Places to inspire, beans and beef

January 15 2023

Baby aubergines with tahini and amba by Ottolenghi

Introduction

My resolution to use up what food I have before buying more, is going along steadily following Fiona Beckett’s example from two years ago and explained again in Eat this. Drink That. I’ve made two pavlovas, when people have come round, with egg whites from the freezer. The first was a double bullseye, as it used some of a tin of chestnut purée I had, and the last of a bar of 70 per cent plain chocolate.

I also made energy bars from the New York Times which used up the last of some of dried cranberries and cashew nuts, but to be honest, the apricots, dates, walnuts and hazelnuts, I will buy again when they are finished as I’m always using them.

I’m thinking carefully about what I throw away and have realised that a ‘ready to eat’ avocado pear or indeed a pear, is what it means and not two days later.

Recipes

It’s recipes for slow-cooked winter warmers and comfort food this week with Ottolenghi and Diana Henry writing on the same welcome theme, as well as some good bean recipes and lentil dals.

I made the baby aubergines with tahini and amba and the braised greens with chickpeas and almond from Ottolenghi in the Guardian for Sunday lunch. I would have made the red pepper-braised lamb neck with preserved lemon salsa as well, had I not bought a leg of lamb. I was going to do Méchoui lamb from my new Frontières book by Alex Jackson but then I realised it took seven hours to cook and I didn’t want to get up at six o’clock in the morning. So I butterflied it, chopped off the end to make a tagine  and roasted the rest it with garlic, rosemary and lemon and everybody liked it. A happy Sunday morning cooking.

Diana Henry in the Telegraph has comforting winter recipes, lamb shank pie with pickled red cabbage, pumpkin and bean soup with parsley pesto bread and a gorgeous looking sticky toffee pudding cake. She says, ‘autumn and winter demand a different kind of cooking – stews, pies and soups that take a bit of time and effort and make your kitchen the warmest room in the house. The recipes here are for the dishes I want to come home to.’

Bean time with creamy Parmesan beans with broccoli and crispy sausage with chilli, lemon and fennel to flavour from Eleanor Steafel in the Telegraph and butter beans aglio e olio with pangrattato by Ravinder Bhogal in the FT . More of that warming easy food

Rosemary rye crackers by Rachel Roddy which she says are a great vehicle for butter and so I’m all in.

Brussels sprouts still popping up with Thomasina Miers’ vegan recipe for chickpea and squash pozole rojo with brussels sprout caesar salad. There are also tofu vegan chilli by Meera Sodha, kimchi fried rice with prawns, peas and pak choi by Rukmini Iyer  and dals with  Maunika Gowardhan all in the Guardian. (links to be added when they come online)

Mark Hix in the Telegraph has four cheap beef recipes using cheaper cuts of meat. There is Thai hanger steak salad, beef flank, ale and oyster pies, ox cheek hotpot with ginger and polenta on the table with beef ragu

A salmon ramen, a chicken soup, and express stir-fried rice with pancetta and peas for luxury bowl food by Clodagh McKenna  in the Sunday Times.

Finally, a ‘fiery red spice paste’ which Nigel Slater then used to make baked feta in vine leaves in the Observer and something sweet with banana buttermilk muffins by Benjamin Ebuehi in the Guardian .

Books

Small Pleasures: Joyful Recipes for Difficult Times by Ryan Riley  

in the Times with comfort food recipes for one including prawn aglio e olio orzo, Brie, cheddar and harissa toastie with ginger paste and Marmite cheddar jackets. It crosses my mind that even people cooking for one might have a microwave or an air fryer to start off the jacket potato and save on oven fuel.

Restaurants

In the FT, Tim Hayward was at Dear Jackie, the restaurant in the basement of the Broadwick Hotel in Soho, London W1 and the decor reminded him of 1970’s Bournemouth. He ‘considered it had been a fine evening, in a quirky and entertaining room, with gratifyingly excellent food.’

In the Guardian, Grace Dent was at Bébé Bob, ‘a rotisserie spin-off from the nearby well-established Bob Bob Ricard’, in London W1 and ;thought Bébé Bob is a chicken-and-chips joint that thinks it is “it”, and I shan’t tell them otherwise.’

In the Observer, Jay Rayner went to the Hunan Man in London W1 and said ‘the menu has uncompromising depths that need to be explored. My only mistake was to visit with just one other person. This place needs multiple willing mouths. It needs a gang. Find some friends.’

In the Standard, David Ellis reviewed Mambow in Clapton, London E5 and said ‘it was a Malaysian masterpiece undeniably worth the schlep and that chef Abby Lee had a triumph on her hands

In the Telegraph, William Sitwell was at the Llama Inn in Shoreditch, London EC2 and wrote, ‘with its breezy, well-versed service and professional intent, is the best thing to come out of Peru since Paddington.’

In the Times, Giles Coren went to Canton Blue, the Chinese restaurant at the Peninsula Hotel in London SW1 which was expectedly expensive. He concluded, ‘the restaurant is beautiful, the service is exemplary, the waiters are kind and friendly, but none of the food would pass muster in Bangkok, Tokyo or Hong Kong or for staff lunch.’

Travel

UK

Guide to the Isle of Wight in the Independent including a useful resumé of its seafood restaurants

Car-free tour of East Sussex: waterside walks, woods and delicious food stops in the Guardian including Wadhurst and Bewl Water

Writers in the Guardian share their hidden treasures in the UK and Europe that leave them awestruck, from the Chagall windows in All Saints Church in Tudeley Kent, through Kelmscott Manor where William Morris lived to Château La Coste in Provence and a whole lot more besides. Following on from that, readers’ contribute their favourite cultural trips in Europe including literary West Yorkshire. I visited Sylvia Plath’s grave in the churchyard at Heptonstall last year and found it moving, partly because it was one unassuming stone in a long line of graves but also because of the floral tributes.

 Europe

The new holiday calendar: why you should visit the Italian Lakes in March and the Swiss Alps in July in the Telegraph. They say, ‘With extended seasons, climate change and peak season prices getting unaffordable, here’s how you should be planning your holidays this year.’ I hope the flights to Sicily Ive just booked at the end of May fit the bill.

Polar bears, melting glaciers – and a blues festival: a wild week on Svalbard in the very north of Norway in the Observer. This sounds magnificent.

Where to eat in Amsterdam in the Times

Reading the papers

People ask me how I read all the papers. I believe in paying for quality journalism and my husband and I have digital subscriptions to the Times and to the Telegraph. Sometimes my husband buys a Times on Saturdays or I buy a Guardian and I buy the Observer when it’s Observer Food Monthly. Otherwise I rely on what’s online, and on Twitter and Instagram. And occasionally, I ask a friend to save an article for me.

The Times gives you two free articles a week as a registered user and the Telegraph gives you access to one free article each week if you register an account. The FT gives a certain number of free articles

Local public libraries often have Pressreader which gives access to over 7,000 newspapers world wide for free or you can subscribe to it.

Sometimes, I use the recipes for inspiration. If they are from a cookbook, they may be in other publications as well for publicity, and you may find them or a similar version through a quick Google.