This wonderfully easy new-to-me way to cook polenta comes from Paula Wolfert's terrific new book, Mediterranean Clay Pot Cooking. There's none of that strewing cornmeal onto fiercely boiling water, followed by constant stirring. You just mix cornmeal, oil and cold water, put the resulting mess into the oven & let time do all the work for you. Amazingly, it comes out of the oven entirely lump-free. Not sure if it works in a metal pot, although I can't think why not.
Waitrose in Henley have just begun to stock bags of Italian stoneground cornmeal ... perfect for this, and for a loaf of cornbread later this week.
Oven polenta in a clay pot
for 6
2 cups cornmeal, stoneground if you can find it
2 tablespoons olive oil, or butter if you prefer
salt
8-10 cups water (see note below)
Note: Paula Wolfert's instructions say: the consistency of the polenta is a factor in deciding how much liquid to use. For soft polenta, use 5 parts liquid to 1 part cornmeal and for firm polenta 4 parts liquid to 1 part cornmeal. She also specifies a wide, shallow dish; I cooked mine in a narrower, taller pot, and therefore didn't need so much water.
Preheat the oven to 180C. Stir the cornmeal, oil salt and water. Bake uncovered for one hour and twenty minutes. Stir, and bake for a further 10 minutes. Remove the pot from the oven. If you're using a clay pot, be careful where you put it or it will break; it will be safe on a folded kitchen towel, or on wood. Let the polenta rest for 10 minutes before serving.
You could spread it out flat to cool, for cut and grilled/fried polenta shapes. That's the thing to do with the leftovers (especially good if you stir in a little parmesan). But I couldn't bear to deprive my blue Orpington hens of the pleasure.
All through the winter I've seen this greater spotted woodpecker feeding in the garden. In the last few days he's been boring holes in one of the finials Lucius made for the rose pergola. It looks like a toy our children used to have years ago.
Photographed through my study window. No chance of getting much work done, particularly as he announces his presence with short bursts of drilling.
Five years ago, when I started this blog, I posted two recipes on the first day. One of them has reappeared in the Telegraph, which is where I think I got it in the first place. It is Raymond Blanc's truly wonderful tomato essence ... glamour without much effort, haute cuisine without the high price of Le Manoir**. Although it's a little shocking that Monsieur Seasonality is suggesting tomatoes so early in the year.
The fundamental recipe hasn't changed - why tinker with perfection? And now, M Blanc suggests that, as well as using the golden liquid as a soup, you can use it in a tomato risotto. I'll be posting that one day soon.
I made Tarte tatin for pudding the other night; it's an indulgence, but an enjoyable one - Lucius said it was the best thing I'd ever cooked, and he was still talking about it the next day. It's very rich, so not for everyday .... but it's perfect for friends, as you have to make it early so that you don't burn your mouth on the caramel.
I followed the instructions on the box of the de Buyer tarte tatin tin I bought from Lakeland; so delicious there's no need to look for another recipe. By the way, you don't need to have a special tin for this: any heavy-duty oven-proof tin would do (a Le Creuset frying pan would be ideal, provided it doesn't have a wooden handle).
This is a very good way to use up slightly-past-their-best apples; I know we're supposed only to use the freshest produce we can, but we also need a few strategies to combat waste in the kitchen. My grandmothers used to cook up wrinkled apples, and so do I.
Tarte tatin
(it says for 2-4, but I'd say this would easily do 6)
20cm tin
shortcrust pastry (I used ready-rolled Dorset puff, a truly excellent product)
85g butter
200g granulated sugar
4-5 apples (800g is specified, probably unpeeled weight)
juice of half a lemon
Use the tin as a guide to cut a circle of pastry 2-3mm thick. Prick the pastry and put in the fridge.
Peel and core the apples. The recipe says you should end up with apple halves; that's too fiddly for me, and quarters looked fine in the finished dish. Drop them into a bowl of lemon juice as you work.
Put the butter and sugar into the pan, stirring constantly for about five minutes until the mixture starts to become golden. Arrange the apples over the caramel (pour in the lemon juice too) and keep cooking, without stirring, for 15 minutes.
Now give it five minutes in a very hot oven (250C is suggested; I used 220C on fan, and that was quite fierce enough).
Next, arrange the pastry over the apples, tucking the edges under. Put the tin back into the oven for 15 minutes (have a quick peek just before the end, you don't want the pastry to burn).
Cool the tin for 25 minutes before turning out onto a dish. It will come away easily and firmly in one piece, glued together by the caramel. Eat lukewarm.
The recipe ends with this instruction: Lovers of Tarte tatin savour it without whipped cream nor vanilla ice cream to appreciate its authentic taste. To be honest, anything with it would be overkill.
I tried a couple of weeks ago to make a rye loaf, but it was fit only for the hens. They loved it, but they're connoisseurs of good grains and flours, rather than bread. This one is a success, because 75% of the flour is white, giving the dough enough gluten to rise. I'm still on a mission to make a loaf which is mostly rye - and I'd also like to find some darker rye meal than the very pale flours available here. Suggestions warmly welcomed.
I used the no-knead method for this loaf: it's my favourite way to bake, because of its elegant simplicity - you let time do all the work for you, and the result is a flavourful rustic boule. (You may remember the sensation this recipe caused when it went viral in 2007.)
400g flour altogether (100 of which was rye), about half a teaspoon of yeast, and a little less than a teaspoon of salt. Otherwise, no change from Jim Lahey's original no-knead method.
Related posts
Daily bread
Daily bread 2
Six seed rolls
Bread knots - another simple way to make beautiful and delicious rolls, using this dough, or your default dough
Yeast starter for bread - and the bread make your own sourdough starter
No-knead bread the famous NY Times recipe
Speeded-up no-knead bread and a different take on it
Yoghurt bread fabulous, easy, TRY IT
Quick oat loaf
Spelt bread - it's getting easier to buy this highly-flavoured flour
Anti-oxidant tea bread - I made this for my husband for a pre-surgery boost - delicious, too!
Yeast conversion - fresh/dried/quick
Oven temperature conversions - Centigrade, Fahrenheit, gas mark, descriptive
Things to do with stale or leftover bread
Be warned, these suggestions only work with good bread - useless with supermarket pap!
Panzanilla
Herb stuffing for roast chicken
Grilled trout with rosemary stuffing
Baked scallops
Anchovy toasts
We eat risotto at least once a week, as I always have plenty of home-made stock & we're not great soup drinkers.
This is a good way to give flavour to a plain risotto (which I usually scent with saffron), using ingedients which are generally found in my kitchen, unless I'm unusually disorganised.
Lemon risotto
Melt finely chopped onion, carrot, celery in a little oil. When all is softened, add arborio rice, then, after a few stirs, add a splash of wine. I generally add the hot stock in three diminishing dollops. The more you stir the smoother yr dish will be, but if you're busy don't fret if you don't stir, it's not a competition and it will still be delicious.
While this is going on, chop a whole lemon into pieces so that you can remove all the pips. Put them into a processor with a little rosemary (sage wd be good, too). Whizz to a pulp.
Stir this into your finished risotto together with a little Parmesan & a splash of cream.
PS remarks about stirring also apply to stock: use what you've got. But I urge you to make yr own, as it is no effort, takes no time, & is very thrifty and life-enhancing
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
The Guardian has made a list of the best food books of the decade. Interesting overview, and, of course, there's always room for a few more decent cookery books (especially if I cull some of the second-rate ones).
Some are staples here ... Fergus Henderson's Nose to Tail Eating; Michael Pollan's two food books, In Defence of Food and The Ominivore's Dilemma; Elisabeth Luard. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Meat is much consulted here, although I'm not so keen on Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries. Like Jay Rayner (never thought I'd write that!), I'm more likely to read Moro than cook from it, and wouldn't ever bother with Heston Blumenthal's cookery books, because foam is not my thing (although I like dipping into Harold McGee, who might have started the trend for techno-cooking, or whatever it's really called).
There are a few I own, but which I haven't properly used for one reason or another. These deserve another chance: Culinary Pleasures by Nicola Humble; Salt A World History by Mark Kurlansky; The Taste of Britain, by Laura Mason and Catherine Brown.
These are the books from the list that I don't have that may be hard to resist:
We've been snowed in for most of the week, so Christmas has taken us a little by surprise ... not many decorations, not much shopping. But all the family is here, there's plenty of good homemade food, and we've had time to enjoy doing not very much. A six-foot igloo was built, and then collapsed in the night in a rainstorm before anyone had a chance to take a photograph. Lots of laughter. Happy days.
So ... a very happy and peaceful Christmas to you. xx Joanna
We're snowed in here, so it's been a day of quiet pleasures: a walk round the wood, a little photography, some bird watching, a game of croquet in the snow, and Horatio is building an igloo which he plans to sleep in (shades of his father, for those with long memories). I had time to make a complex three-stage recipe, which in the ordinary way I wouldn't have bothered with: the most delicious brussels sprouts with caramelised garlic and crystalised lemon peel. So good that they'll be made here again and again.
Actually, this is a recipe you can make ahead: two of the three stages could easily be made the day before. And if you don't like brussels sprouts, you could leave them out and just have the caramelised garlic.
The unusual combination of flavours is the brainchild of Yotam Ottolenghi, and his recipe appeared in the Guardian on Saturday.
Best-ever brussels sprouts
4 heads garlic, cloves separated and peeled
olive oil
balsamic vinegar
caster sugar
water
1 lemon
600g sprouts (I used around 400g)
1 chilli, finely chopped (or a little chilli jam)
Put the garlic cloves in a pan of water and blanch for three minutes. Drain. Fry the garlic in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil; put them on a high heat and keep turning them until they are golden. Then put in a few drops of balsamic vinegar, a tablespoon of sugar, 90ml water and a pinch of salt. Simmer until there's virtually no liquid left (about five minutes).
Make julienne strips from the lemon peel (you can either use a potato peeler plus knife, or, if you've got it, one of those hole-y implements that make fine strips of zest). Put them in a small pan with a tablespoon of sugar, and the lemon juice made up to 100ml with a little water. Cook until the syrup is reduced to almost nothing (about 15 minutes).
Trim and halve the sprouts. Fry them in olive oil (in batches) at a high heat for about five minutes. Don't stir them more than once or twice, otherwise they won't char.
Stir everything together in a bowl (Ottolenghi specifies a chopped chilli, but I didn't have such a thing, so stirred in a couple of teaspoons of chilli jam). You may need to add more oil. Eat hot, or at room temperature.
PS Ottolenghi strew his dish with shaved parmesan and basil leaves, but I didn't; we don't have out-of-season basil leaves at this time of year, and the parmesan seemed to me to be over-egging the pudding. Unbelievably good without.
My sister brought Meyer lemons from her garden in California. It's impossible to buy a Meyer* lemon here, so it was a wonderful gift - they have a scented taste quite unlike other lemons. So, something special. But my sister's only here for a few days, and I don't want to spend them chained to the stove.
These little citrus pots take moments, although you'd never guess. They're rich, so tiny quantities - a shot glass would work well, if you don't have ramekins (which, in truth, are too big; I half-fill mine). Perfect. So there was time for a walk by the river in the snow, even though we were nine for dinner.
Lemon pots
75g sugar
300ml double cream
one lemon
In an ordinary saucepan, melt the sugar in the double cream. Add the juice of a lemon and pour into tiny pots or shot glasses. Put them in the fridge, and by the time the cream is cold, it will have set. I generally use the zest, too, because I value the sharp taste over a truly smooth appearance.
* Just before my sister arrived, David Lebovitz, who used to be Alice Waters' pastry chef at Chez Panisse, posted interestingly about Meyer lemons, with a recipe for lemon curd
Lunch was an elegant protest in a flurry of snow in Trafalgar Square. Delicious fruit smoothies, vegetable curry, all the fruit you could find. Supermarket waste. And all of it would otherwise have ended up in landfill. Not even composted.
This lovely fruit made thousands of smoothies, full of goodness. Why don't supermarkets TRY selling less-than-perfect fruit, and see what happens? Why don't they give the rest to homeless charities. And COMPOST whatever's left.
They couldn't give these grapes away fast enough. No stalks, so no good to the supermarket, apparently. Daft world: I spent a few minutes earlier in the week taking grapes off their stalks to put in a sauce. But even if they don't want to sell them, they should at least PUT THEM IN THE COMPOST.
Then on to Heywood Hill to pick up a book they'd found for me; and a walk round Shepherd Market. Heywood Hill really is the most life-enhancing shop, laid out a little like a library in a private house, and full of well-chosen books, both old and new. Always lots you want to browse, some you want to buy. Nancy Mitford used to work there; now there's a helpful young man called Ben, and a bevy of girls in the room at the back.
And home, to find the house looks like this:
Breakfast this morning: yoghurt with stewed plums. Bliss. The plums were slightly past their best, but fully revived with a little muscovado sugar. So much flavour there's no need for spice. 20 minutes, covered, in a moderate oven.
I've never been very good at making Yorkshire pudding. Years of cooking on an Aga meant that by the time the meat was perfectly roasted, there wasn't enough heat left for the puds. Years of pudding failure = deep-seated belief that my Yorkshires would always be a flat soggy mess.
But now, I have a foolproof recipe. I first came across it when I was cooking on the Miele stand at the BBC food show; we made the batter into toad-in-the-hole. Yesterday, I made a huge ballooning effortless Yorkshire. Eggs. The secret is eggs. Lots of them. Not quite Mrs Beeton ("take 2 dozen eggs"), but I reckon this method uses at least twice the usual amount of eggs, so of course it's not going to remain pancake-flat.
I've just spent a merry morning looking up recipes for Yorkshire pudding; Hannah Glasse, Jane Grigson, Elizabeth David, Mrs Ruffell, Michael Smith ... they're all more or less agreed on two eggs to half a pint of milk and enough flour for a pouring cream consistency. But here's an interesting thing: Yorkshire pudding is merely a parsimoniously thin version of batter pudding, one of the earliest dishes in English cookery - think thick Yorkshire pudding. Truth to tell, this would be a batter pudding if you chose too small a tin.
I got a lot of complaints last night about serving this with lamb. I think it's a shame to forego something so deliciously eggy for the sake of a tradition which is almost certainly invented. Next time we'll have it with roast chicken.
This is Jane Grigson's tip about what to do if there's any left:
On roast-beef Sundays, my mother's father, who had reached heights of power and respectability in the Bank of England, forgot what was due to his position and remembered the ways of the Northumbrian farm at Old Bewick which his family had come from. The roast beef went back to the kitchen after the main course, but the Yorkshire pudding remained to be finished up with sweetened condensed milk. I do not know how my grandmother took this - she prided herself on her desserts - but my mother shared his delight in the crisp and sticky pudding. When she had a home of her own, and a family, she passed his taste on to us who only remembered him, in spats and spectacles and pin-striped trousers, from old photographs.
Foolproof Yorkshire pudding
equal quantities by volume* of:
eggs
milk
plain flour
Mix the flour into the eggs; when there are no lumps, slowly mix in the milk. Season: you'll definitely need salt; you could add chopped herbs. Let stand for half an hour.
Heat fat in a roasting tin, pour in the batter, and roast for 20 minutes in a very hot oven (200C).
* last night I used four eggs which came to the 200ml mark in a jug (that volume of flour weighed around 100g). The tin I used measured 25cm x 35cm, and the result was a crisp and thin Yorkshire; a smaller pan would give you batter pudding with these quantities.
Mushrooms, like aubergines, soak up oil if you give them the chance. Here's a way of locking in taste without using any fat at all.
Put equal quantities of wine* and stock** in the pan - just enough to stop your mushroom slices burning. Add a few drops of Worcester sauce, or soy sauce, or balsamic vinegar. Put the pan on a medium heat. Watch and stir. The mushrooms will exude their juices after a few minutes; turn up the heat and boil off all the liquid. Watch them carefully; they are ready when the last of the liquid evaporates. Delicious.
* red or white is fine; I sometimes use Marsala, which gives a strong flavour to the mushrooms (not great at breakfast)
** I've always got stock in the fridge, either chicken stock, or Fergus Henderson's fabulous trotter gear. If you don't go in for this sort of thing, just use bouillon
Related links
Foolproof recipe for fuss-free chicken stock
Jellied pork stock - easy to make, keeps for months in the fridge, adds depth to everything it touches
Fabulous sticky ribs last night. Easy, you just need a bit of time. As it was a last-minute decision, I didn't marinade the meat, and it didn't seem to make any difference. We made proper pigs of ourselves.
Sticky ribs
for 4-5
1.5kg pork ribs
6 tbsp redcurrant jelly (or whatever jelly is to hand)
2 tbsp honey
2 finely chopped cloves garlic
1 knob of grated ginger
2 tbsp soy sauce
chilli jam to taste (I used a tsp or so of a v hot mix)
Stir up the marinade ingredients, then coat the meat. Put everything in a roasting tin. Leave for an hour or the whole day if time allows.
Cover the tin with foil and roast at 170C for 45 minutes. Take the tin out, turn the meat over, turn the oven up to 190C, and roast uncovered for 45 minutes. Baste once or twice if possible. When they're done, switch off the oven and leave them for 5-10 minutes, otherwise they'll be too hot to handle.
I'd forgotten, til I made it in front of an audience of about 200 at the NEC on Thursday, how easy it is to make custard. If you use a double boiler, which takes longer, you don't have to stand and stir continuously.
As custard is the unctuous basis of many a good pud - trifle (which is what I'm making today), ice creams - it's worth taking a little trouble. And not much point in using cornflour: eggs will thicken the custard without the kind of help food manufacturers resort to.
Here, I'm following Fergus Henderson's recipe (from Nose to Tail 2), which has too much sugar for my taste - I'd halve it, unless it was going to be the basis of an ice.
The main problem with making your own custard is the amount of washing up it generates, even if you double up. A couple of saucepans, endless bowls, wooden spoons - and now I'm reminded why so many sieves hang in my kitchen.
Custard
450ml milk (you could use cream if you wanted)
2 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla essence
85g sugar
Heat the milk and vanilla essence. Beat the eggs and sugar and strain into a large bowl. When the milk is almost at boiling point, strain it into the egg mixture, stirring vigorously to prevent the mixture from curdling. Now put the bowl over a pan of boiling water. At this point, you can let it alone to a considerable extent; it will need only the occasional whisk.
When it's as thick as you'd like, cool it by pouring it into a bowl.
Masterclass with Thomasina Miers yesterday. Lovely thrown together prune and armangac layers. Making it again for dinner tomorrow, so more detail soon. Fun at BBC food show.
I love this new take on Brussels sprouts ... Alice Waters' new recipe in time for Thanksgiving. We don't just save sprouts for Xmas eating, so I'll be giving it a try in the next few days.
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