Tomato & Fennel Soup

It was getting cold. The sea had leaked through my wholly inadequate aging leather boots and a frustrating hunger was beginning to nibble away at my belly. I was most definitely on the edge of a full-on grump.

The GF was still taking pictures, seemingly keen to fill up the entire 8 googabytes of memory that her camera was capable of.

[photo credit]

‘Can you just get a shot of me taking a picture of this limpet?’ she asked, very sweetly, it must be said. I trudged over and snapped away, well aware that we’d left the car two miles away across decidedly swampy marshland. Lunchtime had been and gone and the kipper I’d eaten for breakfast but a distant memory apart from the occasional fishy burp. Even less pleasant than it sounds.

More photos for her magazine. I poked a few of the tenacious shellfish to pass the time, making a mental note to check HFW’s Fish Book later to see if they were edible (turns out that they are).

‘All done, come on, I’ll take you for something to eat at Badgers Tea House, it’s really good.’

Nod. Ok then. Trudge, trudge, trudge. the kitbag beginning to instil a niggling and deep ache in my shoulders.

The sight of the car was enough to lift the spirits, as was the promise of sandwiches, tea and cakes. But what really blew the fug away was Alfriston itself, a small but perfectly formed village in East Sussex, home to a quirky independent bookshop, numerous eateries and a village store that could have been yanked determinedly out of Edwardian England.

It was disconcertingly close to my own personal Elysium.

By the time we arrived at Badgers it was mid-afternoon and there was no way a sandwich would suffice. Something warm and hearty was required, stat, and the soup of the day seemed like the ideal option, despite the addition of fennel – a flavour I haven’t seen eye-to-eye with since discovering the debilitating effects of Pernod in my early teens.

Two bowls arrived, cauldron like, mine ‘garnished’ with a chunk of bread and a wedge of brie the size of a generous slice of pizza. It was delicious. A slightly jokey, but mostly serious request for the recipe was met with a frustratingly dismissive laugh and the words ‘Ooo, it’ll cost you, it’s top secret I’m afraid.’

The only disappointment of the meal (followed by tea and mince pies) was that this wasn’t mere banter. The recipe really was not forthcoming and there was no hastily scribbled list of ingredients on the back of the (very modest) bill.

But gosh darn it, I think I cracked it and I’ll be a little more open with the knowledge. Here you go. Merry Christmas.

Tomato and Fennel Soup

The fennel here is magical – it offers up none of its medicinal, aniseed qualities, merely backing up and boosting the rest of the flavours to the extent where you’d really notice if it was gone. A bit like a bass guitar. Ideal if, like me, you’re not too keen on it of itself.

Makes lots.

Two small carrots, peeled and chooped
Two small onions, diced
A single rib of celery, diced
A fennel bulb, roughly chopped
Three tins of tomatoes
A litre of vegetable stock
Olive oil
Salt and pepper

In the manner of Gordon Ramsay: vegetables, olive oil: fry. Tomatoes. Stock. Simmer. 40 minutes.

Blend. Seasoning. Serve. Tomato and fennel soup with homemade bread and squidgy cheese? Done.

For more soupy secrets, follow me on Twitter

Sous Vide Christmas Lamb

I’ve been playing with my immersion circulator again and came up with this festively coloured lamb dish.

The cut is rump and it was vacuum sealed along with some rosemary before being cooked to the magic 64 degrees and then quickly seared in a smoking hot pan.

Served with a sweet tomato passata, pepped up with a little chilli, spiced cous cous and baby leaf spinach it was darn near perfect.

Home-cured Guanciale (or ‘Cheeky Pancetta’)

In the eyes of the layman (and I include myself in this category), charcuterie looks like pure magic. Admittedly slow, drawn out magic, but trickery nonetheless.

It is a true artisanal craft that, done properly, illustrates beautifully the idea that cooking can be alchemy. With just a few extra ingredients (usually salt, booze and a few herbs) it is possible to transform the mundane into something truly sublime.

There are few simpler pleasures greater than eating a thin slice of cured meat – the fat melting like butter onto the tongue, filling the palate with rich, porcine flavours. A loaf of warm bread, some good oil or butter and a plate of cold cuts can make for a very happy time indeed.

Having tried making cooked charcuterie, in the form of rillettes and pâté, I felt it important to embrace the next logical step: curing.

Preserving meat using salt has a long and noble tradition. Prosciutto, pastrami, baccala, salt beef, herrings – all are made in the same way and use the dehydrating properties of salt to help extend the life of produce.

Bacon seemed like the ideal place to start, given how easy it is supposed to be to turn a slab of belly pork into dry-cured rashers but these plans were shelved after a revelatory moment at west London Sicilian deli, Vallebona.

Guanciale is cured pork jowl. Cheeky pancetta, if you will. Given my history of trying to turn pig’s heads into tasty treats, one taste of this face bacon was all that was needed to convince me it was worth trying to re-create.

Popular in Tuscany and Umbria, it can be used in place of pancetta in a whole raft of dishes or simply thinly sliced and enjoyed with a glass of something cold and alcoholic.

But whereas pancetta tends to be on the expensive side, because guanciale utilises a cut that is often thrown away, it is incredibly cheap, not to mention surprisingly easy to make.

In short, it is everything anyone could possibly desire from an item of charcuterie.

If that has done enough to whet your appetite for dipping an adventurous toe into the dark art of meat curing, here’s how to do it.

First procure yourself one or two pig’s noggins and remove the jowls starting below the chin and, keeping as close to the jawbone as possible, working your way up until just underneath the eye socket.

[If this is too much, you could just order them ready trimmed from your friendly neighbourhood butcher]

This is a dry curing process (as opposed to making a brine) so mix together 200g of fine sea salt and 200g of dark brown sugar and add 10 crushed peppercorns, a couple of crushed cloves, a small handful of very finely chopped rosemary and a pinch of saltpetre.

Rub this mixture into both sides of the cheeks then pour a thin layer of it into a plastic container (make sure it has a lid). Pack the cheeks in and cover with a little more of the cure mix. Pop the lid on the box then put it in the fridge for 24-48 hours.

Commence thumb twiddling.

When you next come back to them, the cheeks should be swimming in a liquid that feels a lot like wet sand. This is water that has leached out of the cheeks (see, they look a bit smaller). Pour this off, repeat the salting process, replace them in the box and leave for another five days.

After a week they should be ready for drying. Remove them from the salt, rub them with a dry cloth and attach some butcher’s string to the thin end. Hang them in a cool place (no warmer than 18 degrees) for three weeks and hope to Buddha that they don’t fall prey to many of the potential pitfalls that could destroy them.

Re-commence thumb-twiddling or alternatively keep your fingers crossed so darn tight it begins to hurt.

Results to follow soon. In the mean time, how about saying ‘Hi’ on Twitter?

The Tastes of Autumn: Squash, Chestnut and Bacon Risotto

When it comes to food, Autumn is the most exciting season. By the time the end of November rolls around, one hankers for rich, big, warming flavours and hearty platefuls to ease the depression of driving home in the dark and fighting through increasingly bad weather.

Large jumpers can hide expanding waistlines and the only way to achieve a healthy glow is by supping an extra glass of wine. It truly is the season for gourmands.

Those earthy flavours so reminiscent of Autumn are a delight to cook with. Their versatility offers infinite combinations, each one guaranteed to be tasty. Pick three of the following and you’re almost certain to achieve deliciousness in perfect harmony:

Pheasant. Bacon. Mushrooms. Pears. Truffles. Pumpkins. Squashes. Rabbit. Potatoes. Pigeon. Chestnuts. Garlic. Thyme. Apples.

In fact, you could probably put all of the above together and create something lip-smackingly good.

I didn’t quite go that far with this risotto but came pretty close.

First step was to roast off a small squash – sliced and cooked until tender in a hot oven, squash develops a rich sweetness that demands to be matched with something salty. In this case bacon, although some melted blue cheese with it would make a good meal on its own.

Once the bacon had been crisped up nicely in a hot pan, the fat rendered out into a tasty sizzling liquid, it was put to one side and a finely chopped red onion softened in a tablespoon of the reserved bacon fat – using the same pan to make the most of the flavours in there (and minimise washing up)

A handful of chestnuts were roasted in the oven until the insides were sweet and the skins had split open. Half were then chopped finely, the others merely split in two to act as a textural contrast.

The risotto was made in the usual way – toast rice, add onions and spoon stock in until rice is tender but still in possession of some integrity. Right at the end, along with the requisite Parmesan and butter, the bacon, roasted squash and chestnuts were stirred in.

The whole thing was topped off with thinly sliced pheasant breast that had been fried off in a little butter, chestnut halves and a little of the reserved bacon. Finally, it was seasoned with a small pinch of ground coffee to add the merest hint of bitterness.

A big, steaming, delicious bowl of Autumn.

Just One More: Further Adventures with Pigs’ Heads

Sometimes things don’t always go right in the kitchen.

There is a wonderful book called ‘Don’t Try This At Home’ where fifty highly skilled chefs share their own personal culinary horror stories. It as an affirming read: to know that such artistes as Adria, Batali and Henderson can mess up gives us mere mortals reason not to hang up the sauté pan just yet.

Last week I attempted a rather adventurous process with my ingredient of the year, a pig’s head.

After removing the jowels, they were seasoned with salt, pepper, lemon and rosemary and cooked sous vide for about 8 hours. Once cool, the meat was shredded and fat removed from the skin. The shredded meat was then spiced and packed back into the skin, the whole thing rolled up into a crude sausage.

The inspiration was a Tom Kitchin recipe I saw in Coco – crispy on the outside with a hint of teeth sticking crackling and soft within, exactly the way pork should be.

Except it didn’t quite work. As the sausage hit the hot metal of the pan it split quite enthusiastically, the skin popping and sending the filling flying out onto the hob.

The cats ate well for three days.

And I declared that I’d had my fill of porcine head – that it was fun but I’d proved my point and, what’s more, belly is far, far tastier. ‘I can’t be arsed to cook one of these again,’ I uttered as I tipped the last of the snout into the rubbish and waved it goodbye, a piggy little eye looking up at me from the depths of the bin.

Like a true junkie, 48 hours was all it took to renege on my promise.

Brawns and braises and crispy fried ears are all well and good (and sometimes not so good) but it was a tiny transparent slice of charcuterie that convinced me it was worth obtaining just one more head from my butcher.

Guanciale is the perfect halfway point between pancetta – made from belly pork – and lardo, the cured back fat of a particularly chubby variety of pig. It is the cured jowl cut, the name coming from the Italian word guancia, meaning cheek. And it is delicious.

Some say the reason behind the popularity of chocolate is that it melts at body temperature – pop a piece in your mouth and you can feel it gently spreading across the palate as it transforms slowly into a liquid.

For me, charcuterie has the same effect. The fat in top quality cured meats should be near translucent at room temperature and should slowly dissipate once in the mouth leaving just a tiny morsel of intensely flavoured meat to chew on.

Guanciale did just that. It fluttered around the mouth like a delicate angel’s wing but then settled into tasty, porky goodness of the sort I’ve only tasted with the finest and ethereally thin slices of prosciutto.

What’s more, it convinced me that now is the perfect time to attempt some proper meat preservation. It should be ready by Christmas…

Eccles Cakes

A while ago I wrote a brief manifesto centred on making the world a better place through the introduction of mandatory elevenses.

Should I ever be appointed ‘Food Tsar’ in order to help see the successful passage of this essential legislation, the Eccles Cake would almost certainly be the official flagship treat.

The finest example of this Lancastrian delicacy can be found not in their hometown of Eccles but at Restaurant St. John close to the City of London. Tightly packed with spiced currants and served warm, with a cup of tea on the side, I can think of no better way to ward off winter ills than taking 15 minutes out of your day to have your cake and eat it.

These are loosely based on the St. John recipe and should make six decent sized cakes.

Be sure to slightly overfill each one and pack it in tightly to full appreciate the glory of these delightful wonders.

NB – If you want to make a smaller or larger quantity just use the ratio one part butter to two parts sugar to four parts currants.

Half a block of ready-made puff pastry (oh, how convenient)
250g currants
60g unsalted butter
120g golden caster sugar
Nutmeg
Allspice
One egg white
Extra caster sugar, for dusting.

Heat the sugar until it starts to melt and colour slightly then remove from the heat and add the butter. Allow to melt then add the currants. Stir well so each is coated with some of the caramel. Flavour with allspice and nutmeg – keep tasting it until it is slightly Christmassy and comfortingly warming – then leave to cool.

Roll out the pastry to about half a centimetre’s thickness then using a 9cm cutter press out as many discs as you can. Re-roll the leftover pastry and repeat until you have 12-14 discs. Top each with a spoonful of the filling and sandwich them together, making sure to press the sides together tightly.

(You can make the circles larger and fold the pastry together underneath. Either way works fine)

Turn them over and neaten them up with your palms. Flatten the top and cut three times with a sharp knife (supposedly to symbolise the holy trinity). Brush with egg white and dip into caster sugar. Bake for 20-25 minutes until they are an inviting colour and the filling is oozing out of the top.

‘Easy As’ Pie

There is something slightly decadent about a pie that belies their inherent simplicity.

Well, most pies.

I’ve had many a miserable midweek football match warmed by a steaming meat and potato number at halftime and to call these a luxury would be akin to describing X Factor as a singing competition.

But pastry can work wonders. It can turn a stew from sustenance into a centrepiece or even make the most cackhanded of bakers look like a master practitioner: Crème patissiere plus puff pastry equals ‘millefeuille’ – a dessert so impressive that it is near impossible to pronounce, let alone eat.

As a result I’ve taken to keeping a slab of ready made pastry in the freezer for those occasions when potatoes, rice or pasta just won’t cut it and my Northern roots are whispering that sweetest of words down my lughole: pie. Pie. Pie.

This little creation is light enough not to raise the blood pressure but also satisfying, cheap and downright delicious.

Cheese, onion and ham pie

Serves four, or two with enough left over for an enviable lunch the following day.

Half a slab of ready-made puff pastry (save the other half for Eccles cakes – coming soon)
6-8 white onions, depending on their size
3-4 slices cured ham (prosciutto, Serrano – anything of that ilk)
two or three handfuls of young leaf spinach
Pesto
Any cheese that melts and as much of it as you like
An egg, beaten

Chop/slice/dice the onions any which way you wish but be sure to leave them in fairly big pieces. Cook them slowly in olive oil until they begin to brown. This should take 20-30 minutes, don’t rush it or they will go from crunchy to burnt in a matter of minutes without passing through that delicious sweet stage. Stir them occasionally.

Whilst the onions are cooking, cut the pastry into two squares (so two quarters of the original block) and roll them out to two equal sized rectangles – about 8 x 12 inches. Put one on a suitably sized baking sheet and layer on the ham, making sure to leave a border of about a finger’s width round the outside. Top with a few dollops of pesto.

Once the onions are cooked, stir in the spinach to wilt it down and spoon the whole lot over the ham. Grate or slice the cheese and sprinkle over the onions. Brush the border with beaten egg, lay the second pastry sheet over the top and press it into place round the edges. Brush the top with more egg and cook for 25-30 minutes. Eat as soon as it comes out of the oven. Mouth burns are inevitable.

For more pastry bites, follow me on Twitter

The Ultimate Comfort Food: Gnocchi

If it’s comfort food you are after, there are few better options than gnocchi.

These little pillows of deliciousness deliver satisfaction in ways that a mound of pasta could only dream of. They have a dense chewiness and a slightly sticky texture that holds onto whatever sauce they are coated in making each one a ferocious nugget of flavour.

They almost invite you into the bowl like tiny carbohydrate Sirens, their sweet song beckoning you further and further to the bottom of the pile until you inevitably collapse in a misty fug as the last one makes its way down your throat.

Cue belly rubbing, sighs of satisfaction and the inability to move as 90% of your body’s blood rushes to your stomach as it begins fighting its way through the wheat/potato onslaught that has just descended.

The only option is to sit very still, sip the final inch of red wine that was sitting innocently in the bottle – a chianti would suit nicely – and fall into a merry doze on the sofa as mindless brain candy plays its way across your television screen. Happiness descends. Winter isn’t that bad after all.

Potato Gnocchi with tomato, chilli and oregano

Like bread baking, the secret to successful gnocchi is instinctive. Play around with the dough and I guarantee you will just ‘know’ when it’s ready. Not too sticky, not too dense and easy to roll. Make the sauce whilst the gnocchi are resting in the fridge.

Precise measurements rarely work for this type of cooking, it’s better to think in terms of ratios and various flours and potatoes behave very differently. As such there is no recipe here, merely a rough method.

Bake a large potato for an hour or so until the insides are light, steaming and fluffier than Paris Hilton’s bedspread. Scoop out the innards and let it cool in a bowl.

Weigh out how much potato you have and add 20% by weight of plain flour (example, for the dunces, if you have 200g potato, use 40g plain flour). Keep some aside for dusting and rolling.

Add an egg (roughly one egg per two potatoes)) and some salt. Mix well with your hands and knead into a pliable dough. If it’s too sticky just work more flour into it but go easy.

For rolling out the gnocchi, I find the easiest way is to divide the dough in two and roll until it becomes unmanageably long. Divide again and continue rolling, repeating the process until your dough sausage is about as thick as a plumber’s forefinger. Split into half inch sized pieces and place on a floured tray. Cover with a damp towel and refrigerate.

For the sauce, heat a generous sluice of olive oil in a frying pan, add a clove of garlic, gently biffed with the side of a knife (leave it whole so you can fish it out later) and a finely chopped chilli, heat dependent on your preference. Allow the two to flavour the oil then pour in some passata. Season with salt, pepper and oregano and allow to bubble away for 15 minutes.

Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil and drop in the gnocchi. Rather helpfully they will rise to the surface when cooked so you can easily fish them out with a slotted spoon straight into the waiting sauce. Stir, serve, eat and sleep.

Oh, and keep those potato skins…(recipe to follow).

Five-hour steak

The perfectly cooked steak is the holy grail of many chefs and home cooks.

For me a steak is a treat, a rare (no pun intended) but glorious treat. As a result if I cut into one that is overdone the disappointment can easily ruin the entire meal and the next thirty minutes will be spent in a deep sulk that only time and some well-cooked chips can offset.

The happy inverse of that is slicing through a piece of beef that is cooked to the ideal doneness – a quivering pink throughout with a crisp, charred and heavily seasoned exterior. Oh, the sheer delight.

I can think of few other gustatory pleasures that can measure up to a perfectly cooked steak.

Fillet, for so long the posterboy of the steak world, doesn’t quite measure up for me.

It may be tender but its leanness is also its Achilles’ heel. For the fat is where the flavour is and a muscle that has done no work (its position in the anatomy of the cow ensures this is the case) hasn’t enough depth for the truly discerning steak lover.

Instead I prefer a muscle that has worked, one that has led a life of hardship and built up a rich marbling and intense flavour as a result. Give me an onglet or bavette to work my teeth into over a chateaubriand any day of the week.

The problem with these cuts is they can be a little too tough. Served beyond rare they turn into slabs of meat that could resole a rudeboy’s Doc Martens. Even cooked momentarily, with a brief kiss of a searingly hot frying pan, the presence of connective tissue and sinew can offer a mandible workout of intense proportions.

Enter the water bath – a way of cooking meat to perfection. Every. Single. Time.

High end restaurants have long known about the benefits of cooking sous vide. Four or five years ago I ate a piece of lamb at Midsummer House, a two-star restaurant in Cambridge. It was delightfully tender and so flavourful I can still recall it now. I couldn’t quite believe it when I was told it had cooked for six hours. How was it still so pink inside? And uniformly so?

Thomas Keller is such a convert that he has written an entire book about the method. More top shelf gastro porn from the author of The French Laundry Cookbook and Bouchon.

I’d looked into buying the kit (called immersion circulators) to achieve the results at home but they were bulky and astronomically expensive – designed for commercial kitchens rather than the shoebox I have at home.

But then a couple of weeks ago I was sent one aimed at home cooks from these guys. It’s small, easy to use and delivers results you would expect in top restaurants.

And as someone who delights in the science of cooking and the potential of gastronomic experimentation, it is fast becoming my new favourite toy.

For beef junkies, skirt steak is the ideal cut. It’s incredibly tasty and bargain basement cheap. Cooked right it’s a joy to eat but its window of deliciousness is small. In other words, the perfect guinea pig for my first forays into sous vide.

Each piece was well seasoned with black pepper and sea salt then placed into a plastic zip-lock bag. Apparently sous-vide means ‘under vacuum’ so enter the vacuum cleaner. I sucked out as much air as I could then quickly sealed the top before dropping the whole lot into a stockpot full of water at 52 degrees.

Why 52? 50-60 degrees is the temperature window at which the meat proteins co-agulate, or cook. Pick a point between these two magic numbers and your steak will be between rare and medium rare and gloriously juicy.

And there it remained for five hours, bobbing up and down and gradually turning an unappetising shade of grey-brown before being removed and shocked in an ice bath to stop the cooking process.

A frying pan was heated to ‘scorching’ and a small drizzle of cooking oil – enough to cover the bottom – was poured in. Whilst it was coming up to temperature, the steak was seasoned again then cooked on either side for about a minute until a generously dark colour covered each side.

After a five minute rest on a warmed plate it was time to cut and see if experiment one had worked:

What surprised me most was the uniformity of the cooking. The meat was at the rarer end of medium rare all the way through. There was no gradation towards a pinker centre but the same colour throughout, aside from the dark brown crunch of the exterior.

The flavour was assuredly beefy, intense and unmistakably steak like. The outside crisp, rich and earthy and the interior almost sweetly bovine and wonderfully soft. Whilst the meat could have been slightly tenderer – which could be achieved over a longer cooking period – it offered enough resistance to be satisfyingly chewy.

It was, easily, one of the best pieces of meat I’ve ever tasted. From now on, for me, there is only one way to cook steak. Now, I wonder if pork belly will work…?

Ten minute Tartiflette

Everyone loves leftovers.

From a rare beef sandwich that brings memories of yesterday’s roast flooding back to a slice of cold pizza, picked out of the box amidst the empty beer cans and overflowing ashtrays, leftovers can be a culinary experience worth savouring. Not to mention a winning hangover cure.

As a result, most nights I try and cook a little too much for dinner. Lunch often consists of a bowl of reheated pasta, liberally dosed with ketchup and extra cheese or a steaming plate of freshly microwaved noodles.

But, for me, it is potatoes that top the leftover tree. That hit of carbohydrate is just what I need as a late, second, breakfast or early lunch. Boil, roast or mash a few extra and your midday meal the following day is sorted: sautéed with a fried egg, dipped into pungent aioli or even squashed into cakes and fried, they are darn near perfect.

The absolute best way to use up leftover spuds, however, is to make a speedy tartiflette. Potatoes, bacon and cheese? That’s three boxes ticked and a guarantor of a very happy lunchtime indeed.

Dice a few rashers of bacon and fry in a little oil. Meanwhile, finely chop a couple of shallots or a small onion. Once the bacon has started to crisp up, turn down the heat and add the onion. Fry a few more minutes until it’s softened.

Add a handful of cooked potatoes to the pan and allow to heat through. If you get a few crisp edges then all the better. Top with a generous amount of soft cheese – camembert, brie, reblochon – and grill until the top of the cheese starts to bubble and the underneath has melted into a gooey sauce, slathering the bacon and potatoes in its cheesy goodness.

Eat immediately. And feel no shame if you squirt some ketchup on the side, it’s not like anyone’s looking.

For more sundry leftovers, why not follow me on Twitter?

What to do with too many courgettes…

Glut is such a wonderful word. Glut.

Its harsh consonants give it the feel of one of the more abrasive swear words but it also has an inherent softness that makes it warm and cosy – a small cuddle of a word that presents ample opportunity for elaboration.

Glut. Glutton. Gluttony. Gluttonous. Gluttonously.

Words that speak of the decadently indecent.

The garden is, finally, offering up its bounty. Potatoes were dug up a fortnight ago, the maize stems are starting to bulge at the halfway point suggesting that sweetcorn is not far off. The tomatoes are barely threatening to turn from acidic green to sweet red and the courgettes?

The courgettes are taking over.

For each that we pick, two more seem to grow in their place overnight. They are like the mythical Hydra and I am failing in my Herculean task.

As a result we have them lined up in the kitchen, a rag tag bunch of all shapes and sizes. The Usual Suspects as re-imagined by a vegan pacifist.

They’ve made their way into most things. Last night’s lasagne had a layer of them, thinly sliced, in between the ragu, pasta and béchamel. Diced and fried with a little garlic added at the last minute, they make an excellent addition to pasta.

Those that hid deftly under the expansive leaves and transformed into marrows have their insides scooped out and replaced with a tasty filling before being roasted.

I’m well aware that I am not alone. Courgettes seem to be as ubiquitous as Simon Cowell this summer so here is a ten point plan for what to do with them. You might guess that by the end, I was struggling. But that might be because I used up all the good ideas above…

One – Courgette Fries

I first had these crispy little bites of wonder at Italian restaurant l’Anima. Finely sliced and dipped in a light batter, deep fried courgettes are a joy and the perfect vehicle for some rich aioli.

Two – Courgette Bread

Grated and added to a sweetened bread mix in place of – or in addition to – banana, courgette adds a welcome moisture to this cake.

Three – Baked Courgette and Tomato

Layer thinly sliced courgette into a roasting dish, season and cover with a rich tomato sauce. Add another layer of courgette, more sauce and then cover liberally with cheese. Bake for 25 minutes and eat straight from the dish. Plates not necessary.

Four – Chutney

Ah, the forgotten art of preserving. Courgettes are perfect chutney fodder and take on a remarkable range of flavours beautifully, especially warming spices. We have a solitary jar of last year’s ‘Glutney’ left and it’s disappearing fast. most delicious with cheese and cold cuts. There are plenty of recipes out there but this one from HFW is a real winner.

Five – Roasted courgette with pine nuts

Simple, quick and very good with pasta. Slice or dice, dribble with oil, season, throw in a handful of pine nuts and bake. Top with Parmesan and commence nom.

Six – Barbecued Courgettes

Chargrilling courgettes really brings out a depth of flavour that is often lost when they are boiled or steamed (eurgh). Make sure your griddle or barbie is searingly hot so you get those tasty black tiger stripes on thin slices of courgette and serve with a sweet/sour yoghurty dressing.

Seven – Courgette Wine

I have no idea if this is possible but it must be worth a go? Anyone? Hello?

Eight – Doorstep Courgettes

Wait until nightfall. Take one, two or three of your largest courgettes and leave them on the doorsteps of your neighbours. Run. Go to bed happy in the knowledge that you’ve successfully ridded yourself of that particular problem. Until tomorrow and you discover that your neighbours had exactly the same idea.

Nine – Stuffed Courgette Flowers

OK, so this doesn’t really help you with eating your way through the courgette mountain taking over the
kitchen but they are tasty. Stuff the flowers with well seasoned ricotta, dip in batter and deep fry. I cannot recommend these highly enough.

Ten – Courgette Portraits

Take pictures of your courgettes in various different poses and use them to illustrate a piece on what to do with a courgette glut. Realise that you still have nineteen to eat and a further seven peeping through the vegetable patch. Give up and promise not to plant so many next year.

Required Reading: In Defence of Food

The holiday to Umbria wasn’t entirely about stopping and smelling the rosemary. I did some work too. Sort of.

In between dips in the pool, singeing my hair in a pizza oven and trips to hilltop towns, I read In Defence of Food by Michael Pollan.

It’s a book about food. Really, really about food. Proper food. More an extended essay than a fully-fledged tome, it is the most intelligent, impassioned treatise on the subject I’ve ever read.

With so much extraneous information bombarding us everyday, seeing the topic of food stripped down to its bare essentials is both refreshing and important. Crucial even.

Pollan writes about food with a sense of unhurried urgency and seemingly effortless intelligence. He is a man who, if you’ll excuse the pun, knows his onions. And shallots. And garlic and all other members of the allium genus. He knows what is wrong with the food industry and, more importantly, he knows how to fix it.

One of the criticisms levelled at many polemicists is that they are happy to point out problems and often less able to talk of solutions. Michael Moore, take note. Pollan does both with equal skill.

In Defence of Food is the sort of book that comes along so rarely it makes you want to buy copies for everyone you know, thrust it into their grease-flecked fingers and sit watching to make sure they consume it. And consume it they will.

It is, without a shadow of a doubt and no degree of hyperbole, the best book about food I have ever read. Ever. Now, go and get a copy, sit ye down and read it.

And follow me on Twitter. But only if you really want to.

Pork Pies

Full many a glorious morning I have seen
Flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye.
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gliding pale streams with heavenly pork pie

William Shakespeare, Sonnet 33

We are a nation of pie lovers. That is undeniable.

From steaming hot meat and potato pies that grace chip suppers across the north to the crescent shaped Cornish pasty of the south, if it’s a scorching filling wrapped in artery clogging pastry, we adore it.

Legislative affirmation of this fact came just last month when the legendary Melton Mowbray pork pie was finally granted Protected Geographical indication by the EU.

It now stands proudly alongside such luminaries as Parmesan Cheese and Champagne. Only pork pies from Melton Mowbray can be labelled as such. Anything else is a mere pretender.

But pretenders aren’t necessarily a bad thing when they originate in your own kitchen.

Recent dispatches from New York saw me trying to re-create some of the tasty food that was consumed there. It was great fun, making pizzas and bagels and hot dogs and cheeseburgers.

So much so that it got me thinking – why not try it more often, with things that originate closer to home. Why not try to create in the home kitchen those foodie treats we know and love: doner kebabs, pink wafer biscuits, custard creams, marshmallows.

By using excellent ingredients and leaving out all the unnecessary bits and bobs it should be possible to cook versions of these treats to rival anything that can be found on the shelves. Artifice by more natural means.

Before I get started on the big things, I wanted to start small. Keep it simple.

If my girlfriend and I are ever out and attacked by hunger pangs it inevitably falls not to a chocolate bar to quell the cravings but to a pork pie.

There is something so satisfying about the combination of heavily seasoned meat housed in a crunchy yet melting pastry that just makes us smile. It is a rare treat, but a treat nonetheless.

We’ve been hunting for the perfect pie for a while. One whose meat:pastry ratio is spot on and where the jelly doesn’t overwhelm you with its strangely appealing yet vaguely disgusting texture. It’s a fine pie tight rope to tread and some get it right.

Others fail miserably. Hopefully now that the pork pie has some certification it will mark an end to any disappointments.

Recipe: Pork Pie

This isn’t a traditional pie. This is me freestyling, throwing caution to the wind and rolling easy. The result? A perfect picnic item, great served with homemade chutney, just erring on the side of sweetness.

For the filling you’re going to need some pork. Don’t scrimp here. Toddle over to your friend the butcher and ask him for some fatty shoulder or hand meat. While you’re at it inquire politely about acquiring some bacon offcuts. They shall be your new best friend and work out about a quarter of the price of regular bacon.

[I cannot believe I just shared my best culinary secret with you.]

Oh, and ask him to throw in a couple of pig’s trotters too, you’re going to need them later.

Once you’ve got hold of your meat, head home, turn on the stereo and get cooking.

800g pork hand (or shoulder) meat
300g cooking bacon (smoked or unsmoked, dependent on your preference)
Two trotters
A couple of onions
1 litre or so of chicken stock
Thyme, finely chopped
Sage, finely chopped
Cayenne Pepper
Ground ginger
Allspice
Nutmeg
Salt and pepper

For the pastry (taken from HFW’s Meat Book):
100g lard
100g butter
200ml water
Two eggs
550g plain flour

Your first job is to make the jelly. Split the trotters down the vertical and them to the stock and the onions in a pan, bring to the boil and let it simmer gently for about three hours.

Next up, make the pastry. Melt the lard and butter into the water over a gentle heat. Don’t boil it. Sift the flour into a large mixing bowl, crack in the eggs and stir them in. Gently pour the water/butter/lard mix into a glass, take a big sip and pour the rest over the flour and egg. Mix together until a dough forms, knead for a couple of minutes. It may need more flour. When you have a verifiable dough cover it with cling film and get it into the fridge.

Finally, you’re going to need to dice the meat. Finely. And that means small. You could cheat and mince it but who wants a pie filled with sausage meat? Sharpen your favourite knife, crank up the music and get chopping.

Once you’ve transformed your great hulks of meat into delicately fine dice, it will need seasoning. When cold, food can taste bland – as such be generous with the seasoning, especially the salt. I’d go for a teaspoon of sea salt as well as a pinch of everything else and a good grind of pepper.

To check the seasoning, fry a little of the mixture off like a mini-burger and taste it (it’s a hard job but someone has to do it). Adjust as required.

By now your pastry should be cool and far more workable than it was before when it was all warm. Take a cricket ball sized handful (or a baseball if that’s your thing) and roll it into a vaguely spherical shape.

Squidge the bottom of a jam jar into the dough-ball and start working it up the edges:

Don’t be too precious – this is a pie, not something to grace the plate of a three star Parisian temple to haute cuisine. Once you have a rough outline, ease the jar free and pile in the filling. When you think it’s full, add another spoonful and ease the pastry around it.

Cut off a piece of dough about the size of a ping-pong ball (gawd bless sporting analogies), roll into a disc and top your pie. Crimp the edges together, brush the top with beaten egg, poke a hole in the lid and place into a roasting tray.

Repeat until out of dough or filling or both.

Bake at 180 degrees C for thirty minutes then turn the oven down to 150 degrees and bake for another twenty minutes.

Leave to cool on a wire rack and tend to your jelly. Trotters, being jam packed with gelatin, make an excellent jelly after simmering away gently for a couple of hours.

Strain your stock through a fine meshed sieve, return to the heat and reduce by about a third. To see if it is ready, spoon off a little of the stock in a small cup and refrigerate. If it sets, it’s ready. If not, carry on cooking.

Once the pies have cooled down you’ll need to get the liquid jelly into them, a procedure that those of you unskilled in veterinarian sciences might find tricky. I improvised with a syringe. I’ll leave it to you to find the best way (pouring is not, repeat not, the best way).

Try and resist the temptation to bite into your pies before they’ve been refrigerated overnight. They are best eaten outdoors with a picnic blanket under your arse and a bottle of something cold and beery in your hand.

For more high fat delights, follow me on Twitter.

Italy: Slow Cooked Lamb Shoulder (plus video)

It’s only so much time that can be spent in a state of blissful relaxation before the mind turns to food.

On holiday breakfast tends to be a mere distraction – a hastily gobbled croissant, piece of fruit or biscotti washed down with a short, sharp coffee. Lunch provides a brief respite from the heat of the day, usually some bread and cheese with a couple of tomatoes on the side.

But dinner is where the magic happens. This is the real centrepiece of the day where effort truly pays off and the gentle preparation can be done whilst gradually slipping into a state of happy inebriation.

As such, the majority of my days were spent thinking about what to cook that evening.

Being in possession of a pizza oven, we, naturally, cooked pizza. But the giant domed edifice was still warm come the following morning: the perfect conditions to slow cook some local lamb.

After adding some more fuel we went in search of the meat and returned with two whole shoulders – almost a quarter of the beast – ready to be browned off, sat atop some freshly picked rosemary and crushed garlic and shoved into the waiting furnace, cooking slowly in a winey bath until it emerged lovingly tender and achingly delicious.

It also seemed a good time to indulge in my first ever video post so please be kind. I’m still learning.

And, yes, I really did come that close to setting my head on fire. Look carefully and you will see the innocent, yet telltale, wisp of smoke rising from my reddening forehead.

Slow cooked Lamb

Leg of lamb is fine, and if that’s your sort of thing then I’m happy for you. But shoulder is the business end, where the real flavour is. It does a bit more work, and as such should be cooked longer and slower, but the effort is worthwhile.

It’s also slightly fattier which will baste the meat from the inside keeping it juicy, rich, tasty and tender.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6PTiukdKTs]

Serves 8-10

Two lamb shoulders, complete with neck
Two bulbs of garlic, squashed lightly under the flat of a knife
Half a lemon
Two handfuls (think bricklayer’s size rather than manicurist) of rosemary
Salt and pepper
Half a bottle of red wine

Season the lamb with salt and pepper all over and brown in a large frying pan. Layer half the rosemary and garlic in a casserole dish big enough to hold everything comfortably. Nestle the lamb on top and then deglaze the frying pan with red wine.

Put the rest of the rosemary and garlic on top of the lamb, squeeze over the lemon then pour over the wine.

Cook in a 200 year old wood burning oven for about four hours, turning and basting halfway through. Temperature? Pretty hot.

NB – Make sure you don’t get too close to the oven and singe your fringe.

If you are only in possession of a regular oven go for about 120 degrees. Serve with potatoes and maybe a token salad. Maybe.

For more slow cooked and half baked musings, follow me on Twitter

Aperitivo

‘A bicyclette, that’s what we’ll drink,’ I said with unreserved confidence.
‘A what?’ asked my brother.
‘A bicyclette,’ I repeated with similar bravado.

Memory can be a strange thing. I’d called to mind a simple cocktail from Fergus Henderson’s ‘Nose to Tail Eating’. It had Fernet Branca, an Italian bitter of some alcoholic fortitude, as its main constituent.

Sitting in the courtyard of an Umbrian farmhouse and gazing out over the patchwork hills, it seemed the perfect opportunity to try this potent little number.

‘Are you sure that’s the right recipe?’ said my brother as he watched me splash equal parts of medicinally coloured Fernet Branca and lurid Campari over ice.
‘Yup, positive,’ I replied.

Although I didn’t have the book with me, I was sure this was how to make a bicyclette.

The drink is so-called because after two or three you are unable to ride home in a straight line on your bicycle. When the mixer weighs in at a hefty 20% alcohol you know you are dicing with forces more powerful than your average aperitivo. This was no regular stomach-readier.

The first sip offered surprise: a distinct alcoholic bitterness. But a cooling sweetness swiftly followed by the Campari. It was dangerously drinkable and over the following week it led to a number of dinners being eaten considerably later than planned.

When we returned home I consulted the book to check I’d got the recipe right.

I hadn’t. What I had done was combine the only two drink recipes in Henderson’s two books: Campari and white wine (the famed bicyclette) and Fernet Branca and Crème de Menthe (a Dr Henderson)

What could have emerged was a terrifying hybrid monster. Thankfully it didn’t and the slightly skewed memory served only to create something new, something tasty, something to ready yourself for a night of gastronomic indulgence.

I shall name it a Centaur – it approaches like a gentleman but has the kick of a stallion.

Centaur – an aperitif for the brave

One part Fernet Branca
One Part Campari
Sugar syrup, to taste
Lemon juice, to taste

Pour the booze over ice, stir. Have a little sip. If the taste make you pull a face like a baby eating marmite, it’s probably a little bitter. Add sugar syrup and lemon juice until you reach a pleasant combination.

Two of these will give you the appetite of a king but render you unable to cook at your best. Take precautions.

Back home…

Phew. Amazing week in Umbria and somehow managed to strike the perfect balance between adventure and inaction each, naturally, involving much food.

Plenty to write about including making pizza in a furnace and probably a video post too so you poor, poor people get to see and hear me as well as read my culinary ramblings.

Fairly busy week coming up so it may be a few days before I get the chance to start the write ups but you are so wonderfully patient, I’m pretty sure you won’t mind.

And Ryanair is a sorry excuse for an airline. Just had to get that off my chest.

Back Soon…

Off to Italy. I’ll be spending the next seven days here:

Normal service will be resumed forthwith. Until then, ‘arrivederci!’

Eating New York – Cheeseburger & Fries

If there is a meal that sums up New York better than this, I didn’t find it.

While much of the food available in the city reflects the diverse nature of the population – noodle bars next to falafal huts and pizza parlours – this is the all-American meal.

While they may not be able to lay claim to creating the individual components – the burger from Germany and the fries from Belgium – here is where the two were thrust together in a happy and enduring marriage.

There are a number of elements necessary to create the perfect cheeseburger and each must be just right before you can consider the possibility of creating something significantly greater than the sum of its parts. All good burgers are greater than the sum of its parts.

The bun should be soft and yielding and of an absorbent nature to suck up those delicious rich and beefy juices from the patties. The cheese has to be sufficiently melted with a distinct but subtle flavour of its own that doesn’t overpower the taste of the beef. As a result, blue cheese is a no-no for me.

Thinly sliced tomatoes should cut through the whole thing with a sweet freshness and a slick of mayonnaise and a dribble of ketchup must complete the ensemble, ready to squirt out at any moment over a clean shirt. Lettuce is window-dressing.

Whilst a good cheeseburger, when presented, must tower in an intimidating fashion, the first bite should compress the whole thing together into a manageable thickness so that all the components can be taken with every mouthful.

The side order, whilst not as important as the burger itself, needs also to be frighteningly oversized but the individual fries should be no thicker than a plumber’s finger.

And they must not, under any circumstances, be stacked in the manner of a virginal game of Jenga, merely tossed happily into a warm bowl. Melted cheese is optional but highly recommeneded.

According to trusted reports, the ultimate burger experience is to be enjoyed at Shake Shack, a veritable institution at Madison Square Park, within spitting distance of the wonderful Flatiron Building.

It’s not unusual for the queue to snake through the park and out towards Broadway as hungry residents wait patiently for upwards of an hour for a little taste of the city.

We didn’t wait quite that long but the lack of breakfast made the fifteen minutes pass achingly slowly.

But, oh, was it worth it. A truly excellent burger recreated in all its magnificent glory below.

Cheeseburger & Fries

Inside sources have revealed that Shake Shack use a combination of beef cuts (with a ratio of 80:20 meat to fat) in order to create their tasty patties. Budget and practicalities prevented me from taking this Heston Blumenthalian approach to burger making but beef skirt is a great alternative. Tasty, juicy and cheap enough to not feel guilty about forcing it through a mincer.

To make two thick or four thin burgers:

300g beef skirt – Good beef, please (goes without saying, no?)
Salt and pepper.
That’s it. No, really. That’s it. Don’t mess around with egg or breadcrumbs or onions. Leave it pure and let it sing over your tastebuds.

Slice the meat into 2cm pieces and salt generously. Leave, covered, in the fridge for a couple of hours. Rinse the meat under cold water and mince finely. Season with salt and pepper and shape into burgers. Let them come up to room temperature before you fry them.

The buns were made with the exact same recipe as the hot dog buns, just shaped differently and brushed with a little beaten egg before baking. They freeze just fine.

Tip: I used a cutter when making these little fellas but they would have risen better if shaped by hand. As a result instead of slicing one bun in half, I just used two for each burger.

Other items:
Cheddar cheese
Thinly sliced tomato
Lettuce
Mayonnaise
Ketchup
A little butter

Get everything ready before you go, that way there is no waiting around and you can assemble and attack as soon as possible.

Get a frying pan nice and hot, dribble in a little cooking oil, season each side of the burgers and fry for about four minutes. Flip them over – the underside should be browned nicely – place a couple of slices of cheese on the cooked side and leave to cook for a further two minutes.

Remove the burgers from the pan and put them on a warm plate to rest. Add a small nugget of butter to the pan, return to the heat and fry the cut side of the buns so they mop up all that lovely beef juice.

Smother one half of the bun with ketchup, the other with mayo and layer up.

Serve with cheesy fries and a hearty appetite.

Mutton Vindaloo

Thanks in part to the coarsely named ‘Fat Les’ football anthem of the late 90s, vindaloo became near synonymous with lad culture and the various negative connotations involved therein.

Going for a curry became an exercise in machismo and vindaloo, somewhat unfairly, was labelled as the number one challenge in the heat tolerance stakes. With such a tag, much of the subtlety was inevitably lost amidst an ever-increasing barrage of heat.

Wrong on two levels. Vindaloo, although hot, should also encompass a subtle blend of spices creating a warming dish with a delicious sourness from the vinegar that creates much of the ‘gravy’, as it is called in India.

And as any true curry aficionado knows, the vindaloo isn’t the true challenge on the menu. That mantel has always, and will always, remain with the phaal – an eye-wateringly hot dish that could fell Brian Blessed at ten paces.

The great thing about making curries from scratch is that you can blend the spices to your desired taste, and I guarantee that no two will be the same. All part of the fun.

Although I usually use lamb neck or chicken thighs when cooking Indian dishes – the bone adds a depth of flavour and richness that you just can’t achieve with boneless meat – mutton is something that I’ve wanted to get on the menu for a while.

Despite the best efforts of the Prince of Wales, mutton has remained a meat that exists on the periphery of most people’s radar. As a result a special order with your butcher or a trip to a Middle Eastern supermarket might be in order. A kilo, bone in, will make a good-sized curry. Easily enough for four along with rice, bhajis and other necessary additions.

Mutton Vindaloo recipe

I know the addition of tomatoes in this recipe will probably see me ostracised by a great many traditionalists but I’m prepared to live with that.

Spices
Chillis are the foundation of this Portuguese inspired dish. Go for at least five or six dried chillis and take it from there depending on your taste and tolerance for heat. For those that prefer a milder curry experience, the heat can be tempered with yoghurt. Feel free to play around with the ratios.

5-6 (or more) dried chillis
An inch of dried cinnamon
5-6 cloves
Half a teaspoon of black pepper corns
A teaspoon of coriander seeds
A teaspoon of cumin seeds
Four cardamom pods, seeds removed
¼ nutmeg, grated
Two large garlic cloves
A thumb of ginger, peeled

Mash the spices together in a pestle and mortar, or grind them in a spice or coffee grinder until you have something resembling a rough powder. Add the garlic and ginger and pound into a paste, adding a little water where necessary.

Other ingredients:

1kg mutton neck, on the bone and cubed into inch pieces
Three large onions
Four garlic cloves
Two tins of tomatoes, drained and blitzed.
150-200ml white wine vinegar
Dark brown sugar, to taste
Two tablespoons of oil or ghee

Finely chop, or blend the onions and garlic. Fry in the oil or ghee in a heavy bottomed pan or casserole over a low heat until they start to brown, crank up the heat and add the vindaloo paste. Fry for two or three minutes and tip into a spare bowl.
Season the meat with salt and brown over a high heat in the same dish.

Lower the heat, add the onion, garlic and curry paste and stir. Pour in the vinegar and tomatoes and leave to cook either in a low oven or on the hob for at least an hour, preferably two or three. It should bubble gently, barely a quivering simmer – necessary to break down the tough bits of meat.

Once cooked, taste and add the sugar to temper the astringency of the vinegar.

Serve with rice, naan bread and bottles of lager, all in memory of lad culture, the grandest of oxymorons.

With Compliments…? Thoughts on Freebies

The Twittering classes are working themselves into a frothy hubbub. Journos are striking low blows. Battles lines are being drawn and codes of ethics are being drafted quicker than an emergency UN resolution.

It’s all about the freebies.

It seems that the issue is coming to a head and is rapidly gaining some serious press attention: Is it right for bloggers to accept freebies (anything from sample packets to slap-up meals) in return for write ups? If so, what provisos should be laid down? And if it’s not, why not?

For all the attention the issue has been getting, one could be forgiven for thinking that the food blogosphere is awash with cleverly disguised puff pieces masquerading as restaurant reviews and greedy amateur food writers hounding PRs for anything, so long as it’s free.

Not that I can see. The suggestion that your average food blogger would pen a sycophantic review in return for some gratis nom and half a bottle of wine is deeply denigrating. Full disclosure seems to be the consensus with very little, if any, dissent.

Honesty and transparency are crucial for a writer to maintain their integrity. The second your word becomes suspect or is revealed to have been bought, that integrity disappears and, in the words of Bill Hicks ‘every word you say is like a turd falling…into my drink’.

Perhaps a little harsh, but it would be foolish not to quote the man on this issue seen as he spoke so vociferously about it.

Sometimes the lure of pound or dollar signs becomes too great, or is a necessity (Exhibit A: Marco Pierre White with one divorce too many). Others have no such scruples about whoring out their name (call to the stand Gordon Ramsay and the arch worshipper of Mamon, Anthony Worral Thompson).

But from what I can see food bloggers are an honest bunch. We resemble the beloved Saint Delia in this respect – a woman of strict moral standing who has refused to endorse any product for monetary re-imbursement.

Our word is important. It is all we have. When it becomes suspect we lose any respect and with it any power it carries.

So where is the clamour coming from?

It’s coming from the one place that is set to lose out: print media.

The insinuation is that accepting a tidy little freebie in return for a positive report is something new, something that brings with it a new set of moral codes.

It isn’t.

The press and PR have been strolling hand in hand for decades, scratching backs and trading favours since Gutenberg first lifted the cloth on his invention. So why the furore?

It’s about access.

Before the Internet, before email, before Twitter, before blogs there was journalism. It was a closed shop on a pedestal high, high above the world in which we mere mortals lived. A notoriously hard industry to break into and one that had a monopoly on the written word. Food writing, but a miniscule part of the trade, was even more of a hidden avenue.

But things have changed. The Internet and, more specifically, Web 2.0 with its user generated and led content has brought with it a democratisation of the written word. Print journalism has finally woken up to this.

It’s not so much about their place on the pedestal being taken over, it’s about the pedestal rapidly crashing to the ground.

This isn’t necessarily new. Both Harden’s and Zagat guides have been utilising user-generated content for years to compile more democratic, balanced and realistic restaurant reviews (whether or not they can fell Michelin remains to be seen, but I suspect we are witnessing the final throes of that revered institution).

What the Internet has done, though, is give a voice to all those who want it. Naturally, there are good and bad blogs. Good and bad food writers. And the web is awash with dull lists of what people cooked for their friends, Hank and Maureen, last weekend.

But this is a product of the fledgling nature of the phenomenon. Some will fall by the wayside, others will flourish – it’s not unusual for the top food blogs to get over a million visits a month, the sort of hit rate some magazine editors would eat their own children for.

This wheat/chaff sorting is happening already and as the word on the screen becomes as respected and as powerful as the word on the page, it will happen more rapidly.

Last year I did an internship (perhaps stage is the more appropriate word as we talking in culinary terms) at a well-known food magazine. Two weeks, unpaid. Even my expenses went unpaid, the ‘economic downturn’ given as an excuse only weeks after I submitted my claim.

I’d held this form of magazine journalism in high regard, put it on a pedestal. Magazine offices were places where exciting things happen everyday, where people who love food get giddy about all the things I get giddy about. As a result I was struck, rabbit-headlight like, for much of my time there. Slightly shy and in awe of those around me. Those who were doing exactly what I wanted to do.

Except they weren’t. The daily grind was dull. The reality was that I was already doing what I wanted to do by writing off my own back, finding my own stories, working freelance and publishing online. I just didn’t realise it at the time.

On my final day the editor took time to talk to me about what I wanted to do and how to achieve it. ‘Something’s not really been published unless it’s in print,’ they said.

At the time, I agreed. Having had a couple of pieces published, there really was a thrill in seeing one’s name in a by-line. It was a buzz. But the reality is very different, and I’m only just coming to realise this.

There is a freedom on the Internet and successful writers here can be seen by hundreds, thousands, more people than those in print. Many journalists – the good ones at least – know this and are embracing the medium.

What the debate about freebies really comes down to is part of a larger discussion about the future, nature and value of print journalism.

Don’t get me wrong. I love print. Newspapers are an integral, and deeply enjoyable, part of my life. Likewise magazines. The very nature of print journalism is a near guarantor of its quality – providing you look in the right places, of course. There is something wonderful, tangible about print. Sunday papers are one of my favourite things in the world.

But to assume that just because someone only publishes online they can’t be as good as a print counterpart is just wrong. And to assume that just because someone has been offered a free meal they will happily shelve their own opinions and scruples is not just wrong, it’s also deeply patronising.

Freebies and the media go together, and always have done, like children and chocolate. Only now, food bloggers are getting a share of the chocolate and the old guard don’t like it.