Frittata doesn't get better than this !

I was giving this dish a trial this morning as I am demonstrating for Riverford again this weekend at the Sussex Food & Farming show, Weald and Downland open-air Museum, Singleton, West Sussex. I wanted to combine a few of the seasonal flavours that are available this week and create a dish that can be cooked, start to finish, in 30 minutes as this is how long I have on stage. I can't quite describe how fantastically delicious this fittata is. Cook it now ! Before the wild garlic is no more and the purple sprouting has vanished for another year. I think these are my favourite spring vegetables. Purple sprouting , the first showing of fresh green after the roots of winter , tender, sweet and bursting with vitamins, as fresh and crisp as a spring morning. Wild garlic is a dichotomy of intense yet subtle over and undertones, sometimes garlic, sometimes spring onion and hints of leek. Both are only with us for a short season and this dish uses them both to their best.

Purple sprouting broccoli, wild garlic & taleggio frittata

Serves: 4

• Taleggio cheese, sliced
 
• 1 large handful purple sprouting broccoli stems

• 1 handful wild garlic leaves, shredded or a couple of crushed regular cloves

• 6 eggs, beaten

• 1 medium onion, sliced

• 1 small leek, sliced

• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley
• Salt and pepper 

Blanch the broccoli stems in boiling salted water for a few minutes, plunge into cold water and drain. Soften the onions , leek and garlic , if using, in a little olive oil in an ovenproof frying pan on a gentle heat for about 5 minutes until soft. Arrange half the broccoli in the pan, Season the beaten eggs with salt and pepper and mix in the parsley and wild garlic if using and pour this evenly over the broccoli/onion/ and leek mixture. Layer on the rest of the broccoli and push down into the egg before laying the cheese slices on top.

Cook over a low-ish heat until you can see the frittata cooking at the edges. Then pop it under a medium hot grill to finish. Keep an eye on it as the top cooks fast. Serve warm with a crisp green or tomato salad.

Riverford at Number11

Last night I had my cooking hat on again over in Folkestone Kent for Riverford Organics, the veg box delivery people. We were hosted by Number11 the very cute little restaurant just off the harbour front in Folkestone and were made very welcome by Douglas and his staff. The idea of the night was to demonstrate and chat about a few seasonal dishes that are easy to achieve using the ingredients from this week’s organic veg box. Quite a few people seem to get stuck with their boxes and run out of ideas. What we wanted to do was show off some simple delicious recipes that would inspire, encourage and hopefully get customers to try something just a little bit different.

On the menu we had wild garlic risotto, purple sprouting broccoli with hollandaise, fennel and orange salad and to finish off rhubarb, orange & ginger pavlova. All delicious and individually very easy dishes to cook, I just had to produce enough of each for the 38 people present.

I started off with the risotto, which as you know takes a deal of attention and a fair bit of stirring and in turn about 20 minutes of chat to accompany the procedure. You never think of that when you plan these things. Always focusing on the logistics of cooking the dish in front of a live audience but not really considering the amount of chat involved. Thanks to a lively and spontaneous crowd though the banter warmed up alongside the risotto and we soon had a good open discussion going on. This continued through the next few courses and by the end of what turned out to be nearly three hours of cooking and talking I retired somewhat dry in the throat to the confines of the kitchen to do the washing up.

Thanks again to all involved Caroline at Riverford Home Delivery Ashford and all the crew at Number11 Folkestone.
Event photos by Chrissy Asteraki-Speer

Wild Garlic Risotto

Serves: 4

• 250g Arborio rice 
• 750ml Vegetable stock 
• 3tbsp olive oil 
• 1 white onion finely chopped 
• 1 garlic clove crushed 
• 1 handful of wild garlic leaves 
• 1 lemon juiced 
• 1 glass of white dry wine 
• 30g butter 
• Salt & pepper

Heat the oil in a heavy based pan and gently fry the onion for a few minutes. Add the crushed garlic clove stir in for a minute or two and then pour in some more olive oil and add the rice. Cook the rice for a few minutes until the rice absorbs some of the oil and starts to puff a little. If you are using wine this is the time to add it to the pan and heat until absorbed into the rice. Now start adding the stock, just cover the rice and stir whilst it is absorbed and then repeat. Keep cooking until the rice is nearly done but still a bit ‘husky’ and now add the garlic leaves and the lemon juice, season with salt & pepper and keep cooking adding more stock as required until the rice is al dente. Remove from the heat, stir in the butter cover and let it sit for five minutes, then serve on warmed plates.

Fennel & orange salad

Serves 6

• 2 Fennel Bulbs 
• 3 Oranges 
• 1 Garlic clove 
• Lemon Juice (1 lemon) 
• 3 tbsp Olive oil 
• 1 handful of Black olives (stoned) 
• Flat leaf parsley 
• Salt & Pepper 

Finely shred the Fennel, using a mandolin if you have one and place in a bowl, squeeze over a little lemon juice to keep it from colouring. Cut the skin and pith from the oranges and slice out the segments into another bowl and squeeze the juice from the remaining part of the orange and save. Mix the orange segments, olives and parsley into the fennel, sprinkle liberally with the dressing adjust the seasoning if needed.

To make the dressing: Whisk the olive oil, crushed garlic, remaining lemon juice and some seasoning into the orange juice. 

Purple sprouting broccoli & hollandaise recipe click here

Rhubarb orange & ginger pavlova

Serves: 6

• 4 egg whites 
• 275g caster sugar 
• 1 tsp vanilla extract 
• 1 tsp cornflour 
• 1 tsp white wine vinegar 
• 250ml double cream 
• Zest of an orange 
• 6 sticks of rhubarb 
• 2 pieces of preserved stem ginger 

Preheat oven to 180 degrees

Whisk the egg whites into stiff peaks and then slowly whisk in 225g of the caster sugar. When all the sugar is incorporated whisk for another 2 minutes until you have a stiff shiny mixture. Now add the cornflour and continue whisking, the vinegar and vanilla extract, whisk for a short while more until all the ingredients are well mixed together.

Place a sheet of greaseproof paper on a baking sheet and run the sheet and paper under a cold-water tap to thoroughly soak it. Drain off the excess water. Now spoon the meringue onto the sheet of greaseproof making a pile about 6cm high and 25cm in diameter. Place in the oven and immediately turn down to 100 degrees (80 for fan) and cook the pavlova for an hour and a half. Remove from the oven and leave to cool and peel off the greaseproof paper. If you can make this a couple of hours before you need it or even the day before then all the better. The more the meringue dries out the crisper it becomes on the outside but still remains gooey in the middle.

Chop the rhubarb into 5cm lengths and cook in a sauté pan with 50g sugar and the finely grated or julienne orange zest, check for sweetness and add more sugar if needed but don’t over sweeten as rhubarb is best remaining a little tart. Cook for about ten minutes or until the rhubarb is just tender to a knife. Allow to cool

Now whisk up your cream until stiff, spread over the meringue base generously and spoon over the rhubarb and allow some of the juices to drizzle over the edge. Chop the ginger into small little chucks and scatter liberally over the top. Some toasted almond flakes make a nice finish too.

Give us this day our daily bread

There can’t be many civilisations in the world that don’t in some way or another depend on bread, well ok, China and Japan maybe and a few other parts of the far eastern continent, but for most of us, certainly in the west, a ritual and daily habit is the consumption of bread. Breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea and dinner usually consist or are accompanied by some kind of bread. The French and Italians are certainly obsessed by it, I think you could say most of central and eastern Europe has a keen interest in bread too, the Mediterranean, northern Africa and the middle east all have delicious varieties, the Americans can boast some original forms and even us Brit’s wouldn’t get far without a doorstop sandwich. It’s on offer everywhere, from street corners to supermarkets, cafes and restaurants (By merely lowering one’s posterior into a chair in any given restaurant a flurry of activity not only produces a menu but an offering of bread) home made, artisan baked, soughdough or yeasty our daily bread is indeed a blessing.

I started baking shortly after the birth of my son. It was in the lonely early morning hours, usually around 5am, nappies changed, baby bottled and now gently rocking in his chair fully awake and expecting that I, as a way of entertainment, started to make bread. I found that I could steal enough time in between the baby’s needs to do a bit of kneading myself. He seemed happy to gaze and gurgle as I mixed and kneaded the dough, I seemed to have an hour to spare whilst the dough was proofing so we could play and so on. Everyone was happy and I think my son found the running commentary and movements as entertaining as anything the teletubbies had to offer. By the time the rest of the household was stirring warm fresh crusty bread was sitting proudly on the kitchen side and a pot of fresh coffee brewing in the corner.

Baking bread is in essence pretty simple: flour, yeast, sugar, water a little salt and there you have it, the makings of the world’s most basic foodstuff. There are of course as many different varieties as there are techniques, many time consuming and complicated, but for me just the same level of pleasure and satisfaction is attained from the baking of a simple loaf as is derived from a protracted and convoluted procedure. Either way there is nothing quite as intoxicating and hunger making as the smell of fresh bread baking in the oven.

Recipe for Focaccia Bread

• 1kg tipo ‘00’ flour
• 21g dried active yeast (easy bake)
• 30g sugar
• 25g salt
• 625ml tepid water
• Rosemary sprigs
• Sea salt
• Olive oil

Mix the yeast and sugar, add to the water and allow the mixture to stand until frothy. Put the flour and salt in a food processor or mixer with a dough hook, mix briefly to distribute the salt, then add the liquid and mix until a soft dough is formed. Some flours will absorb slightly more or less water but you want to have a loose but not wet dough. I allow the dough to mix for at least two minutes in the machine before turning it out onto a floured surface .

Pull, stretch and knead the dough until it's really soft, this takes about 5 mins. If it gets sticky then dust lightly with more flour. Form the dough into a ball, slash with a very sharp knife to ‘relax’ the dough and place in an oiled and floured bowl covered with a damp cloth. The proofing process will take about an hour depending on the temperature but you're looking for the ball to have doubled in size. When ready, turn the dough out again onto a lightly floured surface and bash it a few times to deflate it, then form into another ball.

Butter and flour a deep sided tin, about  20cm x 30cm, and gently press the dough roughly into the shape of the tin. Now drizzle with olive oil and push your fingers right down into the dough making a uniform pattern of indents. Drizzle oil over so the holes you’ve just made are filled and place a small sprig of rosemary into each hole. Sprinkle with sea salt and cover with a sheet of cling film and leave in a warm draught free place for another hour or so. This second proofing gives the bread it’s texture and improves the taste so don’t be hasty. Preheat the oven to 225 degrees. When the volume of the dough has doubled again, gently remove the cling film and place the tin in the oven and bake for about 18 minutes until the top is golden dark brown. The bread is cooked when having removed it from the tin it sounds hollow when tapped with the back of a spoon.

Allow to cool on a rack.

Recipe for White Tin Loaf

• 1kg white bread flour
• 21g dried active yeast (easy bake)
• 30g sugar
• 25g salt
• 625ml tepid water

Follow Focaccia recipe above through to end of 2nd stage

then ...

Butter and flour a 1kg bread tin, or two smaller tins and either divide the dough equally or place in one tin, cover with a sheet of cling film and leave in a warm draft free place for another hour or so. This second proofing gives the bread it’s texture and improves the taste so don’t be hasty. Preheat the oven to 225 degrees. When the volume of the dough has doubled and it risen up above the rim of the tin, gently remove the cling film and place the tin(s) in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes until the top is golden brown. The bread is cooked when having removed it from the tin it sounds hollow when tapped with the back of a spoon.

Allow to cool on a rack.

First came the egg

Like most things in life whether mammal, reptile, bird or fish, indeed our very own humble human life, it all began with a an egg. This beautiful, glorious and sometimes controversial (Edwina Currie, remember that) elliptical form that we take for granted, is our basic food stuff. Breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner, pasta, soufflé, bread and pastry, meringues and even drinks, it appears everywhere and is a staple of most family larders. A late night omelette with bacon and loads of parsley is simply divine and who could forget a classic egg sarnie, creamy chunks of egg and crisp peppery watercress. So it occurred to me that this was a good place to start.

I was inspired just this week by my sons jubilant return from a visit to his grandparents who had taught him to boil an egg. Whilst quite an accomplished foodie for his meagre 12 years, the knowledge instilled and his enthusiasm for this simple process reminded me of where my own culinary journey began some forty years ago, in a very similar way, under the guidance of my mother, I too boiled my first egg. Since then I have used eggs in so many different, diverse and interesting ways but I would still hazard a guess that for most of us, as young children , propped up at the kitchen table on a weekend morning, that an egg was the very first ingredient we were able ( according to our parents ) to safely cook. Guaranteed results, in one form or another, and generally liked by all. Fried, poached, boiled or scrambled, served with warm toast and deliciously melting butter, a dash of ketchup, et voila, the first meal you ever cooked.

Food is part of my life. Although it's not my full-time career (yet) I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time thinking of, reading about, shopping for, preparing and cooking food. I am a photographer by trade, I work in travel and advertising and vicariously through my travels I have come into contact and been inspired by foods from all over the world. My own culinary background is that of a north London Jewish family,I grew up through the sixties and seventies, a period when British food was still in an embryonic state, the Eighties were my first real encounters and since then I have been obsessed. My mother, father and two brothers, all very accomplished cooks, are always engaged in conversations of food, what they are eating, what they have just eaten or what they are about to eat. So in this blog i thought that's what I would talk about, where i get my food from, how i prepare it, cook it and to be quite frank (I'll spare you the gory details though) how I eat it. I'll throw in a few stories of travels, photography, inspirations, family, friends and hopefully you ( the reader ) will feel some of the same level of excitement, inspiration, satisfaction and quite possibly in the process gain insights and knowledge too. I hope so.

The shell has now well and truly been cracked ... scroll down to see some recipes and photographs of a few of my favourite eggy delights.

Purple Sprouting Broccoli with Hollandaise Sauce

In terms of sauces, and there are many excellent ones and varieties, for me however there can surely be no more richer, more luxurious, silky, delicate a sauce than hollandaise. When made to perfection it's a sheer joy to eat, making it perfectly is a complete satisfaction.

I have been making this sauce for a very long time and in so doing have learnt that there are a handful of methods that work well, whilst all vary slightly in terms of ingredient or technique: there is the traditional, original and precise Elizabeth David method and there is the modern, quick fix blender method, either way the end result has often not been quite what I wanted. This one is pure genius, is easy, produces a light frothy sauce, works every time and will have you picking up fronds of Broccoli plunging them deep into the sauce and devouring platefuls of the stuff, smacking of lips and licking of fingers will confirm that this dish is a delight.

For the sauce

• 150g butter
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 tsp tarragon vinegar
• a squeeze of lemon juice
• sea salt
• a twist of pepper
• 1 tbsp cold water

Gently melt the butter in a pan and then remove from the heat. Put the egg yolks a tablespoon of cold water into a bowl that fits on top of another pan of very gently simmering water ( a bain marie ) and whisk the yolks with an electric blender until light frothy and just starting to thicken. Remove bowl to the side and continue whisking for a minute and then very slowly start to pour the melted butter into the eggs, a drizzle at a time whilst continuing to whisk. A couple of points here: pour the butter very gently you want the butter oil not the milky solids that have sunk to the bottom of the pan. If the sauce splits, unlikely if you're careful, just trickle in some cold water to bring it back together. When all the butter is incorporated you will have a creamy sauce, bright in colour and shiny and slick. Now season with a little salt and pepper, add the vinegar and the lemon juice to taste. You could at this stage add some fresh herbs to enhance your sauce, fresh mint, fresh tarragon for example.

I have discovered that this sauce will keep quite nicely for a few hours in a very gently warm bain marie. Refresh the heat every now and again and occasionally stir the sauce to stop it forming a skin, if the sauce gets thick add some cold water, a teaspoon at a time and whisk gently to loosen it up.

Chocolate & Orange Zest Soufflé

There seems to be an almost mystical unnerving fear of soufflés. We have all watched TV contestant after contestant serve dishes of collapsed goo to their judges and this has instilled a dread of the soufflé. I will concur that they might not be the easiest dessert to produce the first time around , but apply a little bit of logic, a degree of scientific thought and you'll have these gorgeous little soufflés popping out the oven like there's no tomorrow. There are a thousand flavour variations , raspberry, rhubarb, strawberry, vanilla, ginger & honey, but these chocolate ones are a real show stopper at any dinner. Served as shown dusted with icing sugar or sprinkled with chocolate gratings which melt onto the surface for that extra degree of indulgence.

The trick , in my opinion, is getting the ramekins greased properly and getting the oven temperature right. The ramekins need to be brushed with soft butter making sure both the bottom and the sides are fully coated. I use a pastry brush, brushing vertical lines of butter up the insides of the ramekins, then cool in the fridge for a while, re-apply the butter again and then dust the insides with finely grated chocolate, return to the fridge until needed. The grooves of butter and the chocolate lining are going to help the soufflé rise smoothly and evenly up and out of the ramekin. The oven setting is also crucial , you'll have to experiment on this one a little. In most recipes a temperature of 180 degrees is recommended, maybe it's my oven, maybe not, but i find a temperature of 200 degrees to be optimum. This rises the soufflés in about 8 mins and forms a slight crust-like top which helps to support the soufflé when out of the oven and prevents unsightly and premature collapse .

Makes enough for about 8 ( 100ml , 90mm diameter ramekins )

• 200 ml milk
• 20g corn flour
• 100g 70% cocoa chocolate
• 4 eggs, separated
• 150g caster sugar
• tsp orange zest
• 30g butter
• icing sugar to dust

Mix the milk and cornflour together in a pan and place over a medium heat until the mixture starts to thicken. Remove from the heat and beat in the egg yolks , when smoothly incorporated mix in the chocolate , orange zest and return to a gentle heat until all the chocolate is thoroughly melted into the mixture and it's thick and smooth. Allow to cool whilst you beat the egg whites and sugar into soft peaking meringue. Stir about half the meringue into the chocolate mixture and mix well with a metal spoon so as not to knock the air and lightness out of it, then add the rest of the meringue and mix gently and thoroughly. Fill the buttered and dusted ramekins to within 5mm of the top and clean around the top edge so there is nothing to restrict the soufflé from rising. Place the ramekins on a tray and into in the oven, watch them rise for about 8 mins, they should still have a 'wobble' to them, remove and serve immediately to intrigued and delighted guests.