Heartburn and Coconut Cake - Cook the Books Club

This month's Cook the Books Club feels like a turning point. After four years, we've had our first change in host personnel, as Joanna has stepped out and Simona and Heather have stepped in. After four years, the site has moved to a new blogspot home. And after four years of sourcing second hand copies of our books on Amazon, this is the first time I have used an e-reader. We live in interesting times.

Heartburn was announced as our book for this month back in April, a couple of months before author Nora Ephron passed away. The flood of obituaries that followed her death took Heartburn from a book that I had vaguely heard of, but was a little more familiar with as a movie, to a sort of cultural icon. There were articles on how it changed the dialogue about divorce and the background of her own marriage and divorce. Even more of the obituaries talked about Ephron's love of food. It made me very, very interested to finally read the book!

It's honestly not like anything I have read before. Very funny, even when describing heartbreak: for a story about the end of a marriage it was a very easy read. I didn't find any of the characters particularly sympathetic. Ephron managed to write a character based on herself without making herself particularly heroic or endearing.

One element I did like was the occasional line that Ephron used in later work. A rival is described as "Your basic nightmare", which is also how one of Sally's rivals is described in When Harry Met Sally, and there were other familiar turns of phrase.

Food runs throughout Heartburn, as Rachel is a cookery writer, but I didn't feel particularly inspired by any of those recipes. I decided to look into Ephron's work to a more ultimately optimistic view of relationships. At the end of When Harry Met Sally when they are describing how they fell in love, they talk about their wedding cake. An enormous coconut cake with a very rich chocolate sauce on the side. 

So I decided to make a coconut cake with very rich chocolate icing. Not on the side, because picky eaters annoy me.

I used Dan Lepard's coconut milk layer cake recipe - making 2/3 of the quantity and baking it in a single 9" cake tin. I omitted the lime juice but sprinkled it liberally with rum. I frosted it generously with buttercream.

Bounty Buttercream

125g soft butter
2 tbs good cocoa
3 tbs rum or malibu
3 tbs coconut cream
Small slosh coconut essence (if not using malibu)
Up to 500g icing sugar

Beat together the butter and cocoa until fluffy and the cocoa is evenly mixed. Add the rum, coconut cream and coconut essence if using. Then gradually beat in sifted icing sugar until it is the consistency you want - I was just piling it on so I left it quite soft, would have added more if I'd intended to pipe it.

It's moist, it's rich and uses plenty of butter. Nora Ephron would have loved it.

Rich, moist coconut cake topped with chocolate rum buttercream

Meat-Free Monday: ravioli minestrone

In case you hadn't noticed, last weekend I met Nigella Lawson. And as a bonus, I got a copy of her new Nigella-style Italian cookbook Nigellissima.

As I mentioned, I didn't particularly like the accompanying TV series, but now I have had a chance to peruse the book properly, there is a lot that I am tempted to cook. This soup was the first cab off the rank. It's a green minestrone (i.e no tomatoes) with the pasta element supplied by a pack of spinach and ricotta ravioli. It's also given some extra body by pureeing a portion of the vegetables with a handful of parmesan and a pile of basil leaves.

I did make a few changes to the recipe - I didn't have any fine beans but I did have runner beans, and I didn't want too much leftover so I left out the potato, courgettes and cannelini beans. Omitting those starchy bits meant that it probably isn't as thick and rich as intended, but it was a very nice, hearty supper. The basil puree mixture really lifted the flavours. A good start for a new cookbook.

Empire Tea - a warming cocktail of my own device

I've been wrestling with a dilemma for a while now. Should I tell you about one of my favourite things, and potentially make it too popular and less good, or should I hoard the knowledge to myself? The thing is, I've been going to a gin club for over a year. But it's getting really busy and I don't want anyone else to go to it. It's mine and I don't want to share. But I have to tell you about it so you understand where this drink comes from.

You see, at one meeting, the guest distiller was Chase, who make a delicious apple-based vodka and gin in Herefordshire. How very British. Then I discovered that they make a marmalade-infused vodka as well. Britisher and Britisher. And it was recently discounted at the supermarket, so I nabbed a bottle (eye for a bargain, arguably British).

I have also been enjoying the King's Ginger, developed to provide sustaining warmth to Edward VII in 1903. OK, so he was half German, but still VERY BRITISH.

Since ginger and marmalade have such an affinity (in flavour as well as both being terms for orange cats), I was kicking around ideas on how to combine Chase Marmalade Vodka and the King's Ginger in a cocktail. My first idea, for a champagne cocktail, didn't really work. It was, if you can believe it, too alcoholic. So I was thinking about what to use to lengthen it. What is more British than anything else? Tea.

This tea is, unfortunately, French, but since the British monarch only stopped using the title "King of France" in 1801 I am reclaiming, temporarily, a corner of Paris for the Empire.

I served this to a friend who'd arrived to stay on a cold day, without weather-appropriate clothes, and she found it thoroughly warming and reviving. Not as syrupy as a mulled wine or cider, more fortifying than a straight cup of tea. Edward VII would be proud.

Empire Tea (per serve)

35ml Chase Marmalade Vodka
35ml the Kings Ginger
150ml strong Mariage Frères Chandernagor tea (flavoured with cloves, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom and pepper, delicious fruits of colonialism)
1 lump crystallised ginger and, if properly organised to have such a thing, 1/4 slice of orange.

Put the booze into a robust glass then pour in the hot tea. Garnish with a lump of ginger and float a quarter of an orange slice on the tea. Nibble the crystallised ginger whilst sipping the steaming tea.

I could have done more with the presentation

BSFIC: Blue cheese and quince olive oil ice cream

A very long time ago (8 or 9 years ago now, I guess) Paul and I went with our friend Helen to a Greek restaurant in Petersham called Perama. The chef, David Tsirekas, was known for doing interesting and unusual things with classic Greek flavours. I remember that there was a large, noisy party next to us and that the staff were very apologetic - this party had brought along several more people than they had booked for and both the space and the kitchen was under pressure. I ordered the signature baklava ice cream, but the waiter had heard us talking about the olive oil ice cream and brought out a bit of that to taste as well.

It was divine. A green, fruity undertone from the olive oil, with an additional fruit note from dried figs, crunch from pistachios and a bit of spice. A very memorable taste.

On and off over the years I've thought about trying to make it myself, but I've never really had the opportunity. Then Kavey announced that this month's Bloggers Scream For Ice Cream event had a savoury theme. The perfect excuse.

While I was considering how to approach the olive oil ice cream, I also remembered the roquefort ice cream that I have had a couple of times at Mon Plaisir as a starter. I decided that I would use both olive oil and blue cheese in a sweet ice cream.

Rather than following David Tsirekas's recipe, I decided to use the condensed milk and cream no-churn base that had been so successful for me for the Japan BSFIC challenge. I thought about using dried figs, or the delicious little boozy baby bottled figs you can get, but then I spotted that quinces were in season and I knew that their honeyed flavour and intense perfume would be just the thing.

I followed the recipe in Nigella Lawson's Forever Summer, making life a bit more difficult for myself by peeling and coring my quinces and using those off-cuts to make the stock syrup for cooking them in, rather than sacrificing a whole precious quince to it. I also added a cinnamon stick, because I like the smell and wasn't going to add any cinnamon to the ice cream base.

Red roasted quinces - Maggie Beer via Nigella Lawson

I made an error of judgement in preparing the ice cream base, so I have written the recipe correcting the mistake. I added the olive oil to the cream and then tried to whip it. Of course, it didn't mount properly doing it that way. What I will do next time (and what you should definitely do) is whisk the cream and condensed milk together, then fold in the olive oil once you have the volume.

Folding chopped pistachios and diced quince into the ice cream

Blue cheese and quince olive oil ice cream (serves 4-6)


150ml double cream
80g condensed milk
1tsp vanilla
50ml extra virgin olive oil
75g St Agur (or other creamy blue cheese)
3 quarters of red roasted quince, diced
50g pistachios, chopped
extra quince quarters to serve

Whip the cream, vanilla and condensed milk to soft peaks, then fold in the olive oil, crumbled/grated blue cheese, nuts and quince. Still-freeze in a plastic box over night. Serve with quarters of quince and a drizzle of the quince syrup.

I had about 150ml quince syrup left over, which I re-boiled, spiked with 50ml white rum and bottled in a sterilized bottle. I have plans for it to feature in a cocktail at some stage.

Now, I thought this was absolutely delicious. Cooking the quinces this way gives them an almost glace-fruit texture, without any of the graininess that puts some people off quince. And the balance between salty, strong cheese, grassy olive oil and sweet condensed milk I thought I'd absolutely nailed. I needed a second opinion though. Paul's not particularly reliable on sweet things, and even more unreliable on sweet and savoury combinations (he doesn't like fruit with meat). Fortunately a very food-focused friend with an excellent palate came to visit, so I tried it out on her. She loved it and wasn't remotely freaked out by the unusual flavours. I'm not sure who else I could serve it to though.

Kavey improved the photo no end - increasing contrast and brightening up the colours

Afternoon tea with Nigella

Menu

Social media really is extraordinary. A couple of weeks ago Daniel Young tweeted that Nigella Lawson was cooking a one-day only, pop-up afternoon tea menu with him. I signed up for notification of the tickets going on sale. Then last week they went on sale, and in the 20 minutes it took me to get in contact with a friend who said she'd be interested in coming, both sittings sold out.

We put ourselves on the waiting list. I got a ticket pretty quickly, and then spent several days wondering if Megan was going to get a ticket or if I was going to have to go by myself and (ye gods) talk to strangers. But Daniel retweeted someone offering to either sell his ticket or buy someone else's. I swooped, and in a very straightforward transaction nabbed Chris's ticket.

At this stage it was still all very cloak-and-dagger. The venue was only announced on Friday, and we were asked not to reveal it until afterwards. Fair enough.

Parmesan shortbread and panettone stuffing squares. The shortbreads were about the size of £1 coins, to give you an idea of scale.

It turned out that the venue was a slightly dive-y, formica-tabled workmen's caff near Holborn. Not at all the sort of place you'd associate with the glamorous Nigella, or a fancy afternoon tea. It was all by design, of course - apparently she wanted to bring a breath of the 1950s Anglo-Italian experience to it all. So it was builder's tea, not a fancy loose-leaf blend, but good coffee, to reflect how far the British palate has come.

The food was on a similar Anglo-Italian theme, all recipes from her book Nigellissima, and a signed copy of the book came in the ticket price. I wasn't 100% enthused by that idea. I didn't particularly like the accompanying TV series, so I took a book plate and planned to ask her to sign that, to stick in my copy of Feast, which is my favourite of her books.

Cappucino pavlovas and nutella cheesecakes

The glass of prosecco that we started with was excellent. Dry and light. I've occasionally had excellent prosecco, but somehow whenever I buy a bottle it is sweet and headache-inducing, so I usually think I don't like prosecco. If it was all like this I would drink it more.

Daniel came around and explained how the event had come about and then cake-stands of food were served.

It seemed appropriate to start with the savouries: little coins of parmesan shortbread and squares of panettone stuffing. Personally, if I was designing an Anglo-Italian afternoon tea menu I'd have gone with some sort of mini taleggio rarebit squares (pizza was called Italian rarebit on menus when it first arrived in England) but the panettone stuffing was delicious. If we end up having a bird for Christmas this year I will definitely consider that recipe for the stuffing.

Christmas Pudding Cake.

Then on to the sweet stuff.

Cappuccino pavlova was not nearly as sweet as I feared - the strong bitter espresso flavour and properly unsweetened cream struck a very good balance. The outer shell was crisp, collapsing into dense, chewy marshmallow in the centre.

I think the chocolate hazelnut cheesecakes had been out of the fridge for a shade too long - they were almost impossible to get from the cake stand to the plate. Fantastic flavour though. It was very obviously nutella and cream cheese and nothing else. Although I am a confirmed baked-cheesecake lover, the creamy texture of this unbaked version was delicious.

And then, oh and then, Italian Christmas Pudding Cake. I had no expectations of what this would be like, based on the name. It turned out to be a sort of trifle affair, of boozy panettone and chocolate chip-studded cream layers, topped with pistachios and pomegranate arils. Utterly sublime. This is almost certainly going to make it to my Christmas table. 

I was utterly tongue-tied and couldn't think of a word to say

When push came to shove, I came over all star-struck and couldn't actually manage to ask her to sign my book plate. She had such a rhythm going of photo, a few words and signing the book that I just couldn't interrupt. She said she liked my glasses though.

A very superior bacon sandwich

Second proving

A very superior bacon sandwich begins with some superior bread. In this case, a home-made milk loaf made using Dan Lepard's recipe. Not too crunchy a crust, not too open a crumb, with a subtle sweetness.

Look at that nice even crust

Then a very superior bacon sandwich needs 3 rashers of superior crisply cooked streaky bacon. This should be dry-cured and from high-welfare, outdoor reared pork.

Finally, the choice of condiments. This is a private matter between you and your god, I cannot presume to dictate whether brown sauce, chilli sauce, chutney or ketchup is right for you.

3 slices of bacon provides the best coverage

My very superior bacon sandwich is going over to Deb for the Souper (soup, salad and sammie) Sunday round-up.

Presto Pasta Nights - Farewell!

 

So here it is - the very last Presto Pasta Nights. I'm a johnny-come-lately to this event, my first entry was only last year, but it's been running since March of 2007!

For this very special round-up, I decided to put a bit more effort in than my usual boiled-pasta-plus-a-sauce, and made some gnocchi. I used this recipe from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall for goat's cheese gnocchi, but instead of the walnuts in brown butter, I sauteed roughly chopped watercress and garlic in a little butter and added some cherry tomatoes and a little lemon juice to finish. The only other thing I did differently was to push the potatoes through a ricer, to keep the gnocchi light, rather than mash them.

It was, I think, the most successful batch of gnocchi I have ever made. Perfect texture, with just the most subtle flavour of goat's cheese. The walnut sauce sounded delicious but richer than I wanted! By adding the watercress and tomatoes, I didn't need to make a salad to go with it.

So, thank you to Ruth for all her efforts with this event over the last 290 weeks, and thanks to all of the guest hosts along the way.