the courgettes lengthways to create courgette ribbons.
2. Place the courgette ribbons on the chargrill and press down with tongs so the entire length gets a chance to have some heat on it. As soon as the charred stripe appears remove with tongs to a separate dish. You need only do one side of the courgettes.
3. Roast the nuts in the oven, they rarely need more than 10 minutes but do watch them, I think I burn more nuts than anything else!
4. Finely zest and juice the lemon and whisk together with the olive oil.
5. Now put you salad together, rocket first, a few courgette ribbons, some nuts, crumbled ricotta and some chopped fresh mint, drizzle with the dressing between each layer and season well with salt and pepper.

Notes

How to get there: Actually it is not that easy, no direct flights, but a liquorice assortment of combinations of flying to Italy or Sicily and then on. Alternatively one can fly to Trapani and then catch a ferry to the island.

Where to stay: I am sure there are a many hotels on the island, but we opted for the self-catering option and stayed at the fabulous ‘Djenna’, which is sublime, I could write an essay on how wonderful it is. http://pantelleriacollection.com/it/pantelleria/

Where to eat: We only ate out a couple of times but both restaurants I would recommend; La Nicchia in Scauri and ‘The Prince and the Pirate’.

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Notes from Pantelleria

Posted on September 6, 2013 by lardersaga

Time‘Pantelleria’, is a small volcanic island west of Sicily, about 30 miles east of Tunisia, and it is where I am now (actually not any longer but due to a lost bag and laptop there has been a slight delay in publication). Wild and forgotten this is a place one arrives at and allegedly cries, yet when it comes to leaving, one also cries. It has a knack of getting under your skin and being our third visit one can assume we are totally smitten. Honestly, I had never heard of it before 2004, but thankfully since then it has been officially on my radar. Beautiful in its timeless and hostile landscape one cannot escape from the effortless island pace of life, luxuriously slow and gentle. Lost in an age where technology seemingly rules our world this little island is a long way from the fast pace of London, my rather under utilised iPhone got dropped on day 1 and has not been located since, and frankly I don’t really care, frankly it is rather liberating!

The island is famously known as the home for ‘caperi’, the one product that is exported in vast quantities to the rest of Italy and indeed the world. Yes, there are some vines and some rather good wine, in particular the local ‘Passito’, but capers are the real currency and boy do they feature in the cooking. These small little gems have inhabited our larder for some time and I have to admit I am a committed fan, they are such a useful little number to have at hand and being in their home territory we are seeing rather a lot of them.

Take yesterday for example, ‘Francesco’ (otherwise known as ‘Jack Sparrow’ but more on that another day) our new local boating friend  took us out in his boat to shim around the clearer waters of the coastline inaccessible by foot. Having anchored up in turquoise waters all on board dived in with the exception of him and ‘Valeria’ the all important boat girl. While we splashed around searching for sea urchins, starfish and creatures of the deep the boat team put together an authentic ‘Pantescan’ lunch. Which given the cooking facilities was pretty astonishing, one tiny gas primer stove to feed 8 hungry mouths!  Spaghetti with fresh tomatoes, garlic, almonds and capers miraculously appeared, sportingly laid out on a flashy bright blue clothed, magically erected table. It was sublime, especially so with the rather novel ‘nut addition’, adding texture and flavour to this very simple tomato pasta dish.

The ‘nuts’ jolted my rather stunted holiday brain and I suddenly remembered how many of the islands off Italy, particularly Sicily and Sardinia use nuts liberally in sauces to accompany pasta, particularly almonds and pistachios, you only have to open Locatelli’s cook book on Sicily and there glinting out of the pages are bright green pistachios, golden almonds and pinenuts a plenty. But it wasn’t just the nuts that made this so good; sun ripened tomatoes, just the right amount of garlic and of course the critical ‘caper’. It was really ‘deleeeshush’, as the ‘pink one’ announced, and certainly one I will try and reincarnate on return to ‘Blighty’ assuming my tomatoes have gone scarlet red and are crying out to be eaten!

My version of: Fresh Tomato Pasta with Toasted Almonds and Crumbs

Serves 4

400gms of spaghetti

400gms of vine ripened cherry tomatoes cut into quarters

2 cloves of garlic crushed and a pinch of dried chilli or 2

3 tablespoons of capers

4 tablespoons of toasted almonds

4 tablespoons of stale bread crumbs cooked off in olive oil till golden (sourdough works really well)

Several glugs of olive oil, a good grind of black pepper and a liberal pinch of Maldon sea salt

1. Put the water on to boil with a good pinch of salt.

2. Meanwhile quarter the tomatoes and mix in the crushed garlic, capers, chilli and ground pepper, splash liberally with olive oil and give this a really good stir.

3. The almonds we bought in Pantelleria were pre-roasted so as soon as you crush them up they revealed their golden middles. I have never seen this in England so you will need to roast your whole almonds and then crush them with a pestle and mortar or chop with a knife.

4. Cook your pasta till it is al dente and drain. Remember to save some of the cooking water from the pasta. Put the pasta back in the saucepan and add the tomatoes, capers etc. Give everything a really good stir and then add a few tablespoons of pasta water. This will give the pasta a silky texture and will add to the tomato sauce. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper – be quite generous a good teaspoon or 2 of Maldon sea salt and a healthy amount of black pepper will not go amiss. Serve on to warm plates and top with the crumbs and chopped almonds.

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Heidi and Peter country

Posted on August 7, 2013 by lardersaga

 

Cow bells, wild flowers, snowy peaks, fresh unpasteurized milk and lots of cheese. Where else could I be but in the higher climes of the Swiss alps. Not the obvious choice of summer holiday, not a bucket and spade in sight, but woe betide anyone who deems this a cop-out. Escaping the suffocating heat of the city this really was what the proverbial ‘doctor’ called for. With the ‘Sound of Music’ ringing in my ears and the ‘little people’ in tow our adventure unravelled over 4 days and we returned converted lovers of ‘mountains in summer’.

Swiss cheeseWe were the extremely spoilt guests of some dear friends of mine who happen to own a very pretty chalet perched high above the charming town of Champery. On a one track road to nowhere some clever developer has built a handful of traditional chalets. Clearly erected with skiing in mind they are stunningly located summer or winter. It is high, about 1800 metres, so the view is spectacular, the drive up a little hairy, with a wee single track road clinging to the mountain face, but once there you barely want to move. The only other noisy residents being the beautiful, and I really mean that, cows, all with their own bells ‘ding-donging’ away. It’s a wonderful harmony to wake up and go to sleep to and an integral part of life at this altitude!

Summer in the alps revealed itself to be children’s heaven. Practically every restaurant has a fun, innovative play area, occasionally with the added bonus of animals thrown in for extra amusement. A small bag of nuts guarantees added excitement in the goat enclosure and there’s horse riding for those looking for something more conventional. The list of things to do is endless, from the novel to the totally unexpected. The ‘luge’ in Chatel was a top trump, riding the ‘flying train’ (cable car) was pretty popular but what curiously won hands down was watching the goats being milked at ‘Chez Gaby’. The children were rivetted, and I haven’t even started on the food….yet!

TartI’ll keep it brief in the eating department. Switzerland is famous for chocolate and also cheese. Let’s call it mountain cheese, as to be honest I am not sure I ever got the correct local name. My highlight on this sojourn was without question going to collect fresh milk from the local dairy herd and procure some of the cheese. Of course the milk was unpasteurized, to be precise the cows had only been milked 20 minutes prior to our visit. Can I just say how amazing full fat, fresh cows milk tastes. It is quite breathtaking, a country a mile from anything I have ever drunk before. As for the cheese, we chose one that was 3 months old and another that was 18 months. The difference was astonishing, not in a bad way, but totally different cheeses, the young one was fragrant and slightly soft while the older had a distinct caramelised note to it and typically was golden in color and hard in texture. As a result of my ‘cheese fest’, I have been craving Swiss cheese ever since touching down in ‘Blighty’. Thank fully a magazine I picked up provided the inspiration and hence the tart in the photos above was born, a happy marriage of surplus garden vegetables and the all important mountain cheese that I love so much.

Garden Vegetable Tart with Gruyere– Serves 4 – inspired by Delicious, September

1 pack of puff pastry: rolled out thin to line either a rectangular or round tart tin

Filling: 3 egg yolks, 100ml of creme fraiche, salt and pepper, 80g of finely grated gruyere, 4 spring onions sliced finely, 1 handful of fresh chives (or parsley, or tarragon)

3 courgettes very finely sliced and blanched briefly in boiling water

To decorate: 2 handfuls of fresh garden peas, 2/3 handfuls of rocket, 2 handfuls of podded broad beans

1. Preheat the oven to 200c, cover the lined tart tin with baking paper and ideally fill with baking beans and bake for about 20 minutes until the pastry is golden and dried out.

2. Remove the tart from the oven and spread the filling over the base, sprinkle with the spring onions followed by the courgettes, followed by some additional grated gruyere. Return to the oven for about 12-15 minutes till the filling has risen and set. Remove and scatter with fresh peas, beans and rocket. Serve warm or leave to cool and take on a picnic!

Notes from Switzerland:

We stayed at Chalet Les Beliers, http://www.chaletlesbeliers.com/ ; which is available to rent Summer or Winter.

We ate at Chez Gaby : http://www.chezgaby.ch/ ; wonderful food and an extraordinary wine list. Also good for viewing goats. Milking takes place at 5pm every day.

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Lolly pop, lolly pop….

Posted on July 30, 2013 by lardersaga

Ice lolliesI admit it was a fair few years back but there was a time when all I wanted on top of my ice cream was some ghastly melting chocolate sauce called ‘Iced Magic’. I seem to remember it came in a number of flavours and froze on impact with the innocent unadulterated ice cream that it made contact with. Thankfully my ice cream tastes have improved and actually I would almost deem myself a wee bit of an ice cream snob, making massive detours to end up in my favorite gelateria’s! The ‘little people’, strangely, have had to be encouraged to eat the cold stuff. It took a degree of patience and determination on my behalf to convince them that ice cream is not to be sniffed at, instead it should be rapidly inhaled before a prying ‘Mummy’ takes a sly scoop or 2.

Lolly makerI have practically stopped making ice cream, selfishly because all I do is eat it. Also there was a time when I was super spoilt and had an all singing and dancing machine to aid the process, not the eating bit but the manufacture! Now that the mass catering has come to a halt so has the ice cream production, well almost, and probably saved my waist line. So having weened the ‘little people’ on to the cold stuff I was beginning to look at a rapidly diminishing bank account as the school holidays loomed and the hot weather seemingly just got hotter and hotter. Imagine my delight one morning while bombing around Waitrose to discover the ‘cutest’ (I hate the word but you have to admit they are) of lolly pop makers; cunningly designed with a bucket at the bottom and a ‘sippy, sucky straw’ to slurp up all the melted contents, the result of hours of licking and melting, wow, children can really make these things last!

lolly2This has to be the best thing I have bought this summer. Certainly the ‘little people’ would vote for it, and possibly Mr.P to as it has inadvertently saved him a fortune on shop bought lollies and ices. Not only has this charming delight of a lolly pop maker saved the pennies it has also, unbelievably and slightly unintentionally, made the ‘pink’ and ‘blue’ eat things they never would have dreamed of! Gooseberry and blackcurrant for starters, who would have thought; added to which there is huge excitement in making the lolly pops and a vast amount of anticipation for the lolly masterpiece that is revealed, but only after all the ‘trees’ (brocolli to you and me) have been consumed. To be honest we have not been that adventurous in lolly pop mixology, the flavor combinations have been dictated mainly from what fruit is about to turn and hence is rescued from the firing line by being rapidly pureed and slung into the lolly moulds. Our signature pop goes something like this; ‘Cawston Apple Juice’ on the bottom, strawberry or raspberry puree, sweetened with a touch of honey, followed by a fruit puree mixed with natural yogurt. So simple yet it knocks the socks off most pops!

Lolly pop lady

As you can see from the lolly pop lady above, serious concentration in progress! On that note, I can’t really give you a recipe as it really does not require one. Of course one could do a pure flavor but I think children like color and contrast. All I do is fill the containers with an inch of juice, put in the freezer for an hour or so and then top up with whatever puree I have knocking around.  To date we have tried gooseberry and yogurt, blackcurrant and yogurt,  raspberry and strawberry yogurt, all with resounding success. My point is this is not a time consuming cooking adventure, it is a simple, one would hope healthier, certainly cheaper alternative to what is available on the street; happy lolly making!

Ice Lolly Moulds; £2.50 from Waitrose

http://www.waitrose.com/shop/ProductView-10317–171634-Waitrose+Tooty+fruity+ice+lolly+moulds

Posted in Delectable delights, Picnic party, Toddlers and tinies | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Lemonade days

Posted on July 9, 2013 by lardersaga

Image

Oh yes….. bring it on….. this is just the right thirst quenching answer in what bodes to be the hottest week in England this year. I had completely forgotten how good it is and was reminded when I was in the fortunate position of making a batch for a ‘4th of July barbecue party’. Nestled somewhere between the mini ‘sliders’, that’ll be burgers to you and me, and mini hot dogs, stood a quaint selection of kilner bottles with said lemonade, and the most charming stripey straws money can buy. A complimentary change to the seasonal elderflower cordial that is being made in industrial quantities at home, and unlike the former it does not require citric acid which actually can be a bit of a fiddle to get hold of. Don’t ask me, but my pharmacist seems insistent on asking whether I am using it for drug production… !?! That aside chances are the ingredients for lemonade are probably lurking in your kitchen now.

Image

Lemons, sugar and water, that’s it. How simple, if you make it now it will be ready for drinking tomorrow, possibly in time for afternoon tea. You can play around with the ingredients, add lime, add elderflower, use agave nectar instead of sugar, basically you really can’t go wrong as long as you follow the very simple instructions below. I dilute mine with sparkling water and serve it with fresh sprigs of mint and a few ice cubes. Bottom line is this is easy, takes 10 minutes maximum to make, tastes fantastic and is a good world away from anything you have ever drunk before. It is nostalgia in a bottle; conjuring up memories of the Famous Five, camps, childhood, picnics and lots of adventures. And boy those adventures need sustenance, as the ‘pink’ and ‘blue’ daily demonstrate, trips to the ‘moon’ and ‘Africa’ are seemingly hot, hard work and need refreshments! Roll on the summer holidays and lots more lemonade!

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Homemade Lemonade

6 lemons

150gms of granulated sugar

2 1/4 pints of boiling hot water

1. Wash the lemons down. Pare with a good peeler the rind off 3 of the lemons and put in a large bowl or saucepan along with the sugar and the juice of all 6 lemons.

2. Now add the hot water and the sugar, stirring all the time till the sugar dissolves. Cover and leave to cool for 24 hrs.

3. Sieve the lemonade removing the rind and any pips and decant into storage bottles. Store in the fridge till your next picnic, adventure, trip to the ‘moon’ or ‘Africa’ !!!

Lemonade 5

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Rice paper rolls

Posted on July 3, 2013 by lardersaga

Spring rolls 008

The first week of Wimbledon has been and gone, and for the cynical among us, as sure as night follows day, ‘rain will stop play’. Yet between these poignant, classic, English summer showers there has been some remarkably ‘balmy’ weather, even verging on hot at times! London particularly heats up like an oven, at least our flat does and hence a little re-think in the cooking and menu planning department has taken place. I instinctively crave light, clean, crisp flavors; Summer garden salads are top of the list but having exhausted the radish supply and got slightly bored by the broad beans I have deviated East for some more punchy ‘taste explosions’. Thai Salads are always popular, packed with raw vegetables and punchy herbs they seem to cut through the heat and leave one zinging with the warmth of chilli, the coolness of mint and sharpness of lime. Dressed up with a ‘Nam Jim’ dressing, all sorts of combinations work and believe me, they are a welcome, welcome change, perfect Summer fare on humid, hot, steamy, city nights.

Spring rolls 006

Drum roll please…..let me introduce you to, ‘Vietnamese Rice Paper Rolls’. No looking back, once you’ve eaten these delicate little packages, you will be totally smitten. They happily tick the box of keeping it healthy and light. A little mint, crunchy cucumber, radish, bean sprout, carrot, prawn or crab, wrapped up in a magical sheet of rice paper and then dipped according to your taste into anything  ranging from a sweet chilli sauce to soy. How savvy are those Vietnamese to invent such a heavenly spring roll, such a distant cousin to the deep-fried variety more commonly seen. Making these rice paper rolls does require a little bit of attention, but that in itself can be quite therapeutic, given that the preparation in question is cutting lots of vegetables into identical shaped sizes!  Also, unless you are lucky enough to live in Vietnam or near an Asian restaurant, making your own is your only option for reincarnating this particular delicacy. Some nifty knife skills are a bonus, or failing that, investing in the extremely clever little gadget I was given for Christmas that can only be described as a ‘julienner’. Basically it is a ‘peeler shaped’ ‘julienne’ cutter,  total genius, and makes slicing the vegetables a whole lot easier. The end game is that these little rolls are the coolest, most refreshing morsels one can ever be lucky enough to eat. Packed with flavor I can’t recommend them enough for a little change from the norm as our Summer staggers on.

Spring rolls 002VIETNAMESE RICE PAPER ROLLS Serves 4

Vietnamese Spring Roll Wrappers  – I use the ones made by ‘Blue Dragon’, found in most large supermarkets in the Asian / Oriental section, make at least 2 per person

Any and maybe all, of the following combination of vegetables:

2 or 3 carrots

1/2 a cucumber

3 Spring onions

A good handful of bean sprouts

Radishes

Fresh mint and coriander leaves

1 Avocado

Cooked prawns or fresh crab

1. To make the spring rolls have all of your chosen ingredients prepared, and ready to go.

2. Have a bowl of hand warm water to hand – this is what you will use to re-hydrate the spring roll wrappers! When you are ready to go, dip one wrapper in the water for about 10 seconds, remove and lay flat. Place a couple of mint and coriander leaves flat, skin side down on the wrapper, now top with a few strips of your juilenned vegetables followed by your prawns or crab. Roll the wrapper up as tight as possible, cut in half and place on a platter. The rolls can be made a few hours in advance and kept in the fridge. If you are stacking them up they do tend to stick together slightly so my advice is to place a little baking paper between them. They are delicious served with a combination of dips, nam jim, works very well, a homemade sweet chilli and lime dipping sauce and may be a plain soy. I am not sure any of the dips are ‘Vietnamese authentic’ but they still seem to work.

And for the alternative option…………..

If throwing this together doesn’t rock your boat take a trip to ‘Mein Tay’; http://www.mientay.co.uk/ ; the most wonderful little Vietnamese restaurant in London. No glitz or glamour but the ‘Pho’ is fabulous, vouched for by AA.Gill!

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The humble radish

Posted on June 21, 2013 by lardersaga

Radish4I am quite partial to a radish. I think there is something slightly comedy about their appearance, riotous cerise with white tails. I can’t say I have that many use’s for them, at least I didn’t until this June when the only thing growing in abundance are the radishes in our garden. Peter Rabbit would be thrilled! I am thrilled, if a little daunted by the quantity and the fact they all need eating NOW. That, I believe is always the dilemma with homegrown vegetables, how to regulate, and how not to have a glut, superfluous to man or beast.

Radish10I have no idea why 2013 has produced such a bumper crop. Previously  they have been grown with only marginal success yet this year they are worthy on an outing to the village fete. We have 2 varieties, one the perfect round specimen and the other is the more random; slightly oddly shaped spherical one. Note the amateur gardener, no record of what was planted, what species or where the seeds came from, what a wolly! Never mind, back to the radish, neither are particularly hot, which in my eyes is a little sad, but both have a very satisfying crunch. Of course there is a hint of pepper but nothing like the horseradish hot that I have had on occasion. The obvious home for them is eaten raw and in salads, and to be honest why change that? They are surprisingly ‘good for you’ and extremely low in calories, that’s if you are counting. An astonishing 1 cup of sliced red radish equates to 20 calories!! Presumably by the time you have eaten them you have probably burnt off the calories consumed? Who knows, who cares! Added to which they have been in cultivation for hundreds of years, yes those savvy clever Romans ate them too.

Radish saladIn my quest to use up the harvest I have roasted them, pickled them, and eaten the large majority raw. The have been served whole, sliced wafer thin and quartered. They are pretty, pretty, pretty however you use them and I have to admit, have become a staple in every salad over the last few weeks. Jacob Kennedy in his cracking book ‘Boca’, has a stunning recipe that I posted about last year, ‘Raw’, which elevates the humble radish to a new height, thanks to lashings of truffle oil. But keeping it simple can also be equally successful, have a peek at the one below which packs a gorgeous summer punch of color, texture and flavour. Broad beans, shelled peas, radish, baby beetroot leaves and a very simply olive oil and lemon dressing, coupled with some freshly sliced mint, what is there not to like? Served alongside a barbecued shoulder of lamb the combination works magically. My apologies, I am not sure this is really worthy of a recipe but if you are looking for directions on quantities, see below:

Radish Salad with Broad beans, fresh peas and mint

Serves 6

500gms of broad beans

500gms of fresh peas in their pods

15 radishes

A handful of fresh mint

Several handfuls of baby beetroot leaves, picked from beetroot in the garden if you have!

Lemon and olive oil dressing – 1 lemon / olive oil

1. Pod the broad beans. Blanch them in a pan of boiling water and then plunge into cold water. Pod again, so you are left with the wicked green bean! Pod the fresh peas and mix with the beans. Wash the beet leaves and mint leaves and spin in a salad spinner. Now slice the mint leaves really finely or you could leave them whole. Wash the radishes and quarter.

2. To make the dressing add 2 tablespoons of lemon juice to 6 tablespoons of good olive oil, a pinch of sugar, salt and pepper. Whisk thoroughly and toss through the beans, peas and radishes. Scatter the mint and beet leaves on a plate and place the dressed radishes, beans and peas on top. Serve immediately.

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Festival Food

Posted on June 12, 2013 by lardersaga

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Possibly one of the best kept secrets south of the English Channel, is the magical and unique Queille Festival. Every 2 years since 2003 I have made a little pilgrimage out to this corner of south-west France to cook for this extraordinary event. Along with a happy band of merry chefs, we arrive on the Wednesday and cook frantically till late on the sunday night. The music of course is the main reason why people go, and that I am sad to say I have not seen or indeed heard much of, our focus is of course the food and feeding the festival goers and volunteers who make this weekend such a memorable event. Holed up in the medieval kitchen we have our own agenda and program as to what needs to be done. The number of mouths to feed escalates as the days pass by, peaking at around 200 to 230 over the weekend. It is feat of wonderful teamwork, vast amounts of organisation and lots of salad washing. It is hardly gourmet or Michelin star cuisine that we create, instead it is much more rustic, country and rural, in keeping with the festival, Chateau and the whole raison d’être as to why the festival started in the first place. I love it and adore the challenge it presents, with the constant shifting of menus and juggling what one can or can’t buy locally, it is several days of very large, moveable, happy feasts.

Queille 2013 067Take this year for example. Sunday night which is traditionally a sit down dinner in the famous ‘Big Top’ had a menu looking something like this: ‘Gazpacho with white balsamic condiment and basil oil’, ‘Slow braised beef with five spice, star anise and dates’, ‘Nectarine and polenta cake’. All sounds pretty sensible stuff, apart from on arrival in France we were greeted by grey clouds, temperatures of around 8c and lots of chilly lashing rain! Uuumm, not quite what I had in mind when I sold the trip to my happy team, of what hoped to be ‘bikini clad’ cooks!! Obviously I’m joking and honestly most of our work is conducted inside, but for the troops outside aspects of the menu had to change, nothing worse than eating refreshing ‘Gazpacho’ on a cold and wet Summers evening!

Queille 2013 063Mutterings of ‘Hocus Pocus’ and  ‘Abracadabra’ could be heard form the kitchen, lots of stirring of the cauldron, and the much more appropriate ‘Roasted red pepper and tomato soup with harrisa yoghurt and rocket oil’ was magiced into being! So as has happened before and I am sure will happen again, a little shifting of the boundaries, playing around with the ingredients resulted in a much happier ending. The same can be said for the pudding. We already had the ‘heads up’ that nectarines would be in bountiful supply, so it made perfect sense to incorporate them into a pudding. I had envisaged a polenta and almond based cake but had no ‘tried or tested’  recipe at my fingertips. A google search revealed a straight forward one that worked like a dream on the day, and allegedly improved with time. I can’t vouch for that,  as I was not around long enough for leftovers, but the pudding on the day smelt and tasted divine.  Scents of sweet sun ripened nectarines and rich vanilla wafted out of the kitchen on the breeze of what turned out to be the only sunny day. It was heavenly, the pudding and the day! Come rain or shine this is a lovely summer cake, either for tea or for pudding, particularly with lashings of nutmeg creme fraiche. As for the Queille Festival, words alone can do no justice, you will just have to go and experience it yourself, 2015 is the next one!

Queille 2013 105Nectarine, Polenta and Almond Cake – taken from http://recipes.coles.com.au/recipes/2546/nectarine-polenta-cake/

Serves 10

15ogms of butter at room temperature

3/4 cup of caster sugar

3 eggs

2tsp vanilla essence

1 cup of polenta

100g of ground almonds

1 tsp of baking powder

200g Plain yogurt

3 0r 4 nectarines

2 tablespoons of apricot jam for the glaze

1. Pre-heat oven to 180c. Grease a 20cm square cake tin and line base with baking paper.

2. Using electric beaters or a magimix beat the butter with the sugar and vanilla until pale and creamy. Add the eggs, one at a time, fold in the polenta, baking powder and yogurt.

3. Spoon into prepared tin and smooth the surface. Cut each nectarine into 8 wedges, lay overlapping on top of the cake batter. Bake for 45 – 55 minutes until risen, golden brown and just firm when touched in the centre.

4. Leave to cool on a wire rack and glaze with a pastry brush and apricot jam glaze. (2 tablespoons of apricot jam with 1 tablespoon of water heated up till the melts into the water).

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A Fairy Party

Posted on May 29, 2013 by lardersaga

Amalfi's Birthday 043I cannot believe the pink one is two. Walking, talking, independent, confident, and full of attitude of the good and bad variety. Thankfully she is still squidgy and hugely huggable, so there is a little bit of baby left, but not much!  Her fairy party was adorable, lots of pink, fluttery wings and pretty dresses, the sun shone, it was dry and the little darlings flew round the garden, bounced on the trampoline, rode ‘Toffee’, and shockingly, jumped in muddy puddles!

Amalfi's BirthdayThe fairy tea party was a thrill to create, pink elderflower cordial, stacks of pink meringues, fairy wands, pink fruit skewers and of course a 4 tier pink sponge cake with buttercream icing bedecked in lots of flowers and edible butterflies. Probably not the healthiest tea in history but it looked charming and the birthday girl loved it. A very helpful fairy godmother, who resides in Africa, had been wonderfully inspiring and it was all thanks to her that the super popular star wands appeared on the menu. Buttery shortbread  stuck together with icing, decorated with iced flowers and glittery icing. The pink one was quite overwhelmed, even requesting a ‘dar’, before bed!

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It was without doubt a team effort. Mr.P decorated the fairy dell, cladding it in loose white linen. The Raj tent was erected in the garden, spare wings were left on the coat rails, fairy dust and magic everywhere. What a wonderful way to welcome in the year famously known as the ‘terrible twos’.

Fairy Wands (recipe adapted from the Billingtons Sugar, ‘Baking Mad’ Vanilla Star Recipe)

150gms Butter

50gms golden caster sugar

25gms icing sugar

1tsp vanilla extract

300gms plain white flour

Set the oven to 180C and line 2 baking trays with parchment paper.

1. Cream together the butter, sugars and vanilla extract either in a Magimix or in a Kenwood with the beater going at full speed.

2. Slowly add in the flour until you have a pliable ball of dough, you may not need all the flour, I certainly did not. Wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for 15 minutes or so.

3. Dust a surface with icing sugar and roll out the dough till about 2-3 mm thick and stamp out your stars. Pop on the baking trays and put in the fridge to chill again for another 15 minutes.

4. Bake in the oven until just beginning to turn golden at the edges. About 12 – 15 minutes. Leave to cool on a baking tray.

5. Leave as stars or make into wands by sandwiching a skewer stick with butter icing between 2 stars – abracadabra………fairy wands. Decorate with glitter, icing and flowers.


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