I know that the fact I like to invite people to a dinner party sounds as though I’m stuck in the 80s (or 70s, even), but sometimes I want to give family or friends a bit of a treat, to indulge them a little. Laying on dinner is the main way in which I do that: it’s the chance to serve nice drinks and to be able to sit around a table that has been ever so slightly primped and polished – all of which gives the evening more of a sense of occasion than your usual homely, workaday supper. I’m not necessarily suggesting that you bring out the posh china or freshly laundered napkins, nor am I demanding that people dress up, but a delicious, carefully thought-out dinner that’s been designed to please and pamper is a wonderful thing. It is, for everyone, the culinary equivalent of being given a beautiful present, a relaxing massage, or even a full-blown visit to a spa. And if you want to throw in some nice music and a couple of candles to add to the therapeutic ambience, that’s really up to you.
When I was a vegetarian, I could never have given up eating fish: I love it too much. For me, wandering around a vast fish market awash with gleaming scales, glittering eyes and pile upon pile of sparkling shellfish is one of life’s magical moments – I almost have to stop myself from bursting into a bad rendition of ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’. I also relish the buying of fresh fish: the choosing and pointing; the flash of the sharp knives; the constant splash of fresh, icy water. I am also, oddball that I am, curiously fond of the white paper my fish gets wrapped in.
And then there’s the cooking. I have to admit that I rather enjoy the faint tension that cooking fish brings, the anxiety that having spent a certain amount of money on your dinner, you are now about to ruin it. Fish, after all, demands a light hand and a sharp eye on the clock. As long as one remembers this, it’s a joy to prepare and is the ideal fast food. None of the recipes in this section takes long to make, so you could easily knock them up for a midweek splurge (they aren’t intended to be prepared ahead of time). For some reason, I always crave fish more in the warmer months, so most of these menus have a fairly summery feel. That’s not to say that fish is banned in the winter in my house, it’s just that when it’s cold outside I want to eat something a little less elegant than a rather refined sea bass or a delicate piece of sole. Come a touch of chill and I need my fish to be more rustic and coated in some sort of gloopy comfort, such as sauces, cheese and good-old mashed potato.
A summer’s evening and it’s dinner on the terrace for four. It’s me, the Vicar, and another couple. I wanted to serve a main course that was fresh, light and full of zing. After that, I was after a contrasting pudding: something luxurious and wickedly creamy Come to think of it, if you halved everything, this meal would make fabulous seduction food. Actually, don’t halve the pudding: scoff the lot.
ROASTED RED ONION AND TOMATOES
GRIDDLED COURGETTES IN GARLIC AND PARSLEY DRESSING
WHITE CHOCOLATE AND RASPBERRY CRÉME BRÛLÉE
I love tuna, but only if it’s cooked to perfection. For me, that means rare, but hot all the way through. It’s quite a tricky culinary feat to pull off; tuna steaks coming in various shapes and sizes, and all. Too little time on the griddle and the fish ends up cold in the middle; too much, and you might as well feed it to the cat.
I remember one particularly bad tuna event some years back at some friends’ house. The male half of the couple proudly announced that he was cooking tuna niçoise, and we all spent a fair few minutes making bonding murmurs about the necessity for it to be cooked just-so. The Vicar and I joined the chef in the kitchen as he cheerfully set about his task. Salad made; dressing prepared; on went the tuna. Two minutes passed; five minutes passed; ten minutes passed. By now the Vicar and I could barely still hold a conversation, transfixed, we stared in sad horror as the still-happy chef carried out tuna cremation. After fifteen minutes, Cardboard Niçoise was finally on the table. A memorable meal.
Here is a tuna dish that I hope will stick in your minds for all the right reasons: it’s colourful, light, yet full of flavour and beautiful to behold. I used to hate guacamole (and if it is shop-bought I still do; it looks like a terrifyingly toxic substance exuded by aliens from Doctor Who); homemade, however, is a different matter. There’s texture, and the combination of the soft mildness of the avocado, the heat of the chilli, the zinginess of the lime and the fragrance of the coriander is addictive. The tuna doesn’t take very long to cook, so do prepare any other dishes first.
4 spring onions or ½ small red
onion, peeled and finely chopped
juice of 4 limes
2 tablespoons coriander, chopped
4–5 teaspoons red chilli (fresh, or ‘Lazy Chilli’ from a jar), de-seeded and finely chopped
2 large or 4 small ripe avocados, peeled and stoned
salt and pepper
2 small packets plain tortilla chips
4 spankingly fresh tuna steaks (each weighing about 175–200g)
To make the guacamole, all you need to do is pile the spring onions, lime juice, coriander, chilli, avocados and seasoning into a bowl and mash them together. Don’t go wild, though, as you want a bit of lumpiness going on to avoid any reminders of alien pus (sorry, now I’ve probably put you off your food). These quantities make too much guacamole for the tuna recipe, so feel free to graze a bit as you cook.
Heat up the griddle or frying pan over a high heat until it’s smoking hot. Meanwhile, bash the bags of tortilla chips with a rolling pin, which, if you have a childish bone in your body, is a job you’ll enjoy. It’ll make you want to get another bag and do that fantastically irritating banging thing that makes the crisp bag burst open and drives sensible adults totally mad. Anyway, toast the crumbs lightly in another, dry, frying pan and watch them like a hawk – you want them to be lightly golden, not burnt.
Meanwhile, griddle the tuna steaks on each side. For tuna steaks about 1½cm thick, I would go for 1½ minutes on each side, maybe slightly less. If they’re thicker, they will obviously need a bit longer. Remove from the pan and spread each steak with a thick carpet of guacamole, then sprinkle over the tortilla crumbs to make a crust. Serve with the roasted red onions and tomatoes and the dressed courgettes and eat, maybe with a glass of chilled rose wine.
6 large, vine-ripened tomatoes, halved
2 red onions, peeled and quartered
4 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
4 tablespoons basil oil
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Arrange the tomatoes and onions in a roasting tin, sprinkle over the garlic and basil oil and season generously with salt and pepper. Pop the dish in an oven preheated to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. The vegetables need to cook for 25–30 minutes or until they are nicely browned and tender, at which point you can swirl in 1 tablespoon of the balsamic vinegar. Turn the oven down low, to about 120°C/Gas Mark ½, and put the dish back in whilst you finish off preparing the rest of the feast.
2 courgettes
olive oil, for brushing
6 tablespoons lemon oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons flatleaf parsley, chopped
Halve the courgettes widthways, then slice each half lengthways into thin slices. Brush them with some olive oil and either sear them in a frying pan or griddle them on a ridged grill pan, if you have one, so that you get those nice, brown ridge marks that make you feel ever so slightly chef-like.
Once the courgettes are cooked, put them on a plate and pop it in the warm oven to keep the tomatoes company. Combine the lemon oil and lemon juice in a small bowl, add the garlic and seasoning and stir together thoroughly. When you are ready to serve, slather it over the courgettes and sprinkle over the parsley.
This luxurious pudding provides a fantastic contrast to the fresh-tasting main course. It needs to be made in advance (bar the caramelising bit), which means that once the tuna is dealt with, you can relax and lap up the fabulous pleasures of good food and friends.
225g fresh raspberries
200g good-quality white chocolate
400ml double cream
5 egg yolks
1 tablespoon caster sugar
about 100g demerara sugar
Divide the raspberries among the bases of four ramekins or small shallow dishes of about 9cm in diameter. You may not need all of the fruit, depending on the size of your dishes, but keep any that’s left over to serve on the side. Pop all four dishes into the freezer.
Break the white chocolate into a bowl placed over a pan of just simmering water and leave to cook until glossily molten and smooth. Take care not to let the bowl touch the water or let it get too hot, or the chocolate will go grainy. Heat the double cream in a small pan until hand-hot. Whisk the yolks and caster sugar in a bowl for a couple of minutes, then carefully pour the hot cream on to the yolks and whisk together. Pour the mixture through a sieve back into a clean pan and stir over a low heat for about 5 minutes or until the custard is very thick. Remove from the heat, add the melted chocolate and mix together until smooth. Leave to cool for about 10 minutes and then pour the mixture into the ramekins. Cover and chill in the fridge overnight or until set.
Once set, sprinkle the tops of the brúlées with the demerara sugar and spray with a little water, which helps the sugar to caramelise. (You can buy water sprays at garden centres, or places like Ikea.) Blast the tops of the puddings with a blowtorch or place the ramekins under a hot grill until the sugar is a beautiful golden brown. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes before serving.
Summer has nearly left London, and so too have some friends of ours, who are moving. To say a goodbye to both I cooked a delicately delicious, late-summer dinner that had one of my guests vigorously and unashamedly scraping his plate clean.
WARM SMOKED TROUT FILLETS IN A HORSERADISH AND CHIVE CREAM SAUCE
GARLICKY POTATOES IN ROSEMARY AND PANCETTA
LAVENDER SHORTBREAD WITH BLACKBERRIES IN MUSCAT AND LEMON CREAM
8 fillets of hot-smoked trout
15g butter
1 shallot, peeled and finely chopped
150ml white wine
200ml double cream
2 teaspoons horseradish cream
juice of ½ lemon
1 tablespoon chives, chopped
salt and pepper
The trout needs little preparation: it only needs to be heated through just before serving. I know many people despise the microwave, but it’s a very convenient tool for something like this. Trout fillets are quite delicate little creatures, so rather than heat them in an oven in a baking tray (they’d take around 10–12 minutes at 160°C/Gas Mark 3) and then have to oh-so-carefully transfer them to warm plates, I found it easier to put the cold fillets on their plates and zap them in the microwave for 90 seconds per plate. Hot fillets and hot plates in one easy step! I did this as the sauce was reaching its final stages and put the prepared plates of fish in the oven to keep their heat once they’d had their time in the microwave.
To make the sauce, melt the butter in a medium-sized pan and cook the shallot until soft but not brown. Pour in the wine and let it reduce for 6–7 minutes until fairly syrupy. Add the cream, and again let it reduce a bit before adding the rest of the ingredients. Season well and pour over the fish. Eat with the green and red salad and garlicky potatoes and feel free to lick your plates.
750g floury maincrop potatoes, such as King Edwards or Maris Piper
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
3 sprigs of rosemary, leaves pulled off the stalks
60g cubed pancetta or smoked bacon lardons
salt and pepper
Prepare the potatoes first. Wash them, dry them in some kitchen towel, then cut them into 2cm chunks. Pop them in a roasting tin with the oil, garlic and rosemary.
Preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. Meanwhile, fry the pancetta lightly (no oil needed). Toss this in with the potatoes, season with salt and pepper and put in the oven. They should take about 45 minutes. When done, the potatoes should be pleasingly crispy on the outside and fluffy in the middle, which, incidentally, is just how I like my chips.
1 large red onion, peeled
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 garlic clove, peeled and crushed
1 teaspoon French mustard
salt and pepper
pinch of granulated sugar
125g baby asparagus spears or French beans, trimmed
a large handful of sugar snaps
7 sweet baby plum tomatoes, halved
1 tablespoon flatleaf parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon basil leaves, torn into small pieces
For the salad, cut the onion in half lengthways through the root, then across into 5mm thick slices and separate them into rings. Toss the red onion rings in a roasting tin with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil and put in the oven on the shelf below the potatoes (still set to 200°C/Gas Mark 6). They will only need about 10 minutes in there to sweeten and soften up. When the onion rings are ready, put the rest of the olive oil and the vinegar, garlic, mustard, seasoning and sugar into a salad bowl and whisk everything together to combine. Add the roasted onions, oil and all.
Cook the asparagus spears for 3 minutes in salted boiling water (French beans will take slightly longer – 4 minutes or so or until they still have bite, but aren’t raw), adding the sugar snaps for the last minute or so of the cooking time. Drain the vegetables and add them, still warm, to the salad bowl. Leave the salad on the side whilst you get on with the fishy bit. Just before serving, add the tomatoes and herbs to the bowl and toss everything together.
Apart from the shortbread, this dessert is a bit of a cheat. I included the lavender in the biscuits to pick up on the purple colour of the blackberries and to add a note of mysterious scentiness. To adorn the top of the biscuits, I naughtily plucked a sprig of fresh lavender from someone’s front garden down the road. Unfortunately, my son saw me and copied my evil actions a few doors down, gleefully grabbing a bundle of leaves from a rather attractive plant. There’s nothing like leading by example. The poor child was spotted mid-theft by the Vicar and scolded, to my very great shame.
The blackberries need only be warmed through in the sweet, honeyed wine and the lemon cream is just good lemon curd mixed with Greek yogurt. But there’s no need to divulge these secrets if you don’t want to; just sit back and watch people enjoy the pleasing combination of some tender blackberries, a creamy yet zesty mousse, and a nice crisp biscuit. Or maybe two.
For the lavender shortbread:
olive oil, for greasing
160g plain flour
15g semolina
100g butter
1 teaspoon dried lavender (or finely chopped fresh)
50g caster sugar
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
2 teaspoons lemon juice
For the blackberries in Muscat:
450g blackberries
100ml sweet dessert wine, such as Muscat de Beaumes de Venise or the far cheaper Moscatel de Valencia
1 tablespoon caster sugar
For the lemon cream:
400g Greek natural yogurt
4 tablespoons good-quality lemon curd
Preheat the oven to 160°C/Gas Mark 3. For the lavender shortbread, wipe a little oil over two baking trays and then sift the flour into a large bowl, followed by the semolina. Cut the butter into chunks and stir in. You could use a food processor to combine all this together, but if you can’t be bothered to get it out, rub in the butter with your fingertips, allowing the mixture to fall through your fingers. Continue until it looks like fine breadcrumbs and then stir in the lavender, sugar and lemon zest and juice. Using your hands, form the mixture into a ball and then place it on a lightly floured surface. Roll out the dough with a floured rolling pin until it is about 5mm thick, and then cut out lots of little shapes using mini-sized cutters. (I used a star shape and a heart shape.)
Using a spatula or a palette knife, lift the biscuits onto the baking trays, re-kneading and rolling out any scraps until all the dough has been used. Bake for 12–15 minutes until crisp and lightly golden, then place on a wire rack to cool.
For the blackberries, put the fruit, wine and sugar into a pan and stir over a low heat until the sugar has disappeared and the blackberries are hot but not collapsing.
For the lemon cream, simply stir the Greek yogurt and lemon curd together. Serve with the blackberries and lavender shortbreads or eat on its own as a lemon mousse.
Whilst this dinner doesn’t cost a king’s ransom to produce, it’s luxurious, delicious and makes you feel that you are richer than you really are. If, in reality, you aren’t hugely wealthy, can I beg you to remind yourself of the fact as soon as you can after finishing eating? I’d hate to be the one to blame if, full of this sumptuous food, you rush out and buy a Porsche.
The dessert is my twist on that old-fashioned classic, Peach Melba. I remember eating cheap café versions of it as a child: tinned peaches and sickly sauce, served with bad-quality ice cream. I served my version on one big white plate and gave everyone a spoon – which was a bad idea as a physical fight nearly ensued. Unfortunately, one greedy person (okay, actually it was my spouse) felt he had the right to try and hoover up everything from left, right and centre. ‘Get off!’ came the outraged cry from the woman to his left, ‘That’s my sauce!’
Please note that the peaches need to be served at room temperature, so you should bake them a little in advance to allow them time to cool down. You could also prepare the raspberry purée ahead of time.
PLAICE IN SOURED CREAM AND CHIVES
BABY JERSEY ROYAL POTATOES IN CAVIAR
BAKED PEACHES IN SPIKED RASPBERRY PURÉE
4 large, or 8 small, spankingly fresh fillets of plaice
salt and pepper
6 tablespoons crème fraîche
3 tablespoons chives, chopped (I use kitchen scissors, it’s loads easier)
juice of 1½ lemons
3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
For the potatoes:
500g baby Jersey Royal potatoes
big slice of butter, about 25g
4 teaspoons lumpfish caviar or salmon keta
black pepper
4 big handfuls of baby spinach leaves
Take your lovely shiny pieces of plaice, lay them out in a baking dish and season liberally. Then mix the crème fraîche with the chives, lemon juice and garlic and a really generous grinding of salt and pepper, and spread this mixture over the fish. The potatoes and the fish will both take 20–25 minutes to cook, so put the potatoes in a pan of salted boiling water and pop the fish in an oven preheated to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. You could now tidy up a bit or else defiantly turn your back on any kitchen mess and go and have a nice chilled glass of wine with your guests, which is obviously the polite option.
When the cooking time is up (keep your eye on the clock), drain those beautiful potatoes and anoint them with a generous amount of butter, the caviar or salmon keta and some black pepper (no salt, though, as the caviar is quite salty enough). The plaice is cooked when it has lost any hint of translucency, but you want it to remain moist and tender. Keep an eye on it during the cooking time if you are at all worried.
Serve each person with a plaice fillet and some sauce, some potatoes and a handful of baby spinach. I don’t think you should dress the leaves – they are there for colour and to mop up any stray bits of sauce or caviar butter.
4 ripe peaches, halved and the stones removed
8 teaspoons demerara sugar
250g fresh raspberries
2 tablespoons icing sugar
a good splash of vodka, about 2 tablespoons
some good-quality vanilla ice cream, to serve
Preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. Place the peaches flesh-side up in a shallow baking dish and sprinkle each half with 1 teaspoon of the demerara sugar. Now splash each half with about 2 teaspoons of cold water and cook the peaches in the oven for around 25 minutes. The peaches are ready when they are tender when pierced with a sharp knife. Allow to cool.
For the purée, combine the raspberries with the icing sugar and put the whole lot in a blender and whizz. Now push the purée through a sieve into a small pan, add the vodka and warm gently over a low heat. Swirl it over the peaches and serve with the vanilla ice cream. It’ll look beautiful and taste so, too.
A trip to the fishmonger’s and I am very many pounds lighter – financially, that is. But that’s okay, this dinner was always meant to be a treat; a chance to spoil tired friends who don’t earn very much but really appreciate lovely food. It turned out to be a very happy, laid-back evening. Indeed, one old friend relaxed so much that, by the time pudding was finished, he was fast asleep, head on the table, snoring loudly. He rang up the next day to say thank you and apologise ‘for the lack of service towards the end’.
Like the main course, the pudding is a bit special, too. For a start, gooseberries are only really around for a few brief weeks in the summer, so eating them always feels like a celebration in its own right. You could also make this pudding with other fruit, such as blackberries, which you wouldn’t need to cook in the pan or add sugar to. But the combination of slightly tart gooseberries and elderflower-scented creamy custard is something that is really rather hard to beat.
PAN-ROASTED HALIBUT ON CLAM STEW
GOOSEBERRY AND ELDERFLOWER CUSTARD
I often buy mussels, but hardly ever clams. However, having eaten some on holiday in Spain, I decided to give them a go. I tracked down the palourdes (also known as carpetshell clams) at my local fishmonger, which are bigger than some other varieties. You may want to give your fishmonger a ring to check if he has them in or if he can order some for you. If you can’t get clams, use mussels instead.
1kg fresh clams (palourdes)
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 heaped teaspoon red chilli (fresh, or use ‘Lazy Chilli’ from a jar), de-seeded and finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped
250ml white wine
900ml passata
6 fillets of halibut or any other meaty white fish, each weighing about 200g
2 tablespoons parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon basil leaves, torn up
juice of ½ lemon
salt and pepper
When you’ve got your bag of shellfish home, empty it into a big bowl of cold water and discard any shells that are open. (It’s probably unnecessary to remind you not to eat any that are tight shut once you’ve cooked them. However, I once cooked some mussels and absent-mindedly prised one open at the dinner table and ate it. Let’s say I didn’t sleep much that night.) In a big, deep, flameproof pan (I used my trusty witch’s cauldron), heat 2 tablespoons of the oil and then add the onion, chilli and garlic. Fry gently for about 5 minutes until the onion has softened, but not browned. Throw in the clams, pour over the wine and bring to the boil. When you can see it bubbling away, add the passata and cook for about five minutes or until the clams are open.
Meanwhile, pour the rest of the olive oil into a frying pan and place on a high heat. Once the oil is really hot, lower in the fish, skin-side down and cook for about 4 minutes. (I chose halibut as it is a meaty fish which, unlike cod, doesn’t fall apart when it’s cooked. It is a bit of a treat, though, being devilishly expensive.) Have a little peek at the skin now and again, as you are aiming for brown and crispy. Gently turn the fish over and cook for around 30 seconds more, then turn off the heat.
It’s handy to get one of your guests involved at some point in the end stages of cooking, preferably someone who doesn’t mind getting a bit mucky (don’t go for anyone wearing white or dry clean only!). The friend needs to de-shell as many clams from the big pan as he/she can manage, removing the shells and discarding them. Not all of them need this treatment, as some unshelled clams in the stew look pretty, it’s just that if they are all in the shells the dish is a bit of a faff to eat, and some people can’t abide food that needs a lot of fiddling with before they can actually get it in their mouths.
Before serving the stew, add the herbs and lemon juice and test for seasoning, adding pepper but being restrained with the salt as the clams have their own sea-salty taste. Serve the stew in big flat bowls, with the fish placed on top, skin-side up. All you need to accompany it is some good bread.
Oh, it took me endless trouble to get this recipe right. I wanted the custard to be set, but not overly firm. The first one I attempted was too runny and the second had lost all its unctuous wobble. I kept trying because the taste of the thing was so beautiful that I really wanted to get it right. And here you have it. Prepare it before your guests arrive, as it is best served at room temperature and making it will require all your attention.
350g gooseberries (or, out of season, use a 350g jar of bottled gooseberries and then only 3 tablespoons of cordial)
5 tablespoons elderflower cordial
6 large egg yolks
50g caster sugar
500ml double cream
You will need one shallow gratin dish, about 1.2 litres in capacity.
Pull the little fluffy stalks off the gooseberries and discard, then wash the fruit in a colander or sieve. Pop them in a pan and add 2 tablespoons of the elderflower cordial. Put the gooseberries on a medium heat and cook until they start to pop and the juices are syrupy; this should only take a few minutes. Drain them of any liquid and discard it, tip the gooseberries into the gratin dish and set aside so you can crack on with the custard. (If you are using gooseberries from a jar, there is no need to cook them: just drain them of their juice and put them straight into the gratin dish.)
Briefly whisk the egg yolks in a large bowl with the sugar, then heat the double cream and the rest of the elderflower cordial in a small pan until boiling. Pour the scented cream onto the egg yolks and sugar, stirring constantly, then pour the whole lot back into the pan. Cook on a gentle heat, stirring constantly, for about 5 minutes or until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon. Now strain the custard through a sieve into a large bowl, which ensures a really smooth custard, and pour it over the gooseberries.
Put the dish in a bain-marie (that’s a baking dish filled with enough hot – but not boiling – water to come up to halfway up the sides of the gratin dish) and bake in a preheated oven at 150°C/Gas Mark 2 until lightly set. It should take about 25–30 minutes, but check it after 25 minutes and turn the oven down to 140°C/Gas Mark 1 if the top is beginning to colour. When cooked it should still have a wobble in the centre; it will firm up as it cools. Remove and leave on the side until you are ready to eat.
Scallops are one of my favourite things and they combine beautifully with bacon. They don’t come cheap, though, so feel free to buy fewer than I specify if you are trying to save cash. Or, to save even more money, just halve everything and cook it for yourself and someone you love very much (and if you’re feeling very greedy, this other person could even be you).
TAGLIOLINI WITH SALMON, SCALLOPS AND PANCETTA
BAKED APRICOTS WITH AMARETTI BISCUITS
1 tablespoon olive oil
170g pancetta, cut into small cubes
30g butter
2 salmon fillets, each weighing around 180–200g, cut into 2cm chunks
400g scallops, cleaned and removed from their shells
125ml white wine
2 tablespoons parsley, chopped
juice of ½ lemon
salt and pepper
a small knob of butter (optional)
300g fresh tagliolini (or you could use linguine, spaghetti, or even tagliatelle)
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over a medium-high heat and add the pancetta. Cook for a couple of minutes and then add the butter. Once it’s frothing, add the salmon and cook for about 1½ minutes, then turn the chunks over and add the scallops. Cook them for 1½ minutes, turn over and cook for another minute. Pour in the wine, let it come to the boil and bubble away and then throw in the parsley, lemon juice and the seasoning. Add the butter if you want to add a bit of gloss to the sauce.
Meanwhile, cook your pasta in the pan of boiling water: follow the cooking instructions on the packet, but if it’s fresh it should only take a few minutes. Drain the pasta well and toss with the sauce. Serve in big, flat, warmed, individual bowls.
This dessert makes a good contrast to the creamy main course, is very easy to prepare, and brings the best out of apricots – which when raw are, in this country at least, a tough and tasteless disappointment. These babies are the opposite: sweet and full of flavour, enhanced by an ingredient that always makes them shine: almonds. (For a winter pudding that also makes use of this wonderful combination, see here)
I think these baked apricots are nicest served oh-so-slightly warm, so you may want to factor this in to your timings.
10 fresh apricots, halved and the stones removed
20 amaretti biscuits
1 tablespoon brown sugar
Amaretto liqueur (about 20 teaspoons)
clotted cream, double cream or good-quality vanilla ice cream, to serve
Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4. Place the apricots, skin-side down, in a shallow baking dish. Then put the biscuits in a plastic bag and bash them vigorously with a rolling pin until they become coarse crumbs. Add the brown sugar, shake the whole lot up and then, using a teaspoon, pile some of the mixture in the holes and over the flat tops of each apricot half Finish off by drizzling 1 teaspoon of the almond-scented Amaretto liqueur over the top of each. Bake in the oven for 25–30 minutes. Serve with good-quality cream or ice cream.
I have to confess that my decision to not eat meat wasn’t made out of principle. I think God made animals for all sorts of reasons, and one of them is for eating. Nevertheless, I have to admit that, as I write those words, I am struck by the shock factor that I am eating our four-legged friends: it does feel brutal to think of killing, say, a happy little lamb, cutting it up and sticking its leg in the oven. However, as I say, such kind and noble thoughts didn’t inform my decision to turn veggie: it was just the meat at college tasted like dog food (not that I’d know) and it kind of put me off the carnivore thing altogether. And so it was that nearly two decades of abstinence began. My mother thought I had turned anorexic; my burger-loving then-boyfriend thought I had gone mad and, much later, my to-be-husband, when I met him, felt a touch disappointed.
However, I still cooked meat (surprisingly well, apparently) in my days of non-participation. Fast-forward to the present and I think poultry, game and meat are to die for (oh, sorry, it’s the other way around). It was morning sickness in my second pregnancy that returned me to eating meat; endless sucking of lemon sherbets failed to rein in the nausea, but a bacon sandwich did the job in a jiffy. After that, I succumbed to chicken, rapidly moved on to game and then all my meaty barriers fell down rapidly. I like to think that, if he was still around, I’d have given my butcher grandfather a good boost to his business.
Six of us for dinner, including a petite French girl and her husband. He currently works for a church but used to make violins for a living. Being good with his hands, he was tasked with putting in our £200 second-hand kitchen. ‘It’s only temporary, honest,’ said the Vicar reassuringly, as a mismatched work surface was installed. Eighteen months on and I am still muddling along with too little storage space, an unreliable oven and frankly inadequate everything. Anyway, the violin-maker is not to blame for that, so tonight I made a meal in celebration of his lovely, diminutive French wife. For the main course, I plumped for poussin – in the chicken world it is small but perfectly formed, just like her.
CHICORY, PEAR AND PANCETTA SALAD
POUSSIN WITH BOURSIN AND BACON
Chicory is eaten rarely in this country, but it is beloved in France. Maybe it’s because we British don’t know what to do with it. That, or the fact that, when tasted by itself, it has a rather bitter flavour. In this salad, this bitterness is offset by the sweetness of the pear and the saltiness of the cheese. One guest (not the French one) finished his portion and said, in his broad Scottish tones, ‘Well, I can’t say I know what that was, but it was really very nice.’
2 heads of chicory
2 ripe pears
80g cubed pancetta
a lump of Pecorino or Parmesan cheese, for shaving
For the dressing:
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1½ teaspoons Dijon mustard
1 garlic clove, peeled and crushed
a pinch of caster sugar
2 teaspoons water
First, put all the ingredients for the dressing into a clean jar, put the lid on and shake it like crazy.
Next, make the salad. Take 6 side plates and place 3 leaves of chicory on each. Cut the rest of the leaves across into thin slices and set aside. Peel, quarter and core the pears and cut each quarter into 4 slices. In a frying pan, fry the pancetta without any oil and, once it’s crispy and brown, remove from the pan and toss with the chopped chicory, the pear and two thirds of the dressing. Divide all this among the whole leaves on the plates and shave over some Pecorino or Parmesan, using your potato peeler. About 6 shavings per person should do it. Drizzle over a bit more dressing and serve.
Years ago, a supermarket magazine did a version of this dish, but made with chicken breasts. I cooked it endlessly, and every time I did, the recipe was requested. So much so that I think I might have propagated it around the whole of London. I’d turn up at someone’s house and there it was again; the failsafe dinner-party dish. When I enquired how it got there, the answer would always be that the recipe came from a friend … of a friend … of a friend …
Anyway, this is my updated version. Poussins are perfect dinner-party food, and if you have male guests they will love the idea of being presented with their very own dolly bird. I love the sort of cooking that involves a bit of prodding and poking and generally making a sticky mess; this recipe certainly offers all that. If you don’t fancy doing the mucky stuff with your guests around, you could prepare it all up to the point at which it would go in the oven, either in the morning or the evening before your dinner party.
6 poussins
300g Boursin cheese
6 slices smoked streaky bacon
400ml white wine, possibly more
15g fresh tarragon leaves, chopped
juice of ½ lemon
salt and pepper
Preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. Take your poussins and put them in a large, metal roasting tin. Using your fingers, separate the skin from the breast meat (it’s fun, honest!); it’s easiest if you just use your forefinger and slide it in carefully, as the last thing you want is to tear the skin. Now put aside half the Boursin to go in the sauce and, taking the other half, insert about 1 teaspoon of the cheese into each opened pouch. It’s here that things will get a bit messy, but don’t be tempted to lick your fingers as you are in contact with raw poultry and, as far as I know, no one has ever put Salmonella and pleasure in the same sentence. Push the rest of the Boursin for the poussins into each stomach cavity. Drape the bacon over the birds, pour the white wine into the tin and put it in the oven for about 50 minutes–1 hour.
After this time is up, stick a sharp knife into a nice fat part of the bird if you are worried about whether it’s properly cooked through: the juices should run clear. If not, return them to the oven for another 5–7 minutes. When they are cooked, remove the poussins to a warm plate and add the rest of the Boursin, the tarragon, lemon juice and seasoning to the roasting tin, whisking everything together. Let it bubble away until it is reduced and well flavoured. It should not end up thin and watery (if it does, just cook it some more), but neither should it be too gloopy (if so, add more wine, or water). Serve the birds on top of the leeky mash, with some sauce spooned over the top and around.
I love leeks, perhaps because I’m Welsh, and I love mashed potato. Combine the two and it’s pure Celtic comfort food.
1kg floury maincrop potatoes, such as King Edwards or Maris Piper
500g leeks, cleaned and very finely sliced
125g butter
200ml double cream
salt and pepper
Peel the potatoes and cut them into quarters. Put them in a pan of boiling salted water, bring back to the boil, cover and cook for 20–25 minutes or until soft. (Turn the heat down to medium if you don’t want boiling water flooding out of the pan and onto your stove.)
Meanwhile, the leeks need to be slowly sweated in half the butter for 10–15 minutes; you are aiming for them to be softened, not browned. Just before the potatoes are ready, heat up the rest of the butter and the cream in a small pan. Drain the potatoes and tip them into a large bowl. Add the leeks, the hot butter and cream and lots of salt and pepper, and either mash heartily with a potato masher or, even better, whisk with an electric whisk. If you want you can make this before people arrive and either keep it warm over a pan of boiling water or (easier), for those of us who aren’t microwave-shy, just pop it in there for about five minutes and give it a really good stir before serving.
Making pastry is something I try and avoid. My mother, whilst insisting ‘there was no point in it’, was so good at turning out the most perfect jam tart that I am loath to try and upstage her. As if I could. But here we go. Here is a strawberry tart that might give my mother a run for her money …
For the sweet pastry:
75g butter, at room temperature
75g caster sugar
150g plain flour
3 large egg yolks, beaten
For the filling:
250g mascarpone
1 tablespoon icing sugar
250g ripe strawberries, hulled and halved
2 tablespoons Bonne Maman jam (or any good-quality jam)
For the pastry blend the butter, sugar and flour in a food processor until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Beat the egg yolks into the mixture gradually, until the whole thing starts to turn into a doughy blob. Plop the doughy blob onto a lightly floured surface and knead it lightly for a minute or so until it is smooth and round. Wrap it in cling film and chill it in the fridge for 30 minutes or until you want to roll it out. When you are ready to bake, lightly grease a 20cm flan ring and preheat the oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5. Place the flan ring on a baking tray and take the dough out of the fridge before kneading it for a minute to soften it up. Roll it out so that it is about 5cm bigger in diameter than the flan ring. Carefully place the rolled-out pastry into the ring, pressing it firmly into the sides. Trim off any extra pastry around the rim and prick the base lightly with a fork. Cover the pastry with greaseproof paper and pile in either baking beans or dried pulses, before chilling the flan ring in the fridge for at least 15 minutes. Once your pastry is nicely chilled, take it out of the fridge and pop the flan ring in the oven to bake for 15–20 minutes. Then take the flan tin out of the oven and remove the paper and beans before popping it back in the oven to cook for a further 5 minutes, or until the pastry has a pleasing golden hue. Remove the flan tin from the oven and allow the pastry to cool, after which you can remove the flan ring (but not the base) when you are brave enough to do so.
Meanwhile, to make the filling, beat together the mascarpone and icing sugar and pile it onto the base of the pastry. Arrange the strawberries, cut side down, on top of the unctuous creamy mixture and warm the jam over a low heat in a small saucepan until it is hot and liquidy. Brush the melted jam over the strawberries and then chill your beautiful confection for at least 20 minutes in the fridge, lest it all goes soggy.
Four of us for dinner tonight and a big lump of unsmoked gammon sat in the fridge all day. I stared at it for quite a long time before deciding what to do with it – my thoughts drifting between that old-fashioned porky-pineapple combo and Nigella Lawson’s ham cooked in Coca-Cola. I ended up putting the two ideas together: I braised the ham in Lilt (the pineapple and grapefruit fizzy drink), and picked up the grapefruit notes in a pink grapefruit salsa. Sounds totally crazy, I know, and I only confessed how I’d cooked the ham after all of it had been gobbled up. It’s a dish that proves that, sometimes, in the kitchen at least, being a bit mad isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
HONEYED HAM WITH PINK GRAPEFRUIT SALSA
FRIED POTATOES WITH SOURED CREAM AND CHIVES
BLACKBERRY AND BLUEBERRY ETON MESS
This ham would be fabulous cold as well as hot. I served it with fried potatoes to give a cheeky, yet dignified, nod to pub ham and chips. Incidentally, if you doubled or even tripled the quantities (upping the cooking times accordingly, of course), this whole meal would make a fabulous feast for a crowd. And it’s easy to do, too.
1kg unsmoked gammon
700ml Lilt (not the diet version)
1 onion, peeled and quartered
2 tablespoons runny honey
For the salsa:
1 large pink grapefruit
½ red onion, peeled and finely chopped
2 tablespoons coriander, chopped
2 teaspoons olive oil
salt and pepper
Remove the gammon from the fridge about 20 minutes before you want to cook it. As it is unsmoked, it won’t need soaking. Put it in a large pan with the Lilt and the onion and bring everything to the boil. Pop on the lid, reduce the heat so that the Lilt is just simmering, and cook for 1¼ hours. (Gammon takes 55 minutes per kg, plus 30 minutes.) As the ham (Nigella tells me that gammon becomes ham once it is cooked) nears the end of its cooking time, preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas Mark 6.
Meanwhile, prepare the salsa. Take a thin slice off the top and bottom of the grapefruit, then sit it on a board. Slice away all the skin and white pith to reveal the fruit. Then slice away the segments from between the pieces of membrane. Do this over a large bowl, as you want to keep all of the lovely juice. Combine the grapefruit with the onion and coriander, pour over the juice and olive oil and season. Stir it all together gently, and it’s ready
Once the ham is cooked, take it out of its fruity bath and pop it in a roasting tin. Drizzle the honey over the skin of the meat and put the tin in the oven for around 10 minutes. Carve the ham into slices and serve with a helping of salsa on the side, the fried potatoes and their soured cream dressing (see recipe on page 118) and an unfussy green salad.
500g maincrop potatoes, such as King Edwards or Maris Piper
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
275ml soured cream
1 garlic clove, peeled and crushed
2 tablespoons chives, finely chopped
Wash the potatoes and slice them into rounds that are around 5mm thick. Put them in a large pan of boiling salted water and parboil them for around 7 minutes, then drain. (This can be done any time during the cooking of the ham.) About 15 minutes before you are ready to serve the gammon, heat the oil in a frying pan and toss in the potatoes, coating them evenly with the oil. Don’t move them around too much – you want each side of the potato to turn a rich, golden-brown colour. When they’ve reached this stage, season them well. You can drain them on kitchen paper if you think they need it, but they are probably fine as they are.
At some point while the potatoes are cooking, stir together the soured cream, garlic, chives and a little seasoning in a bowl and put it on the table for people to smear liberally over their potatoes, if they wish.
After experimenting with the ham, I plumped for something safer for pudding. Nevertheless, it was a classic with a twist. (New recipes are so often about re-inventing the wheel – there being only so many ingredients and flavour combinations in the world.) This is my version of the well-loved dessert, Eton Mess, which is perfect for when you’ve spotted some really good blackberries, or even picked them. Unless I’ve got some unused egg whites knocking around, I don’t always make my own meringues for this. I find the meringue nests made by Marks & Spencer, and also Walkers, have a pleasing enough chewiness to them, which is what I think you’re really after when it comes to meringues.
568ml double cream
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
300g blackberries
1 tablespoon icing sugar
1 tablespoon crème de múre (blackberry liqueur) (optional)
150g blueberries
8 meringues, around 250g in total,
broken up into small pieces
Put the cream into a mixing bowl and whip it to the floppy stage – you don’t want it to be too stiff. Add the lemon zest to the cream.
Take half of the blackberries and whizz them in a blender with the icing sugar and the crème de múre, if using. Remove the pips by pushing the purée through a sieve into a bowl. Put the rest of the blackberries in a big bowl with the blueberries, halving any whole blackberries if they are firm enough to cope with it. All this can be done in advance.
When you are ready to serve, stir together the cream and the broken-up meringues. Finally, swirl in the purée, being careful not to stir it all in until it disappears because you want to retain a blackberry ripple effect. Serve straight away.
It’s a cold evening in October: time to batten down the hatches with friends who are the equivalent of well-loved old socks. They’ve just returned to London after a few years of living in Manhattan. As we catch up and they tell us tales of New York glamour, constant eating out and parties with George Clooney, somehow it feels right to be sitting there with them, eating steaming plates of unpretentious, rustic grub. Thanks for shanks, I say.
LAMB SHANKS BRAISED IN RED WINE
STICKY BREAD AND BUTTER PUDDING
The Chinese say that good food is as much about the variety of textures as it is about taste. Here, I try to take this on board, British-style. This dish combines hearty meat with pillow-soft mash and grainy, earthy beans. A winning combination that,
I think, proves the Chinese right.
4 lamb shanks
3 tablespoons seasoned flour
3 tablespoons oil
2 carrots, peeled and cut across into 2cm chunks
2 onions, peeled and sliced
2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
4 medium tomatoes, each cut into 8
500ml gutsy red wine
250ml lamb stock (fresh, or use a good-quality liquid bouillon)
1 tablespoon herbes de Provence
4 sprigs of rosemary, leaves removed
4 anchovy fillets in olive oil, drained and chopped
1 tablespoon ready-made redcurrant jelly
salt and pepper
Toss the shanks in the seasoned flour to coat, then heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large flameproof pan that the meat and vegetables will fit into comfortably. Brown the shanks in the oil until they are a lovely burnished bronze then remove to a plate.
Add the last tablespoon of oil to the pan and throw in the carrots, onions and garlic. Make sure the heat isn’t too high now, as you don’t want the vegetables to turn the same colour as the meat: you want soft, but not brown. Cook for about 5 minutes, then stir in the tomatoes, put the shanks back in the pot, add the wine and bring it to the boil. Pour in the stock and add the herbs. Herbes de Provence are a delightful mixture of herbs which traditionally contain lavender. The ones I use at the moment were bought in France, but I have also seen them in a shop in Bloomsbury, but that’s a fat lot of use to you if you live in a small village near Scarborough. Add all the other ingredients and season, but don’t add too much salt because whilst the anchovies won’t impart a fishy flavour, they will add saltiness. Now slap a lid on the pan and turn the heat right down low. You could also, if it’s easier, cook this dish in the oven at 160°C/Gas Mark 3.
Have a look after 2 hours, but it may take longer for the meat to reach the point of desired tenderness: that is, almost falling off the bone. Taste for seasoning and serve the lamb on the mashed potato, sauce spooned over the top, with the beans to one side.
1 × 400g tin flageolet beans (or butter beans)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
salt and pepper
Pour the beans into a sieve and rinse them under the cold tap. Now put them in a pan with the oil and garlic to heat through gently. I gave them a gentle mash with a fork from time to time to give the beans a varied texture. Season and serve.
I have a very hazy memory of eating syrup sandwiches as a child. Not very healthy, I know, but maybe we had just run out of honey. This bread and butter pudding uses syrup instead of sugar and thus gains a caramel richness. I love bread and butter pudding with a passion, and this one really hit the spot on a cold night. This dessert serves six, so there’s enough for seconds or leftovers.
6–7 thin slices (about 5mm) of good white bread cut from a very fresh tin loaf, buttered, crusts removed and cut into quarters
60g raisins
4 tablespoons golden syrup, plus 2 tablespoons extra for glazing the top
3 medium eggs
1 egg yolk
00ml full-fat milk
250ml double cream
Place half of the pieces of buttered bread in overlapping rows in a shallow, oblong or oval, 2-litre baking dish.
Sprinkle half the raisins on top of the bread, then drizzle over 2 tablespoons of the golden syrup. My then 4-year-old got involved in this process with hands-on (or should I say hands-in) enthusiasm, underlining for me that I had given the pudding exactly the right name. Repeat the same process with the remaining ingredients, finishing with syrup.
Beat together the eggs, egg yolk, milk and cream and pour it over the pudding. Using a palette knife, push the bread down into the liquid, then leave the dish on the side for around 30 minutes for the bread to really soak up its sweetened dairy drink. Preheat the oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5. Put the baking dish in a bain-marie (which simply means you put it in a bigger dish with hot, not boiling, water coming to about halfway up the sides of the baking dish containing the pudding), and bake it in the oven for 25–30 minutes, by which time the custard should be softly set and the top golden.
Now drizzle over the extra 2 tablespoons of golden syrup and place the dish under a hot grill. Don’t forget about it: cook it carefully for 30 seconds or so until it is nicely caramelised. You want the pudding to be sweetly glazed, not bitterly burnt. Serve with some good-quality vanilla ice cream.
Oh dear. I’ve finally had to face up to it: winter is really here. Everyone rushes grimly from A to B, trying to limit their time spent in the cold, and hats, gloves and scarves are simply de rigueur.
Tonight I decide to banish the blues and chase the chills with a comforting stew and an indulgent pudding. To start, it’s oxtail – a cut many people are suspicious of. I can kind of understand it: raw oxtail looks far from appetising, with its thick, milky-white central bone, and cows’ tails don’t appear to be the most obvious thing in the world to eat. So when I announced to my guests that it was oxtail on the menu, I was far from surprised to pick up a sense of forced bravado. I could see, behind the carefully arranged faces and polite smiles, a deep sense of unease.
However, I knew my menu instincts were right: the guests were all feisty types, full of character, and the food needed to be gutsy enough to stand up to them. And indeed it did. The punchy, yet tender, meat was the perfect backdrop to their fond but lively banter. Everyone was won round and all went home happy and replete, tails wagging.
MASH (SEE LEEKY MASH)
WHITE CHOCOLATE AND AMARETTO ICE CREAM
Whilst oxtail is rich, it’s not cloyingly so. And you don’t have to be rich to buy it, either.
I used porter (a dark beer a little like stout) in this stew because it’s full-flavoured and powerful, and so can happily and confidently get cosy with the gutsy meat.
3 tablespoons plain flour
2 teaspoons English mustard powder
salt and pepper
2kg oxtail, cut into 5cm-thick
pieces
4 tablespoons sunflower oil
1 leek, cleaned and cut into 1cm chunks
carrots, peeled and cut into 1cm chunks
2 onions, peeled and thickly sliced
2 celery sticks, thinly sliced
3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
500ml porter
200ml beef stock (fresh, or use a good-quality liquid bouillon)
6 sprigs of thyme
You will need a large flameproof casserole dish for this. As ever, I used my cauldron that can go in the oven as well as on the stove. Preheat the oven to 150°C/Gas Mark 2. This is an ideal dish to make ahead – either to reheat and eat on the next day or so or to freeze for another time – as stews benefit from a bit of time to themselves before eating, so that the various components and flavours get the chance to get together and form a team.
Chuck the flour in a large bowl and stir in the mustard powder and plenty of seasoning. Add the pieces of oxtail and coat them evenly with the flour. Pour 3 tablespoons of the oil into your casserole or pan and set the heat to high. Brown the meat in the oil, in batches if necessary, and then, once it’s got a nice colour, remove and put it on a couple of plates. Add another tablespoon of oil to the pan, turn the heat down to medium, add the vegetables and garlic and fry for 5–6 minutes or until softened, but not brown. Re-introduce the meat to the pan, add the porter and let it come to the boil and bubble away for a few minutes. Add the stock, thyme and a little seasoning, slip on a lid and put it in the oven. It can stay there for 2–3 hours quite happily.
Once the meat is tender, take out the casserole, test for seasoning, and leave to cool. The stew can either go in the fridge for the next day, or the freezer for a rainy one. Just remember that oxtail is quite fatty, but this will all conveniently set in a layer on the top of the stew whilst it’s in the fridge. Remove all the fat and then reheat the stew – this should take about 15 minutes on the hob. However, if you are serving it straight away, skim off the excess fat from the surface with a spoon.
I served my stew on buttery creamy mash. There are enough fiddled about mash recipes in this book without my telling you how to make the plain stuff. If in doubt, just use the recipe for leeky mash on page 112, replacing the leeks with the same quantity of potatoes.
This pudding makes a wonderful contrast to the gutsy stew, being light, but creamily decadent. When the Vicar has taken weddings we have usually had the happy couple over for supper at some point before the big day. It was on one such evening that the bride-to-be mentioned this recipe that her mother had given her. We were eating a pudding of my own creation at the time, but I have to say that when I made her mother’s offering some time later, it put my own handiwork in the shade. I served this recently to my brother, an ice cream aficionado, and its creamy perfection generated just two words: ‘Oh yes.’
When served as dessert after the stew, this ice cream makes for a very carefree evening for the cook, as both are make-ahead dishes.
300g good-quality white chocolate, broken into squares
4 tablespoons full-fat milk
5 tablespoons Amaretto di Saronno liqueur
300ml double cream.
2 large fresh eggs, separated
Around ¼ of a packet of amaretti biscuits
First, line a 1kg loaf tin with cling film. Then put the chocolate into a small pan with the milk and leave it to melt on a very low heat. Once it’s all glossy and lick-able, remove it from the hob and pour into a bowl. Add the liqueur, mix together and allow to cool. Lightly whip the cream. Beat the egg yolks into the cooled chocolate mixture and then gently fold in the cream. With clean dry whisks, whisk the egg whites until stiff in a large clean bowl and then fold gently into the chocolate mixture.
Put the amaretti biscuits into a plastic bag and bash vigorously with a heavy rolling pin, or something similar, to make coarse crumbs. Sprinkle some of the crumbs over the base of the loaf tin to make a 5mm-thick layer. Spoon half of the ice cream mixture over the biscuits, top with another layer of biscuits, then finish off with the rest of the soon-to-be ice cream. Cover with clingfilm and freeze for at least 5 hours or until firm. Serve cut into dreamy slices.
After all my enthusiasm for meat, please don’t think I’m anti-vegetarian. I’m not. Despite any playful comments, I respect those who feel that eating meat is against their conscience and so don’t do it. As I say, my reason for depriving myself of meat was far less worthy – I just thought I didn’t like it. Now that I’ve discovered I do, I can’t get enough of it and I have spent the last three and a half years playing carnivore catch-up. I fear this fact has somewhat swayed the balance of recipes in this book, so I beg forgiveness from those keen to cook vegetarian.
As someone who has had to watch the pennies, I feel doubly ashamed about my paltry veggie offerings, as good meat is expensive, as is fish. Blame the Vicar, I say. Even when I was a staunch vegetarian, he never budged. For him, a meal without meat is as good as a church without people or tonic without gin. Vegetables, he says, are just the colourful stuff on the side; they do not a real meal make.
It’s the end of October, with Halloween tomorrow and a weekend of bonfires to come. I’m not a great fan of Halloween, but I do like this season, food-wise. Suddenly pumpkins are rife outside my greengrocer’s, their orange coats bringing a glow to grey days. Once lugged home, hollowed out and filled with a candle, they lend a comforting magic to my kitchen that draws the children to the table without struggle or fight.
However, when it comes to actually cooking pumpkins and all the other squashes, it has to be said that they are a devil to prepare. Uncooked, their flesh is very dense and hard to cut through, and they also have very thick skins that are a pain to cut off. What is imperative, here, is that you use a very, very sharp knife. If you have to run out and buy a knife sharpener, then so be it. Even armed with such an implement, preparing squashes is no pleasant walk in the park, but try and do the job with a blunt knife and it’s a total nightmare: it feels like you have no control over your blade whatsoever (which you haven’t).
If the work involved has you hissing with frustration, be assured that it’ll all be worth it. I always think of butternut squash as treasure chests: they are so infuriatingly difficult to prise open, but once you have done so and have cooked them you are rewarded with the sweetest, pure gold that richly satisfies. Perfect fodder for a cold grey day.
This butternut squash and porcini risotto is one that bursts with the best of autumn. The cooked flesh of the squash is beautiful here, releasing a warm, uncloying sweetness that is the perfect complement to the woody earthiness of the porcini. After that, there’s a pudding in honour of the pear.
For me, pears spell autumn: this mellow season is their time, and whilst summer shouts berries and winter, tangerines, autumn is when we are called to celebrate the pear’s sweetly scented gentleness.
BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND PORCINI RISOTTO
Incidentally, I served this dish to rabid carnivores and it went down a storm.
1 squash (preferably a butternut with a long neck, as this part contains most flesh)
4 tablespoons olive oil
2 shallots, peeled and finely chopped
20g dried porcini mushrooms, soaked in 500ml boiling water
300g risotto rice, such as Arborio or Canaroli
150ml white wine
75g soft goat’s cheese (Rosary would be perfect)
2 tablespoons Grana Padano or Parmesan cheese, finely grated
salt and pepper
This dish takes time, albeit in a relatively undemanding way, so it’s one to make when you fancy an evening of idle, soothing stirring whilst your guests sit around in the kitchen and chat. In other words, this isn’t a recipe to choose if you are having over the scary boss whom you’d prefer not to see you cook.
Peel and core the squash and then cut it into 1cm pieces. Heat the oil in a large pan; add the squash and start cooking with the lid off the pan, stirring occasionally so the squash doesn’t stick. After 20 minutes, add the shallots and allow them to soften. Place the lid on the pan, make sure the heat is low, and let it cook gently until the hour is up, giving it a stir now and again. Taste a bit of the squash – it should be starting to release its sweetness, and will continue to do so as the risotto comes together. The alternative way of dealing with the squash could be to halve it lengthways, whilst it is still raw and in its skin, and put it in a roasting tin in an oven set at 200°C/Gas Mark 6 for 1 hour. After that, scrape out and discard the seeds, then spoon out the soft flesh. Pan fry the shallots in some oil and stir both the shallots and squash into the finished risotto.
However, I went for the more hands-on approach and chose to have the squash involved in the stovetop cooking process from the start. Whichever way you choose, whilst the squash is cooking, line a sieve with 2 pieces of kitchen paper and put it over a jug, then tip the soaked porcini mushrooms into the sieve to drain and so remove any grit that is in the water. Squeeze the mushrooms over the sieve to remove as much liquid from them as possible. Check how much mushroom stock is left: some may have been swallowed up by the greedy little fungi (and the kitchen paper!) If so, make the stock back up to 500ml again by adding just boiled water, chicken stock, or, as I did, some water saved from boiling vegetables. Put whatever liquid you are using into a pan on the hob and heat until bubbling.
Chop the porcini finely – it is easier, to be honest, to snip them with scissors, as they are slippery little things. Add the rice to the squash in the pan and stir to get everything acquainted. Add the porcini, stir, and then pour in the wine. Let this bubble away until it has almost vanished and then add a ladleful of hot stock. Stir until this has absorbed and keep doing this, patiently stirring and, if you like, chatting in a ‘Look at me, I’m so relaxed in the kitchen’, nonchalant sort of way to your admiring guests for 20–25 minutes. Keep tasting the rice as the stock stash depletes. You are aiming to get rid of any hard bite and instead get the rice to the point of gooey creaminess. By now the butternut will be all squelchy and sticky and oozing around in the rice. Finish the risotto by adding the goat’s cheese, which adds a hint of zestiness, and the Grana Padano or Parmesan, for its cheesy bite. Season well and serve in warm bowls, preferably on a cold autumn evening.
This is my take on Nigel Slater’s Apple Betty. I initially made it as I liked the idea of offering people a pudding called ‘Betty’, and indeed my guests welcomed her with joy and expressed huge fondness for this warm, consoling addition to our table. I swapped pears for apples as I adore the classic pear and chocolate combination. I also decreased the amount of sugar as, unlike Nigel’s Bramleys, the pears exude their own sweetness.
1kg pears, peeled, quartered and cored
30g butter
125g soft white breadcrumbs
75g light soft brown sugar
100g good-quality dark chocolate, chopped
75g butter, melted
3 tablespoons golden syrup
Preheat the oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5. Cut the pears into large chunks and put them in a pan with the butter. Add a couple of tablespoons of water and allow them to soften slightly over a medium heat, shaking them around in the pan frequently. How long this takes depends on the ripeness of your pears – mine took about 10 minutes. When they are soft and still holding their shape, but not soggy, tip them into a 1.5-litre, shallow baking dish.
For the topping, mix the breadcrumbs, sugar and chocolate together and scatter it over the pears. Now add the melted butter to the golden syrup in a pan and heat until blended, then pour the mixture carefully over the crumbs, taking care to cover all areas. Bake for 35 minutes, by which time the topping should be gooey, yet crisp and deliciously golden.
Tonight, four to feed, and despite its connotations of 70s’ kaftans, I plan a fondue in which to dip roasted autumn squashes. For moments when the rich cheesiness gets too much, there’ll also be a hot and spicy tomato sauce on the table. And there’ll be good bread, too – pumpkin bread, in fact.
People often feel a bit heavy-stomached after a fondue, and the squash and the potatoes are pretty filling, too, so I would just offer a platter of fresh fruit for pudding. Include some beautiful little exotic numbers, such as physalis, passion fruit and lychees, to make your no-work offerings look a bit special.
COMTÉ CHEESE FONDUE WITH ROASTED SQUASHES
RICH TOMATO SAUCE WITH HARISSA
PLATTER OF FRESH FRUIT
250g Comté cheese (a type of Gruyere, or just use Gruyere)
250g Emmental cheese
1 garlic clove, halved
350ml white wine
2 teaspoons cornflour
4 tablespoons cold water or kirsch pepper
Vegetables for dipping:
1 small pumpkin
1 medium butternut squash
1 sweet potato (I know it’s not a squash, but it feels right to include it)
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
First, prepare the vegetables for dipping. Take a potato peeler and patiently remove the skins from all the vegetables. Now de-seed the pumpkin and the butternut squash and cut all the vegetables into chunks of about 2cm square. Put them in a roasting tin and into a hot oven that has been preheated to 220°C/Gas Mark 7. They need to roast for about 45 minutes–1 hour and you want them to emerge looking brown at the edges and with a hint of toffee about them. Incidentally, if there are any left over after the meal, stick them in a pan and blend them with enough water to make a soup that just asks to be accompanied by good bread and a few nice cheeses.
After the vegetables have been in the oven for about 20 minutes, prepare the fondue. I confess that when I made mine I felt quite nostalgic. It brought back memories, not of the 70s, but of the early 90s and a rather strange party in a wine bar in Earls Court with over-enthusiastic accordion players … but that’s another story. Anyway, grate the cheeses, trying not to scoff them as you do so, and rub the halved clove of garlic around the inside of the pan in which you are going to cook the fondue. (A sturdy, heavy-based one is best.) Now pour in the wine and bring to the boil. Turn the heat down low and add the grated cheese, stirring all the time until is has melted and is gently bubbling. Mix the cornflour with the kirsch or water, stir into the fondue and add some seasoning. When everything looks ‘together’ serve it – preferably over a burner so you don’t end up with stringy cheese or have to keep going back to the stove. Have prongs at the ready and Barry White on a loop.
If you want to serve the tomato sauce, too, see page 303 for the recipe. Just halve the quantities and save the rest as a pasta sauce.
So often we think of vegetarian food as earthy fare; after all, lentils and tofu aren’t really the heights of haute cuisine, are they? However, this menu is proof that meat-free food can ‘put on the Ritz’. Soufflés are always glamorous, and this one, with its delicious base of wild mushrooms and its fresh, yet creamy, cloud-like top, is no exception. As for the cake, it is lighter than the word ‘cake’ would suggest, and as there’s enough for eight, you might have some left over to have with your coffee the next day – if your guests don’t scoff the lot.
WILD MUSHROOM AND GOAT’S CHEESE SOUFFLÉ
LAMB’S LETTUCE AND WALNUT SALAD
ALMOND CAKE WITH POACHED DAMSONS
For the wild mushroom mixture:
40g butter
2 teaspoons olive oil
2 shallots, peeled, halved and thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
25g dried porcini mushrooms, soaked in 300ml boiling water
250g fresh wild mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1–2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves
For the soufflé:
1 small onion, peeled and halved
3 cloves
300ml full-fat milk
300ml double cream
1 bay leaf
½ teaspoon black peppercorns
75g butter
40g plain flour
5 large eggs, separated
leaves from 2 large sprigs of thyme, plus extra to garnish
150g soft fresh goat’s cheese (such as Rosary, Welsh Pant-Ysgawn or French Crotin de Chavignol), crumbled
25g Parmesan cheese, finely grated
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
salt and pepper
First, relax. I know the thought of making a soufflé may well have you fleeing the kitchen in panic, but it really isn’t that scary, I promise, and this one is particularly easy Because it is poured into a shallow, ovenproof dish, there’s not so much of a worry about whether it will rise theatrically over the top of the souffle dish or just fall flat: in a shallow dish it will at least look puffy. So do try and enjoy yourself while you’re cooking, and just look forward to what will be a bountiful meal.
Start making the sauce that will end up being the goat’s cheese souffle. Stud the onion with the cloves and put it into a small pan with the milk, cream, bay leaf and peppercorns. Bring to the boil, then set aside for 20 minutes to allow the flavours to blend together. Then strain the milk through a sieve into a bowl, discarding the onion and any other bits. Melt the butter in a non-stick pan, add the flour and cook over a medium heat for 1 minute to cook out the flour. Gradually beat in the infused milk and bring to the boil, stirring, then leave to simmer very gently over a very low heat for 10 minutes, giving it a stir every now and then. Pour the mixture into a mixing bowl and leave to cool slightly. Preheat the oven now to 200°C/Gas Mark 6.
Next, it’s time for the wild mushroom mixture. Heat the butter and the oil in a deep frying pan and, when it’s bubbling, add the shallots and garlic and cook gently until soft. Drain the porcini, squeezing out any excess water. Chop them up finely and add them to the pan. Cook them for a few minutes before adding the wild mushrooms and thyme leaves. Keeping the heat high, allow the mushrooms to soften for a couple of minutes until soft, but stop cooking before the juices start to seep out. Chuck the whole lot into the bottom of a lightly buttered, shallow, oval ovenproof dish measuring 30cm x 18cm and about 5cm deep.
Return to the soufflé now. Separate the eggs into two bowls, putting the whites into a large mixing bowl. Mix the egg yolks into the cooled sauce, then stir in half the thyme leaves, the crumbled goat’s cheese, the grated Parmesan, cayenne pepper, ¾ teaspoon of salt and some black pepper. Now whisk the egg whites until they stand in soft peaks and then gently fold them into the cheesy mixture. Pour the whole lot over the mushrooms, sprinkle with the remaining thyme leaves and bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 30 minutes or until the top is puffed up and golden but the centre still soft and creamy. Garnish with a few fresh thyme leaves and serve with the salad.
This salad is perfect with the soufflé: the soft flavour of the lamb’s lettuce really complements the cheesy goo and woodland mushrooms. Walnuts and goat’s cheese should get married.
1 garlic clove
200g lamb’s lettuce
2 tablespoons walnuts, preferably fresh
For the dressing:
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon walnut oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
salt and pepper
Cut the garlic in half and rub the cut end around the inside of the bowl in which you will serve the salad, then toss in the lettuce and the walnuts. In a separate bowl, whisk together all the dressing ingredients. Toss the salad with enough of the dressing to coat the leaves, and you’re ready to serve.
You’ll have to be quick to pick up some damsons, as their season is so short. If you fail, then just use plums instead.
For the cake:
100g butter, plus extra for greasing
150g caster sugar, plus extra for dusting
3 large eggs
75g ground almonds
40g plain flour
2–3 drops of almond extract (optional)
cream (double or single), to serve (optional)
For the poached damsons:
120ml red wine or port
450g damsons or plums
4 tablespoons good redcurrant jelly
finely grated zest and juice of
1 orange
First, poach the damsons. Pour the wine or port into a pan just large enough to take the damsons or plums, and boil until reduced by half. Add the redcurrant jelly and stir gently until it has dissolved, then add the orange zest and juice. Halve and stone the plums (damsons will have to remain whole with their stones intact), and place them in the pan with their cut sides down into the red wine/port syrup. Bring the syrup to the boil, let it bubble up over the fruit, then lower the heat and leave the fruit to poach gently until it is tender. How long this takes depends on the ripeness of the fruit – give them about 10 minutes, but check and don’t let them disintegrate. Spoon the poached fruit and syrup into a bowl and leave to cool.
For the cake, grease and flour an 18cm loose-bottomed, deep, straight-sided sandwich tin and line the base with greaseproof paper. Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4. Cream the butter in a bowl and then beat in the sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, until the mixture is light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, beating in one-third of the almonds with each egg. Gently fold in the flour and the almond extract, if using. Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and lightly level out the top. Bake for 45–50 minutes or until the cake has shrunk away from the sides of the tin slightly and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
Turn the cake out onto a cooling rack that has a clean tea towel over it. (I know that sounds odd, but it stops the rack marking the delicate surface of the cake.) Remove the base of the tin and the lining paper. Cover the cake with a flat serving plate and carefully turn it over onto it. Dust the top of the cake with a little caster sugar and serve warm with the plum or damson compôte and some cream, if you wish.