Pistachio Citrus Pound Cake

Tags

baking, cake, citrus, cooking, dessert, food, nuts, vegetarian

Lately, as part of ＳＰＲＩＮＧ ＣＬＥＡＮＩＮＧ, I have been involving myself in a newfound romance with bicarbonate soda crystals which come in 1 kilogram packs. That’s a lot, you know, a WHOLE LOTTA LOVIN’ TO BE DONE:

loooOOOOOVIN’ YOOOOUUUUuuu is easy ’cause you’re beeEEAAAUUTIFUUUuuuuul

I have also been making things. My Marylove came and stayed with me for her last two days in England before she went home to Pennsylvania. I wanted to fill the time we had left with sweetness and feed our feelings, so I baked stuff. A few weeks ago Mary mentioned wanting pistachio grapefruit macarons, which unfortunately I didn’t get the chance to make–those babies require planning and lots of time as I like to go slowly. (Not a euphemism.)

Just before Mary arrived in London, I remembered Flory telling me about Orangette’s pistachio citrus pound cake and decided that this would be a good way to satisfy my need to make something and have a delicious treat in that particular combination. I wanted grapefruit zest and juice to go into the batter with maybe a grapefruit drizzle to go on top. It also just seemed very appropriate to receive an idea from a friend and then expand upon it a little to make more of my friends happy.

I set my helpers shelling pistachios. We could only find salted ones, but they’re still good to go after a good rinse. I saved the shells to use for future potted plants, they can be used in the bottom of the pots to promote drainage.

Mary mixed and drizzled the glaze on top so the cake is very beautiful. It tastes even better, at once rich, fragrant, and lively with pistachio and citrus. The crumb is firm and just moist enough, slicing very neatly and yielding in the mouth.

We two ate most of the cake on the second day with two slices each for brunch and then took a further slice each when we went off to do our own things for the rest of the afternoon (art class for me, British Museum for Mary). We graciously allowed Mr. Pear to have some cake later in the evening, but only because we were also having more at the same time and could quickly eat up what we wanted. Good job, us. Well done. Nice one.

I think Mary’s flight has landed now and I hope her re-union with her family, friends, and Sir Isaac (her cat) goes wonderfully! I look forward to our next baking times ♥

PISTACHIO CITRUS POUND CAKE
Adapted from Orangette.
Makes one 18 cm x 6 cm (7 inch x 2.5 inch) loaf cake.
Gives about 8 – 12 slices. 2 slices per person is plenty.
Keep wrapped in foil for  2 – 3 days, maybe more.

125g plain flour
3/4 teaspoon fine salt
1/2 baking powder
125g unsalted butter, softened to room temperature, plus extra for greasing
200g white granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon fresh grapefruit juice
1 teaspoon finely grated lime zest
1 teaspoon finely grated grapefruit zest
75g unsalted pistachios, roughly chopped (shelled weight; we used a whole 125g shell-on bag)

For the glaze (optional and recommended; makes just enough to drizzle over this cake)
1 teaspoon soft unsalted butter
1 1/2 teaspoons grapefruit zest
1 – 2 tablespoons icing sugar
About 1 tablespoon fresh grapefruit juice, more or less

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees Celsius/140 fan.

Cut out a long piece of baking paper to line the bottom and two sides of a 18 cm x 6 cm (7 inch x 2.5 inch) loaf tin in one go. Grease the tin with butter or oil and press the paper lining into place. Set aside.

Mix together the plain flour, salt, and baking powder in a small bowl. Set aside.

Put the unsalted butter and sugar into a large mixing bowl and beat until well combined and fluffy. Thorougly mix in the eggs one at a time until you have a very light mixture.

Then, add the citrus zests and juices and fret slightly over your curdled-looking batter. Tip in the flour mixture and beat well until smooth and thick. Fold in half the chopped pistachios.

Scrape the cake batter into the tin and then top with pistachios. Bake for 1 1/4 – 1 1/2 hours until a cake tester comes out clean. Set on a rack and cool completely in the tin.

For the citrus drizzle glaze, put the soft butter and zest in a small bowl and gradually work in just enough icing sugar to form a stiff paste. Trickle in a little grapefruit juice at a time until you get a smooth, flowing icing.

Unmould the cooled cake and drizzle the glaze as you please.

Around Snacks Never Relax: Cajeta Cashew Crunch ice cream from Chin Chin Labs

Tags

camden, chin chin labs, dessert, food, london

 

Spring has well and truly settled down now, we think. Cold weather breeds such sadness and lethargy in me, you’d think growing up in a cold house whose rooms were half underground and barely warmed with questionable central heating would be character-building. We would have to wear hats and gloves indoors, and most activities were carried out swaddled in blankets. But no, moving to a properly heated house still means I am whiny and particularly overdramatic come winter time, and I still feel much more energetic from mid-spring.

This is fortunate, as with spring comes ＳＰＲＩＮＧ ＣＬＥＡＮＩＮＧ.

my spring cleaning face

So, the things I’ve been mixing up lately are not really food, though I suppose they could be if you have unusual tastes. I’ve been making household cleaning products from white vinegar and bicarbonate of soda (not together, obviously, unless you’re unblocking drains). If I’m honest this isn’t because I am vociferously crunchy (though it’s cool if you are!), but mostly because I am lazy and can’t be bothered to have half-a-dozen bottles of stuff to clean each specific infinitesimal component of my flat when a perfectly effective and safe cleaner can be made from 2 or 3 ingredients I already have in my pantry. These considerations particularly matter if you only have limited storage space.

But that’s boring.

HAVE MORE BORING. TAKE IT.

I have been doing, erm, gardening (???) if one can call it that. We don’t have an actual garden. We’ve a communal balcony but the lock is difficult and I am worried that I’ll end up locking myself out and will have to spend the rest of my days out there, vine-covered and shivering. But I’m content with looking after a few pots of ballockwort plus a few herbs. I’ve regrown celery and spring onions from their stumps. There’s also basil and coriander.

Despite my newfound vernal vim and vigour, I found myself wanting a quick break yesterday, so Mr Pear and I went down to Chin Chin Labs for some ice cream.

We got this week’s special, the cajeta cashew crunch. It is not too sweet, with a real burnt sugar note and crunchy-sticky bits of cinnamon-cashew brittle. In my mind there’s no such thing as too much ice cream, even–especially!–if it’s as absurdly rich, smooth and creamy as theirs, but we usually share our portion (the staff are happy to oblige and give us two spoons without asking) and it’s the right amount for us.

Then we went home and I made us some Thai-style noodle soup, which I will write about soon. It’s something I’ve been eating most days in the past couple of weeks.

Pasta Salad Primavera + Kew Gardens

Tags

cooking, food, pasta, seasonal, vegetarian

The whole of London, it seems, was out last Sunday. The weather forecast held good and it was indeed mild with sunny intervals, so we went outdoors to enjoy it. The sunshine was lovely and bright for the first couple of hours we were at Kew Gardens and then promptly disappeared when we folded up and packed away the remains of our picnic.

I tried to think of appropriately vernal picnic food for the trip. One dish which came to mind was Nigella Lawson’s pasta salad primavera, something I’ve wanted to try but never before had an occasion to because it seemed to be a dish best shared. Until now I’ve never really had the required number of friends and/or occasion to make something like this. (I missed out the ‘had’ in that previous sentence. This seems to be a common occurrence for me recently. Does anyone else have days where they accidentally the main verb?)

My suspicions were correct. I halved the recipe and it made a vatful, generously feeding five people with only a few bits on the side. Also buying up lots of vegetables at once can get a bit dear, depending on what’s available to you. Ideally everything would be home-grown and seasonal but, things being what they are, I used a mixture of fresh and frozen vegetables.

It was also fiddly and time-consuming to cook and refresh 5 types of vegetables one variety at a time; I suspect if you had a multi-tiered steamer you’d have an easier time of it. (If you were to pare this down, choose your favourite vegetables; I think I’d love it with just the broad beans and asparagus.)

Luckily the whole thing can be kept in the fridge for days, so I prepared the salad the evening before, adding the lemon zest and juice just before we set off as I find that anything left overnight with lemon juice in it acquires an odd whiff of PVA glue.

 

With some small sandwiches, slow-roast tomatoes and parma ham, this was a very good early spring meal.

 

 

Afterwards we went around some of Kew Gardens to look at the David Nash sculptures. The Gardens are so huge that you really need several trips to appreciate it.

David Nash is a British sculptor who works with the land. I suppose, at this point, I might say something completely vapid and posturingly pretentious like ‘As an ART HISTORIAN, I have AN OPINION which isn’t even slightly more thoughtful than those issued from people who aren’t ART HISTORIANS, but you should listen to me anyway, because ART HISTORIAN.’ Anyway, Nash’s work is an interesting surprise to come across as you walk through the place; you might observe them as another sort of man-made phenomenon rooted in nature like the rest of the Gardens. Good to wander around, as Mr. Pear is doing in that picture up there. (He is an ex-art student whose special interest is sculpture. He never goes, ‘As a SCULPTOR…‘ thankfully; if he did I’d have to take off to Norwich again because that is so very boring.)

 

I tried and failed to look like a spring flower but it was too windy so I was just the living embodiment of the sad trombone in all pictures except that one. But that doesn’t much matter because I at least felt comfortable; cosy yet light layers for a cool spring, and an elasticated waistband for lots of food.

PASTA SALAD PRIMAVERA
Adapted from Nigella Lawson
Serves 4 – 5 as a main course
Keeps for 2 – 3 days in the fridge.

250g orzo pasta (or puntarelle pasta)
1 – 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
200g asparagus
200g broad beans (in pod, or 75g podded weight)
125g green peas (I used those sweet frozen mystery pellets; use about 250g whole pods if you wish)
200g sugarsnap peas
75g grams fine green beans
1 small garlic clove, very finely chopped/crushed, mixed with 2 tablespoons olive oil (or just use 1 – 2 tablespoons ready-made garlic oil)
Zest and juice of 1 smallish lemon
3 tablespoons finely chopped chives

Firstly, cook the pasta in a large pan of salted boiling water according to packet instructions – probably around 7 minutes. Drain, rinse with cold water, drain again very well. Put the pasta into a large mixing bowl and pour over the extra virgin olive oil, stirring thoroughly to prevent clumping.

Refill the pan with salted water and bring it back to the boil. Meanwhile, prepare the vegetables: cut the asparagus into short lengths, removing the woody ends, remove the broad beans (and peas, if in pod) from their outer pods, and cut the fine beans in half.

Cook each type of vegetable as you please. I boiled them one variety at a time, no more than a few minutes until the point of a small sharp knife passed through them cleanly, before lifting them out with a slotted spoon into a sieve where I refreshed them in cold water. Add each cooked vegetable into the pasta bowl as you go along. When you get to the broad beans, pod them before doing so, squeezing them out with your fingers.

Once everything’s in, add the garlic oil (holding back the garlic bits) and 2 tablespoons chives to the bowl, seasoning generously with salt and pepper. Toss well. Just before serving, zest the whole of the small lemon over the salad and squeeze in half the juice; taste, adding more of the salt and pepper or lemon if needed, sprinkling over the final tablespoon of chives.

Norwich Again + Goat’s Cheese, Caramelised Onion, Honey & Rocket Flatbread Pizza

Tags

baking, cooking, food, vegetarian

yes, I really am that small. (photo taken by Mary love <3)

On Wednesday afternoon I took a brisk walk up and around Primrose Hill, and I was so invigorated by all the fresh air that I decided the logical extension of this delight was to take myself off to Norwich. On Thursday morning I left a note for Mr Pear and got on the train. The adventures I have are small in scale and distance but no less thrilling for me to experience.

Norwich cathedral dates from 11th – 12th century CE and has an awful lot of fan-vaulting.

Norwich is a lovely corner of the world, and it was made even better because I went to stay with this lady:

Mary being her wonderful self

Mary texted me while the train was pulling into Norwich, asking what I’d like to do for food and if I wanted to help her make a goat’s cheese and honey flat bread pizza. I admitted to her my lack of experience with goat’s cheese:

Me: I’ve never had goats cheese before, will you be gentle with me bb
Mary: Omg. Goats cheese is tender and meaningful.

so tender, so meaningful

Easter + Banoffee Pie

Tags

baking, british, dairy, dessert, food, fruit, pastry, pie, vegetarian

Oh, so loverly sittin’ absobloominlutely still
I would never budge till spring
Crept over me winder sill…

Which will happen when, Britain, when?! Come on, Spring!!! Move your bloomin’ arse, etc. etc.

I had an enjoyable Easter break. In Britain, there’s a long weekend around Easter, Good Friday to Easter Monday inclusive, which is (in terms of secular activities) generally spent seeing family and eating too much chocolate. Mr. Pear and I stayed over at his mother’s house and had a family lunch and Easter egg hunt.

Daffy-down-dillies

B. divided up the Easter eggs, helped by his Auntie Su-Su.

Things were beginning to bud in C’s garden.

The weather was dry and cold and furthermore couldn’t decide if it was going to be blazing gold sunshine or the usual grey flatness, which made taking photos on the fly difficult for my slow, inexperienced and easily flustered self. I think I am learning how to do it, though–this is the second time I’ve taken the camera out and about, so I have to remind myself that I must keep at it steadily and that it’s ordinary for things to be learnt with difficulty. With picture-taking I’m back at square one: images don’t look how I want them and I currently have neither the instinct nor the skill to effectively deal with the problems. I try to nourish my mind’s eye with striking photographs so that I always have lodestars in my imagination, but sometimes you just end up thinking, ‘I’ll never be able to do that.’ To be brutally honest it’s been a bit hard on the already ramshackle structure that is my ego, but there we are. Still–I can only go forward!

I have, at least, acquired enough skill over the years to think nothing of knocking up some pastry. Mr. Pear’s mother asked me if I wanted to make a tart for the meal; I gladly accepted, then spent an embarrassing amount of time and energy deciding on what  to make. The factors considered were how it would balance with the rest of the food on offer, its general appeal to the various diners, and whether it would be generally cumbersome to assemble, store, or serve. But I wasn’t worried at all about the actual pastry.

Now, I know the very idea of making pastry sometimes strikes fear into people’s hearts, like making custard or mayonnaise from scratch. That is understandable. But you might also, as Nigella Lawson once said, ‘Feel the fear and cook it anyway.’ However, there’s also no real reason to disdain anyone if they would for any reason prefer to use bought pastry, particular for Banoffee pie as–let’s be honest, here–the joy mainly lies in the filling and topping. It’s not like the peach pie where I feel the flaky pastry comprises half the delight. (And you can get very good ready-made pastry, anyway, and indeed ready-baked sweet crusts…)

I over-whipped the cream a bit but it was still good.

Banoffee pie, if you’ve not heard of it before, is a British dessert which first became popular in the 1970s in Sussex. The chef, Ian Dowding, honestly answers the question of how this pie came to be on his website, and freely gives out a recipe for the ur-version. He is firm on the fact that you should use a pastry rather than biscuit base and that the cream should be freshly whipped, both of which I think  are really worth adhering to as they make the pie especially wonderful. The pastry holds everything firmly and there’s just nothing quite like freshly whipped, sweet cream.

What makes banoffee toffee particularly delicious is the fact that it is basically a version of dulce de leche; that is, caramelised sweetened condensed milk. I adore the deep, rich milk flavour and a lovely vanillary fragrance which goes so very well with ripe bananas. The original recipe instructs you to boil cans of condensed milk, but there’s no reason why you can’t use either ready-made stuff or make your own dulce de leche entirely from scratch. I used a can of Carnation caramel whatnot and it was delicious but it’s up to you.

The recipe I used was basically the original with two exceptions: as I knew non-coffee drinkers were going to be at the table I made this without the instant coffee, and I also scaled the filling down slightly to suit the 23cm tin I had.

BANOFFEE PIE
Adapted slightly from Ian Dowding
Makes 1 x 23cm pie, gives 6 – 8 slices, maybe more–it’s quite rich and sweet
Keeps for 1 – 2 days in the fridge. You can certainly make it the day before, just wrap it well in clingfilm.

Pastry
(If using your own recipe or bought pastry, you’ll want at least 300g dough in total)
250g plain flour
25g icing sugar
Good pinch of salt
125g cold unsalted butter, cut into dice
1 whole large egg
1 egg yolk

Filling
4 – 5 perfectly ripe medium-sized bananas (good to have extra in case you need to cut off bruised bits, etc.)
1 or 2 x 397g tin(s) Carnation caramel (see original recipe if you want to make your own toffee)
Pinch of salt

Topping
300ml double cream, chilled til the last minute
1 dessertspoon caster sugar
Grated chocolate–or whatever you like!

* You will need a 23 cm loose-bottomed tart tin with sides at least 3.5cm high.

Make the pastry: mix the plain flour, icing sugar, and salt together in a large bowl. Add the cold diced butter and cut the fat into the flour mixture, either with cool fingers or a pastry blender. The mixture should resemble fine breadcrumbs. If it starts clumping and melting, stick the bowl in the fridge for 10 minutes and, if needed, rinse your hands in cold water. Add the egg and egg yolk and blend into a dough with a round-bladed knife. You may need to use your hands to press and knead everything together. It doesn’t have to be perfectly smooth. Wrap and chill for at least 30 minutes, where it will straighten itself out.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius/160 fan. Roll the chilled dough out on a lightly dusted surface into a circle about 3 mm thick and 28cm wide. You want it thin but sturdy and big enough to very comfortably line the tin with a little overhang. Line the tart tin with the dough, pushing it so it nestles inside rather than trying to stretch the pastry. Trim the edges, and prick the base with a fork. Firmly press some foil or baking paper against the dough, filling it with rice, beans, or actual pastry weights. Bake for 15 minutes until the pastry is just starting to set and remove the paper and weights, then continue to bake the naked pastry until an even gold, 6 – 8 minutes. Leave to cool completely in the tin.

Filling the tart is definitely the easy bit. Spoon the caramel onto the base of the tart. I used a whole can to give a good, thick layer. Peel and split the bananas in half lengthways, arranging them in one layer on top of the caramel. I cut them into shorter lengths so I could cram them together. Pour the cold double cream into a medium bowl with the caster sugar and whip until it just becomes bulky and holds its shape; this is just about possible by hand but might be agonising, an electric whisk is preferable. Spread the whipped cream over the bananas right up to the pastry crust. Scatter over your decoration of choice, or just leave it plain.

Serve right away or cover with clingfilm and refrigerate til you’re ready to dive in.

My Dad’s Thai-style Hainanese Chicken Rice/Khao Man Gai (ข้าวมันไก่) for Two (or One with Leftovers)

Tags

chicken, food, meat, rice, soup, spicy, thai

Khao man gai for one. The dipping sauce should be a touch lighter but I only had thick dark soy sauce to hand, rather than Golden Mountain sauce.

As Leela notes, this example of well-loved Thai street food isn’t commonly found in Thai restaurants in the U.S., and I have to say that I’ve not really found it in restaurants in my corner of England, either. It’s a shame: I think it’s a marvellous example of Thai-Chinese cuisine that is accessible to a lot of non-Thai people. You’ve got tender boiled or steamed chicken, subtly flavoured rice cooked in  fat-rich stock, a savoury-sweet chilli-hot ginger sauce to liven it up, and hot chicken broth to help it all go down. It is simple, delicious, balanced. People already enjoy Thai-Chinese dishes like noodle soups and stir-fries, so why not this chicken rice?

Thankfully, this dish is very easy to make at home. The only small issue is finding yellow soybean paste and perhaps Golden Mountain seasoning sauce, but both are easily found for a couple of quid in both brick and mortar and online Asian supermarkets. Once opened, the bean paste keeps for ever in the fridge so you can joyfully use it again for khao man gai and many other dishes. (You can, of course, use whatever dipping sauce you like, but if you want to experience a more Thai-style chicken rice then you might want to try it this way.)

Dad steams his chicken with a little coriander, ginger, and garlic to make it particularly fragrant, but you can also boil it just with salt and get a deeply flavoured result.

I’ve eaten at what is purportedly the best khao man gai joint in Chiang Mai and also made it to Leela’s excellent recipe. Both were delicious. But they were not like the khao man gai I grew up eating at home that my parents would make for me. There was nothing wrong per se with either khao man gai; I just think this is partially a case of enjoying best what you hold fondly to your heart, even if it isn’t completely traditional.

Dad’s khao man gai is my absolute favourite, but if you’re new to this dish or are seeking the kind you ate in Thailand, please head on over to Leela’s definitive khao man gai post to get the recipe you want. I’ve made it to her recipe and it is unimprovable. (There is also a link to a vegetarian version in her post!)

If you’d like to try a slightly different khao man gai, then my father’s recipe is one possible variation. Last year I asked him to show me how he made this dish and he obliged. I asked him what ingredients went into it to make it so delicious, and while it would have been easy (and utterly corny) of him to say, ‘ใส่ใจ!’ he took me through each step and let me help him make the dish.

There are two things which make my dad’s khao man gai a little different: firstly, he adds a tiny sprinkle of Thai glutinous rice to the jasmine rice to help it become just that little bit more sticky, luxurious and satisfying, and secondly the dipping sauce he makes is a variation on the kind generally served in Thailand.

This is how the dipping sauce should look.

His khao man gai sauce sticks to most of the basic ingredients (fresh ginger, chilli, garlic, soy sauce, sugar) but adds a couple of others (chicken stock, lime juice, fresh coriander) so the end result holds back on the sweetness and is more like a fresh, tangy relish. Some people might understandably find it overpowering, but I still like it best.

What you can instead take away from my post is the reassurance that it’s also very much worth making khao man gai for one or two servings. Even if the sauce and the whole boiled chicken does keep well in the fridge and you can continually make fresh chicken rice with leftover stock, you don’t necessarily want to be eating khao man gai for days in a row every single time you make this dish. You might also just generally not want to deal with boiling an entire chicken.

Whatever your reasons, I just want to tell you that you don’t lose out on all that much fat and flavour if you choose to make khao man gai with a smaller amount of bone-in chicken pieces. It does look like a lot of work, and it is, but you can balance everything so it comes together without undue stress: the chicken, broth, and dipping sauce can be made in advance. This is a good dish to warm you during the cooler months but still won’t weigh you down when it’s hotter. I’m told that Thai people eat dishes like this to help them get through colds. It certainly had a restorative effect on me, there’s nothing quite like the sensation of soothing a chilli-stung palate with hot, plain chicken broth.

One last word: don’t fear the chicken fat. There’s only a small amount and it’s what makes the rice so delicious. But if you don’t want to use it, then my dad recommends a little spoonful of extra virgin olive oil for a good substitute.

DAD’S KHAO MAN GAI
Makes enough for 1 – 2 servings.
Everything keeps in the fridge for a day or two, but I’d really recommend making the chicken rice fresh–keep a little leftover fatty stock for this.

Chicken and Broth
About 500g – 600g bone-in chicken pieces, or a mix of bone-in and breast fillet if you must (allow 1 – 2 pieces per head)
Water
3/4 teaspoon salt
Fish sauce
A tiny speck of stock cube or concentrate, if liked

Rice (Use the rice:liquid ratio that works for you, these are guidlines only)
240ml (1 US cup) white Thai jasmine rice
1 lightly heaped tablespoon white Thai glutinous rice (optional)
1 small garlic clove, crushed
A few short lengths coriander stalks, roughly torn
1 – 2 slices fresh ginger
1/4 teaspoon salt
350ml skimmed chicken fat topped up with cold water (see recipe)

Dipping sauce
3 – 6 red or green bird’s eye chillies, depending on heat tolerance. (I think 3 is very mild)
4 medium cloves garlic, peeled
About 50g fresh ginger, peeled (3 tbsp finely chopped)
A few sprigs fresh coriander
2 tablespoons chicken broth
1 teaspoon brown or palm sugar
1 tablespoon yellow fermented soy bean paste
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce, preferably Golden Mountain seasoning sauce
2.5 tablespoons lime juice (from about 1/2 lime)

To serve
Fresh cucumber slices
Sprigs of coriander

Put the chicken pieces in a medium saucepan and barely cover with cold water. Add the salt, cover and bring to the boil. Turn down the heat and let the chicken simmer for 20 – 25 minutes until completely cooked through but still very firm.

While the chicken is cooking, fill a large deep bowl or dish with cold water. When the chicken is done, lift the pieces out of the stock and place them in the cold water, leaving them there until they’ve cooled to room temperature. Drain and set aside, covered. Refrigerate the chicken if you’re not going to be eating soon.

Taste the stock and if necessary season it with salt, fish sauce, and maybe a bit of stock cube if you think it needs a boost. My family sometimes take the broth plain but you can simmer chunks of winter melon or de-seeded cucumber in it. Keep the broth warm and covered until needed, or cool and refrigerate to be re-heated later.

For the rice: Wash the jasmine rice and the glutinous rice (if using) in several changes of water until the water is as clear as possible. Transfer to your chosen cooking vessel. I used a very basic electric rice cooker. Roughly scatter the garlic, ginger, and coriander over the surface of the rice.

Skim all the fat off the surface of the chicken stock into a measuring jug or cup. There’s no strict measurement needed; I got just over 100ml fatty stock. Make it up to 350ml (or however much liquid you need) with very cold water, mix in 1/4 teaspoon salt, and pour over the rice and aromatics. Cook for 12 – 15 minutes in the manner you choose, until just done. Keep warm until needed.

Meanwhile, make the dipping sauce. Either bung all the ingredients in a food processor and pulse until it’s chopped fairly small, then pour into dipping sauce bowls. Alternatively, put the garlic, chilli, ginger, and coriander on a chopping board and work on them with a big knife until it’s all approaching a paste. Scrape into a bowl and mix with the chicken broth, sugar, yellow fermented soy bean paste, dark soy sauce, and lime juice. Taste: it should be fresh and tangy against a background of mellow saltiness, rounded off by a slightly sweet note. Add more of any ingredient until it pleases you.

To serve: Cut the cooled chicken into large chunks. You can cleave straight through the bone or remove the meat from the bone. Plate it with the chicken rice. Nestle fresh, crunchy cucumber slices around the rice and garnish with coriander leaves. You can either drizzle the sauce on top or pour it in a little bowl. The chicken broth should be served piping hot in a small bowl on the side. Enjoy everything with greedy gratitude.

Around Snacks Never Relax: Norwich – Biddy’s Tea Room and Other Stuff

Tags

food, norwich, tea

Last week for my pre-birthday outing I went to Norwich with Mr. Pear to visit my friend Mary, who was accompanied by her candy girl, Matthew (not pictured, but he is also attractive!)

Mary & Mr Pear. Mary is the queen of everything, not least my heart.

Norwich is around 2 – 3 hours away from London by train, and I wasn’t feeling optimistic about travel because some snow had settled the night before and there were improvement works going on. To my surprise and gratitude, everything ran bang on time and I was in Norwich just past noon ready to have tea with my friends. The pretty snow-dusted scenery we saw during the journey was a bonus. It was still very cold, though–I know for some readers living in other parts of the UK and the world in general, temperatures around 0 degrees Celsius is positively favonian for this time of year, but it makes my teeth chatter.

My Lady Grey tea; chilli jam & ham sandwiches + cake; Mr. Pear’s hot choclit.

AND WHAT A TEA IT WAS. Just to be clear: a lot of Brits frequently drink individual mugs of tea throughout the day, but taking a meal in a tea room isn’t at all a common occurrence unless you are Very Fancy Indeed.

I saw how adorable and delicious Biddy’s Tea Room looked on Mary’s blog and was therefore very happy when she suggested making a booking there. I decided to go for sandwiches even though I don’t really get on with them. You know that part in Zen Cho’s ‘Prudence and the Dragon’ when the titular character attempts a chicken baguette?

They lapsed into silence, Angela considering the merits of each passing baby, and Prudence struggling with her baguette. Despite four years in a sandwich-eating country, she had yet to master this tricky form of food. Her chicken mayonnaise was starting to drip out the other end.

“I think I will name my baby Tristram,” said Angela.

“Very posh,” said Prudence. Perhaps if she started eating from the other end? But then the chicken mayo started coming out of both ends. It was difficult to know what to do.

Rhubarb & Banana Jam

Tags

food, fruit, jam, vegetarian, winter

I find it a little curious that the majority of the recipes on the first page of Google originate in New Zealand or Australia. Is it A Thing in those regions?

As it happens, this recipe largely comes from my friend Mary, who first suggested this particular combination to me a little while ago. Mary has extremely good taste in all things so I trusted her judgement and immediately looked at some recipes in case there was anything in particular I needed to know about making jam with these fruits. I felt that the creamy vanilla fragrance of ripe bananas would be truly wonderful with tart rhubarb, something along the lines of classic British rhubarb and custard.

The final recipe is largely based on Beatrice Ojakangas’ recipe (PDF), which is extremely easy. It’s really nothing like the fussy marmalades I’ve previously made. The preparation is very straightforward–just some chopping, honestly–and you don’t really have to worry about runny liquids setting, the fruit is already full of body and the end result is more of a soft preserve than a jelly-like set which holds edges.

The flavours come through very well in this jam, like a particularly fresh and fruity version of rhubarb and custard. I’ve only ever made this with forced rhubarb so there’s little worry about the texture, but you can also make this with field rhubarb as long as you make sure you boil it til soft and don’t mind the colour too much.

I had the pleasure of giving this jam (amongst other things, ohoho) to Mary on a trip to Norwich last week, which I will post more about presently. In the meantime, have a picture of me and Mary with some ponies:

 

RHUBARB & BANANA JAM
Adapted from Beatrice Ojakangas’ recipe (PDF)
Makes about 2 x 500ml jars.
Scale it up or down as you require; just keep the weight of sugar to rhubarb equal, and use about 1 lemon half per 400g rhubarb.

800g rhubarb, washed
800g white sugar
Freshly squeezed juice from 1 whole lemon
About 350g ripe bananas (peeled weight)

Cut the rhubarb into 2cm chunks. Place in a very large non-reactive pan big enough to hold at least double the volume of the fruit. Add the sugar and lemon juice, stir thoroughly to coat, cover and leave to sit at room temperature for 2 – 3 hours until the rhubarb has given off a lot of juice. Stir occasionally to help dissolve the sugar.

When the rhubarb is ready, start washing and sterilising jars and setting up your potting area with towels, a ladle and funnel, etc.

Put some saucers into the fridge to prepare for the wrinkle test, which I found the most helpful for this jam.

Cut the banana into large chunks and stir into the rhubarb mixture. Set the pan over a medium-low heat and stir until the sugar has dissolved, scraping up from the bottom to check for any gritty crystals. Increase the heat until the fruit bubbles, maintaining a strong boil for as long as it takes for the fruit to soften and break down and for the mixture to thicken and reduce.

Test for set by putting a drop of mixture onto the cold saucer, leaving it for a minute, and gently pushing a finger through it to see if it wrinkles. Mine set at just under 20 minutes from the first gentle simmer to the boiling. If you’re more comfortable using a jam thermometer, the temperature should register 105 degrees Celsius.

Remove the jam immediately from the heat once it’s reached setting point. Working quickly and carefully one jar at a time, ladle the hot jam into the hot sterilised jar until it is very full, leaving around 1 cm headspace. Wipe away any sticky jam from the rims and seal immediately, leaving the jars undisturbed until completely cold. Store in a cool, dry place.

Spring! + Slow-roasted Potatoes and Jerusalem Artichokes with Coriander, Pepper, and Garlic

Tags

food, seasonal, thai, vegetarian

Spring is here, spring is here
Life is skittles and life is beer
I think the loveliest time of the year is the spring, I do!
Don’t you? ‘Course you do!
But there’s one thing that makes spring complete for me,
And makes every Sunday a treat for me…

Today is the first day of spring. It is also, like any other day in the past 6 months, a day of unrelenting greyness and misery. I hoped I might be in the mood to give you the usual obvious snapshots of budding trees and emerging crocruses along with a sprightly salad or tart or something to look forward to warmer, brighter days. As it is, I have spent the day in dumps and dolors.

Since the weather is still clinging onto the remains of winter, so will my food.

Further to my musings about Thai vegetarian food, I’ve been trying to get this dish right all winter. I wanted to see how traditional Thai marinades would work with British seasonal vegetables. If you know the slightest thing about Thai cuisine, it’s that its flavourings–marinades, stir-fry bases, curry pastes etc–are best made by pounding everything in a granite pestle and mortar. It doesn’t matter whether you start off chopping them by hand or in a food processor (many Thai cooks do this themselves); if you then pound the chopped mixture in a heavy pestle and mortar, you will bruise and crush every single fibre to completely release the flavours and aromas. It takes a little time to become confident with this technique, but the main thing is to go steadily–depending on what you’re grinding and how much, it can be surprisingly hard work. (A painful childhood memory involves me, a pestle and mortar, and a fragment of black pepper flying into my eye, so, yeah…)

A pounded paste of coriander roots, fresh garlic, and peppercorns forms an important and very basic marinade in Thai cooking. There’s no strict recipe for this marinade–you can add further seasonings and spices as you please, but I’ve kept it relatively simple here with just the addition of coriander seeds and sea salt. These sorts of pastes are most often used to flavour grilled meat, but I don’t see why it can’t also be applied to vegetables: I’ve fiddled with the amounts and  proportions and tried it with butternut squash as well as jerusalem artichokes. I have found that you only need a little marinade that’s light on the white pepper to flavour the vegetables and bring out their natural complex sweetness.

Since the vast majority of coriander bunches where I am are sold without their roots (quiet sob), you can substitute the tougher bottom part of the stems. The leaves are too delicate to really withstand cooking, so reserve them for sprinkling over the finished dish or to use in an accompanying sauce.

Speaking of which, these are pretty awesome with Thai sweet chilli sauce, home-made or shop bought. Leftover vegetables can be blended with some stock for a delicious soup.

Also, I decided to contrast the tender, yielding textures by sprinkling makrut lime, garlic, and shallot scented breadcrumbs on top along with fresh coriander leaves. Plain breadcrumbs would also be good, but the flavoured kind are exceptional and you can make a batch to use in lots of other dishes. I don’t need to tell you that if you use these breadcrumbs to bread things, you will pack more flavour into the dish than you thought possible. I’ll give you the recipe later once I chisel myself off the sofa. Until then…

SLOW-ROAST JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES WITH CORIANDER, PEPPER, GARLIC
Serves 3 – 4 with other dishes or just plain rice.
Keeps for up to 2 days in the fridge.

3 medium cloves garlic, peeled
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh coriander stems
1/4 teaspoon whole white peppercorns (black peppercorns or pre-ground white pepper can also be used but will give a slightly different flavour profile)
1 teaspoon whole coriander seeds
1 teaspoon coarse or flaky sea salt

350g Jerusalem artichokes, scrubbed and roughly peeled (a teaspoon is useful here)
Around 400g potatoes, floury or waxy, scrubbed and peeled if you like
1 tablespoon light olive oil
25g unsalted butter, cut into little bits

Torn up fresh coriander leaves or makrut lime leaves for sprinkling

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius (160 fan).

Put the garlic, coriander, peppercorns, and salt in a mortar. Pound, first using short up-and-down motions to crush everything, then more of a grinding motion to encourage the ingredients to form a paste. It’s ready when everything is well blended – use a spoon to give it a good stir and check nothing has escaped.

Cut the jerusalem artichokes and the potatoes into large chunks roughly the same size. Place in a large roasting tin and thoroughly toss with the olive oil. Add the marinade paste to the vegetables and toss, making sure every piece is coated – your hands are the best tools for this.

Dot the butter over the top of the vegetables and cover the tin tightly with foil. Roast for most of 1 hour, turning halfway, until everything is fork tender. You can let the vegetables roast for a little longer uncovered if you want to brown them a little.

Sally Lunn Bread

Tags

baking, bread, food, vegetarian

I could go into detail about the history of Sally Lunn Bread, but I won’t. The link is there for your perusal if you so desire. I have been to Bath twice in my life: once as a two year old, and another as a twelve year old. The most remarkable food-related thing about the latter visit was the fact that, during our lunch hour, some lads suddenly involved us in their japes by snatching away our boxes of take-away food to use in their game of street rugby. We hadn’t even had the chance to eat them yet. Other than that I enjoyed my visit, doing the predictable touristy thing of visiting the Roman Baths, but hey–they are truly impressive. Perhaps I should make another visit in my third decade and finally try some actual, hopefully untroubled Sally Lunn buns.

Until that happens, this will be the only version of Sally Lunn bread I’ve ever had, and I’m pretty content with that. Although I can’t measure it to a specific standard  it is a good bread to make and have–it’s got the sweet, buttery richness of brioche but with a fine cake-like crumb rather than delicate stretchy layers. It’s also made without all the arduous effort that brioche requires. When I was in my early teens I unearthed a copy of Michel Roux’s ‘Desserts: A Lifelong Passion’ from my parents’ many charity shop finds and made, with absolute innocence, a few of the recipes. Amongst them was brioche. Let’s say that I wasn’t quite prepared for any of it and stop there.

In retrospect I only wish that I’d first discovered this bread–it’s an easy to mix batter that you just pour into a tin and prove twice before bunging it in the oven for little more than half an hour. I bet any leftovers will make killer French toast. Only one way to find out!

A highly naturalistic representation of Benedict Cumberbatch (I think he is cute but you know it’s true)

SALLY LUNN BREAD
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen
Fills most of a 23cm x 12 cm x 7.5 cm tin

If you’ve only a small hand-mixer like mine, though, I’d recommend using just a wooden spoon for the last step as the dough threatens to climb up the beaters into the machine. Also, note that I use a different kind of yeast and have scaled it down accordingly; use the amount that’s right for you.

250g plain flour
25g granulated sugar
1 teaspoon fine cooking salt
3/4 teaspoon fast-action dried yeast (also known as easy-blend or instant yeast; if using active dried yeast, use the original 1 1/8 teaspoon and proceed as stated)
175ml milk (any kind)
4 tablespoons soft unsalted butter
1 large egg plus 1 large egg yolk

Stir together 100g of the plain flour and all of the sugar, salt, and yeast in a large mixing bowl. Set aside.

Heat the milk and butter in a small pan until just warm to the touch (around 40 degrees C), not worrying about any remaining lumps.

Pour the warm liquid into the flour mixture and beat for 2 minutes by machine (3 by hand) until smooth and thick. Add the whole egg, egg yolk, and another 50g flour, beat for another 2 or 3 minutes. Add the final portion of flour and mix until just smooth. Don’t skip mixing the dry ingredients in portions or you won’t work the dough enough, resulting in a gummy bread.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl, cover with buttered or oiled clingfilm, and leave to rise for at least 1 hour until doubled in size. Be patient: the exact rising time isn’t important; just make sure the dough has properly expanded, or the taste and texture won’t be anywhere near as good as it’s meant to be.

Butter and flour a 23cm x 12 cm x 7.5 cm tin (or equivalent). When the batter is ready, scrape it into the tin and cover once again with the clingfilm, this time leaving it to rise for 30 minutes in total. Uncover the tin after 15 minutes and preheat the oven to 190 degrees Celsius while leaving the batter to complete the final proving time.

Bake for 35 – 40 minutes until golden on top and a toothpick comes out clean from the middle. It may be wise to check at 25 minutes, particular if the bread hasn’t risen much and barely comes up halfway; drying out this bread would be disappointing. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then turn out to cool on a rack until just warm.