May it be filled with everything you want. Then some.
January 01, 2010
December 11, 2009
Raspberry season
Two $5 punnets of biodynamic - yep, I said, biodynamic - raspberries, grown in the so-close-to-Melbourne-that-it's-practically-a-suburb Yarra Valley came home a few weeks ago. Unbelievably good. With raspberry season well underway, think it's high time I shared a little summer raspberry love.
It's uncomplicated; hardly what you'd even call a recipe. Which is good. The less reading during food prep the better, I say. Leaves more time for loading up the Pentax. Just the way I like things, these days.
Based on a recipe in Tamasin Day-Lewis' (not-quite...it's a bit too idiosyncratic to be deemed Biblical...but nonetheless extremely useful...) Kitchen Bible for Uncooked Raspberry Jam. Kinda untrue as there is a tiny bit of cooking involved, but it's not of the boiling, foaming kind. Halting myself from swiping a slow finger through each time I passed the bowl proved tricky. I will add that Rapadura sugar - evaporated cane sugar - is seriously good here, but ordinary caster sugar will behave perfectly well.
Weigh your raspberries. Measure 1/2 of that weight in sugar. If your raspberries are tart, add more by all means. Oscar licked the spoon for a full 2 minutes, so clearly teenagers and adults like it less sweet, though younger ones may not. Only you will know.
Pour the sugar into an ovenproof bowl and add the fruit to another. Warm the oven to a moderate heat - 150 C is perfect, no pre-heating required - and pop both bowls in for 20 minutes. Remove, scrape the sugar into the fruit and stir for 10 minutes, slow as you like, but constantly. Rest for 10 minutes and do it all over again. Cool, avoiding the urge to strain. The goo around the seeds is the best bit.
Ideas on what to do with it, to come.
December 09, 2009
An Honest Kitchen, Take Two
AND
as promised, we've also made an international Northern Hemisphere-friendly edition of our first issue, one that's ready to go right now.
You can download a FREE sample here:
Download SAMPLE An Honest Kitchen International Winter Ed
You can purchase a copy of our international Winter edition by clicking on the Paypal "Buy Now" button below.
And please, have a look at Kathryn's (much better worded) post here which explains why our magazine costs a little more. It's a time-consuming labour-of-love we're really proud of. Thank you. All of you.
December 07, 2009
A little housekeeping
A little early December tidy is in order before we rush (madly) into the downhill stretch of 2009.
I've been head-down for the last few weeks, busily putting finishing touches on a few Honest Kitchen projects and, given it's the 7th of December, think it high time I shared some great links (and an offer) which have caught my eye over the last couple of weeks:
One of the most exciting visual projects I've come across all year, 52 Suburbs explores Sydney's suburbs in absorbing, beautiful detail.Christmas gift-shoppers fall into two camps. Those who love it and those who do not. Gill Stannard's excellent post offers both clever advice for stress-less giving and a gentle reminder of what really matters at this time of the year.
The house next door is set to be demolished soon. I've been slipping through the gate, raiding the long neglected grapevine under cover of dark and making these Middle Eastern-style nori rolls from @silverbeet's lovely new blog.
Really, really good.
Speaking of vine leaves, A.O.F. and I had a great time rolling dolmades a few weeks ago, something we're keen to make an annual event of. You can read about this year's success, here.
And this photo, from Clinkerboy, which is the cleverest Christmas tree, ever.
All of which brings me to the offer I mentioned earlier.
Jules of Stone Soup's gorgeous, loving tribute to her late mum's cooking, 'And the Love is Free', is a great little Christmas gift idea. The book features Jules' signature (stunning) light-flooded food photography and traditional Australian recipes, the kind that brought on a wonderful sense of nostalgia for me, having grown up on things like Apricot Chicken and Caramel Slice myself in the 1970's. Last night, with an almost empty fridge, I picked up Jules' book and made a tofu version of her mum's Chinese Chicken. It was simple, fuss-free and absolutely delicious.
"When I made this recently to test the recipe and photograph it, I was very pleasantly surprised at just how lovely it tasted. It's a bit amazing how soy sauce, honely and ground ginger can produce such an authentic feeling Chinese dish."
It is amazing.
Jules is very generously offering a 10% DISCOUNT for Nourish Me readers who purchase her cookbook 'And the Love is Free' before Christmas. Order at www.thestonesoup.com and use the discount code 'Christmas' or you can call Naomi Clancy on 0407 014 232. Free postage anywhere in Australia.
A lovely way to support a local and much-loved Australian blogger.
December 02, 2009
Never the same, twice
Toward the end of the phone call, one in which Jo, composed but ever droll, reported a significant personal breakthrough over her weekend, things turned to dinner; “Do you really, ‘never cook the same thing twice’?”
Take 250g of fresh ricotta cheese* and drain it very well. An hour in a colander over the sink should see you right. Preheat the oven to 200 C.
Using a little olive oil, lightly grease a small ovenproof dish. Slice the drained ricotta thickly and push it carefully into the base. Take a handful of seedless grapes (red, green, whatever) and slice them into rounds. Pit, if you need to, and roughly chop 2 heaped tablespoons of cured olives (black, green, cracked, whole, whatever) and chop a palmful of fresh thyme and a larger palmful of fresh oregano. Scatter the grapes, olives and herbs over the ricotta, add a little salt and pepper and drizzle the top with a tablespoon, maybe two, of delicious olive oil. Bake for 25 minutes, or until the ricotta is firm and golden at its edges. Cool before devouring as per above.
*Do not attempt this with the ricotta stacked in the supermarket fridge – it’s simply the wrong texture and you will be seriously disappointed. Ask for a wedge at the deli counter instead.
Truthfully, no. It's not intentional; rather, I enjoy cooking and find there’s room for improvement in almost any recipe. I seem to spend a fair chunk of reading time noodling through cookbooks, too. At lunch, over breakfast with tea, and even, very occasionally, before bed. (Though I think the latter terribly bad form and have, this year, finally put a stop to it.) I’m often found marking pages in cookbooks – naughty, dog-eared corners-turned-down marking because, ultimately, the cookbook should be a working object – and making notes of my own all over the margins.
I do, however, want to cook this simple dish again in almost – almost – the same way. The grape, olive and herb topping is very clever; a gratifying combination of sweet-salty-bitter just made for the kind of can’t-be-fussed summer cooking we’re rapidly approaching. I’ll be serving this often over summer with a loaf of good bread, a salad of snappy greens, a bottle of something cold and some stone fruit to finish. The cicadas are already trilling out there. Summer's upon us.
Baked ricotta with grapes & olives
If my habit of bookmarking is naughty, Karen Martini's liberal use of olive oil is damnation on a stick. I love it – cooking without it would be unimaginable - but don't want to drown in the stuff. If you’re feeling underweight (ha!) by all means, follow her excellent recipe. I have a hunch that it may work with fresh silken tofu, though I am yet to try the idea.
Take 250g of fresh ricotta cheese* and drain it very well. An hour in a colander over the sink should see you right. Preheat the oven to 200 C.
Using a little olive oil, lightly grease a small ovenproof dish. Slice the drained ricotta thickly and push it carefully into the base. Take a handful of seedless grapes (red, green, whatever) and slice them into rounds. Pit, if you need to, and roughly chop 2 heaped tablespoons of cured olives (black, green, cracked, whole, whatever) and chop a palmful of fresh thyme and a larger palmful of fresh oregano. Scatter the grapes, olives and herbs over the ricotta, add a little salt and pepper and drizzle the top with a tablespoon, maybe two, of delicious olive oil. Bake for 25 minutes, or until the ricotta is firm and golden at its edges. Cool before devouring as per above.
*Do not attempt this with the ricotta stacked in the supermarket fridge – it’s simply the wrong texture and you will be seriously disappointed. Ask for a wedge at the deli counter instead.
November 28, 2009
Water saving
There's been some rain.
I've been picking snails from the hedges for a few days which means everything's getting a good drink.
But even after a solid downpour, the dams are pretty low. You have to save what you can, when you can.
A salad of very dirty cos hearts and purslane, weeded out of the parsley this week, takes only one bucket of shower water to get clean. That, in turn, gets rationed out to whichever food-bearing plants look most needy and there you have it; water-saving in action. Easy, no?
November 27, 2009
Red witlof
(click on the photo - bigger is better)
...is my current favourite salad leaf. The pale green ones are fabulous and we manage to get through at least a couple of heads each week, but the red ones, slightly more elusive, are better. And prettier. The tiny inner leaves curl, just so.
Tender violet leaves, just-picked from the two plants my father bought last time he visited, add a certain heart-shaped something to a spring salad bowl. A dozen is all you need. No need to overdo it. All a violet asks of her gardener is a very shady spot to quietly go about her business and no actual attention. She doesn't seem to need much water, either. I can do that.
Dressed with a thick, Dijon mustard-heavy dressing, the salad sat alongside a dish of semolina gnocchi. All very good.
(Anyone interested in playing around with violets should read Callipygia's excellent post, here.)
November 24, 2009
Syracuse
Well, the heat, it's gone. The city sighed audibly, drops of rain sizzling on the pathway, last Friday afternoon. Peter suggested, while still in the grip of morning heat, that we could let someone else cook our lunch. Bloody good idea, that.
We chose Syracuse because it's lovely - yes, and the loos are particularly handsome - but also because it's one of the many restaurants participating in the Streetsmart campaign. Ed's been a big supporter of Streetsmart because they are a small, independent charity, one helping the homeless all over the country and indeed, all over the world.
If you live in Australia and are perhaps planning a dinner out soon, why not pick somewhere from this comprehensive list? The food was excellent, but I must say I can't quite remember in detail what we had (I never take notes at restaurants and the Pentax, she has a bit of trouble seeing in low-light). Besides, I want to see and taste and, well, just enjoy eating food that somebody else has cooked.
I can tell you that the white anchovies were good, but the slice or two of steak I snuck from Peter's plate, was really, really good.
(Loving those loos.)
Streetsmart runs right up until Christmas. Donations of $2 (and upward) can be added to your bill. Not too much of a stretch for a very good cause.
November 20, 2009
Hot
It is insanely hot.
The key to staying calm in unending heat is to drink lots of water and move very slowly, especially when performing the everyday sort of tasks.
Like the washing. Which dries, this stunningly hot November, as you're pegging it to the line. Washing can be a drudge, but since discovering Janet's marvellous Mrs Washalot, I'm a whole lot jollier about the small amount I actually do.
Cooking isn't nearly as much fun in the heat, but at least I'm preparing - mentally, I think (I hope...) - for the shocker this summer doubtless shall be. Because Adelaide (next door, to our left on your map, international peoples) have had it far worse than we, I've been looking to Ganga for kitchen inspiration.
Best I be off before I whinge too much about the heat and bore you all senseless. The comments box eagerly awaits any hot weather eating ideas you may like to share.
November 17, 2009
Bowls-full
This week, the fruit bowl finally holds something worth crowing about. Small, hard nectarines, patiently softening and, better still, a clutch of delicious almost-there apricots. That bowlful there is my mothers'. She got in a week earlier than I.
When Nellie bends my elbow to push it gently across my back, she always holds my hand. My fingers (of their own accord) often curl up to greet hers and gently grasp back, a gesture I find intimate and comforting but I wonder how she feels about it. Beneath her tiny, hot hands, my shoulders have dropped, my neck moves freely and I haven’t had a headache worth mentioning in months.
I'm feeling kinda good.
Walking home, shoulders loosened, the light falls beautifully on the neighbourhood gardens. A single wild strawberry pokes out between the fence posts, a bright orange nasturtium blossom peeks at me beneath a freshly-painted white gate. Birds of paradise looked curiously - proudly – over a fence line and a grape vine that tumbles onto the pathway each summer is lush and green.
Soup for one, tonight. A little bowl of cold sorrel soup from Patience Gray's Plats du Jour, one that uses no cream, no butter, no nothing bad. One apricot will be halved when the sun sinks below the fence, stalk end to pointed tip, and prised carefully apart. Its hollow will be filled with a few crushed amaretti, mooshed with a teaspoon of butter, a drizzle of honey then into a moderate oven until done.
Quite enough for a happy solo diner, and the dog, naturally, can lick the bowl clean.
