A friends recent post on a well known "social network" was a rhetorical question while waiting to see if her trashed kitchen was worth it in the pursuit of a batch of home-made brownies. And I say yes, YES! it's well worth a trashed kitchen in pursuit of any home-baking.
I see, all around us, a vast and rapid extinction of the family food traditions of our youth. I remember the weddings on my fathers side of the family, indeed all celebrations - mile-stone anniversaries, baptisims, confirmations and especially first holy communions were important - and thus were occasions to gather all the branches together in celebration. And in true old-fashioned terms, this meant church-hall tables laden with so much baked goods. Long tables upholding tray after tray of cookies the likes of which you can't begin to imagine.
The deliveries began the day before these events. Husbands or brothers tasked to deliver huge Tupperware cake-keepers with layers of waxed paper to provide protection between strata of butter cookies, chocolate & spice "meatball" cookies, butter balls perfumed with ground pecans and rolled in icing sugar, cuccidati (scilian fig cookies) and biscotti di reginas or sesame cookies. If it was an occasion to pull out all the stops, there would be other plates piled high with delecate aniseseed flavoured waffle cookies known as pizzelles as well as other assorted bite sized tokens of love.
There is little evidence of today's children standing at the elbow of their mothers and grandmothers in the kitchen. Learning the old-fashioned traditions handed from generation to generation. I wanted to begin my life here by bringing both my own flavours as well as the traditions of Wales to our combined holiday table and so have asked collegues and acquaintances here for their own tried and true family recipes... and to all my requests I've been told family baking isn't a part of their holiday tables. Over and over again the answers I've received were recommendations as to which shop or brand of christmas pudding or treat is their family favorite.
Sadly, just as with home, there are even fewer home-bakers here - here in the land of Dickens and Shakespeare - and us just living a stones throw away from Pudding-Mill Lane!
And in these economic times the small independant bake shops are closing too. Leaving us only the commercial mass-production loaves and machine peeled apple pies with stamped out crusts. It's dreadful what passes for quality and how the next generation and those to come after will look at the Sarah Lee and Mr Kiplings brands as those things that are cherished from their childhood.
Please, please, find a bowl, let loose the spoon. And even if it's a box mix - bake those brownies and mix those scones. All is not lost when the effort is made to ensure those who will proceed will have been given the skillset to be able to turn out a yeasty loaf and be capable of providing a lovely cream tea for their friends and family.
d xx
Sunday 27 March 2011
Friday 25 March 2011
Where there's heat... get INTO the kitchen
...
It’s a curious thing, heat.
We want it for comfort on a cold winter’s day. We embrace it on a stunning white-sand beach in Mexico. We dread its yearly return when it slides down the California mountains like the Devil's own breath, whipping up raging forest fires along it's path. We take it for granted when we wake up each morning.
And we LOVE to eat it!
I Googled chilli peppers and got over 6.8M hits in less than a nano second. I don't think there's a place on the planet which doesn’t have it’s own version of the chilli pod or peppercorn. There are whole cultures whose identities are closely entwined with the heat of their cuisine. Men folk back home gather at Tom’s Tavern to challenge one another to prove themselves by ingesting a host of different hot-sauces collected from around the world (silly gits).
Growing up in north eastern America, we aren’t as culturally bound to the heat like other regions of the country. Our forefathers in the north didn’t come from old-world hot spots like Spain, Africa and Asia. Our German, Polish, Irish, Italian, Dutch or Scandinavian ancestors were more about slow stews and hearty field-hand fare. If you were to move towards the south and west and you’re moving into regions influenced by Creole, Cajun, African and most especially to the west, Mexico whose flavours were influenced by the Spanish.
And so coming from a heat-timid background, when I arrived in the UK my tastes and senses were naive, (to put it mildly – See? See what I did there?). When I first arrived with my suitcase of personal history, all I could taste was HEAT!!! in even the most mild of dishes. It took time to appreciate the subtle depths and layers of sizzling pleasure one can achieve from these little red flavour bombs.
Another PBS television chef whom I admired greatly was Jeff Smith, The Frugal Gourmet. He was passionate about world travel and brought much of his life experiences to the table. Not just in the dishes, but by the sharing of stories about the generosity of the people who opened their kitchens and lives up to teaching this funny looking gray-bearded Methodist Minister about their day to day sustenance. The most compelling lesson I took from him was this… In order to learn about a culture, start by learning about their food. And it’s really very true. If you study a cuisine from anywhere in the world, you begin to understand their environment (what they eat, indicates what they cultivate which in turn shows what natural resources they can draw on which in turn gives you a larger idea of the environments they live in, etc.).
So I began my culinary love affair with the world in earnest here in the UK. And I selected India as the first place I wanted to learn about to create their amazing dishes. I did this by persuading my dear husband to take me out to dinner, as much as possible, to as many Indian restaurants as we could find – not a bad life that, lol. My Indian journey began through their menus and imaginative flavours. The eager waiting staff who didn’t mind the endless questions I’d ask about each dish gave me a lot of insight into how to craft a truly lovely meal. I enjoyed many creamy kormas giving way to the roar of a pungent rogan josh.
Tasting lead to learning which lead to cooking which leads me to here. And the knowledge that when things are getting hot, it’s time to head into the kitchen and be sultry with your spices and lavish with your love. For cooking as a gift to someone is an act of love, it’s a feathery kiss on a fork and a spoonful of embrace. xx
Wednesday 23 March 2011
Writing is easy... right?
I'm envious of my colleague Miss C who, when she gets in extra early, can just sit down and begin writing with quick taps of her long, made-for-the-keyboard fingers. But writing must be easy you scoff, after all if it weren't, how could we have so many books in the world?
Well I'll tell you how...
See, those with the touch of genius can just do it like it's the most natural thing in the world. They are fountains from which thoughts and feelings flow like rivers of truth wrapped in pretty stories. For those of us who are less touched by genius, (hacks and others filled with their own hubris), well we tend to see the writing maxim more like this: There's nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.
I've got ideas you see. Lots of them. Pretty colorized be-ribboned ideas about characters and plots and settings and stuff. A good writer will have things pop into their heads and make connections between ideas, characters, plots and places. For me, notsomuch. It's a bit more like a box you'd find left over from a jumble sale. You open it and there's all this stuff that bulges and falls out in a mis-matched tangle. And when a hack reaches for a character and matches it to a setting they think will work, you find these ingredients will decide they don't want to fit together. And then everything starts fighting against you and your ideas. So now it's a bloody boxing match between you, your character, your notions of where they belong, etceterra. This goes on until all unite just to bitch-slap the sorry writer (me) who unfortunately thinks they know what they're doing when obviously they don’t!
I get how writing works. I’ve read every book on writing a book that’s been published! I know about plotting and pacing and outlining and tension and dialogue and hooks and stuff. But alas there is one other thing that I lack, the missing ingredient. Which is the necessary genius to bring these things together into a story that flows and sparkles and makes people beg to peer into more worlds from my imagination.
But someday… someday, I tell myself, I’m gonna crack that nut!
Well I'll tell you how...
See, those with the touch of genius can just do it like it's the most natural thing in the world. They are fountains from which thoughts and feelings flow like rivers of truth wrapped in pretty stories. For those of us who are less touched by genius, (hacks and others filled with their own hubris), well we tend to see the writing maxim more like this: There's nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.
I've got ideas you see. Lots of them. Pretty colorized be-ribboned ideas about characters and plots and settings and stuff. A good writer will have things pop into their heads and make connections between ideas, characters, plots and places. For me, notsomuch. It's a bit more like a box you'd find left over from a jumble sale. You open it and there's all this stuff that bulges and falls out in a mis-matched tangle. And when a hack reaches for a character and matches it to a setting they think will work, you find these ingredients will decide they don't want to fit together. And then everything starts fighting against you and your ideas. So now it's a bloody boxing match between you, your character, your notions of where they belong, etceterra. This goes on until all unite just to bitch-slap the sorry writer (me) who unfortunately thinks they know what they're doing when obviously they don’t!
I get how writing works. I’ve read every book on writing a book that’s been published! I know about plotting and pacing and outlining and tension and dialogue and hooks and stuff. But alas there is one other thing that I lack, the missing ingredient. Which is the necessary genius to bring these things together into a story that flows and sparkles and makes people beg to peer into more worlds from my imagination.
But someday… someday, I tell myself, I’m gonna crack that nut!
So ever the optimist, let’s just keep going and see what happens. And Karen – daisy girl, if you’re listening - please come back from your heavenly cloud and help me get your world, Silverhawk, into ours?
xx
Tuesday 22 March 2011
Dodging bullets
You go through life with lots of moments that change the course of things... You know what I mean, you dawdle a little too long at the mirror and miss the train that breaks down or you make the extra effort to be on time, and the car breaks down.
Despite my gluttony of sweets and unashamed love of baking and creating new confections I've always managed to stay on the good side of things, health wise. Yeah, there's extra pounds, but you can never trust a skinny cook I always say.
So it was more than just a little overdue perhaps when reviewing recent blood results to have the good Doctor ask, "Oh dear. Are you diabetic? Your readings are nearly three times normal!"
But there is hope behind this reading. The test results also indicated that my blood had clotted at the time of the taking, so that may also have skewed things, therefore was up bright and early to visit my favorite vampire this morning to take repeats...
Feeling (not unjustifiably) a little like a paper target and the whistle of the bullet is closing in... will let you know in a couple days!
Despite my gluttony of sweets and unashamed love of baking and creating new confections I've always managed to stay on the good side of things, health wise. Yeah, there's extra pounds, but you can never trust a skinny cook I always say.
So it was more than just a little overdue perhaps when reviewing recent blood results to have the good Doctor ask, "Oh dear. Are you diabetic? Your readings are nearly three times normal!"
But there is hope behind this reading. The test results also indicated that my blood had clotted at the time of the taking, so that may also have skewed things, therefore was up bright and early to visit my favorite vampire this morning to take repeats...
Feeling (not unjustifiably) a little like a paper target and the whistle of the bullet is closing in... will let you know in a couple days!
Sunday 20 March 2011
PBS changed my life
I know how fortunate I've been through life. I've learned through bitter lesson why not to take anything in life for granted. And this sense of gratitude fills all the chambers of my heart. Even the place where my dream kitchen lives.
I learned to cook watching PBS. It's the american Public Broadcast System where independant ideas are brought without agenda or corporate influence - the poorer cousin to the BBC if you will as there isn't a compulsatory fee for having PBS, but there are many, MANY telethons and appeals on a yearly basis to beg, wheddle, guilt you into giving and provide ongoing financial support in exchange for the pleasure of their programming, broadcast without any commercials. It's the refuge of classics such as Masterpiece Theatre, Colin Firth's Pride and Prejudice, Sesame Street, This Old House (anyone else remember Bob Vila?), Justin Wilson - the frankly scary backwoods cook who could reel yarns bigger than the trout he was "cooking cajun". Nova, a science program which was much more accessable and enjoyable than what most science teachers could offer.
But for me, there were few like the incomparable Julia Child. Through her I learned it was part of the process that you could make mistakes and still have a lovely meal. Her sense of fun and the unashamed way she loved food inspired me to be adventurous and let myself learn how to do things by trial and error.
My husband Tony thrilled me by finding Julia's The French Chef on DVD and giving them to me as a present. It's fun to re-live the golden days of when her programmes came into my Saturday afternoons when I would spend the day in the temple of my mother's kitchen. I was glued to those b&w images, watching Julia's hands flying over a chopping board. The suppleness of her wrists folding meringues through batter. The power in her shoulders as she hoisted platters laden with a bounty of creations you just knew smelled the way you could imagine all of Paris smelled in the early mornings... butter and sugar and cinnamon and love.
So here I am, still devoted and with the help of modern technology, still watching and learning from Julia on my saturday afternoons a lot of miles removed and many years later. I've found there are still things I'd either missed or wasn't ready to take in on her shows. But this could also be because as the years go by, and the tasting dishes from around the world pile up, I realize there is so much more I do not know about food and the world than what I have already achieved - and my how exciting it is to look forward to meeting the challenge in getting to know them all!
Bring on the lemongrass and galangal root, look out Thailand - here I come!
I learned to cook watching PBS. It's the american Public Broadcast System where independant ideas are brought without agenda or corporate influence - the poorer cousin to the BBC if you will as there isn't a compulsatory fee for having PBS, but there are many, MANY telethons and appeals on a yearly basis to beg, wheddle, guilt you into giving and provide ongoing financial support in exchange for the pleasure of their programming, broadcast without any commercials. It's the refuge of classics such as Masterpiece Theatre, Colin Firth's Pride and Prejudice, Sesame Street, This Old House (anyone else remember Bob Vila?), Justin Wilson - the frankly scary backwoods cook who could reel yarns bigger than the trout he was "cooking cajun". Nova, a science program which was much more accessable and enjoyable than what most science teachers could offer.
But for me, there were few like the incomparable Julia Child. Through her I learned it was part of the process that you could make mistakes and still have a lovely meal. Her sense of fun and the unashamed way she loved food inspired me to be adventurous and let myself learn how to do things by trial and error.
My husband Tony thrilled me by finding Julia's The French Chef on DVD and giving them to me as a present. It's fun to re-live the golden days of when her programmes came into my Saturday afternoons when I would spend the day in the temple of my mother's kitchen. I was glued to those b&w images, watching Julia's hands flying over a chopping board. The suppleness of her wrists folding meringues through batter. The power in her shoulders as she hoisted platters laden with a bounty of creations you just knew smelled the way you could imagine all of Paris smelled in the early mornings... butter and sugar and cinnamon and love.
So here I am, still devoted and with the help of modern technology, still watching and learning from Julia on my saturday afternoons a lot of miles removed and many years later. I've found there are still things I'd either missed or wasn't ready to take in on her shows. But this could also be because as the years go by, and the tasting dishes from around the world pile up, I realize there is so much more I do not know about food and the world than what I have already achieved - and my how exciting it is to look forward to meeting the challenge in getting to know them all!
Bring on the lemongrass and galangal root, look out Thailand - here I come!
Saturday 19 March 2011
Do you remember?
Eating green peas in an avocado kitchen..
It's like a silent film reel, looping only a few seconds but I know it's my first real memory. I'm sitting on a chair pulled up to the kitchen table, my chin just about level. There's an over sized cartoon-like child's spoon in my right hand. And I am watching intensely the wobbly peas heading towards my mouth. To the left, at the head of the table is my foster father. He's stripped off what was probably a blue collar shirt and is enjoying the meal in work trousers and a clean white vest. Just a little blip and his head is thrown back with a silent whoop of laughter. His teeth strong and straight and as white as his undershirt.
I don't know who he was or anyone else around the table. I know there were others, it was a table for six. What made him laugh, what made this memory stay with me over any others one can never be sure. I just know it's me, my first self-aware moment, eating peas. In an avocado coloured kitchen.
I was born in one place, grew up in the "New World" and ironically now love in the "Old World", several time zones removed from where I started. And at each place the memories I have seem to always come back to food. What takes me to my birth place? Coffee Crisp candy bars and little raisin butter tarts from Tim Hortons.
My growing years? Fresh made sweet italian sausages, unctuous mile-high slices of fresh made cream pie from any real diner, meatloaf with ketchup and mashed potatoes, fudgesicles, Bryer's ice cream (any flavour!), waiting in line out to the parking lot during lent for a fish fry from Davidson's - where it comes to you hanging off both ends of the platter.
In the here and now? Thai Chili Chicken in peanut sauce, roast joints of beast with amazing yorkshire puddings the size of a fist, brilliantly spiced and layered flavours of a true Indian Byrani, the passion of Antonio Carluccio and his love of Italian flavours found in every plate of his food, the buttery sugary crunch of a warm Welsh cake in the kitchen of my beloved in-laws in Merthyr Tydfil. And there are hundreds more for all stages of my life I could tell you about. In depth. With step by step instructions. And photo's probably...
I don't know if everyone has this strong of an ability to experience taste-memories out of nowhere. I get the tickle of a flavour or an aroma and I'm instantly transported to a place or time from nowhere. Not just the flavours get me, but I can be anywhere and suddenly I'm cooking something. It's time to whip up a creamy cheese souffle or the perfect mushroom risotto - AND SUDDENLY, I'M DOING IT. Step by step. In my head.
It isn't right really, is it?
But there you go, and so, if you need a tip or a recipe or a flavour profile, I'm your gal. Not only can I answer questions, give menu suggestions and walk you through step by step, but I can introduce you to any number of cuisines to open your horizons and widen your repertoire and relationship with the wonderful world of food!
It's like a silent film reel, looping only a few seconds but I know it's my first real memory. I'm sitting on a chair pulled up to the kitchen table, my chin just about level. There's an over sized cartoon-like child's spoon in my right hand. And I am watching intensely the wobbly peas heading towards my mouth. To the left, at the head of the table is my foster father. He's stripped off what was probably a blue collar shirt and is enjoying the meal in work trousers and a clean white vest. Just a little blip and his head is thrown back with a silent whoop of laughter. His teeth strong and straight and as white as his undershirt.
I don't know who he was or anyone else around the table. I know there were others, it was a table for six. What made him laugh, what made this memory stay with me over any others one can never be sure. I just know it's me, my first self-aware moment, eating peas. In an avocado coloured kitchen.
I was born in one place, grew up in the "New World" and ironically now love in the "Old World", several time zones removed from where I started. And at each place the memories I have seem to always come back to food. What takes me to my birth place? Coffee Crisp candy bars and little raisin butter tarts from Tim Hortons.
My growing years? Fresh made sweet italian sausages, unctuous mile-high slices of fresh made cream pie from any real diner, meatloaf with ketchup and mashed potatoes, fudgesicles, Bryer's ice cream (any flavour!), waiting in line out to the parking lot during lent for a fish fry from Davidson's - where it comes to you hanging off both ends of the platter.
In the here and now? Thai Chili Chicken in peanut sauce, roast joints of beast with amazing yorkshire puddings the size of a fist, brilliantly spiced and layered flavours of a true Indian Byrani, the passion of Antonio Carluccio and his love of Italian flavours found in every plate of his food, the buttery sugary crunch of a warm Welsh cake in the kitchen of my beloved in-laws in Merthyr Tydfil. And there are hundreds more for all stages of my life I could tell you about. In depth. With step by step instructions. And photo's probably...
I don't know if everyone has this strong of an ability to experience taste-memories out of nowhere. I get the tickle of a flavour or an aroma and I'm instantly transported to a place or time from nowhere. Not just the flavours get me, but I can be anywhere and suddenly I'm cooking something. It's time to whip up a creamy cheese souffle or the perfect mushroom risotto - AND SUDDENLY, I'M DOING IT. Step by step. In my head.
It isn't right really, is it?
But there you go, and so, if you need a tip or a recipe or a flavour profile, I'm your gal. Not only can I answer questions, give menu suggestions and walk you through step by step, but I can introduce you to any number of cuisines to open your horizons and widen your repertoire and relationship with the wonderful world of food!
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