Another Food Blog

Outdoor eating was a must on such a humid evening, so I walked up St Christopher’s Place and James Street neat Bond Street tube station, finally settling on Mimosa. It does Mediterranean cuisine. While I sipped on the (slightly too warm) Stowell’s chenin blanc, I ordered goat’s cheese and pear crostini to start with, and then stuffed and roasted aubergine filled with assorted vegetables to follow. The crostini was good, with some very nice roulade atop rather good-tasting pear slices. The aubergine was adequate rather than brilliant, and the wine disappointing. Most disappointing was the saffron rice – far too dry. Next timer I might try some of the roast meats which most people seem to order.

At the last minute I invited two friends over to join me for dinner, but I hadn’t bought any food for the occasion. I had some slices of chorizo I’d forgotten to put in the frittata, and I had a couple of packs of prawns. I decided to try a variant of the scallops and chorizo in which prawns would replace the scallops. I fried the chorizo until the paprika fat came out, then replaced the slices by prawns, only re-adding the chorizo to heat up again at the end. Meanwhile one guest asked “What are you serving with it?” Good question. I had most of a red pepper and a purple onion left, so I quickly chopped and sautéed these in olive oil in a lidded pan on the stove top.

I had nothing in for dessert, but at the back of my cupboard was a tin of sliced peaches years past its sell-by date. Under a crumble people would hardly tell the difference, I thought, so I quickly mixed the fat and flour for a crumble, putting no sugar in the pastry, nor any with the fruit and some of its syrup – sweet enough as it is. Half an hour later, there was quite a nice crumble I dished up with fresh cream. Not a bad meal for spur-of-the-moment stuff.

Inspired by my summer pudding, which is adapted from a Sam Stern recipe, I determined to use up the remaining berries by making a compote of stewed summer fruits. There were strawberries, hulled and halved, blueberries and raspberries, and I added a large fresh ripe peach chopped into pieces to add texture to the mix. I began with two tablespoons of crème de cassis and two of lemon juice, plus half a small cup of high strength orange squash. I added the fruits and simmered until soft, covered the bowl with plastic film, and cooled and then chilled. I served it with fresh cream poured over it. It was fantastic. My guests thought so, too, so this must become a new Madsen standard.

I don’t often serve hot food with a salad, but these seemed right, and it was a particularly interesting salad.  The frittata I made in a parchment-lined tin to stop it sticking.  I whisked four large eggs with two good spoons of crème fraiche, 2 of goat’s milk yoghurt and half a cup of goat’s milk.  I put some into the dish first, them put in cubed par-boiled potatoes, chopped onions, courgettes, red pepper and mushrooms.  I forget to add the chopped up chorizo I had ready, or the grated mature cheddar cheese!  I did remember sea salt and pepper and a sprinkle  of cayenne pepper and powdered garlic.  I added the rest of the egg mix and baked it for 35 minutes.

So the meal came out more vegetarian than I’d intended, but it tasted good and its texture was superb.  The salad I served with it had iceberg lettuce, spring onions, chopped purple onion, cherry vine tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, pine nuts, chopped walnuts, black olives, green olives, sun-dried tomatoes and anchovies.  For dessert I served a new summer berry compote, of which more later.

I’ve been trying out some of the new dishes at Ask.  Although it’s a pizza place and then a pasta place, they do other stuff that can be quite appealing – like that aubergine pasta-free lasagne.  This was on the night’s ‘specials’ board.  It was a seafood risotto, slightly more expensive than most of their dishes, but hey, it featured clams, squid rings, prawns and mussels.  That was quite a lot of shells to remove.  It was good, with the rice nice and creamy and the seafood good, as ever.  I drank a McGuigan chardonnay alongside, which seemed a trifle on the thin side, though it was 12.5 percent.

I can’t wait to try this.  Hardy’s Bin 53 Special Release was in Sainsbury’s at a special price of £3.99.  For an Australian shiraz that looks like very good value.  And Hardy’s is pretty dependable, too.  It’s an ’08 shiraz from South-Eastern Australia, coming in at 14 percent.  The label promises “forest berry flavours with savoury notes and a lingering blackcurrant and mulberry finish.”  I’m going to serve it at a barbecue, thinking it might go well with strong tasting meat and sausages.

I wrote a few months ago about the Belazu chilli oil I bought.  It’s been in use quite a lot recently as I snack on the leftover sections of quiches, flans and tarts.  I notice a couple of things, though.  The first thing is that it’s better NOT shaken up before use.  The heat collects in the oil near the peppers at the top, and that’s what pours first when you tip it carefully.  If you mix it, the heat is diluted through the rest of it.  Instead, I pour from the hot part at the top, knowing that more of the chilli will have given the oil heat next time I use it.  The other is that this one is significantly milder than the ones served in Ask, for example.  This means I don’t have to worry about pouring too much of it by accident.  It really is a very good way of spicing up a dish.