Mussaman beef curry

It’s always a pleasure when the first foray into a new cookbook completely vindicates its purchase. We had talked about buying Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey for a long time, but I had thrown up all sorts of objections: that the recipes wouldn’t be as good as the two from the book we had already tried online, that they would be too complicated to be made regularly, that we should buy cookbooks written by life-long experts in particular Asian cuisines, not a catch-all associated with a (admittedly hugely informative and enjoyable) TV show, that our cookbook shelf was already full.

We may need to impose a one-in, one-out policy, but on the basis of last night’s dinner alone, this book well deserves a spot on the shelf. After this summer, I was particularly excited about the chapters on Balinese and Malaysian food, and had already bookmarked recipes for the fish curry with okra and tomato that was a favourite in Penang, and the different satays which I ate across Bali. The main dish we ended up choosing, however, was a Thai classic: beef mussaman curry.

The preparation began with a method I’ve never come across before: an initial two hour cooking of the meat with just coconut milk, cinnamon bark and black cardamom, the last of which lent a smoky, almost funky aroma. The fattiness of the coconut milk kept the meat moist, while the liquid reduced and took on a nutty flavour and hue. With about 45 minutes to go, cubed potatoes, fish sauce, tamarind, palm sugar and a curry paste were added. Combining relatively mild heat with warm spices such as coriander, cumin, cloves, cinnamon and mace, pungency in the form of shrimp paste, and freshness from ginger and lemongrass, the paste’s unusual mix of ingredients is explained by the dish’s apparent roots in the spices brought to southern Thailand by Indian and Indonesian traders. (The traders would seem to have brought their religion as well, as southern Thailand has a large Muslim population.) Roasted peanuts were added before serving.

Served with rice and a deceptively simple but delicious cucumber, chilli, shallot and coconut salad, this was a truly astonishing plate of food, the flavours ricocheting from richness and sweetness to sourness and heat, and back again. Unlike a Western stew, it’s not something I could just throw together: the spice paste alone had 14 ingredients, requiring stops at a local Chinese supermarket and Indo-Caribbean shop, and the use of a pan, the mortar and pestle and the food processor. But even the resident dish washer agrees that a little extra work is worth it if the outcomes continue to be this good.

Thai mussaman beef curry

Adapted from Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey

Active time: 45 minutes-1 hour; Total time: 4 hours

Special equipment: mortar and pestle OR spice grinder and food processor

The curry paste recipe will make enough for a second, slightly smaller curry (using 600-650 grams of meat). The paste can be kept sealed in the refrigerator for several days or frozen.

Curry paste ingredients and method

10 dried kashmiri chillies (I used hotter dried Thai chillies and decreased the number used by at least 1/3)

20 cardamom pods

2 tbsp coriander seeds

2 tbsp cumin seeds

16 whole cloves

5 cm cinnamon stick (If you are using a mortar and pestle instead of a spice grinder, leave out and add extra to the curry instead.)

2 pieces mace blade

200g shallots or onion

3 tbsp vegetable oil

25g garlic (3-4 large cloves)

1 tsp shrimp paste

25g ginger (thumb-sized piece)

2 lemongrass stalks

8 tbsp coconut milk

Seed the chillies and remove the cardamom seeds from their pods. Heat a small, heavy frying pan over a moderate heat. Add the chillies and all the dried spices to the pan and turn until they begin to smell aromatic, 1-2 minutes. Pour into spice grinder or mortar and pestle and grind to a fine powder.

Coarsely chop the onion or shallot. Heat the oil over a gentle heat in the same frying pan, add the onions and cook slowly, stirring occasionally, until fully softened and turning a dark golden, about 20 minutes. Add the shrimp paste and ground spices and fry for a few more minutes.Peel and roughly chop ginger. Remove tough outside pieces of lemongrass and cut into small chunks. Add these, along with the fried mixture, to the food processor. Pour in the coconut milk and process to a smooth paste.

Curry ingredients and method

850 grams beef stewing meat

400 ml (1 can) coconut milk

3 -4 black cardamom pods (replace with green if not available)

5-7 cm cinnamon stick

200 grams waxy new potatoes (use a bit more to feed an extra person)

2/3 quantity curry paste

1-1/2 tbsp fish sauce

2-3 tbsp tamarind concentrate

Scant 1 tbsp palm sugar

Handful roasted peanuts

Put the beef and just over half of the coconut milk in a heavy, lidded pan. Add the same amount of water, the cardamom, cinnamon and 1 tsp salt and bring to a simmer. Mostly cover and cook on a gentle heat for about 2 hours, stirring occasionally, by which point the sauce will be thick and well-reduced and the meat almost tender.

Cut the potatoes into chunks. Add those, along with the remaining coconut milk, curry paste, fish sauce, tamarind and sugar, to the pot. Taste for sweet-sour balance, adjusting the last three ingredients as necessary.

Simmer uncovered on a gentle heat for another 30-45 minutes, or until the beef can be broken apart with a fork, the sauce is integrated and the potatoes tender. Check seasoning, add peanuts and serve, ideally with a clean, tangy relish on the side.

Pizza lessons

In our near-weekly pizza sessions, we tend to adhere to that maxim that the best pizzas are the simplest ones. A bit of sauce or sliced tomato, mozzarella or ricotta, some herbs from the garden, is usually all that’s used. Occasionally, we’ll shave on a light vegetable topping: asparagus in the springtime (as per Smitten Kitchen’s excellent suggestion), slim yellow courgettes more recently, or smear on a blob of pesto. But the general tendency has been to strip down to the absolute essence, in other words, dough.

On visits to Rome during my early 20s, I, like so many others, frequented Forno Campio de Fiori, a sliver of a shop tucked into a corner of a popular market square. The speciality there is pizza bianca, a rectangular slab of wood-fired dough dressed only with olive oil, coarse salt and perhaps a rosemary sprig. Back in Manhattan, I found a version on a still-undeveloped byway of Soho that was good enough to warrant taking the dreaded N/R train downtown. (Pizza bianca hasn’t figured much in more recent years, though I freely admit that the version served at the UK’s Strada’s pizza chain--called garlic schiacciatella, it's really piazza bianca--is unabashedly moreish.)

Once our dough recipe was honed—Shipton Mill flour, a bit of yeast, salt, olive oil and sugar, allowed to rise slowly in the fridge and cooked on top of the stove in a hefty, well-used pan—it quickly became natural to start off a pizza meal with a bianca. Perfect with a glass of wine and perhaps a few slices of meat or a handful of olives, the bianca sates our hunger pangs and allows an easy slide into the rhythm of cook-assemble-eat.

I’m not quite sure when we started putting the rosemary directly into the dough. And since the idea was G’s, not mine, I can unabashedly say it’s brilliant. Finely-chopped sprigs—anywhere from a teaspoon to a tablespoon, depending on taste—are gradually sprinkled on the dough as it’s shaped and rolled out, ensuring that the herb is embedded, rather than all exposed to the pan’s heat. It’s then cooked as normal. The only other occasional fillip is to rub the top with a cut garlic clove before topping with oil and salt and slicing.

As well as looking pretty, the result tastes pretty spectacular. I can only reason that the chopped rosemary integrates with the dough and warms up through the cooking process, allowing its flavour and fragrance to come through more fully.

Inadvertently, we also seem to have found an adaptable template for herb-infused crusts. Just last night, instead of topping the mozzarella and courgette pizza with thyme, we kneaded the flowers and leaves directly into the risen dough. If our oregano plant revives, its leaves will likely feature in a pizza topped with tomatoes from our garden. And come autumn, I’m envisioning a few of the leaves from the enormous sage bush by our front gate being plucked for the base of a mushroom and taleggio pie.

Did I say that the simplest pizzas are usually the best? Depends, I suppose, on what you call simple.

Duck confit

Duck has always been my favourite meat, almost impossible to reject if it’s on a restaurant menu. When I lived in France, I alternated between sautéing thick breasts (known as magret, they come from ducks being raised for fois gras) and opening up a tin of confit du canard.

In London, confit comes with an even more luxurious price tag. But duck legs are relatively easy to purchase and often cost little more than chicken. The first recipe I tried was a ragù from All About Braising, where the legs were browned, then slow-braised with a wine-enriched sauce base. It was tender and very tasty, but somehow the rich, almost gamey duck flavour didn’t come through.

A shortcut confit, however, was an unqualified success, the kind of dish that makes one feel clever for having stumbled over it. The recipe, from the NYT’s Melissa Clark, calls for thorough browning before a long, low-temperature roast. The fat rendered off in the sauté is left in the pan, allowing the meat to almost poach. Finally, the skin is re-crisped. (I used the grill; Clark simply uncovers the meat for the last third of the cooking time.) The result was nearly as good as any I’ve prepared (i.e., reheated) or even eaten in a restaurant, the meat falling off the bone, and the skin practically crackling.

The key may come from an initial curing with salt, pepper, thyme and bay. Though Clark suggests a full day in fridge (which I plan to try next time), a few hours were enough to add flavour and draw out excess moisture. I imagine, too, that the rub could be adapted, substituting rosemary or herbes de provence, or maybe even smoked paprika.

On the side? It would be hard to better the classic accompaniment of pan-fried potatoes, though for these you’ll need some fat already to hand—ideally duck or goose, with olive oil as a reasonable cupboard substitute—in order to have the potatoes ready at the same time as the meat. A green or bitter-leaf salad (endive or perhaps radicchio) would be good to follow. And did I mention the wine? Unsurprisingly, big reds from the Languedoc, a duck-obsessed region in France’s southwest, would suit nicely, though I’ve read that California Zinfandels make a fine match as well.

Duck confit

Adapted from the New York Times

Serves 2; doubles easily

Total time: 3 ½ hours for cooking (largely unattended); 3-24 hours for curing

Special equipment: An oven-proof pan which fits the duck legs snugly in one layer. If the pan is shallow, a splatter screen would be useful.

1-2 sprigs fresh thyme

1 tsp sea salt

½ tsp freshly-ground pepper

2 bay leaves, ideally fresh

2 good-sized duck legs, washed, any feathers plucked

Strip the thyme from its branches and chop. Combine with salt in a deep plate, pie dish or similar. Grind over pepper and combine. Add bay leaves.

Press both sides of the duck legs into the curing mixture. Cover and refrigerate for 3-24 hours.

If you can, allow the meat to return to room temperature before sautéing. (If not, it won’t affect the final product.) Heat up the pan on a low to medium flame and place the duck legs in skin-side down. Cover with the splatter screen.Preheat the oven to 110-120°C (230-248°F).

Cook gently for 15-20 minutes, checking occasionally, until the skin is browned and crisp, and there is a considerable amount of fat in the pan. Using tongs, turn the legs to make contact between any other fatty areas and the pan. Brown and render the fat from these, then finish with a few minutes skin-side up.

Cover the pan with a lid or aluminium foil and place in the middle of the pre-heated oven. Cook for 3 hours.

When ready to serve, remove the duck from the oven and reset it to grill/broil. Place the meat under the heat for 2 to 3 minutes, which should be long enough to crisp up the skin.

If desired, soak up any excess fat by placing on a paper towel-lined plate before serving.

Beef short ribs braised in beer

Except for when I was scrambling eggs or boiling pasta, most of my early forays into cooking served at least a table full. Friday night Sabbath dinners were a big social event in my crowd, done pot-luck style to lessen the load on whoever had a proper dining table. I recall a spinach, chickpea and cumin combo which got a lot of play in those years. The spinach was frozen, the chickpeas in a can, but it was tasty in a generically ethnic way. At Oxford, the etiquette of potlucks was less well-developed, and I often found myself not only playing hostess, but cooking up a dozen servings of vegetarian chili or a few casserole dishes of baked ziti so as to ensure that guests had more than baguette, hummus and brie to eat.

With a move to London, the cheap and outsized cooking and serving dishes were jettisoned, and I began cooking for two, perhaps four at a pinch. It’s remained that way ever since.

The challenge came not with an unexpected dinner party for ten, but with a few kilos of short ribs. Bought in a tizzy of excitement at a fancy butcher, I soon discovered that they were substantially larger than even my largest pan. Cooking them in foil in the oven was an option, but would have precluded the use of aromatics and a braising liquid. None of our knives was up to the task, and we doubted whether our puppet-making neighbour would want to use his lathe on raw flesh. Eventually, I brought the meat to a local Portuguese butcher (which we frequent for excellent own-cured olives and fresh vegetables), presenting a shambolic story about the ribs having been a gift. Manuel looked at me curiously, then guided the meat through the band saw.

From there, it got much easier. We chose a dark ale with a hint of sweetness and picked some thyme from the window pots. Carrots, leeks and bit of celery were chopped up and sautéed. And the now-manageable chunks of meats got a good browning before everything was combined in my Staub and placed in the oven.

I was vetoed on drinking the same beer with dinner, but we happily comprised on a pungent, barnyardy southern French red . The beef was unsurprisingly delicious, but was almost upstaged by a pile of mashed potatoes, tangy with crème fraiche and shot through with a rasp of horseradish and chives.

With a loan of a few pots (and indeed some more plates), this could well be on the menu for our apartment’s first substantial dinner party.

Beef short ribs braised in beer

adapted from Molly Steven’s All About Braising and The Boston Globe

Serves 4

Total time: 3 ½-4 hours, plus an option on an overnight rest; Active time: 40 minutes

The ribs I used were English style, which is bone-in, with slices cut parallel to the bone. I see no reason why this method couldn’t also be used with flanken-style ribs, or, with minor adaptions, to braise stewing beef off the bone. With English-style ribs, figure about ½ kilo, or 1 rib, per person. For ease of cooking and serving, have the ribs cut into large chunks.

2 kilos bone-in beef ribs

3 carrots

3 leeks

2 stalks celery

olive oil

2 bottles full-flavoured ale

handful fresh thyme

2 bay leaves (preferably fresh)

salt and pepper

Trim any excess fat off the ribs, retaining any connective tissue or membrane-like skin (silverskin). Heat the oven to 120°C.

Cut the carrots, leek and celery into large bite-size pieces. In a large lidded Dutch oven (or other similar pan), warm a thin film of olive oil on medium heat. Add the vegetables, turning occasionally, until softened, at least 10 minutes. Season well with salt and pepper. Remove from the pan and set aside.

In the same pan, brown ½ of the meat until brown on all sides, at least 8 minutes. Season well with salt and pepper. Remove from pan and set aside. Repeat with 2nd 1/2 of meat, then remove and set aside.

Raise the heat to high and pour in the beer. Bring to a boil and scrape down any solidified bits on the bottom of the pan. Turn down the heat to low and return the meat and vegetables to the pan. Add the thyme and bay leaves, cover and place in the oven.

Check the meat after 3 hours. It should be fork-tender and coming off the bone in long strips.

Allow it to fully cool at room temperature. If serving on the same day, skim off as much fat as possible. If holding overnight, the fat can be removed very easily once the dish is refrigerated.

Serve with mash—made either with potato or root vegetables.

Malay Chicken Curry

Malaysia doesn't tend to feature on most gastronomic radar screens. Far less visited than Vietnam and Thailand, with much smaller expatriate and migrant populations than the Indian subcontinent and China, its food is little-known and infrequently available outside the largest capitals.

But with large Chinese and Indian minorities, a land border with Thailand and close proximity to Indonesia, food in Malaysia not only captures many of the methods, ingredients and dishes of more famous Asian cuisines, but also combines them in new and beguiling ways. There are Indian-inspired fried and filled flatbreads, stir-fries adapted to Malay tastes for sour and hot flavours and Thai-style curries aromatic with seasonings like fennel seed, cloves, cinnamon and star anise. With the exception of the desserts, which like many in the region tend to be appealing only to those who encountered them at an early age, it’s difficult to think of a category which is not well-served.

Ever since a trip to Malaysia some 8 years ago, I’ve always been on the lookout for chances to experience the food again, finding good options in New York and Washington D.C., and, less consistently, in London. But Malaysian food has been almost omnipresent in these parts of late. First, G’s brother got engaged to a lovely Malaysian woman, who’s turned out to be a skilled and enthusiastic cook. Our visits to them in Nottingham seem to generate a whirlwind of kitchen activity, and tables loaded with dishes reflecting both her own Chinese background and the Indian, Nyonya and Eurasian influences on Malay food. My interest in Malay food is being encouraged too, with gifts of hard-to-find ingredients like palm sugar and Malay curry powder, and a book of classic recipes.

Closer to home, a converted bus pulled into Brixton a month or so back, parking on a market side street previously dominated by Afro-Caribbean food vans. It serves up Anglo-Chinese standards like black bean beef and sweet and sour chicken to local residents and office workers. But the specials are Malaysian classics, including one of my all-time favourites: nasi lemak, a fantastic combination of coconut rice and chicken curry garnished with crispy anchovies, red-skin peanuts, a spicy vegetable sauce (sambal) and hard-boiled eggs. It’s about as far away from a boring sandwich as lunchtime can get, and at £4 for an enormous portion, far better value too.

With its myriad components, nasi lemak is not a dish that even most Malaysians make at home. But the chicken curry which forms a major part of it is much more accessible, with the added bonus that any extra gravy can be served alongside the rich flatbreads known as parathas (often found in the freezer section of Asian groceries) to make another delicious dish, roti canai.

Malay Chicken Curry (Ayam Masak Merah)

The name of this dish translates as chicken cooked in red, a reference to the large amount of tomato paste used. If your local Asian shop doesn’t sell a Malaysian or Singaporean curry powder, try to find one that contains as many of the following ingredients as possible: coriander seed; chili; fennel; cumin; turmeric; white pepper; aniseed; cinnamon and clove.

Although generating a bit of a mess, the process and ingredients used are relatively simple. It needs nothing more than plain rice and a green vegetable alongside.

Serves 4

Active time: 45 minutes+; Total time: 2 hours

Special ingredients: food processor and mortar and pestle/spice grinder

1 kg dark meat chicken parts (bone-in, skin-on)

1 tbsp curry powder

½ tsp turmeric

Neutral oil

2 large onions

6 cloves garlic

Small piece ginger (1/2 a finger length)

3 fresh red chiles

½ tsp fennel seeds

1 tsp cumin seeds

¼ tsp black peppercorns

3 cloves

3 cardamom pods

short cinnamon stick

200 ml tomato paste

400 ml coconut milk

Marinate chicken pieces in curry powder and turmeric for 1 hour.

Heat a thin film of oil in a large, heavy, lidded pan. Brown the chicken in batches until it gets a good crust. Remove from pan and set aside.

Peel and quarter onions. Peel garlic and ginger. Remove chili tops. Blend to a paste in the food processor. Set aside.

In a small pan, dry-fry cloves, fennel seed, cumin seed and peppercorns for a few minutes until fragrant. Grind in the mortar and pestle. Set aside.

Add a bit more oil to the large pan and place on medium heat. Fry the remaining spices for a minute or two. Add the onion, garlic, ginger and chili paste and stir until fragrant. Add the ground spices and tomato puree. Add a splash of water and cook until the oil begins to separate.

Pour in coconut milk.

Add chicken pieces and cover. Simmer gently until chicken is cooked through and gravy thickens, 40 minutes minimum.

Smoked mackerel rillettes

Fish is preserved practically the world over, but the UK does it particularly well. I imagine that its enormous coastline and historic strength as a maritime power both were factors in its populace finding tasty ways to make fish keep. While the Portuguese and Spanish used salt for their cod, and the Scandinavians chose to pickle their mackerel and herring, the British have generally used smoke. In Scotland and Ireland, cold smoking is the norm for salmon. More prosaic, and these days far less popular, is the kipper, a whole, butterflied herring, heavily cured and grilled with butter as part of a (very) large breakfast. Smoked haddock is another particularly British speciality. Like kippers, the cure—and resulting colour—can often be overly harsh. But the best, when poached lightly to remove excess salt, make a creamy and delicate addition to chowders, fish cakes and the Anglo-Indian classic, kedgeree.

My favourite, though, is smoked mackerel. Its sweet, rich flesh needs no cooking and is tasty enough to eat on its own. In contrast to salmon, kippers and haddock, there don’t really seem to be small-scale producers or regional or other stylistic variations in smoking recipes. But even the bog-standard supermarket varieties—with the exception of the acrid, pepper-coated versions—are surprisingly good.

Smoked mackerel rillettes make a fantastically easy weekend lunch, either in an open-faced sandwich made with rye crackers or dark bread or alongside cucumber and potato salads (and maybe even some borscht). I haven’t had occasion to do so, but I imagine they’d work well as an hors d'œuvre before a more formal dinner.

Many recipes I’ve seen call for cream cheese. You could try this, but the tang and lighter texture of crème fraîche seem preferable. If crème fraîche is hard to come by, sour cream is a perfectly suitable alternative. The horseradish, though not essential, adds a welcome hint of piquancy. Even creamed, jarred horseradish would probably add something. In France, where hot-smoked trout is widely available, I’ve used that instead of mackerel. The only categorical guidance I would give is to avoid the food processor. Not only does it add to the washing-up, but the end-result will have an unwelcome resemblance to wallpaper paste.

If you’ll be drinking with this, non-vodka options could include a Muscadet, an Old World-style Riesling with a bit of residual sweetness, or a beer that picks up the mackerel’s smokiness.

Smoked mackerel rillettes

Serves 2

Total time : 10 minutes ; Active time : 10 minutes

150 grams plain, undyed smoked mackerel filet

crème fraîche

lemon

fresh horseradish root

small handful fresh chives and/or dill

Strip mackerel from its skin and place in a medium-sized bowl. Lightly mash with a fork until there is mix of coarse paste and bite-size chunks. Add crème fraîche one teaspoon at a time, mixing through with each addition. You’ll likely want several teaspoons to get a spreadable but not overly sloppy consistency.

Loosen the mixture with a good squeeze of lemon juice. Using a microplane, grate in horseradish to taste. (I tend to use about one teaspoon.) Chop or snip in herbs.

Check seasoning (you likely don't need additional salt) and serve.

Epaule d’agneau (Shoulder of lamb)

During a recent visit to the Lake District, I fell a little bit in love with the local lamb population. They dotted the landscape, clustering in just-visible fields, clambering onto the fells and meandering along the private road. Even when out of sight, I could still hear their plaintive bleating. I found them comical,characterful and quite adorable.

In what has been an inadvertent project of connecting the contents of my plate to their living source, I’ve been eating lots of lamb too. On the trip it was chops, their garlicky marinade filling up the old stone pantry. The following weekend it was a Spanish-style braise, redolent with saffron, olives and tomatoes. There were homemade kofta too, flavoured with harissa, coriander and freshly-ground cumin.

My favourite has been a shoulder cut, seasoned with a Franco-Italian mix of anchovy, lemon, garlic, rosemary and thyme. The meat came from Ginger Pig, whose North Yorkshire lamb tastes like the happy creature it no doubt was. I hadn’t cooked shoulder before, but the butcher recommended it as the sweetest and tastiest cut, provided it was cooked long and slow.

I took that seriously, roasting the lamb on a very low heat for the better part of 7 hours. The herb rub permeated the flesh, which was soft enough to be pulled apart with a fork. It was sweet and deeply earthy, with a hint of freshness and acidity coming from the lemon. Judged by a ratio of effort to pleasure, it was perhaps the best thing that has ever come out of my kitchen. Judged by most any another standard, it was still pretty damn good.

Slow-roasted lamb shoulder with anchovy, lemon, garlic and herbs

adapted from Clotilde Dusoulier’s Chocolate & Zucchini: Daily Adventures in a Parisian Kitchen

As the meat doesn’t produce any gravy, accompany it with a moist, interesting starch. I made a warm farro salad with chopped tomato, chives and fresh oregano, and topped it with a lemon juice and olive oil dressing. Another good option would be crushed new potatoes with black olives and thyme. A spicy, well-structured French or Italian wine would be my pick: the former from the Rhone, Provence or Corsica.

Serves 4

Total time: 7-10 hours; Active time: 10-15 minutes

½ lamb shoulder

6 anchovy filets

4-5 cloves garlic

handful fresh rosemary and thyme

lemon

olive oil

In a mortar and pestle or small food processor container, combine anchovies, garlic and herbs. Grate or microplane zest of ½ lemon and add. Moisten with enough olive oil to make a coarse paste.

Line a roasting tray or baking dish with a double layer of foil large enough to fold an envelope. Place the lamb on the oil. Use your hands to massage herb paste into the meat, particularly any pockets in the flesh.

Set aside for 2-3 hours. (If it’s warm in your kitchen, do this in the fridge, letting the meat come back to room temperature before cooking.)

Set the oven to 100C. Cook the meat for at least 5 hours, and up to 7. Because of its natural fat and the sealed foil package, it doesn’t need basting or turning. Turn off ½ hour before serving.

Remove from foil and place on carving board. Slice meat against the grain into large chunks. Serve warm.

Polenta aux Choux Fleur et Oignons (Polenta with Cauliflower and Onions)

I was introduced to Italian food—or at least its red-sauce, Italian-American cousin—well before I was sentient. The eastern Pennsylvania town in which I spent my childhood wasn’t a particular ethnic stronghold. It was more the case that Pizza D’Oro and Steve’s Pizzeria were the only places where my family could find vegetarian, kosher-friendly food. Pizza D’Oro was probably the first restaurant I visited, initially in a bassinette, later in a high chair. I even had a dedicated outfit, the clothing in question having become indelibly covered in tomato sauce on my first outing.

Pizza D’Oro’s innovation was a daily all-you-can-eat special. It drew lots of the nearby college’s football and basketball players, who unless they drank as much as they ate, surely generated a net loss. As a spectator sport, however, it was riveting. Steve’s most memorable dish was the exotic-at-the-time white pizza, loaded with a blend of cheeses and lots of garlic.

A good fifteen years before I discovered curry, tacos or sushi, I had learned the difference between penne and ziti and could consume an improbable number of pizza slices. A move during adolescence introduced a far-wider range of eating options, but we remained loyal to Italian-style food, branching out from the old-school eateries to take in the 1990s Californian influences of individual pizzas and pesto.

I traveled a bit in Italy during my early 20s, eating well from Sicily to Bologna. The food I encountered, whether pumpkin-stuffed ravioli in Ferrara or a plate of grilled sardines in Taormina, was instinctively appealing and immensely enjoyable. It’s ridiculous to say that it tasted like home; I’m sure that neither dish has ever been served at my parents’ table. But it was unchallenging in the best sort of way, meaning that it tasted exactly as it should and exactly like what I wanted to eat.

I suspect that Italian food, defined broadly and conventionally, is an unthinking, easy fallback for a great many Americans, who, like me, lack any meaningful connection to Italy. And I also would guess that the comfort, and, most likely, complacency surrounding weeknight pasta dinners or Sunday visits to the local pizzeria means that it’s food we don’t seek to learn about it any serious way. Despite my professed love of Italian food, my repertoire doesn’t extend much beyond a few tomato-based pasta sauces, chicken cacciatore and the odd risotto. And I drink Italian red wine with great pleasure, but with little attention to what can make it distinctive and delicious.

There’s nothing innately wrong with any of this, nor am I likely to challenge the status quo in any more than a dilettantish fashion. For as long as I continue to live in Paris, a hands-on study of Italian cuisine doesn’t present itself as the most obvious of projects. And I also wonder whether there isn’t something I can do in the kitchen which fits more naturally with my background, experiences and day-to-day influences. And yet, in a world where instinctive pleasures are hard to come by, it seems almost perverse not to investigate whether the childlike joy I get when eating a slice of really good pizza or even a simple bowl of gnocchi can somehow be replicated, magnified and, eventually, shared.

All this out-of-character philosophizing was prompted by an improbably delicious bowl of braised vegetables served over soft polenta.

Polenta with Cauliflower and Onions
adapted from Jack Bishop’s Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook
serves 2 to 3 generously
Total time 40 minutes; Active time 25 minutes

This cookbook is one of the first I bought and has remained useful even since re-adopting meat. Bishop understands that Italian cuisine celebrates vegetables, starches, legumes and cheese, and that combining them well can make for a wholly satisfying meal.

1 cup medium-grind cornmeal
Olive oil
1 medium onion
1 -2 cloves garlic
1 small cauliflower
1 can whole tomatoes
Fresh rosemary (optional)
Red pepper flakes/dried chili (optional)
Butter
Fresh Pecorino Romano or Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Bring four cups of salted water to boil in a lidded pot. Lower heat to medium and pour in polenta in a slow, continuous stream, stirring constantly. Continue stirring for another 1-2 minutes as the polenta comes back to a boil and begins to thicken. Lower the heat to a very gentle simmer and cover. Stir every 5-10 minutes. While the polenta will appear cooked after only 10-15 minutes, optimal taste and texture are only achieved after 30-35 minutes.

Once the polenta is simmering, begin the sauce by heating a thin film of olive oil in a sauté pan. Slice the onion thinly and add, cooking on a medium heat until tender and lightly-coloured, about 10 minutes. Chop the garlic and add during the last minute or two of cooking. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Trim the leaves from the cauliflower. Remove and discard the core and stalk and cut or break the florets into bite-sized pieces. If using rosemary, strip the needles from one branch and chop finely.

Add the tinned tomatoes and their juices to the pan, crushing gently with a wooden spoon. Add rosemary and chili, if using. Add cauliflower and simmer on a low heat until soft enough to break with the wooden spoon, at least 20 minutes. If necessary, add a splash of water to prevent the sauce from sticking. Adjust seasoning.

As soon as the polenta is finished, stir in a pat of butter and spoon into individual bowls. Pour over the cauliflower sauce and top with a good grating of fresh Pecorino or Parmigiano. Serve immediately.

Poulet au Cidre et Panais (Chicken with Cider and Parsnips)

Cider and crepes are a near-perfect pairing, bringing together two of the most quintessential tastes of France’s northwest. Low in alcohol (the brut, or dry, varieties, are about 4.5-5%, sweet ones less than half that) with a light, frothy fizz, cider is indisputably fun to drink. But like a former boy-band member now attempting a solo career, it doesn’t tend to get a lot of respect. Outside of creperies, it rarely appears on menus. Selection is often limited, with little differentation in the stock at wine shops and supermarkets.* And while high-quality, low-yield ciders are still being produced, neither marketers nor food writers have exploited cider’s history, variety and versatility.

Until the mid twentieth-century, cider followed wine as France’s second-most popular alcoholic beverage. But a growing taste for beer, combined with rising production costs, has resulted in severe, if not yet terminal, decline of the cider industry. At stake is a product central to the culinary—and cultural—identity of large parts of Normandy and Brittany and an underappreciated partner for all sorts of food.

It’s hardly coincidental that dry cider (cidre bouché) is at its best with autumnal produce and cooler-weather preparations like soups and stews. It can be swapped for white wine in classic dishes like onion soup or moules marinieres and is an ideal braising liquid—with or without another regional product, crème fraiche—for chicken, pork or rabbit. Served chilled in a tall pilsner glass, it would complement a plate of cheese, particularly hard, aged ones with sharp and/or caramel notes (Comte, Cheddar) or any with a blooming rind (Camembert, Brie, Waterloo). Cidre bouché won’t become cloying alongside inherently sweet vegetables like pumpkin or parsnip, and, unlike wine, can tolerate vinegar or other acids. Its sweet counterpart, cidre doux, is, admittedly, a bit less adaptable. But it seems a natural alongside traditional Thanksgiving pies and most any other dessert featuring autumn fruit.

The following recipe, from the ever-reliable Art of Braising, can be used as a template for any white meat-cider stew. Should sparkling French cider be unavailable, substitute a dry, crisp (hard) cider, with more of the same to drink.

Chicken Braised with Cider and Parsnips
Serves 2
Total time: 70 minutes; Active time: 50 minutes

1 tablespoon olive oil
4 skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs
1 large shallot
2 cups (500 ml) cider
Fresh thyme
3/4 pound (330 g) parsnips

Heat a lidded skillet or braising pan over a medium heat. Add oil. When it shimmers, add chicken thighs, skin-side down. Season with salt and pepper. Turn as needed until browned on all sides, 5-8 minutes.

While the chicken cooks, finely chop the shallot. Remove the browned chicken and set on a plate. Add shallot and soften for a minute, stirring to avoid sticking. Raise heat and pour in cider. Scrape the bottom of the pan, then allow the mixture to boil for 10-15 minutes. The cider should reduce to about ¼ of its original volume.

Peel the parsnips and remove any woody core. Cut into long, thin sticks, about the shape of an index finger. Add the parsnips and thyme to the reduced liquid and place the chicken on top. If the pan is deep, use parchment paper or aluminum foil under the lid to get a tight, close seal. Turn the heat down to low and simmer very gently until the chicken is fully cooked and pulling away from the bone, 30-35 minutes.

Remove the chicken to a serving plate. Taste the parsnips for tenderness and the sauce for concentration. The latter should be sweet and glossy, but not thick enough to coat a spoon. If required, cook one or both on a gentle heat for another 5-10 minutes. Adjust for seasoning, arrange parsnips on the serving plate and pour over sauce.

* In Paris, a wide selection can be found at Breizh Café and Pomze.

Courgettes et Fleurs de Courgettes (Zucchini + Zucchini Blossoms)

If the courgettes in your corner of the world have grown huge and out of control, this recipe will have to wait until next year. But here in Paris, I’m still coming home from the market with relatively lilliputian ones. With thin skins and a refined flavour, these require nothing more than a quick softening in olive oil before tossing with fresh herbs and cheese, or combining with eggs. Using mandolin-fine slices, the cooking can be skipped altogether.

Tasty, easy and cheap, variations on courgette frittatas and salads are in frequent rotation right now. But good as they can be, none have approached the practically sublime pasta dish I made recently with sautéed courgette, basil and courgette blossoms. The vegetable base got an extra layer of flavour from chicken stock (obvious, perhaps, though I rarely use it in quick dishes), while the julienned basil and blossoms were thrown in just at the end, allowing them to retain a bit of texture and, more importantly, distinct flavours. Tossed with thin pasta and finished with fresh Parmesan, it was rich and fragrant, the kind of dish that warrants total attention while eating.

Served with an acidic, lightly floral Italian white wine (perhaps a Vermentino or Falanghina), it would make an elegant dinner for two. Yet even without someone present whom I could impress or seduce, it more than justified the (relatively modest) cost and time required. One for the files.

Pasta with Courgettes and Blossoms
adapted from a Chez Panisse recipe by David Tanis
Serves 2
Total time: 30 minutes: Active time: 20 minutes

Tanis’ original recipe used corn kernels and scallions. As both of those are hard to find in Paris, I substituted onion and upped the quantity of courgettes. In order to avoid overwhelming the delicate flavour of the blossoms, be sure to use courgettes which are small, firm and virtually seedless. Also, as the flowers will wilt quickly, this is a recipe to make on the same day as your market visit.

1-2 tbsp olive oil
3-4 slim, very small yellow or green courgettes (if your blossoms have tiny courgettes attached, use those in part)*
1 small onion
100-125 ml stock, preferably chicken
300-400 grams dried fettuccine or linguine (I like De Cecco brand)
4-6 courgette blossoms
Small handful fresh basil
Parmesan

Begin heating up the water for pasta. Dice the courgettes (it shouldn’t be necessary to peel them) and onion. Warm the olive oil in a large, heavy sauté pan over medium heat. Add the vegetables, season and sauté, stirring regularly to avoid sticking or excessive browning. When they are soft—up to ten minutes—add a good splash of stock and continue to cook, lowering the heat slightly. Put the pasta on to boil.

Allow the stock to reduce by ½ and the flavours to combine, another 5 minutes. Remove the stems and stamens from the courgette blossoms and julienne. Tear or cut the basil.

Add both to the sauce and toss to wilt. Drain the pasta and add to the sauce mixture, stirring well to combine and coat. Remove from the heat, adjust seasoning and serve immediately with grated Parmesan.

*A wide variety—along with the blossoms—can currently be found at Joel Thiebault’s market stall.

Tagine aux Sardines

Were I to tell my tomato and herb vendors that I hadn’t yet developed a taste for North African pastries, it’s likely that they would leave their stands in the care of underlings, escort me to any one of a number of local shops and present me with a plate of assorted sweetmeats. Yet if I were to mention that I had developed a method for fish tagine* that might yield better results than those their mother or grandmother used, I doubt that I would be invited into their kitchens for a demonstration.

Taste memory is unassailable, so too authenticity. And while it may have suffered from the ubiquity of time-saving ingredients—instant couscous, bouillon cubes and premade spice mixes—traditional North African food is something that, for much of Paris’ population, is as familiar and evocative as Friday night challah is to me. And so just as I’m dismissive of every loaf which isn’t my mother’s, I can understand why my tagine, though avoiding the common problem of overcooked fish and undercooked onions, would not past muster at the market. In the interest of ensuring my supply chain for tomato and basil salads, I’ll therefore be keeping this more or less to myself.

Sardine Tagine

Serves 2; can easily be doubled or tripled
Total time: 45 minutes; Active time: 15-20 minutes

Unlike traditional tagines, in which all of the ingredients are cooked together for the same length of time, this vegetable and herb base is virtually ready by the time the fish is added. This allows the fish to retain structural integrity and the spice rub to be fresh and unmuddied . Sardines are delicious and inexpensive, but their high oil content means they spoil quickly. If you can’t access good ones, try this with mackerel fillets or a full-flavoured white fish, perhaps mullet or bream. Either add to the fish’s cooking time or cut the fillets into large bite-size pieces.

Olive oil
1 medium onion
1 small bulb fennel
2 small tomatoes
Large handful coriander
Large handful parsley
2 cloves garlic
A few slices lemon peel
Harissa (substitute hot paprika or red pepper flakes)
400 grams sardine fillets (from 600-700 grams whole fish)
Large pinch each cumin, coriander and fennel seed
Lemon juice

Over a low heat, warm enough olive oil to just cover the surface of a heavy, lidded pan. Slice the onion and fennel bulb thinly, add, season and fry gently until just soft, 5-8 minutes. While these cook, chop tomato and herbs coarsely. Add all the tomato and half the herbs to the pan. Pour in a few tablespoons of water and cook the mixture until the tomato begins to break down and the other vegetables are fully softened, another 10 minutes or so. Slice or chop garlic and add once the mixture is nearly cooked. Add lemon peel and harissa to taste. Take off heat and set aside.

Rinse the filets and place flesh side up on a large plate. Grind the cumin, coriander and fennel seeds in a mortar and pestle or spice grinder. Using a teaspoon, distribute the ground spices evenly over the fish.

Warm the sauce over a low heat. Sandwich the fish fillets (spice-side in) and distribute over the sauce. If the mixture looks dry, add another splash or two of water. Cover and cook on a gentle heat until the fish is just cooked through (as little as 5 minutes depending on the size/thickness of the fillets). Add lemon juice, adjust seasoning and serve warm or at room temperature with remaining herbs, couscous or flatbread.


* This Arabic word describes both a conical, earthenware pot and any meat, fish or vegetable dish cooked in it.

Fish for Tennis

The installation of a roof on Centre Court at Wimbledon seems to have resulted in the balmiest June in recent memory. These days, English strawberries—not to mention Spanish or Chilean ones—arrive on the supermarket shelves well before the opening match, regardless of climatic variation. But it is doubtless true that summer traditions such as Pimms cup, Jersey Royal potatoes and Eton mess are more enjoyable when they don’t provide the only reminder of summer’s putative existence.

Perhaps because I spent my childhood elsewhere, I have little sentimentality for England’s variable but occasionally glorious summers. Given the choice, I would rather spend mine in a place where it’s regularly hot enough to require a cool drink, and where climate, architecture and culture all conspire to encourage time spent outdoors. (France has mastered the latter, though its northern reaches often leave something to be desired on the temperature front.) I can therefore only attribute my tangent into English summer cooking to the tennis.

Without the over-abundance of good, cheap fruit that comes from a garden or country farm stand, I’ve never really been tempted to make dessert classics such as summer pudding, preferring to eat my berries straight-up. The only exception I make is for gooseberries, whose mouth-puckering sharpness only softens with a judicious application of sugar and heat.

The gooseberries got no further adornment before being puddled next to a freshly-grilled mackerel, the classic perfection of the combination hinted at by the French word for the fruit: groseille à maquereau. And when I could find no more gooseberries, I moved on to a variation on another English summer classic, salmon and mayonnaise. Guided by Nigel Slater, I made fishcakes from salmon (and an equal quantity of smoked trout), boiled new potatoes, and generous handful of tarragon, dill and parsley, and served them with a punched-up mayonnaise full of the same herbs, lemon juice and chopped-up capers.

The tennis is only on for another week. But I suspect these dishes will be on regular rotation for at least another two months.

Mackerel with Gooseberry Sauce

Because of its high oil content, mackerel is only appealing when it’s very fresh. (If it’s unavailable, salmon fillets or steaks could be substituted.) We ended up with whole, cleaned fish, though fillets would make for neater serving. A sauvignon blanc (I like these moderately priced ones) will pick up the grassy, gooseberry flavours of the sauce and cut through the fish’s richness.

Serves 2
Total time: 30 minutes; Active time: 10 minutes

1 small basket gooseberries
Sugar to taste
Very fresh mackerel, either whole or filleted, with skin on (at least 200 grams per person after wastage)
Lemon

Rinse the berries, trim both ends and place in a small saucepan. Add a tablespoon or two of water, and a tablespoon of sugar. (You may want to increase this at the end.) Place on a low heat, stirring occasionally until the gooseberries are soft and collapse under the weight of a spoon. Crush gently with a fork or potato masher, adjust sugar and set aside.

If using whole fish, heat grill (broiler), rinse fish and season. Grill on foil, turning as necessary. Fillet on a separate plate, then add the gooseberry alongside. You may want lemon, though the sauce likely adds sufficient acidity.

If starting with fillets, heat a teaspoon or two of olive or neutral oil in a non-stick pan. Start the fish skin-side down, turning with a thin, flat spatula when it has browned. Season the skinless side and cook for about ½ the time as the first side. Remove to a plate, adjust seasoning and serve with sauce.

Fishcakes with Tartar Sauce

Fishcakes can, when made small and spicy enough, be delicate nibbles. In truly tropical conditions, I’d opt for those, though the following recipe will be perfect for 99% of English summer evenings. The recipe is not particularly prescriptive: salmon can be substituted with a white fish, smoked (or unsmoked) salmon can easily replace the smoked trout and while aniseedy herbs such as tarragon and dill flatter both, the proportions can be adapted. Extra fishcakes can also be prepared up to 2 days in advance. Follow instructions through flouring the fishcakes, then cover and refrigerate until needed.

Serves 2
Total time: 1 hour; Active time: 20-30 minutes (depending on fish preparation)

Adapted from Nigel Slater's Appetite

Fishcake ingredients and initial prep
250 grams potatoes
250 grams fish (I used 1 small can of wild salmon and the same quantity of smoked trout)
Good handful herbs—a mixture of parsley, dill and tarragon works well
Flour
Neutral oil for frying

Peel the potatoes, cube or slice, and place in a pan of boiling, salted water. Cook on a medium-high heat until very soft.

While the potatoes are cooking, prepare the fish. Drain canned fish and chop smoked fish finely, placing both in a mixing bowl. If using fresh fish, poach in a shallow pan until just cooked, then cool and flake fish from skin, adding to the mixing bowl. Chop herbs finely and add to fish.

Drain potatoes. If still a bit wet, steam off excess water by placing the covered pan over low heat for several minutes. Mash with a fork or potato masher and, when cooled somewhat, add to fish mixture. Mix and adjust seasoning.

Sauce ingredients and prep
1 tbsp capers, preferably preserved in salt
Good handful herbs—a mixture of parsley, dill and tarragon works well
Mayonnaise (homemade or quality store-bought), 1- 2 tablespoons per person
Lemon juice
Cornichons (optional)

Soak capers in water to remove salt (or vinegar). Chop herbs finely and add to a small mixing bowl. Add mayonnaise to taste, aiming for something in-between a herb-flecked sauce and herbs just held together by mayonnaise. Remove capers from water, chop and add. Chop and add cornichons, if using. Add a squeeze of lemon juice and adjust seasoning.

Frying
Heat a neutral oil in a heavy-bottomed frying pan until hot but not smoking. Unless your pan is non-stick, you’ll want enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Put several tablespoons of flour on a flat plate and flour hands lightly. Form fishcakes about 3-4 inches in diameter, flatten slightly and dredge in flour. As each is ready, place gently in the oil. Fry each fishcake until it is crisp and golden on the bottom, then turn carefully with a flat spatula. Remove to a plate lined with paper towels and serve with sauce and freshly-steamed peas and/or asparagus.