What I had for dinner #2

The second in an occasional series, as if the title hadn't already told you that.

Last night we attempted and eventually succeeded in making butternut squash gnocchi. It was a recipe straight out of the fantastic Paradiso Seasons by Dennis Cotter, though I overlooked one crucial part - he used pumpkin where I used butternut squash.

The problem with this is that butternut squash can be a lot wetter than pumpkin when cooked; something that endangered the gnocchi. It meant that more flour and Parmesan than ideal was necessary to ensure a good consistency for the dough, but it worked in the end.

To summarise, here's the recipe kind of from memory, though I recommend you buy the book.

1. Chop pumpkin or squash into cubes and roast it, along with some garlic cloves still in their skins.
2. When cooked, let it cool and then mash the pumpkin/squash in a bowl.
3. Fold in some flour and grated Parmesan cheese. You will probably want to use more flour than cheese unless you're rich. You should end up with a stiff dough.
   
4. Roll out the dough into one or more long sausages and cut this into 2cm long chunks. Keep these covered in flour to stop them sticking together.
5. For the sauce, squeeze the garlic from its skin into a mixture of half stock, half white wine. You probably want about 150mls of liquid. Liquidise the mixture and then sieve it into a pan. Reduce it by half and add some cream, 150mls will do. Heat this through, season with salt & pepper and add some chopped chives.
6. Cook the gnocchi in boiling water until it rises to the surface, some 2-4 minutes. Don't crowd the gnocchi, you'd be better off cooking it in a couple of batches. Put it into individual serving bowls with some wilted spinach and pour over the sauce. Sprinkle with Parmesan and pop under the grill until just starting to colour.
7. Eat it. Really quickly. If your fellow diners can't be bothered to sit down, start with out them. I mean, why can't they go to the toilet and wash their hands when you say "Ready in 5 minutes!", eh? No, they have to do it right at the last moment and let the food get cold. Well, they can eat theirs cold, but I'm not waiting and I suggest you don't either. So there.
   

A restaurant recommendation

Yesterday I was in Islington and we decided to have a late lunch after our business was concluded. Upper Street is packed with eateries - most of the chains are represented along with a very healthy number of independant and local places.

We settled on one of the three branches of Cafe Gallipoli. All three are on the same 100m stretch of road and called Cafe Gallipoli, Gallipoli Bazaar and Cafe Gallipoli again. I don't know how they differ from each other as they all appeared to offer the same menu.

The menu is a collection of dishes from throughout the Middle East, with the restaurants having suitable authentic looking interiors. We shared the Meze Bazzar, a selection of 5 cold and 2 hot starters. I wish I'd taken some notes of what was included (or pinched a menu) but I was too busy enjoying the food.

What I can remember of the meal was felafel, a filo pastry filled with cheese and herbs, a superbly smoky flavoured hummus and some yoghurt dish, potatoes in a tomato sauce with some fantastic seasoning, a bean dish and a very real tabbouleh which featured parsley to bulghur wheat in a 10:1 ratio; really a salad flecked with grain rather than the more usual intreptation of grain flecked with herbs. The tabbouleh really was the highlight of the meal. Bowls of olives ae provided on every table and there are bowls of breads to rip and share and dip.

It was one of those restaurants where the staff eat at the same tables as the customers with their families and their children, an always reassuring sign I think.

The bill for all the meze and a beer, a glass of wine, some bottled water and mint teas came to under £20 and I shall definitely return to explore more of the menu. Highly recommended.

Farmers markets

Where I live in Tunbridge Wells, we have a twice-monthly farmers market, held on a stretch of closed-off road in front of the town hall. And yet Tunbridge Wells has a market square, although a pretty poor one. It was included when the monstrous Royal Victoria Place was developed in the centre of town in an apparent effort to turn Tunbridge Wells into Anytown PLC, UK. Not for one moment am I suggesting that the farmers market move to the market square; the Pantiles would make a far better location as shown be the French, Italian and Christmas markets that are being held there. No, the question arising is why is the market held in the market square twice a week afforded the title "market" when all it sells is out-of-date tinned processed goods, mirrors printed with a picture of Elvis and generally, tat?

I think it is about time Farmers' Markets should reclaim the name "market" from the awful experiences that currently trade under that banner. For isn't a farmers' market what a market should be? Through the rest of Europe, markets are held in town squares and villages; the addition of the word "farmer" isn't even remotely necessary to make it clear that here is an event selling local produce from local suppliers to local people.

So let's reclaim the name "market" to describe the local supply of good food from local suppliers, not let it be wasted on some white-van man selling imitation-brand jeans.

Half Full or Half Empty?

I'm sure "Le Chef" will have seen the latest BBC food programme, Full On Food which has just finished... I must say I was pretty "full on food" whilst I was watching it, having just consumed loads of sausage and chips. But the programme itself seemed to be running on empty.

I think there seems to be some sort of obligatory code at the BBC which prescribes that their food programmes must appear to be as relaxed and casual as possible. This may be in order to exorcize the spirit of Fanny Craddock, whose uneasy ghost must hover over the saucepan hand of the current crop of food presenters. Nowadays, the programme has to appear totally impromptu and unstructured. The food must be perfectly authentic and genuine, yet totally without effort.

The presenters, ideally, would be tousled Italians who slosh the extra virgin around, whack the hell out of vegetables and slice fruit in a blur of razor-sharp steel. Strangely, the eventual product of all this primal activity appears to be a gorgeous delicate fantasy structure of unparalleled beauty and deliciousness. Imagine the creative technique of Jackson Pollock, resulting in a Tintoretto. Seems a bit unlikely to me. I think it's all done by camera trickery.

The next step will be to have presenters who just sit around doing bugger all, for 25 minutes, and then there's this "ping" noise, and they hoik something utterly perfect out of the microwave and then all grab little spoons and tuck in and compete for who can make the most orgasmic noises of gastronomic pleasure.

What I had for dinner #1

The first in a very occasional series of postings.

Tonight it was lentil dahl (not to be confused with the "model" Sophie Dahl, granddaughter of author Roald Dahl).

Here is the recipe for what I made up.

1. Chop an onion - almost unnecessary to say really. How many recipes start with anything else other than chopping an onion? Maybe ice cream.
2. Fry the onion in some vegetable ghee along with some black mustard and cumin seeds.
3. After a short time (maybe enough for a beer) add some lentils. About as much as you feel like eating. Or more.
4. Add some spices. I used the Penang Coconut Curry blend from the most excellent Spice Shop in Notting Hill.
5. Add some water or stock. Enough to cover the lentils (the ones in the pan, not the ones you put back in the cupboard).
6. Simmer for a while (the pan, not you) until things are cooked, probably around 30 minutes. Why not treat yourself to a beer while waiting? You want the lentils to be on the verge of breaking up, not a complete mush of baby food.
7. Serve with some boiled basmati rice. I was going to have naan bread but I forgot to buy them.