Loquat chutney

Loquats are a new discovery for me. I had heard of them before I started working at Natoora, but I only tried one for the first time last week. So when I was asked to do a cooking demonstration in the shop this Friday I thought I should experiment a bit with this lovely fruit. 

Loquats have a texture and flavour akin to apricots, but with a sweet and sour element that lends itself well to Asian cooking. In its initial stages, without the Indian spices, this chutney tasted like a fruity Chinese sauce for duck or pork. Had that been my desired outcome, I would have stopped there, but it tasted a little odd as a chutney.

I added cumin, coriander seeds and cardamom and it was transformed. The result: a sweet and sour and sour Indian chutney with warming spices and a little kick.

Click to read more ...

Claudia Roden's potaje de garbanzos y espinacas

(Chickpea and spinach stew)

For my birthday my Mum gave me Claudia Roden’s fabulous cookbook, The Food of Spain. I love this book because the recipes are real and unadulterated Spanish food. The other Spanish cookbooks I have are full of extravagant recipes that are difficult or very expensive to source ingredients for in London or which are too fiddly to make for anything other than a special occasion. Roden’s book is full of the kind of recipes Spanish people actually cook and eat regularly.

I have tried to replicate this Spanish staple several times before and, until now, it never tasted quite like it does in Spain. I have a good palate for detecting spices, and got close with that, but I would never have guessed that the key to it’s “rich texture” and “intriguing flavour” comes from a paste made of stale bread fried with garlic blended to a cream with hard-boiled egg yolks and stock.

Click to read more ...

Tapas no.3: Pinchos from Movida Rustica

Updated on Monday, June 13, 2011 at 11:10AM by Vix

I lived in Seville for three months in 2008 and Granada for 3 months in 2002. One of my favourite of the tapas I ate while I was there were the adobos de pollo or "pinchos". Usually made with chicken, these salty, spicy skewers were served all throughout Andalucia with a piece of crusty bread to mop up the juices. I was over the moon when I found the recipe in Movida Rustica.

Now I have to admit that this recipe does not produce results as good as some I have tried in Andalucia, but I think that is because I love the ones I am used to and this is different. If you have ever tried to replicate a favourite dish you will know what I mean. I will try to play around with this recipe next time to get it closer to what I know, but in the meantime this is a very nice, if not quite right, rendition.

The recipe below makes 12 tapas or 6 raciones (larger portions). If you are only cooking for 4-6 people and serving the pinchos as part of a selection of tapas, I would recommend halving the recipe.

Click to read more ...

Middle Eastern mezze no.3: Hugh Foster's spicy lamb mince

 

Hugh Foster is often credited with having introduced Sydneysiders to Morrocan and Middle Eastern food in the 1990s with his trendy Darlinghurst restaurant, the Fez. The Fez is now closed, but he continues the theme with Café Mint in Surry Hills which has been open since the early noughties and still draws a large crowd, a testament to his ability to keep up with the times.

Café Mint’s takes the successful Sydney café model – communal tables, sleek furnishings and interior, good coffee, all day breakfasts which merge into lunch and dinner – but adds a twist, North African cuisine. Alongside the usual breakfast offerings of sourdough toast, bircher muesli, and scrambled eggs, you have breakfast cous cous with yoghurt, merguez sausage with chakchouka, and baked eggs with beans and sucuk.

My Dad did a stint working at Café Mint after he closed his own restaurant. It was probably around this time that Middle Eastern mezze became a regular part of our weeknight dinner menu. One of my favourite of these recipes is Hugh’s spicy lamb mince with pine nuts, which has made appearances on Cafe Mint’s breakfast, lunch and dinner menu over the years.

Click to read more ...

Middle Eastern mezze no.2: Falafel

Updated on Tuesday, April 12, 2011 at 7:51PM by Vix

Falafel is one of those foods which you either love or hate. Or is it? I think the people who hate it just haven’t had the good stuff.  

When falafel is bad, it is really bad – bland and dry, you might as well be eating cardboard. It is a pity that this is many people’s only experience of falafel, because the problem is so easily remedied; add more! More spices, more herbs, more garlic, more salt. This may seem obvious, but in practice more people turn out bland falafels, than aromatic and fragrant ones, so it is worth driving the point home.

At first glance, 4 tablespoons of cumin, 3 bunches of herbs, 6 cloves of garlic and 2 tablespoons of salt may seem excessive, but bear in mind that this falafel mixture makes 20 to 30 balls. You can test a small bit of the raw mixture, it won't hurt you, but if you don't want to do that, then fry a little piece to check it.

Click to read more ...