Sort-Of Nicoise Salad
Eeek, doesn’t that look dryer than a dry thing? It really wasn’t though but perhaps that’s because I added lots of extra dressing when I sat down to eat.
So, I wanted to eat asparagus tonight because, you know, it’s in season and we love it and it doesn’t hang around for long. Then I remembered we had potatoes in the fridge that needed using up so I thought I’d put the two together. I was going to add some smoked trout but then I suddenly remembered tuna. I hate the tinned stuff but love the fresh kind, we just don’t eat it because it’s so unfriendly to the environment. I thought about reverting to the trout but there was no way that was going to cut it when the tuna was looming so large so, I ignored the little monster sitting on my solider and scurried to Waitrose to pick up said fish.
We’ve done something similar to this before but without the olives. Stephen’s a big fan of the nicoise but I’m not so keen, largely due to the eggs. I keep on trying to love them but I don’t think it’s going to happen so I just left them out. He didn’t seem to mind, I added some tomatoes which is another thing we fight over and that seemed to please him.
So, tuna, new potatoes, asparagus instead of green beans, olives, tomatoes, lettuce and a Dijon vinagrette. No anchovies because they’re also on the banned list and my conscience couldn’t cope with two unfriendly fishes in one night. Similar to a nicoise salad but not really. Just as good though, or better really if you don’t like eggs. Chicken would work here too (free-range, obviously), if you’re not as environmentally irresponsible as I was being this evening.
Chickpea Curry
As we weren’t lounging in the sun yesterday, we decided to make the most of the time and prepare something for tonight’s dinner. We hadn’t planned on cooking anything so had to make do with what we had in the cupboards. Stephen suggested a curry made with pulses and this, from Camelia Panjabi’s book, fitted the bill perfectly.
We’ve made chickpea curry before but it wasn’t a huge success. It was a quick and easy recipe from the BBC web site and it suffered from the lack of slow-cooking. This dish was the polar opposite, with lots of blending and browning and frying and simmering but it was definitely worth spending the extra time because this dish was far superior to the previous incarnation. The onions cooked down to form a deep and delicious sauce with a lot of woody spice character.
We served it with basmati rice and some moong dal that we had cooked a few weeks ago and frozen.
Chickpea Curry
Serves Six
250g dried chickpeas
3 large onions
15g fresh ginger
15g garlic
250g tinned tomatoes
2 black cardamoms
8 cloves
2 bay leaves
15 peppercorns
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
Pinch of asafoetida
65ml oil
1 teaspoon turmeric powder
1/2 teaspoon garam masala
1 teaspoon coriander powder
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
Soak the chickpeas overnight in five cups of water (we just soaked ours for four hours).
Chop two of the onions and reserve. In a food processor, blend another onion with the ginger and garlic. Puree the tomatoes separately.
Place the chickpeas and soaking water into a pot with the last chopped onion, the cardamomsa, cloves, bay leaves, peppercorns, cumin seeds, one teaspoon of salt and the asaofetida. Bring to tbe boil. Cook for 50 minutes. Drain and reserve the cooking liquid.
In a separate pot, heat the oil. Add the reserved onion and saute for 25 minutes until brown. Add the pureed onion, ginger and garlic and cook for 10 minutes.
Add the turmeric, garam masala, coriander powder and pepper and stir. After one minute, add the tomatoes and cook for a few minutes.
Add the cooked chickpeas and stir. Add the water in which the chickpeas were cooked and cook until tender. Add salt.
Shooter’s Sandwich
Stephen and I have been keeping a keen eye on the weather all week and when we realised it was going to be 23 degrees today, we started planning some outdoor food. We initially considered a barbecue but eventually settled on a picnic in the park: much less effort which would result in more time for sun worshiping. That dream was shattered pretty quickly when we woke up and it was raining and there was no sign of any sun.
Of course, having decided on a picnic in advance meant we had already started preparing the food and had in fact finished what was to be the main event: Shooter’s Sandwich. Having seen this fabulous looking specimen earlier in the week, I had been able to think about little else and I wasn’t about to let the lack of sun stand in the way. We therefore did what millions of Britons have been doing for years: we had a carpet picnic.
The sandwich was good, the mushroom mixture added an earthy flavour and the whole thing tasted really meaty with a gamey note. The bread had gone a little soggy though, it wasn’t a particularly brilliant loaf to start with and I think something like a sourdough would be better.
We also had a potato salad (new potatoes, dressed with oil, raspberry mustard, salt, pepper and spring onions) and a spinach, asparagus, blue cheese and walnut salad both of which worked well with the steak.
We also had some rose because, well, if you’re not having Pimms at a picnic then you have to have rose, right?
Asparagus and Trout Quiche
Since it was St George’s Day, Stephen suggested we cook some asparagus. Not needing much of an excuse to eat asparagus, I happily agreed but remembered that it’s still a bit early and the spears are a bit tough. I decided to use the asparagus in a quiche, hoping the baking would sweeten and tenderise the spears.
The baking did indeed tenderise the spears but that’s about the only thing that went right. I didn’t have enough of the egg and cream mixture but went ahead and poured it on top of the onions/trout/asparagus anyway. I thought I might be able to rescue it by adding some creme-fraiche and milk but it just sort of settled on top. I sprinkled on the cheese anyway and shoved it in the oven, hoping for the best. It started to puff up which encouraged me but it just didn’t seem to cook. After about 40 minutes, I decided to grill the top so that it was at least brown and slightly attractive looking.
I took it out of the oven and left it to settle while I busied myself with a potato salad. Stephen arrived home and said it looked great. Then we cut into it and the whole thing collapsed. The insides were a curdled mess and looked thoroughly unpleasant and inedible. Stephen, who admits he’ll eat pretty much anything, went ahead and tasted it and said something kind about how the flavour was good so we ate it anyway. With our eyes shut. He was right, the flavour was good but whoever coined the phrase “we eat with our eyes” was right too.
Needless to say, I’m not going to add the recipe. I might make this again though, principally because it is a good flavour combination but also because I got far too much pleasure than is normal from arranging those asparagus spears. If that works out then I’ll make another post, if it doesn’t then, well, it’ll be my little secret.
PS from Stephen – that’s a bottle of Chapel Down brut sparkling wine in the background. Most people drink some sort of English ale on St George’s Day but we decided to go with English sparkling wine instead. It was really good – we’ve had it a couple times before (along with Nytetimber which I used to think was a bargain but has risen in price quite a bit over the past few years). It had lovely yeasty and fruity (peachy and citrus) flavours along with a hint of floral aroma. Just the sort of thing you’d expect from a well balanced Champagne, and cheaper than most of them.
Spaghetti alla Vodka with Crayfish
A quick dinner this evening based on our recent success with spaghetti alla vodka. At the time, Kerri had commented that it would be good with things added into it and this evening those things were little crayfish tails.
We followed the recipe pretty much exactly as it is in the link above, except that we added the (pre-cooked) crayfish tails at the same time as the vodka and cream. And we didn’t have parsley, which was unfortunate. I didn’t think that the sauce had quite the same intensity as last time, but I do have a nasty cold at the moment and that probably dulled my senses – Kerri assured me that it was indeed very good.
More Ultimate Chilli
This time, with rice. I actually had a baked potato, Stephen had the rice.
We wanted something quick and easy tonight so pulled this out of the freezer to defrost this morning. Freezing had made the meat even more tender and the sauce had improved, as these things always do with storing and re-heating. The texture of the meat was reminiscent of a slow-cooked Indian dish such as Rogan Josh.
We served it with some guacamole that we made without chilli or other spices for the first time – we thought that it would act as a good foil to the main event by being fresh and full of coriander and lime rather than also being spicy. It did work well.
Christopher’s – The Burger
We’ve long suspected this is the best burger in London but the last time we visited we were without a camera, knowing how infuriating a post without pictures is we decided to delay the write-up until we could capture the burger in all it’s glory. It took a while but a Friday night shopping trip to Neal’s Yard Dairy provided us with the perfect opportunity to go back and get our shot. I’m not sure it does capture the full glory unfortunately since the bar was pretty dark by the time we got round to eating but it gives you an idea at least.
We’ve been going to Christopher’s American Bar and Grill for years, since we both used to work around the corner. Inevitably, we would end up there at the end of a long evening, order far too many of their very well-made cocktails and need something to soak up the alcohol. The burger was always the best option and never failed to disappoint (apart from one dodgy period somewhere around 2007 when the burgers became strangely tasteless so we stuck to Martinis and relied on the olives for sustenance).
The Christopher’s burger is big and juicy with a proper meaty flavour that is evident despite the bacon and cheese (Monterey Jack) accompaniments, Stephen thought he could detect a hint of rosemary but I’m recovering from a cold so can’t confirm. It’s big but not so big that you can’t bite into it and resort to using a knife and fork. The bun is soft but not so soft that it can’t handle the escaping meat juices, it isn’t toasted though which would definitely add an extra mark for me.
The fries are Proper Fries: thin and crispy, just as they should be. There’s none of those ridiculous hand-cut, triple-cooked chips, arranged Jenga style on your plate that are always raw in the middle; there’s exactly the right amount for the size of the burger too, allowing for a couple of fries per bite which is another thing I find very important in the burger experience.
There’s no pickle though which I imagine would disappoint some people, I like pickles but it’s not the main focus for me so I’m happy to let it go. It would be a good addition though.
At £9.50, it’s almost £2 cheaper than the equivalent burger at Byron (a branch of which is opening opposite, incidentally) who I think make a pretty good burger. The Christopher’s burger is a lot bigger and much more substantial and it feels wrong to compare it a Byron burger, it’s in a different league. Byron vs GBK is probably fairer alongside Christopher’s vs a pretty good steak. How it compares to a proper American burger I don’t know, since I’ve never eaten one and therefore isn’t a mark of quality for me as it is a lot of people.
So, we’ve done Hawksmoor and Byron. We did Goodman too but didn’t write it up since the pictures were blurry – it was pretty good but definitely lacking something compared to Christopher’s, the chips were ridiculous wedge-type affairs too. We’ve done GBK which wasn’t even worth commenting on. Next up is Hache, and possibly Guerilla Burgers (although I’m yet to read a single decent write-up) then we’ll really be in a position to decide on our favourite burger in London. They’ll have to do something pretty amazing to compete with Christopher’s.
Christopher’s American Bar and Grill
18 Wellington Street
Covent Garden
London
WC2E 7DD
020 7240 4222
PS The burger is on the bar food menu in the bar on the ground floor and I don’t think it appears on the menu in the restaurant proper, which is upstairs.
Asparagus and Chicken Risotto
I spotted the first of the English asparagus in Waitrose yesterday so eagerly grabbed some without giving much thought to what I was going to use it for. It seemed too early for asparagus but looking back at last year’s posts, we had the first of the season on the same week of the year.
These were fairly large so I decided to chop them up and use them in a risotto, following our basic recipe. I’m glad I did because these were quite tough and a little bitter, unlike the sweet spears found later in the year.
Some chicken also went into the risotto, as well as some pheasant stock we made up a while ago. The pheasant stock worked well with the chicken and added a deeper, rounder note than the usual chicken stock. There was also some thyme but it got a bit lost amongst the bigger flavour of the stock. I would have liked some more sweetness too, the shallots I used didn’t provide as much as I thought they would.
Thai Noodle and Prawn Salad
Yesterday Kerri commented that she was craving some sort of Thai style salad with lime juice and fish sauce in it and remembered the one we had made in this dinner. So we tried something similar, but it was not as successful this time because we could not get the bean vermicelli at the last minute and used rice vermicelli instead.
The flavour combinations were good though, the hot, sour and salty dressing with just a dash of sweetness soaking into the noodles and prawns, being freshened up by all the finely chopped, crunchy vegetables and the coriander. The main drawback was that the noodles had gone a big soggy – we either end up with those particular noodles being underdone or overdone, hard to get them right. Certainly something to try again, but with the correct noodles!
Thai Noodle and Prawn Salad (based on a recipe from the Blue Elephant book)
Serves Two
200g vermicelli
1 green chilli
4 cloves garlic, peeled
1 tbsp sugar
4 tbsp lemon juice
4 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp vegetable oil
200g prawns
2 sticks celery, finely chopped
2 large shallots, finely chopped
4 spring onions, finely chopped
2 small carrots, shredded
Cook the vermicelli as per the packet instructions.
Coarsely grind the chilli with two cloves of garlic and mix with the sugar, lemon juice and fish sauce.
Crush the remaining cloves of garlic and brown in some oil.
Cook the prawns in boiling water for 2 minutes and then drain.
Combine all of the above and sprinkle with coriander.
Spaghetti alla Vodka
This is one of those acclaimed pasta sauces that only takes as long to cook as the pasta does, the kind of dish I normally ignore in favour of long, slow-cooked ragus. I’m glad I stopped ignoring this though because I really enjoyed it and would happily eat it again tonight. The combination of the tomatoes and cream create a rich sauce, not unlike a ragu in some ways but with an altogether lighter finish.
Although this isn’t an Italian recipe with a particularly long history, there are many variations on the recipe available. Chilli flakes are a common addition and would be a good way to balance the sweetness and, of course, pancetta would be perfect.
We used San Marzano tinned tomatoes, these seem to be naturally sweeter than other brands of tinned tomatoes and therefore don’t need to be cooked as long. You can find them in Sainsbury’s, under the Taste the Difference brand. If you’re using other types of tinned tomatoes then you might want to increase the cooking time.
Spaghetti alla Vodka
Serves Two
1/2 onion, finely diced (we used shallots this time, since we had some lying around)
1 garlic clove, smashed with the back of a knife
1/2 tin tomatoes
Salt and pepper
Splash vodka
Tbs double cream
Parsley, finely chopped
Parmesan
Start by slowly softening the onions over a low heat until they are almost brown – about 10 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for a further two minutes.
Next, add the tomatoes and season with salt and pepper. Cook for five minutes before adding the vodka and cream. Remove the garlic clove, stir in the parsley and add the pasta. Grate with parmesan and serve.
