Beach BBQ Worthing style

I could not resist the temptation of posting this blog picture in black and white.  I did so because the setting is so reminiscent of small black and white images of my childhood.  sitting on the same pebble beach a few miles up the coast in Hove.  My grandmother, clad in thick coats and scarfs whatever the weather,  my brother and I running in and out of the sea, whatever the weather.   Last weekend our friends took us down to the beach.   Yes, it rained, yes, it was occasionally windy but, as is so often the case in England, we stuck it out.  The sun emerged, the children swam and we ate Asian inspired BBQ.    Delicious fish on skewers, steamed asparagus marinated in olive oil, fish and soy sauce, but the squid deserves special comment.  Again steamed in foil parcels, the squid had been marinated in a little oil, chilli, fish sauce and soy sauce, with the addition of spinach.  Chris steamed these over the BBQ for no more than five minutes.  We could have been on a beach in Indonesia... well almost.

Dom's number one chicken

Two or three warm sunny days in a row and I start to believe its summer.  With both boys home on a Friday night, Dom decided to barbeque a chicken.  He learnt the skill of butterflying a chicken a few years ago by looking up instructions on the internet.  It really is the best way to cook chicken on an open fire.  Nicely flattened, a bit like a cartoon victim of  hit and run, the chicken cooks evenly with lovely crispy skin. 

Today's offering has been marinating in olive oil and lime juice with mustard seeds, garlic, chilli, cumin and fenugreek all afternoon.  It was cooked for about 45 minutes over coals and served with a couscous salad.    Best of all enjoying a beer at the end of the garden while it cooks.

Scorpion pasta

I have been making this for about 20 years and is a regular fall back when everyone is hungry and starting to prowl around the kitchen looking hopefully into an apparently empty fridge.    I suspect most families have a variation of this.  You need:

• streaky bacon
• a pack of uncooked or cooked prawns.  I like the large ones but any size will do.
• about 2cm of root ginger sliced into thin match sticks
• three cloves of garlic thinly sliced
• olive oil
• crème fresh
• grated parmesan.
• some cooked peas
• For the pasta, I think this works best with tagliatelle.

While the pasta is cooking, thinly slice your bacon and cook it in a little olive oil, after a few minutes add the ginger and garlic and cook for just a couple of minutes.  Add the prawns and peas and coat in the olive oil.  Once the pasta is cooked drain it, leaving just a little cooking water in the bottom of the pan.  Add the bacon and prawn mixture, a good dollop of  crème fresh and a handful of grated parmesan.  stir it all up, season with salt and pepper and serve it steaming hot.

Why scorpion pasta?  It's what Rowan used to call it when he was little.  I loved his sense of the exotic, not least because I am pretty sure he had never seen a scorpion, while prawns were regularly on the menu!

Stretching for the Elderflower

After a month or two break, I have found that I have a backlog of recipes that I want to post.  I am going to start with something that I have never made until about two weeks ago.  Which is somewhat contrary to my stated aim for this blog of posting family favourites.  But I think I should be forgiven when it comes to elderflower cordial.

As with all good recipes, first collect your elderflowers. At this time of year they hang tauntingly over pretty much ever fence and hedgerow. In our south London suburb they all seemed to be just out of my reach. So the task of collecting around 25 large heads of elderflower, mainly in flower or in bud but not yellowing, involved me going out  on a sunny morning, putting the roof down on my car, parking under a suitable tree and standing on tiptoes on the back of the car then hooking down the best looking flower heads.  It was subsequently pointed out to me that my cool, urban women about town reputation was destroyed as various neighbours drove past as I was doing this.

I read about six different recipes  for elder flower cordial and was amazed by the different amounts of sugar they suggested. From 250 grams to 2 kilos for basically the same amount of flowers and water. I suspect the difference in the end result is largely the thickness of the concentrate but I used 250 grams and I wouldn't want it any sweeter.

 

Strip the flowers from the storks and carefully removed any insects.  Next pour about 2 litres of just boiled water over the flower heads and leave it overnight.  The next day I used muslin to filter the liquid from the flowers, added the juice of two lemons and 250 grams of  caster sugar and boiled for a couple of minutes, before allowing it to cool and bottling the cordial.  

 

It was as easy as that and resulted in a cordial that everyone loves.  It will keep for a few weeks but also freezes well.

 

 

Alpina inspired apple studel

One of my earliest memories of childish independence was being allowed to walk with my brother to a parade of shops about five minutes away from our house.  There was a little bakery/café at the end of the parade called the Alpina.  Run by a smiley Swiss women, I remember cuckoo clocks, pine tables, benches and pictures of snowy alps.  Did the staff wear lederhosen and have long blond plaits? Probably not, but for the purposes of my memory they certainly did.   Hot chocolate and apple strudel was my order of choice.  It never occurred to me to try and construct a pastry of such complexity as an apple strudel, layers flaky, crunchy and chewy all at the same time.  It never occurred to me, that is, until I bought a book for Giselle when she was about six.  “Cooking with kids”  by Linda Collister.  It not only had a recipe but had one of those wonderful step by step set of pictures.  I realised that maybe this cake was not beyond me.   A few weeks ago I found myself driving through my old town, the parade of shows is still there and to my utter amazement so was the Alpina.  Next time I am down that way I will be paying a visit. This is how I make apple strudel.  

• 200g of readymade filo pastry
• 9 amoretti biscuits
• 4 good eating apples
• 50g of caster sugar
• 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 75g of butter
• 3 table spoons of Sarah’s mincemeat (see earlier blog post) or if you don’t have any use 3 table spoons of raisins.
• Icing sugar

Crush the amoretti biscuits in a plastic bag.  Peel the apples core and cut into chunks, mix the cinnamon and sugar.  Melt the butter.  Once you have all the filling prepared lay out the filo pastry on a work surface in a large overlapping rectangle.  Brush about half the melted butter on the base, then sprinkle the amoretti crumbs, the mincemeat or raisins, the apple, and the sugar and cinnamon.  Leave a good margin of about 3 cm all the way round the pastry.  Next fold the margins over the edge of the mixture and finally carefully roll your strudel up.  Brush the rest of the melted butter over the top and side of your strudel sausage. If holes appear pastry a bit more pastry over the top using butter as your glue. 

Carefully transfer your strudel onto a greased baking tray and bake for about 30 minutes in a preheated oven (200 degrees C).  When it is ready the pastry will be golden brown.  Dust with icing sugar and serve with a flourish.

Chittarni

Today, I have a guest post from my father. This is a recipe that he had told me about but only as a memory from his childhood.  We cooked it together a few days ago and I will certainly be introducing it to the rest of the family.  I have found another recipe for this in Copeland Marks', The varied kitchens of India which has a chapter on the food eaten by the Jews of Calcutta.  It was almost exactly the same as this one except that he uses tamarind paste rather than vinegar. I wonder if the vinegar was added by my great grandmother and others finding themselves transplanted in England, as an alternative, since tamarind must have been pretty tricky to come by in England in 1941!

Guest post

"My first recollection of the dish called chittarni which we put together today is specific.  It was during World War II. My Grandmother (Big Granny) was staying with us in Sidmouth,  Devon, where we occupied a flat on the sea front. The dish was  a favourite of Granny's because one of her daughters had cooked some for her at home in London, and sent it to her by post.  It consisted of pieces of chicken stewed  in a  smooth and richly spiced onion sauce to which tomatoes had been added and which is  sharpened by vinegar. The sauce you could tell both preserved and enhanced the chicken. It arrived in one or two glass jars. I have  never forgotten its smell and its sweet and sour taste. Nor my greed in wanting to eat it then and there as Granny unpacked her parcel  even though I knew that it was meant to be warmed up and was intended as a  treat for her and not for me. Treats were in short supply in 1941.  I have thought of that day but did nothing about trying to recreate the experience, until I discovered its recipe in the Sephardi section of Claudia Roden's brilliantly researched  Book of Jewish Food.  

Here's how you cook it. You need a lot of onions which slow cooking melts down - two Kilograms, say six large ones. In the old days you would grate them or chop them very fine. Fortunately  adding the onions coarsely chopped to a food  processor will quickly give you a large bowl without tears or too much effort. The onions should then be slowly softened  in oil in a large pan with the lid on and stirred from time. This may take half an hour or more. The onions should on no account be allowed to brown.

While the onions are cooking prepare the spices. You will need:  several cloves of garlic mashed into a paste,  a generous portion of grated ginger, a teaspoon of turmeric, a teaspoon of ground cinnamon, 1 and half teaspoons of ground coriander. ground cardamom, chili powder and a couple of bay leaves. I leave some of these amounts open to allow for taste preferences. Add these spices and cook slowly for five minutes stirring from time to time.  Add chicken pieces, thighs on or off the bone and sauté for a few minutes. 

Now add a can of chopped tomatoes and simmer uncovered for 30 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed. Finally stir in a three of four tablespoons of wine vinegar according to taste. I find that this sour element is very important to the final balance of taste. Cook for a further 10 minutes.

 

It gives me pleasure to think Dear Pippa that the  dish which we had for lunch and which your bother Toby ate the same day when he came to stay the night, should bring so long a strand of memory leading to your great grandmother and to a seaside  flat in wartime England. A true family recipe I suppose."

 

Giselle’s chocolate and raspberry brownies

Today’s recipe comes from Giselle. These chocolate brownies really are the best I have ever tasted. As well as baking them at home she used to make them for the local café where she worked at weekends when she was at school.

• 300g of dark chocolate
• 50 g of milk chocolate
• 225 g of double cream
• 2 tablespoons of espresso coffee
• 3 large eggs
• 225g caster sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 75 g of self-raising flour
• About 150g of raspberries
• 100g of milk chocolate broken into chunks

Preheat the oven to 190 degrees, grease and line with greaseproof paper a large square tin. Melt the chocolate and cream in a bowl over a pan of hot water, stir occasionally until it is melted and glossy. Allow it to cool a little.

In another bowl mix together the coffee eggs, sugar and vanilla essence. Slowly beat in the chocolate mixture. Fold in the flour, the raspberries and milk chocolate chunks and then pour the mixture into the tin. Bake for about 40 minutes, the brownies should have a soft centre.