As Strong As Soup

Last Christmas I was saddened to hear the news that Bill Granger had gone. When I first came across the book "Sydney Food" at the start of the new century, it felt refreshing and joyful. There were many high-profile books published at the time that I found repetitious and dull, but Bill's sunny, carefree food was never forbidding and always relaxed and interesting. Reading his recipes made me want to make them or, at least, something inspired by them. If I strayed away from the details of his recipes here and there, it didn't seem to matter. For me, cooks that inspire in that way are rare and always uplifting.   Since then, I've collected a modest pile of his books and made many meals over the years using his recipes, even if I've altered them a bit along the way. Incidentally, BG was called the "egg king" because of his famous, Australian-style scrambled eggs made with a serious amount of cream, but, I suppose because of my European background, that...

It's that happy time of year again when courgettes are growing in the garden and appearing in the shops faster than a politician thinking up excuses. Here are two simple recipes to make use of the bounty that are just a little bit different. ( Slow-cooked courgettes are also well worth trying, if you haven't already). Courgette, Olive and Basil Sauce If you take a look at the ingredients, I'm sure it won't come as a surprise when I say that this is a Southern French sauce, or, at least, my interpretation of one. It's a way of producing a creamy sauce with no cream (or anything like it) and plenty of flavour. Admittedly, the colour of the sauce isn't quite as exciting as the taste, but it will seriously liven up simply-cooked chicken, roasted veg (squash, for instance) or, as I fancied eating this time, flash-fried prawns. If you want to vary the amount of basil or olives, or add a little chilli, then I'm confident that the sauce will still come up smiling. ...

Please don't imagine that this dish is authentic. Let's just say that it's inspired by the Catalan dish ‘samfaina’, which is itself a cousin of ratatouille and caponata. Over the years I've heard many chefs insisting that the flavours and textures of the vegetables in ratatouille should always be kept distinct from one another but for this slow-cooked style of samfaina please forget about that. This dish is all about blending the flavours and textures into something closer to a jammy dip. That may sound odd but, believe me, it works. I have it on good authority that courgettes aren't normally used in the classic Catalonian samfaina but I like what they bring to the dish. (I warned you that this wasn't authentic.) The addition of smoked paprika to the dish at the end isn't really authentic either but I came across a restaurant doing something similar and so I've copied the idea. It makes a subtle but very real difference to the flavour. (A little warni...

I was sad to hear recently of the passing of Antonio Carluccio. Many years ago I used to visit his Neal Street deli whenever I could and met the man himself there a few times. His respect and enthusiasm for quality ingredients and simple but intensely flavoured dishes were a significant influence on me. For instance, I didn't realise just how good Parmesan cheese could be until he scooped a piece from a wheel and handed it to me and I might never have tried to make risotto if he hadn't told me to stop worrying and just get on with it. He was a great ambassador for Italian food and I for one will always be grateful to him. Although I use quite a few Italian recipes I haven't posted many here. The fact is that when I started this blog it seemed to me that the world really didn't need me to add to the mountain of recipes for Italian food. There were just so many blogs already specialising in Italian dishes and so many Italian restaurants down here in Surrey that if you ...

Five years ago I wittered on about slow cooked courgettes and, as if once wasn't enough, I'm afraid I'm now going to witter on about a few variations on that theme.  After all, there are a lot of courgettes around at the moment that need to be cooked somehow and these recipes even allow me to use up the overgrown courgettes that I've neglected so badly in the garden. To be honest, though, the main reason to revive this way of cooking courgettes is that nobody believed me the first time. I know we're forever being told not to overcook vegetables but if you cook courgettes for as long as I say then Jamie Oliver won’t break down your door and take you away for questioning. Really, that hardly ever happens. So here's how to produce tasty, healthy dips and a different sort of mash with that courgette mountain. First cook your courgettes SLOWLY This is the initial step for the recipes below but, if you want to keep things simple, just add a few herbs or oth...

This can’t be called a full-scale recipe, it’s really just a useful alternative way to cook courgettes. I found it especially handy when my courgette plants suddenly decided to become surprisingly productive towards the end of the season. We’ve been told for years that vegetables should never be overcooked so this method sounds odd, but trust me, it really works. This healthy little dish can be used hot or warm alongside meat or fish (don’t overdo the mint and lemon if you’re serving it with subtly flavoured foods). It also works really well at room temperature as a part of a mezze – I think it’s a good alternative to the more common aubergine salad. I grew yellow courgettes this year and I think the colour’s very pleasing, but green courgettes will work just fine too. If you’ve let a few courgettes get a bit larger than usual, then you can still use them very successfully in this dish, but it would be best to scrape out and discard the seeds. The amounts given here will give you a...

My little veg plot has suffered a bit from neglect this year but in early summer I planted a couple of courgette plants (a variety called ‘Yellow Taxi’) and left them to get on with it. For many, many weeks it seemed to rain solidly every day and the courgette plants sulked. Then, around the end of July, they suddenly decided to produce very large numbers of lovely yellow courgettes. When I get a lot of courgettes, I start thinking about courgette cake. Savoury courgette cakes are nice but I really enjoy the sweet versions. The cakes can have a slightly off-putting green colour unless you remove the peel, but use yellow courgettes and that’s not an issue. There are plenty of courgette cake recipes around but this one from the Farrington Oils website is my current favourite. The use of cold pressed rapeseed oil together with grated courgettes gives the finished cake a nutty and herbaceous or almost grassy flavour which may not be to everyone’s taste but I think is a little differe...

I suppose that it's about time to gather in the summer harvest before finally having to admit that the autumn is here.  I feel like I’ve eaten every courgette dish imaginable and I’ve made plenty of chutney but the courgette plants are still producing. So I've used a few of the spare courgettes to make this simple but pleasing jam. Actually, calling it a jam is a bit misleading since it's based loosely on a French confiture de courgettes and is intended for serving with cheese, pâté or other savoury bits and bobs. Of course, there's nothing stopping you spreading it on your toast in the morning; after all breakfast in France is just a small lunch. You can use up any overgrown marrow-like courgettes in this jam, but only use the fleshy outer parts and discard the seedy core for best results. You can vary the mix of dried fruit as the mood and market takes you, but a few figs are particularly nice. The amount given here should make 3 standard jars. 900 g coarsely grat...

I'm willing to admit that this soup comes as an attempt to use at least some of the bumper crop of courgettes and herbs from the garden, but I think it tastes pretty good too.  Courgettes are good with other herbs like basil too if that's what you have to hand and if you don't have sorrel, then add a little more lemon juice instead. This soup will work either hot or chilled, but if you're serving it chilled then you may want to increase the amount of lemon or sorrel for that refreshing sharpness on a warm day. Instead of reaching for the olive oil as I usually would, I used a little extra virgin rapeseed oil. These oils have a very pleasing nutty and slightly grassy flavour which works really well with courgettes. The one I used was Hillfarm extra virgin cold pressed rapeseed oil   but I've also been using Farrington's Mellow Yellow cold pressed rapeseed oil and that's an excellent product as well. Both these oils work very well in courgette cake too (...

We have a new restaurant in the Carluccio's chain coming to our High Street and I'm certainly not complaining about that, but for some reason there are a lot of places to get Italian food in this area . I felt I ought to try to reduce my carbonara footprint and avoid cooking anything with even a vaguely Italian pedigree for a week or two. I failed miserably thanks to my risotto craving. I remember many years ago shopping in Mr Carluccio's original Neal Street deli and on a couple of occasions the man himself was there. At the time I'd never made a risotto but he told me that there was nothing to be afraid of and many hundreds of risottos later I can confirm that he was right. Plenty of people far better qualified than I have described the process of adding hot stock to rice to make risotto, so I don't think it's worth me repeating it, but it might be worth passing on a tip I was given some time ago (not by Mr Carluccio, I hasten to add). If you need to pre...

This dish might sound as if it just wouldn't work, but oddly it does – as long as you like plums. I came across a French recipe using chicken and plums and since there were plenty of cheap plums around, I thought I'd try something along the same lines. It might sound a little complicated, but it's not really and can be prepared largely in advance. This recipe serves two hungry people, but the size of plums and chicken thighs will vary a lot so you might want to vary the amount of pasta or other ingredients to suit your appetite. 3-4 chicken thighs, skin on and bone in 3-4 plums, ripe but preferably still on the firm side 2 medium courgettes, topped and tailed Zest and juice of 1 small lime 150 g (or thereabouts) tagliatelle – or use whatever pasta you have Balsamic vinegar, olive oil, dried chilli flakes, salt and pepper and maybe a little sugar Cut the courgettes into thin slices lengthways. Dry these slices out by placing them on silicone sheets on baking tray...