Midday in Paris

So yesterday, if you remember, I was swanning off to Paris for lunch. There wasn’t any real reason for it. Everyone was just being really January-ish. You know, ‘what is there to look forward to now that Christmas is over,’ and ‘it’s so cold and miserable’ etc etc. Now I don’t get too bothered by January. I like cold weather as I feel quite uncomfortable and sweaty in heat. So snow suits me down to the ground. Plus it’s good fun. I also didn’t have ‘a terrible year that I’m trying to move on from’, or need to ‘make a new start’ etc etc. All in all, I feel ok in January. As though to prove this point, I determined to have a January filled with fun. I have seen friends I don’t see often, taken lots of long walks and become dedicated to my Michel Roux cookbook in my Masterchef dreams.

In light of all this (and a deal on the Eurostar), I decided to go to Paris for the day. My manager had highly recommended a restaurant for lunch so it was sorted. The train journey there was fairly nondescript, apart from coming out of the Eurotunnel on the French side and being greeted by a sea of white…

It was beautiful. It was a crisp cold day and the snow sat on everything in sight. It was still there when we came past again going home, the cold weather preventing any snow from melting.

We hopped off the train at midday, our minds boggled by the fact that we were now in France. It seemed silly, so easy and effortless. Get on the train in London. Get off it in Paris.

We had bought tickets for the metro on the Eurostar train so we just found our way downstairs and got on the underground, no fuss. When we got off to switch trains, however, there was a policeman shouting something at everyone on the platform about the ‘sortie’ – exit. We asked him what was the problem and he said there was a ‘suspicious bag’ so everyone must leave the station.

Welcome to Paris. You’re about to get blown up.

Optimistically, we looked at our map of Paris and concluded that it would only be about 15 minutes to walk the five stops to the restaurant so we set off along the river.

Let me just say this – it did not only take 15 minutes and, despite the freezing weather, we arrived three minutes late, out of breath and quite warm!

The restaurant itself looks unassuming….

…but inside has the lively fun atmosphere typical of a French restaurant. Four men discussed business loudly in the corner, a large family chattered happily, laughing when one of the teenagers looked suspiciously at the food they had been served, a group of Japanese tourists next to us photographed everything excitedly.

And us? We watched. We watched everything. We watched the kitchen.

We watched the food going to the tables. We watched the animated waiters telling their little jokes as they rushed about. And we loved it. It was such a fabulous little place to tuck into a corner and watch Parisian life happening.

And we ate. Of course we ate. We chose the tasting menu and prepared to eat whatever the chef was cooking that day. We started with a cauliflower and fish soup, which was definitely a highlight of the whole meal.

We then had a beef tartate, with oyster, shrimps and radish.

We moved onto mackerel with white beans and a green salad foam.

Next up was a rich slow-cooked beef dish with a carrot soup.

We were then given a dish to share, which looked like short pieces of pasta dressed with chilli oil. We looked closer and realised that, actually, we were eating baby eels! They were way tasty.

Then it was onto another hearty French dish, a small rack of lamb with pomme puree. This was the best of the mains we had.

It was then time for dessert, which blew our minds. We were presented with a huge bowl of rice pudding and two smaller bowls, one with salted caramel and one with caramelised walnuts and almonds, to put as much as we wanted of each in our bowls.

Midway through this delightful bowl, small glasses of lemon sorbet and mango were put next to us, so that we hardly know where to start.

It was dessert heaven.

After this onslaught of foodie indulgence, we paid and emerged into the sunlight, three hours later and thirty stone heavier. As we wandered along, carefree and a little cold, I saw it….

A TRUFFLE SHOP! A shop. Full of truffles. The most truffley things I’ve ever seen in one place. It blew my mind. Danda took a seat and left me to it in the end. They had truffle pesto, truffle pasta sauces, truffle aperitif, truffle flavoured chocolate drinks and (this one floored me), truffle popcorn!

I purchased some truffle honey and a truffle pasta sauce and of course a bag, to carry things in and pretend it’s a bag of truffles.

By this time it was late afternoon and we had wanted to catch Notre Dame in the fading light so we walked back the way we had come and found our way to the cathedral.

It’s so massive that it’s almost impossible to get the whole place into one picture. We wandered in and took a seat. Suddenly the excitement of the day gave way to a moment of tiredness and we had a sneaky little nap under the colourful mosaic windows and beautiful chandeliers.

After realising we must have looked like homeless people, we pottered off to make our way to the station for our train home. We still had two hours so we dawdled along the river and stopped off if we wanted to.

We came unexpectedly across the Pompadou Centre and went inside to look at the bookshop. There was a coffee shop so we sat for coffee and I bought some little cakes. They weren’t quite the beautiful petits fours and delicate macaroons I had been envisioning for the afternoon coffee stop but the centre itself was lovely so we sacrificed taste for ambience.

With an hour until our train, we kept going and reached the station twenty minutes early.

We then had a second dose of wierdness when we boarded the train in Paris, got off it in London and went back home to have a cup of tea on the sofa and watch an episode of Family Guy.

An Italian feast – the carb light version

On Wednesday it was Halloween. Last year on Halloween, I got some sweets in and waited for the kids to come trick-or-treating.

They didn’t come.

I ate the sweets.

Apparently the thing you’re supposed to do is put something Halloweeny in the window or somewhere visible, to show you’re in on the fun. So this year, I got a few little pumpkins, put them in the window and planned to bake some goodies, flapjacks or something.

Well, then I got cooking for dinner as I had a friend coming over and didn’t get time to bake goodies for the kids, so good job no-one knocked! (I think I might be feeling a bit offended though. Why didn’t they want my sweeties?)

So I was back in the kitchen with my favourite cookbook, Polpo, by Russell Norman. My friend and I are both ex-Dukaners so try to not to go too mad on carbs. I definitely don’t avoid them, you can’t really, when eating like an Italian, but I just try not to have loads of them.

The antipasti was the carb-heavy part but I kept it out of the mains. Here’s the antipasti plate.

Top centre are my signature grissini sticks, wrapped in prosciutto and pickled chicory. To the left are music paper crackers. To the right is one of my favourite things in life ever, truffle butter, and just behind that, black truffle oil. In the white dish to the left is homemade basil pesto, in which I used pecorino and black truffle oil. Right at the front, the little pink squares are ham hock terrine and to the left are cherry tomatoes with a little shred of mozzarella and some torn basil on the top, then sprinkled with truffle salt. In the middle are little crostinis with ricotta, mint and broad bean on half of them and goat’s cheese, roasted walnut and grape drizzled with white truffle oil and thyme on the other.

For the mains, they unfortunately don’t photograph well so I will just have to tell you about them. I made a parmigiana with aubergines and courgettes, in which I used fresh basil and oregano where I usually use dried as the flavour is more concentrated. After having used just fresh this time, I think I will go back to using dried as the lovely oregano smells you usually get with a parmigiana definitely weren’t as strong. I also made a duck, black olive and tomato ragu which was far tastier than I expected. You spend about two and a half hours just slowly cooking the tomato sauce so the flavours are really strong and lovely. I also steamed some kale, spinach and fresh basil together as a side dish.

The dessert was vanilla panna cotta with blackberry coulis on top.

I also made something called a chocolate salami for having with the espressos I decided were a good idea at 9.30pm.

It is chocolate with egg yolks whipped into it, with crushed up sponge fingers, chopped dried fruit and loads of nuts. You just fridge set it until it is hard enough to cut in slices and have as little biscuits.

We then proceeded to have a super long chat about my visit to Mr Red Wine’s house. I must just add that I washed quite thoroughly, thirteen times, in between visiting Mr Red Wine and preparing this food!

Another Italian feast

Yesterday, two of my favourite friends came over. One had just handed in two peices of work, which signalled the end of her dissertation. The other is half Italian. I therefore went crazy on the organising front and decided to make a feast of epic proportions, much like the last time someone came for dinner.

This time though, I was equipped with truffle oil…! The night before, I had prepared the delicate carta di musica – music paper – and made the pesto. Where last time I went for a rocket and walnut pesto, this time I was without food processor (it broke when I used it to whizz almonds for cantuccini) so I made the simpler traditional basil and pine nut pesto as it’s easier to bash together in a pestle and mortar. I lightly toasted the pine nuts first and it gave them a really creamy texture.

Then the morning of the big feast, I made walnut brittle, which I then bashed into breadcrumb-size peices and added to a delicate mixture of whipped cream, whipped egg white and whipped yolk and sugar. I froze the whole thing to make semifreddo, which means half-cold in Italian. It basically comes out like an ice cream but is different, somehow.

I also whisked a few eggs with sugar, 00 flour, crushed nuts and I forget what else, to make cantuccini. I fridged the whole thing first, to let it chill and set a little, to make the baking process easier later.

Then I went bread crazy for a bit, making my pizza dough and leaving it to rise and then tackling the grissini. I had just bought them at the shop last time and felt a bit like I’d let myself down. So this time, I made them from scratch. I melted a bit of butter in a pan then added milk. In a bowl, I put 00 flour, dried yeast, salt and a handful of parmesan. I added the butter and milk to this, kneaded it for a while, then left it in a warm place to rise. Although I was supposed to be using strong white flour, I couldn’t find any in my cupboard. So I used 00 flour and wholemeal flour mixed together and hoped it would be fine.

It was fine! Surprisingly. And I even thought it looked a bit more interesting than if I’d used totally white flour. Check them out.

I love the uneven nature of the sticks, how some are a bit short and stubby and others are quite long and thin and smooth all around. They also got a great reaction from my guests, one of whom said it was their favourite thing out of everything we ate.

After making these, I rolled my pizza dough into twelve balls (used one to make myself a pizza for lunch, just to test it, you understand), put them on a tray covered in a damp towel and fridged until needed.

Finally, after a whole day of prep, I was ready for guests. And here it is in all its glory. The antipasti…

Prosciutto, figs and mint.

From the back, you can see truffle butter, pesto (in the glass), grilled aubergines with tomato sauce, mozzarella and basil (at the front) carta di musica (to the left) and in the centre, the homemade grissini wrapped in salami milano and pickled chicory. The little purple thing off to the right contains truffle oil and balsamic vinegar.

There was much dipping of grissini into truffle butter and eyes lighting up. The pesto was a firm favourite with my half Italian friend, who kept an eagle eye on it whenever anyone else took a slightly-too-large scoop on their breadstick.

We also had tomato, mozzarella, basil sticks as well but herein lies the problem with mozzarella. The better quality you use, the higher water content it has. Which means that it gets all over you when you’re touching it and all over whatever you’re trying to do with it. So my basil leaves and tomato wedges were covered in mozzarella water, making them unpretty for photographs. But they were there, honest.

Next up was the mains, for which I went traditional Italian…

With a courgette, rocket and basil salad with a lemony-parmesany dressing…

My half-Italian friend polished most of this off single-handedly.

For the pizzas, I just rolled them fairly small and topped them with whatever I felt like. Chicken, fennel, white asparagus, romano peppers, truffle oil, proscuitto, courgette, mushrooms, red onion, mozzarella, chilli flakes. And so we ate. And we ate. And we ate some more. The mains and the antipasti were all lingering around in front of us and we just kept nibbling. A mouthful of pizza. A bit of grissini dipped in truffle oil. A tomato, mozzarella stack. It just went on. And on. And on.

We waited maybe five minutes before I discreetly cleared the plates and got bowls out for everyone. Loud declarations of “O, I can’t eat dessert yet, no way!” were made.

“Don’t worry,” I said, calming their fears. “I’m just putting the bowls out. And the semifreddo needs to be out of the freezer to soften up for a bit.”

But, of course, I set up all the stuff on the table and our stomachs forgot about how full they were and we got started.

Ok, from left to right. Slow-baked figs, then cantuccini. In front of the cantuccini is a little dish of walnut brittle, a jar of honey, then to the right is the walnut semifreddo. The order of things for the semifreddo is as follows – scoop some semifreddo out and put it in your bowl, drizzle with honey, top with walnut brittle. Add into the equation a few figs and try using the light  crumbly cantuccini to transport the last few bits of ice cream to your mouth and suddenly, you’re not full anymore. You’re back in the game. You’re ready for action! More semifreddo! More figs! More honey!

We sat, shell shocked and taken aback, viewing our destruction before leaving the scene of the crime to go and watch a program about plane crashes (don’t ask, I wasn’t in charge of the dinker).

And now I have leftovers for at least the next week. Well, I say ‘the next week’…. They’ll last me a day or two….

Eating artwork for lunch

Yesterday, for Danda’s birthday, we had fancy lunch next to the Thames river, in a place called The Bingham. I was quite excited when I booked it as it’s one of those super swanky places that you never think you’ll eat in. I had done a bit of research though and found out that their lunch menu was very reasonably priced. So we had a lunchtime booking and I was very much looking forward to it.

They have a Michelin star, by the way, did I mention that. O yes, they have a Michelin star.

I started the whole thing off in a rush because I decided to bake thank you gifts for my neighbours who helped me break in the other day when I locked myself out, remember? There I was, baking away, then suddenly it was half eleven and the booking was at twelve and I was still in my jarmies!

I practically threw the baked goodies at my neighbours as I hurtled by, yelling “Can’t stop! Sorry!” Then we ran for our lives and arrived, red faced and sweaty, a few minutes late. Not the grand entrance I was hoping for!

This place is lovely. It’s quite grand and, to start with, there were no other diners.

About four or five waiters and hosts and what have you, hovered about, checking if we were fine and if we needed anything.

We were given some lovely fresh-from-the-oven bread to start…

…and then an amousse bouche. No, erm, amooze boosh… No… Amuse bushe…. Ok! I’ll admit. My non-fanciness was giving me away! I had heard of this but I’ve never known what it was. I’ll never become the Masterchef Champion of the World at this rate. I did some research. It’s a goat’s cheese mousse, with tomato mousse and cheese and onion sprinkles on top.

I know what you’re thinking. And I was thinking it too. Cheese and onion sprinkles! What on earth!? But it’s ok. Just roll with it. They have a Michelin star.

Next were the starters.

Chicken soup with Jerusalem artichokes (and other stuff which I don’t remember) and a small beautiful ham and cheese toastie. If I were ill or just miserable and grumpy, I can’t imagine anything better than this beautiful beautiful little soup dish.

The other starter was a pig’s head and rabbit terrine with a pear and chicory salad. I was initially a bit scared of the “pig’s head” part but decided to face the fear and do it anyway. There was some kind of mustardy dressing thing on this which was gorgeous. And the terrine was really meaty, no snouts or eyes as I feared.

The mains were great, just the right amount for lunch and unbelievably tasty. They were a partridge dish with blackened figs and a crostini with game pate on it. And some greens, I forget which. I was too busy eating the amazing figs and trying to contain my excitement.

The other main was a butternut squash risotto. That sounds quite ordinary, doesn’t it? This was NOT ordinary. It had a parmesan mousse and some teeny baby shitake mushrooms and some clear squares of jelly which were beautifully sweet but I couldn’t remember what they were! Anyway, the whole thing was amazing.

Lastly, we had dessert and it was no less fabulous. Danda loves cherry and chocolate together so he got a chocolate ganache thing with cherries and a sweet lemon sorbet.

I had a giant marshmallow thing with strawberry sorbet hidden in the middle. It sat in a bed of summer berries and raspberry juice. It was phenomenal.

Lastly, just when we’d ordered espressos and thought we were done, they brought this beautiful board of sweeties.

What you can see is a vanilla macaroon, an orange and ginger jelly, a passionfruit marshmallow and a Baileys chocolate truffle. I scoffed most of it without an inch of decorum and I don’t care who knows it.

Overall, this might be one of the tastiest and most beautiful lunches I’ve ever had! Really great service, amazing food and a beautiful view of the river. What more could one expect from lunch?

M is for…

MARSHMALLOWS!

This was a very nerve-wracking experience for me so I thought I’d do another ‘What runs through my head when I’m…’ about it.

Ok, marshmallows! I’m going to make marshmallows! This will be amazing! Marshmallows. I can’t wait. Ok, the recipe. Nervous! Nervous! Ok, concentrate.

Sugar and water in a saucepan. Heat it to 216 degrees! What?! That’s so hot. Ok, jam thermometer, in it goes. In the meantime, whisk egg whites. I’d better do that now! Quickly before the sugar heats up! O goodness, it’s a race against time. Crack the eggs in, whip them up, ok, phew, done.

The. Sugar. Is. Taking. Ages. It’s been forever. The egg whites are settling a bit. Should’ve done them later. Why is it taking so long to heat up? O, wait a minute, the end of the thermometer has been touching the bottom of the pan, not the liquid! O no, I think I may have overheated it?! Quick quick! Get whisking the egg whites, pour in the sugar syrup. I think I burned it. Great. I think it’s burned. What do I do? I’ve just wasted all that sugar and those eggs now. Right, just keep going and see what happens.

It’s definitely burned.

Whisk, whisk, whisk. Dammit. Omygoodness, everything in the bowl just suddenly mixed together and swelled up and became one huge marshmallow! One huge bowl-shaped marshmallow. Amazing. I still think it’s burnt, I’ll just keep going and see if you can taste it after they’ve set.

Put half in a baking tray. Roll raspberries in icing sugar and cornflour and dot them over the marshmallow mixture. Other half of the marshmallow mix on top. O no, it’s sticking and the raspberries are going all over the place. Never mind. Just splodge it all on and hope it settles. Leave it for an hour and a half to set now.

Ok, hour and a half up. I’m definitely nervous again. Let me just turn it out of the tray. It’s stuck!! It’s stuck. I have the tray upside down and I am shaking it around like crazy. It’s stuck. Hmm. Calm down, calm down. Think. Spatula, slide round the edges, help it a little bit. Phew, it’s coming out, in one piece. A miracle! Loads and loads of icing sugar and cornflour and it’s sticking to me and to everything in sight.

Ok, breathe, calm. Cut into squares. Icing sugar. Cornflour. It doesn’t look burnt. I still think it might be. Taste one. O thank goodness! Not burnt. I knew it’d be fine. I knew all along. Phew. Need to get a second opinion. I wonder if any of my neighbours are in. Fill tupperware with marshmallows and find friends to get an opinion from.

That was fun. I think I’ll do some more soon.