Salut mes amis!
So to earn my keep / pie / wine / foie gras while here in France, I’ve been redesigning the website of this petit French paradise. It’s now back up, so go look! http://kitchen-at-camont.com
Bisous x
* The nickname given to me by Dominique the pig butcher, who invited us to lunch last week
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Alors mes amis, the deuxieme post.
Since we last spoke, I have had a lot of pie. Specifically: a plum tart, a swiss chard tart, a French apple pie, an American apple pie… possibly there are more. The lady who owns this petit french paradise makes pastry like you and I make toast; indeed, I found her making a batch at half seven this morning (i know! up so early!). Apparently, all those rules I have followed religiously – use fridge-cold butter and ice-cold water, don’t overwork the dough, don’t get it too wet… – all irrelevant. Still not sure what the key is with that, but the revelation has been the creamy fillings: fresh goat curd with the plums, creme fraiche & nutmeg for the chard
ARGH SOMETHING JUST FLEW INTO THE CARAVAN AND I JUMPED OUT THE WINDOW AND TORE MY SHORTS
ok, pretty pie pictures to follow tomorrow; i’m going to bed because SOMETHING IS SCRABBLING AROUND and there is a mosquito whining in my ear and something flitting against my leg and my bum is out. damn countryside.
(by the way, kate (pie-mistress) is looking for another volunteer asap, so if anyone wants a week or two free holiday in the sunny south of france with all the pie you can eat and the rose you can drink included, plus fresh eggs and raspberries and figs and a sheep called margo and a giant dog, just 4h train from paris, then let me know. night. x)
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Alors mes amis, today we go up another level in smug blog tediousness. Je suis in France, and thus maintenant we are a smug food travel blog. Bœuf.
You may all not believe this, mais mes amis, I sleep these days in a caravan sans running water. Mainly though, je mange. Je mange, je pick the fruit, je go to the market, je say bonjour to the chickens, je drink le rosé.
Et aujourd’hui, because my hostess is American, we had a 4th July party. I sat next to a Californian lady who had Joni Mitchell play at her wedding.
We must take time to consider the awesomeness of this fact.
Bon.
Here for you is our table:
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We had un peu de foie gras, quelques olives and then un barbecue d’hot dogs francais: saucisse in baguette with homemade chilli plum sauce (picked and stoned par moi). Voila, mes amis, my work these days:
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I go now to sit in a hammock. Bon.
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Recently, this blog has taught me that I eat lots of 1) eggs and 2) warm salad. The first is me avoiding meat in a combined attempt to be frugal and save the planet; the second is down to laziness and anxiety. Having only one dish to put together is so much easier than trying to get three different things all ready at the same time, timing being a particular kitchen weakness of mine.
Tonight’s combo – after the sad last-minute cancellation of a trip to my favourite restaurant - sounds strange, but was inspired by a revelatorily(?) brilliant Allegra McEvedy pasta recipe in the Guardian last year: linguini with prawns, almonds and tomato. I think, frankly, that the tomatoes in my dinner were an ingredient too far, but otherwise, I’m feeling quite smug about this one.
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Slice a garlic clove thinly, cut half a thumb of ginger into matchsticks and finely chop some green chilli. Heat oil in a frying pan and sweat all three for a few minutes. Meanwhile, cut a bulb of fennel in half and then into thin wedges, then add to the pan. Cook on a low heat until just tender. Spread a handful of flaked almonds on a baking tray and toast in the oven until lightly golden. Add raw, peeled, deveined prawns to the frying pan, squeeze in the juice of half a lime, season with salt, and partially cover with a lid to steam cook the prawns. Once they turn pink, remove the pan from the heat and stir in the almonds and a scattering of fennel fronds.
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After making mum French toast on Mothers’ Day, I thought it would be nice to make dad his favourite, Eggs Benedict, on his corresponding day of parental appreciation. But then last week, after three months in the diary, my own parents cancelled on me in favour of friends. Thus it was Eggs Florentine (cheaper, vegetarian) with my Bethnal Green family this morning instead.
I won’t lie, it’s a bloody arse to make. Everything needs to be done at the last minute and everything needs a pan of simmering water and everything is only ever a few seconds from going irreparably wrong. For an already-anxious person and cook, it’s not in the least bit fun. But somehow, it all worked. Thanks to posh housemate P for taking over on the egg-poaching front and happy housemate R and saintly-patient M for their toast-buttering and tea-making services. The hollandaise was great, and while I wish I could offer some insight into why it didn’t curdle or scramble or split, I just don’t know.
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It’s just occurred to me that this blog makes my life seem like one long brunch of eggs.
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First, put
on. Meanwhile: boil
for a couple of minutes until tender. Drain and cool under the cold tap. Turn on the oven – temperature doesn’t matter – and slide in a baking tray scattered with
sliced almonds
– they’ll take maybe five minutes to lightly toast. Chop and fry
in olive oil. Remove from pan. Add a bit more oil,
for a minute on its own, then add and fry
gently until soft. Season, but easy on the salt because of the cured pig. Now to assemble: stir the beans and bacon into the leeks, squeeze over
and warm through for a minute or so. Finally, stir in
the toasted almonds and the drained pasta with a bit of its cooking water. Taste seasoning and finish with
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Can’t get more smug than that.g
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Chop some parsley. Halve an English muffin. Heat a frying pan. De-skin and cut chorizo sausage into small bits, add to pan. Melt a generous lump of butter in a saucepan on a medium heat. Put muffin halves in toaster. As butter foam starts to subside, but before it colours, pour in two beaten, seasoned eggs. Stir. Keep stirring. Stir the chorizo. Stir the eggs. Keep stirring. Just before they set, tip in the chorizo. Give it all a final stir. Remove from heat. Tip over muffin halves. Scatter with parsley. Take two bites. Photograph. Eat.
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As per post title (and sorry to friends finding out about that on here), last night’s baking-for-the-office effort was one of my last. This time, though, not only were the results actually edible enough to bring in this morning, but my chocolate millionaire’s shortbread was so good that housemate R’s boyfriend NWSixDan actually DREAMT about it. Alas, this is another of those occasions when I can’t take too much credit: the recipe belongs not to me but to Rachel Allen, an annoying lady who nevertheless gives good cake. On the plus side, statistically I can now expect only one in every two of my baking attempts to end in disaster.
Allen calls these chocolate caramel bars, but that’s boring, so in honour of my soon to be ex-overlord, Mr Murdoch, I give you:
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The problem with worshipping at the altar of goddess Nigella and god Nigel is that their generous enthusiasm convinces you you’re a wonderful home cook, when in reality they demand nothing more from you than the ability to soften onions (Him), or lasciviously dribble cream into all and sundry (Her).*
But bless them, they are always encouraging their followers to wander from the fold, to trust our own judgement and use their recipes as mere guides rather than commandments. Frankly though, I’m a liability off-piste. One afternoon at university I tried to invent a new class of savoury snack by pouring miso soup on my Weetabix. Needless to say, the moral I took from that particular tale was that devotion to the Nigels He & She was crucial if I didn’t want my culinary skill level to plateau at misconceived Japanese/Kellogg’s fusion food.
However, as a very early post on here noted, I have been doing some serious homework of late. Reading cookbooks will never be able to teach me how to make pastry – I’m not sure even a personal lesson from Nigella herself could do that – but after reading hundreds of recipes, you do begin to spot the underlying patterns that make for good eating, and to understand which leaps of food faith aren’t likely to end in a bowl of tepid, miso-sodden cereal.
Which brings us to last night, when I thought I might make some sort of warm salad with squid and sweet potato, just because it sounded – tasted? – in my head like it might work. I thought I might add some capers for a bit of salty spike, and plenty of chopped fresh herbs, and dress it with lemon, and olive oil…
And then, because I’m still a bit tentative about these things, I googled squid + sweet potato, and lo! it turned out the lovely Ottolenghi’s done it all before. Nigels above! The relief!
A few months ago I would have followed the big O’s instructions down to the last 3/4tsp of salt, but – aside from stealing his idea of using maple syrup in the dressing – I was just happy to know my culinary instincts aren’t completely out of whack, and would you believe it, I made a rather nice dinner all on my own.
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Chop a sweet potato into mouth-sized chunks. Drop into boiling water and cook for maybe 5 mins until just tender. Drain and season. Meanwhile, prepare the dressing by whisking together: 1tbsp lemon juice, 1tbsp maple syrup, 4tbsp olive oil, s&p, a finely chopped shallot. Tear some salad leaves (I used a red chicory and Romaine combo), and put in a bowl with the sweet potato and a roughly chopped, generous handful of any combination of parsley, mint and coriander. Heat some olive oil in a frying pan, slice three squid into rings, and add when the oil is very hot. Fry for barely a couple of mins, until the the squid is just cooked through. Tip into the salad with a tbsp of capers. Because I bought some wild garlic last week, I had some of the edible flowers in a pint glass on the draining board, so I finished with a (smug) sprinkling of those.
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* If you want to see my gods together in truly sensual action, have a look here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK61hlek064
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