Ok, ok I admit it: I've been in a great big strop with this blog. How does one throw a strop with a blog? Turns out it works much the same as throwing a big old ranty ass strop with a person, but the potential success rate of the cold shoulder method is even more pitiful. In fact it is zero, hence my shameful return this sunny afternoon.
I was in a strop because I kept trying to write this post and the damn thing just kept on not saving it and losing it, making me feel like I was back in my first year of uni again (well, strictly speaking I only got the hang of a computer in my fourth year).
But I managed to leave the house for my Vitamin D hit today and so have charged up the bit of my brain responsible for bothering to blog. And in future I am going to "copy all' frequently and then it should be ok. Fucking better be.
Anyway, here it is. The top bit is old, the bottom bit new.
Cookery books, as you and I both well know, are as much about selling lifestyles as teaching you about cooking and revealing wonderful new recipes. And thank god, or otherwise what would be the point in buying endless new ones which, depending on the season, year and trends all spout very similar recipes for greedy full fat risottos, beetroot and feta/goat's cheese salads and variations on the sausage casserole theme?
Take the idyllic image above of Burgh Island, a teeny tiny spit of land off Devon famous for its art deco hotel, which you'll have seen in Agatha Christie. Or was it a Poirot?
Well now, this is the view (give or take a bit of neck-craning and excellent eyesight) that greets Miranda Gardiner when she packs her three children onto the school bus each morning from her beachside home in the village of Bigbury-on-Sea. Jealous? Me too. Better make that steaming with envy and inconsolable yearning that my front door opens onto disgusting overstuffed bins, some light fly-tipping, perhaps a jaded skaghead or two and, as of last week, blustering, head-swelling hayfever.
And not only does Miranda live in this beautiful place, her family has a Scandinavian summer house and her youth was spent hanging out in Sydney with her first love Diggory (now her husband), breaking into open air swimming pools for illicit swims and feasting on the sort of fresh, bountiful produce Brits pretend they're moving down under for when they know damn well they'll revert to the fried chicken habit two weeks after landing.
And yes, she's stuck out in the sticks, but that means she's surrounded by organic farmers and perfect little markets.
I hope this doesn't sound too much like sour grapes, because my intention here is to say what a lovely book Teaching Dad To Cook Flapjack (her first) is, both to accompany a good British summer if we have one, and imagine the good life and cook accordingly if we don't.
Anyway, your luck's in because since starting this blog first time around I've actually had chance to make some of the recipes. I'm a bit gutted I didn't take a picture of the beautiful Lime, Basil and Mandarin salad I made yesterday to go with my roast chicken. You'll have to imagine its lovely bright green and orange colours. I couldn't actually find any mandarins, so I substituted with an orange and half a pink grapefruit (even more exciting colour), and added some mint along with the basil because I had just bought some and I like it and it goes really well with basil. Then you sprinkle on some toasted pine nuts and a tablespoon of sesame seeds - and cucumber batons, which I almost forgot - then an amazing dressing of one tbsp of caster sugar mixed with one tbsp light soy sauce, juice of a lime and salt and pepper. Mmm.
I have Miranda's Green Tart waiting in the fridge for someone to come over and help me eat it. It is lots of fresh green herbs and pumpkin seeds stirred into a mix of two egg yolks, two eggs and 300ml double cream, but I've gone a bit easier on the cream.
So far the pastry case looks good. I try and use a different recipe every time I make pastry (see
Rhubarb Tart and
Madchester Onion Tart) to try and find one that works consistently for me. Miranda's is 180g plain white flour, sifted, whizzed in a food processor with 90g cold butter, cubed. When it's all blended and crumbly, add in two or three tbsps water to bring it together. Pick it up into a ball and chill for 30 mins. Then roll out (for 20cm tin), bake blind for 15 mins (putting something in to keep the damn stuff down...beads, chickpeas, rice, a saucepan), prick and bake for a further five, then slosh in your mix and pop it in for another 25 - 30 mins. All at 190/gas 5.
The pastry came together easily enough, but after I messed up the first attempt to roll it big enough, at the very last moment, it was quite tricky to keep in one piece from thereon, so the result is a patchwork affair, but has held together on cooking and isn't too thick.
Tomorrow I'm baking Caramel Salties for my nephew Olly's birthday. I think that's how he spells his name, it seems to change all the time. He and his sister also change the name of their guinea pigs at a whim, which I think is a bit mean. Olly is greedy but doesn't like overly sweet things. These are a sort of brownie cake and ode to posh salty chocolates, which I love. I'll let you know how they go down.
There now, that wasn't too painful, was it?
