The Wine List: April 7, 2012

Bottle No.2: Chateau Musar Red

There is a Musar club. You are either an in-the-know member or not. Free membership here.

Continue reading “Bottle No.2: Chateau Musar Red” »

Outdoorsman: March 25, 2012

First Catch Your Rabbit

You’ve foraged for nettles and made nettle soup, you’ve foraged for berries and eaten, well, berries. You’ve been living in the wild for a day now, but it feels like a week, and you’re thinking foraging isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And then out of the corner of your eye, you spy a little rabbit…

Illustration courtesy of Sam Chelton

Continue reading “First Catch Your Rabbit” »
Food Routes: February 27, 2012

Lamb Shank Vindaloo

The food you miss when you travel away from home is revealing. Returning from childhood holidays abroad, there were only two meals we craved: fish and chips and a take-away Indian. Curry, you see, is as English as it gets. Well it is now anyway. Vindaloo, more than other curries, has been transformed by time, culture, available ingredients and tastes for over more than 500 years. It is genuine and wonderful fusion food.

The dish in fact originated in Portugal and was taken to Southern India by Portuguese merchants who had first landed in Goa in the early 16th Century. The name vindaloo is derived from the dish “Carne de Vinha d’ Alhos”, a feast made of meat, generally pork, braised in wine with garlic. The Goans substituted vinegar for wine and added chilli and spice and sometimes also potatoes.

Continue reading “Lamb Shank Vindaloo” »

The Gourmet Diet: February 12, 2012

Chocolate Lover’s Chocolate Mousse

This is the best chocolate mousse possible if you like the true taste of chocolate – and it is genuinely low in calories. It also takes only 15 minutes to prepare. Sometimes you can have your cake and eat it.

Continue reading “Chocolate Lover’s Chocolate Mousse” »

Kitchen Alchemy: January 25, 2012

Gravadlax: Home-Made Is Best

Gravadlax exemplifies what I think of as ‘kitchen alchemy’ – pure culinary gold created from raw ingredients through transformative technique, in this case a simple dry cure.

Originally, Scandinavian fishermen preserved the fish by burying it in the sand to be cured by saltwater – ‘gravadlax’ means buried salmon. It is beautiful, tasty and healthy. Gravadlax is also easy-peasy: The initial preparation – the actual work – takes a few minutes, and the curing process requires only that you have a fridge and turn your fish just once a day. The results are far superior to anything you can buy in a supermarket.

Continue reading “Gravadlax: Home-Made Is Best” »

Streetfood: January 19, 2012

Pho Bò – Obsession in a Bowl

Pho is Vietnam’s national dish, obsession, subject of poetry, and often described as the ‘soul of the nation’. Served by street vendors, it is eaten for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It is low in fat, healthy and tasty.  It is a great restorative. Pho Bò with beef – originally from Saigon – is my favorite: The spiced beef stock flavoured with roasted ginger and shallots is sublime. Serve with clouds of steam straight from the pot.

The Gourmet Diet: January 11, 2012

Beachcomber’s Shellfish

This steaming dish of shellfish evokes windswept, seasprayed northern beaches. The smell is of the sea and it brings back memories of my childhood trips to the beach searching for crabs in rock pools, raking for cockles and snatching razor clams with a salt bait.

Continue reading “Beachcomber’s Shellfish” »

Flavour Family Trees: January 7, 2012

Chicken & Lemon

Chicken & lemon have a special affinity and there are dozens of preparations that pay homage to it across many cultures and cuisines. It works because the acid of the lemon cuts against the fat of the chicken much as wine or vinegar would (the dish below also includes a glass of wine). But it is the aroma of chicken and lemon together that is really something else. This simple rustic way of roasting chicken and lemons creates an intense perfume that fills the kitchen.

 

Image courtesy of Jill Mead.
Continue reading “Chicken & Lemon” »
The Wine List: January 6, 2012

Bottle No.1: Guigal Côtes du Rhône Rouge (2007)

Everyday drinking at its very best.

Guigal is justly famous for its upmarket wines but it is at the everyday drinking end that the estate has arguably done its most important work: The Côtes du Rhône Rouge is affordable yet damn good. Good enough to put a smile on your face.

Continue reading “Bottle No.1: Guigal Côtes du Rhône Rouge (2007)” »

The Wine List: January 6, 2012

Welcome to The Wine List

Life is too short for bad wine. If your name is not on the list, you’re not getting in.

Unlike most food and drink, buying wine is a bit of a lottery. We are bombarded by reviews and recommendations. It would take me a whole year just to drink the ‘Wines of the week’ published in any given week! The choice is overwhelming, the wine – even expensive wine –  is very often underwhelming. Not that we need to be told but various surveys bear this out. A third of us describe feeling ‘overwhelmed’ by the choice on offer. Apparently 80% of us choose wine by label, mostly because we like the look of it or because we recognise it, which is, quite frankly, sad. It does not need to be that way. Welcome to the Wine List.

Continue reading “Welcome to The Wine List” »