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Apr 1

Potato cakes, smoked salmon, beetroot, ginger, watercress

Potato cakes, smoked salmon, beetroot, ginger, watercress

Potato cakes, potato farls, tattie scones…call them what you will, a stack of hot, buttery potato cakes is a great start to any supper, forming an amenable host to a variety of tasty toppings. I mostly just buy them ready-made, but this week I had leftover mash in the fridge so I made my own. They were so easy I really should do it more often.

My favourite way to eat potato cakes is what I think of as scandi-style: topped with soft, rich smoked fish, pepped up with the addition of hot horseradish or mustard. This time I went for something a bit different, making two little salads to replace the usual dollop of sauce on the side. Firstly, a simple mixture of beetroot and ginger, made with slivers of fiery pickled ginger, the sort you normally find in those little packets in a box of sushi. Secondly, some watercress and rocket to provide extra pepperiness and crunch, drizzled with a tangy goats milk yogurt dressing. Read more

Mar 7

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Roasted rhubarb with ginger white chocolate crunch ice cream

Roasted rhubarb with ginger white chocolate crumble crunch ice creamRhubarb and ginger – a food pairing made in heaven. My idea of heaven anyway! I get totally overexcited when my favourite foods are in season and rhubarb is no exception. Whilst you can get rhubarb pretty much all year round, forced English rhubarb is only around for a couple of months, so I like to cram in as many rhubarb puddings as possible with this extra special bright pink bundle of joy.

Since I discovered no-churn ice cream recipes I’ve never looked back, to the point where I very rarely bother making a traditional custard based ice cream at all. Despite the lackadaisical approach, the results are great and a relief from the tyranny of hourly stirring or filling my freezer with another seldom used piece of gadgetry.  This recipe produces a creamy, smooth ice cream which you can pretty much spoon straight from the freezer. Read more

Feb 25

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A warm salad of grilled aubergine and puy lentils

A warm salad of grilled aubergine and puy lentilsAfter a long day at work, supper needs to be super-fast. When I’m only putting my key in the front door at 8.30pm, I need something that requires minimal effort and intervention, nothing more than a little slicing, a little stirring.

A salad might not be the first thing that springs to mind, but when it’s getting late, I shy away from the default bowl of pasta and pesto, knowing that it will be still be sitting heavily in my stomach when my head hits the pillow just an hour or two later.  When time is of the essence, a pack of ready cooked puy lentils from my store cupboard stash of pulses is invaluable. The addition of some grilled aubergine, which can be left happily to its own devices, gently charring and softening away whilst I freshen myself up, makes for a light but substantial dinner. Read more

Feb 11

Super green soup

super green soupA simple, vibrant soup. Pure green, green, green – the colour alone is just so beautiful. And the flavour is peppery and bright, refreshing and nourishing. It’s like a turbo-watercress soup, unadulterated by cream or potatoes; just fresh, clean, intense flavour. Read more

Jan 29

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A little something on toast: pan con tomate with avocado

Pan con tomato with avocado

Its nice to sometimes have a slightly summery lunch in the depths of winter, on a day when the sunshine makes a frosty appearance and cuts through the winter gloom. Pan con tomate is one of my staple orders in a tapas bar and whilst it undoubtedly tastes much better in the Spanish sunshine, maybe sat out on a little terrace…with a chilled glass of wine… it can also brighten up a January lunchtime in London.

If you’ve not had pan con tomate before, I’ll accept that its not immediately obvious what the magic of a bit of tomato on toast is. It’s one of those simple dishes that is so much more than the sum of its parts. The brief twang of garlic in the background, the grassiness of the olive oil, the crunch of a little sea salt with sweet juicy tomato on top. It’s my favourite thing on toast by a long way. This time I added few chunks of avocado to make it more of a meal, but its not really necessary.

You need a robust white bread for this with a good crisp crust – no pre-sliced industrial loaf here please. Grill chunky slices until just golden. Cut a clove of garlic in half and rub the cut side briefly over the crisp bread, just anointing it with a little of its scent. Drizzle over some olive oil, a good quality, full flavoured oil is called for here. Next you need some quite large tomatoes, so they have a decent amount of flesh to them. I find cherry tomatoes are too much pips and skin for this. Rub the cut side of the tomato generously over the bread, giving it a bit of a squeeze as you go. The crispiness from the grill should mash up the flesh a bit and leave a scant layer of pulp and juice over your toast. Add a little extra chopped flesh if you like. A good sprinkle of sea salt plus some roughly mashed avocado and you’re done.

Jan 19

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Butternut squash and kale fritters with chorizo and poached eggs

Butternut squash and kale fritters, with chorizo and poached egg

So happy new year! I’m a bit late, I know. January is a bit of an interesting month eating wise. So many friends and family are tucking into salads and staying off the booze. I rarely fancy a salad in January – the cold weather combined with a house stripped of its tinsel makes me feel like I need something comforting, not food purgatory. And there are plenty of tastier ways to up my vegetable consumption and gently get myself into a healthier frame of mind.

My shopping bags are full to bursting with greens this week. Kale seems to be everywhere all of a sudden, in every A-lister’s smoothie, the superfood of the moment. So hopefully you’ve got a bag in the fridge and I promise this will be much nicer than juicing it! Read more

Dec 21

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Cranberry and pear compote take 2: with orange and cinnamon pancakes

Orange and cinnamon pancakes, with pear and cranberry compote

So this is what became of the compote – dolloped generously on top of a quick stack of breakfast pancakes, with some added Christmas magic by way of orange zest and cinnamon. The rest of the jar was greedily eaten by the spoonful straight from the fridge, on stealthy midnight missions or before dashing out of the door.

Dec 18

A cranberry and pear compote. One compote, endless possibilities

Pear and cranberry compote

I had one of those frivolous trips to the supermarket last weekend, stuffing my basket with as many festive things I could find, I’m such a sucker for all that stuff. Sprouts, salmon, pate, marzipan, cranberries….. Christmas needs cranberries right?

However, too many Christmas get-togethers has resulted in not much home cooking of late and hence the bag of cranberries was still loitering unloved a week later. But what to do with them? I needed something with versatility, to be on standby in the fridge, ready and waiting for impromptu puddings or breakfasts on the go.  So one more thing for an overstuffed fridge, but I think this earns its place on the shelf.

Start by tipping 300g cranberries into a saucepan with 2/3 cup of caster sugar, the juice of a clementine and a splash of water. Place over a medium heat and bring up to a simmer, The cranberries will start to burst and release their juices. Meanwhile core and chop 2 just ripe pears. For once a pack of ripe-and-ready-to-eat pears were in fact verging on ripeness, perfect for this. I didn’t bother to peel the pears. Stir into the cranberries. The pears will only need about 5mins or so in the hot cranberry mixture to soften, so do keep an eye on them and stop cooking before they turn to mush. You may need to add another couple of splashes of water as you go along too, to stop the mixture becoming too jammy. Finally stir in a good pinch of cinnamon and leave to cool.

Endless possibilities await. Decisions, decisions. Maybe I’ll swirl it through some yogurt and shower it in muesli for breakfast….  Or maybe it will get rolled up in some filo pastry for a quick festive strudel… Perhaps it’d be best hot, like molten lava over some ice cream…. I’ll let you know.

Dec 9

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Cranberry, orange and almond mince pies – two ways

Cranberry, orange and almond mince piesI’ve never made my own mincemeat. Whilst apparently super straight forward, it always feels like one step too far when you have a million and one other things to do in December. Yet that doesn’t stop me tinkering a little bit with the shop-bought stuff, which in my book makes it pretty much as good as home made. The combination of cranberry and orange flavours enhances any jar of mincemeat beautifully and I must say I feel pretty pleased with myself about this little invention.

I made two types of pie as I was feeling indecisive. The pies were for a work bake-off and couldn’t decide whether to go for a sweet, moist almond frangipane topping or an orange crumble topping, so in the end I made both. This recipe therefore makes 24 pies, but is easily halved. Read more

Dec 3

The ultimate tv dinner?

Vacherin and little roast potatoes
Cheese isn’t a food that I really think of as being particularly seasonal. While so many ingredients ebb and flow from my kitchen with the seasons, cheese remains a constant, a reliable friend in the fridge.  So maybe its the fact you can only get it for a few months each year  that makes Vacherin a special treat. Not to mention its fabulous oozing texture and deep, almost nutty taste. One to snap up while you can and savour before it disappears again for the summer.
Such a wonder ingredient wants for very little. No playing around, just let the cheese be the star. For a simple, yet extravagant feeling supper, I part boiled for 5-10mins some mini potatoes, whole with their skins on. The sort of size you’d want to spear with a fork and dunk into some cheese. Then drizzle over some olive oil and roast in the oven on about 180C for 30mins until crisp and brown. Sprinkle with sea salt and a little crushed garlic then pop back into the oven with the cheese in its box for another 10-15mins. After this time the cheese will have warmed through and become even runnier, ready to voluptuously smother the potatoes.
Serve with a nice glass of port, a roaring fire and a good film.
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