As Strong As Soup

Recently, I had a go at clearing out the scary place known as The Mysterious Store Cupboard and I found some ground almonds that I bought for a Tarta de Santiago that I didn't quite get round to making. I then found the ground almonds that I bought for the winter-warming Gingerbread that I still haven't bothered to make. Finally, I found the ground almonds that I bought for the Galette des Rois that I didn't make because I got distracted. So ground almonds had to be put to work. The Reine de Saba (the Queen of Sheba cake) is a well-known, classic French recipe – I'm fairly sure there's a version of it in one of Elizabeth David's books – but it has a lot of variations. For what it's worth, this is the way I make it and, happily, it's made a small dent in the ground almond mountain. 130 g  dark chocolate (around 70% cocoa solids) , broken up 30 ml Grand Marnier (or other orange liqueur) 100 g unsalted butter, cut into smallish cubes and allowed to so...

In my post last year about sloe gin I admitted that after I strain and bottle the gin, I then throw away the sloes. Until now  the recipes that I've come across for recycling sloes haven’t really worked for me. But shortly after writing that post, as I roved out on a fine autumn morning to view the fields and take the air, I met a lady gathering rose hips (sorry, for some reason this posting is turning into a traditional English folk song) . We got talking about sloe gin and she told me off (this happens quite a lot).  She told me that I shouldn't waste gin-soaked sloes and that I should try eating them with chocolate. Well, I've been thinking about that for a while and eventually I tried making these truffles. It turns out that she was right to tell me off, of course. To keep truffles smoother and lighter, I've tended to think that you have to make some kind of custard. I was in a bit of a hurry this time and so I used a decent shop-bought custard instead. The...

Happy New Year and let's hope 2011 is a good one. I have a feeling that I might have some trouble finding enough time to keep this blog updated in 2011, but I promise to try. Anyway, enough of this self-regarding nonsense and back to the recipes.  Here's a fragrant little soup to start the new year that's good for using up the veg left over from the festive season. This will make 4 – 5 portions. 1 onion, finely chopped 400 g carrots, peeled and chopped 200 g parsnips, peeled and chopped 2 cm fresh ginger, grated 2 tsp ground cumin ½ tsp ground coriander 2 tsp sumac 1.25 litres vegetable stock 1 cooking apple, peeled, cored and chopped small handful of basmati rice 2 tbsp maple syrup 2 tbsp pomegranate molasses a little lemon juice, but only if needed Soften the onion in a little oil – cold pressed rapeseed oil works really well if you have some. Stir in the carrots and parsnips followed by the ginger, cumin, coriander and sumac. Pour over 1 litre of the s...