Wed
02-May-2007

asparagus

It's asparagus season! Matt got some asparagus, and yesterday he made asparagus with hollandaise, today, scrambled eggs with asparagus. Marvellous!

Tue
30-Jan-2007

potato and mushroom pie

When I got back from my gig at Koko, Matt had made a lovely potato and mushroom pie. He had the mandolin out again, for exquisite thin slices of potatos and mushrooms, and had layered them beneath puff pastry.

It's another recipe from the glorious Silver Spoon (Il cucchiaio d'argento) – the bible of authentic Italian cooking. The Silver Spoon was commissioned by an Italian magazine over fifty years ago, with a team of cooks gathering 2000 recipes from across the different regions of Italy and creating a comprehensive anthology of simple, reliable dishes in the process. Almost everything in it is a joy to cook: simple, unfussy, homely, tasty and quick.

Mon
17-Apr-2006

bank holiday barbeque

Images

Abbie, Jim, Kal and Alex came round on today's gloriously sunny bank holiday Monday and we had the first barbecue of the season. Not much - burgers, pear and parsnip kebabs, mushroom and pineapple kebabs, mushroom burgers. The "wacky" vegetarian kebabs were actually quite nice. Matt took some lovely pictures with the camera that showcase the glory of the roof terrace!

Sun
26-Sep-2004

figs

Images

I got some figs from Green Lanes on Friday and we ate some today in a savoury dish, with mozzarella and basil and a lemon and olive oil dressing. The combination works so well, with the sweet figs backed up by the cheese and cross cut by the basil and lemon. I hadn't had figs in a savoury context before.

Mon
24-May-2004

delia and russell's chiminea

Matt and I went down to Delia and Russell's new two-bedroom house in Surbiton to enjoy some sunny Sunday barbecue cooked in their marvellous Mexican chiminea. I'd never encountered one of these before - they are bulb-shaped wood-burning ovens that you can stand up on little legs. They have a round bottom, with a mouth where you pile wood and coals, and where you can grill your food, and also have a chimney extending upwards. You can hang things to cook in the chimney and also cook things on a grill on top of the chimney. It's all very clever and efficient and has much of the appeal of an aga.

Mon
22-Mar-2004

green tea

After a delicious Polish comfort food meal of Ema's - a thin soup, followed by chicken and potatoes with this mashed vegetable, apple and horseradish sauce - Matt made us some green tea. It was so good. Green tea always reminds me, in a Dharma Bums kind of way, of the power of simple drinks and simple sensations. I've just about reached utter saturation with food and alcohol at the moment. I can feel a fast coming on!

Wed
25-Feb-2004

the power of sushi

I've realised that I am totally into Japanese food at the moment, mainly sushi. The strong, yet delicate, flavours, and not too many of them mixed together. The small portions. The marvellous fishiness of it all. I'm tempted to start making sushi myself, but I'm also afraid that would spoil the perfection of it arriving all delicate and perfect like in a restaurant. Preparing it yourself, you might nibble bits as you go along, or prepare too much, all things which I think could spoil that moment when you place an inarizushi delicately in your mouth with some chopsticks and taste it with a clean palate. I think one would have to be disciplined about it anyway.