DELIGHTS IN STORE
22 December, 2008
Readers, be vigilant as Christmas approaches this year. There are two reasons to take a firm hand. First, with ourselves. This is a time
of a potentially monumental overspend. We start worshipping at the altars of vainglorious food stores. In years of plenty I have often
expanded the size of our festive party simply to accomodate my capacious desires to prepare lavish banquets way beyond the scale of need.
Not that necessity should ever be the mother of desire. Such would be a world of gruel and gripewater. But in these times of
belt-tightening, it is surely an opportunity to embrace invention. To search deep in our cupboards for delights unused from bacchanalial
shopping trips of previous years . This must be the year for small pleasures based on existing rations. Think post war spirit. Not for
parsimony but for the purging of heedless culinary extravagances. Savouring small delicacies to meet the new year with elegant sufficiency.
Already in my cupboards, I have found tins of graisse de canard, chestnut puree and vongole (baby clams). A bottle of
Cassis, an unused Christmas pudding, salted capers and - unbridled joy - an unobserved jar of marmalade from last year's batch. Practically
a feast in the making. With a bird of some sort. Probably game. Not Turkey. On the whole, it is a joyless bird, on account of a flightless,
dreary life. And I'm adding some seasonal vegetables, cheese, bread and wine.
There is a wintry episode in Wind in the Willows where Ratty and Mole are trudging through the snow. Mole, since the spring,
has left his home deserted while he shacked up with Ratty, his affection for his new friend frankly overcoming the attachment he previously
felt for ‘Mole End'. Until this freezing afternoon, when he catches a whiff of home on the air and gets a sudden pang. He rushes off and
starts scuffling in the snow, eventually uncovering his little front door.
But poor Mole, ever in awe of Ratty's hospitality and conviviality, is ashamed to have brought him to this humble place, with nothing
to eat on a cold night. While his sanguine chum Ratty, dependable as he is, immediately takes charge and summons every morsel left in the
cupboards to prepare a festive meal of dreams, gets a fire lit and before long, the young fieldmice turn up to sing Christmas carols. Some
are despatched to fetch a few further supplies and with no fuss a delicious evening is mustered from nowhere.
I suggested another reason for vigilance. There is nothing more tempting for friends of foodies than to make generous gifts of
unusable foodstuffs from department stores. Unbrowseworthy shop dressing. Oils and vinegars with ludicrous flavourings and bottles stuffed
with undergrowth. Preserved fruits in jars that eye you up all year from a shelf, like shrunken heads in a museum. Selections of christmas
condiments, packaged in country kitchen cookware with doyley lids. Once breached, the fragrance and flavour of what amounts to floor
sweepings in attractive vessels is lost in seconds. I noted with despair that Jamie Oliver, has a range of this useless kitchen detritus
through his supermarket contract. Encourage people to cook ‘pukka tukka' from their kitchen gardens and then heap cynicism on them in
the supermarket. Ho! Ho! Ho!
So if you are tempted, just remember, food isn't just for Christmas.
TENDER WORDS
Tender (2009) tells the story of Nigel Slater's love affair with his garden in
Islington and the many seedlings he has raised in his box-hedged vegetable patches. It’s a magnificent volume, like a medieval knightly
treatise with pictures of his Eden, its produce and many of the recipes he has created from them.
23 May, 2010
FOOD FROM THE HEART
Cooking is a basic human instinct. We’ve been eating, chopping, shaping, flavouring, enticing ingredients into something delicious
since time began. But as the way many of us live has changed, the basic skills we require to cook, are no longer valued and it’s often easier to
let others take control of what we eat.
21 April, 2010
IN A RIGHT FISH STEW
This week we had sustainable fish stew. It’s a quick and easy way to feed a gang of hungries on a Friday night and
doesn’t need much else but some good bread and wine. Like all stews, you need balance, rich liquid and a range of potent flavours steaming
from your pot.
15 March, 2010