Slow Food London

Going Slow Week 25 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Slow Food London set a challenge: could regular Londoners go slow for an entire year? Would it be easy? Would it be hard? Would there be times when it would (slowly) start to go wrong?

Here, Susan Paul talks us through her twenty-fifth week:

I am planning and preparing for Christmas, as I am keen to make several food gifts and to keep the food we have “slow” and stress free – I am hoping to enjoy the whole process. The dried fruits for the Christmas puddings are now in the largest mixing bowl we have, soaking up the stout and brandy. 

I seem to have been all over the place this week and did not organise my food as well as usual. Consequently my diet suffered and I noticed the difference in my now usual feeling of well-being. I did however have a very special and delicious lunch of oysters and a steak at the Galvin Brasserie in Edinburgh – expensive though but it was after all for a 21^st birthday. We also tried some very good, creamy white and crumbly, Anster cheese which is made in Scotland by the St. Andrews Farmhouse Cheese Company.

By Friday there was still quite a stash of vegetables in the fridge. - I scrubbed and cooked the potatoes to keep for use at the weekend and they ended up in a delicious omelette with softened onions and sage. The remaining vegetables comprising a leek, some Brussels sprouts, carrots, a swede, and a parsnip, were washed, peeled and shredded for even more of the delicious salad with dressing (see below for details), and finely sliced red onion and chopped parsley that I have been making regularly over the past month or so. I have made a large bowlful, as experience has shown that it will keep extremely well for several days.

I added two new things to the usual bag of fruit and vegetables at the Farmers Market – some sorrel
and some Jerusalem artichokes – I just have to work out what to do with them now.

A Sunday lunch for family of Phill Truin’s free range roast chicken and giblet gravy with sage and onion stuffing – there is still lots of sage in our garden – cauliflower in a white sauce seasoned with nutmeg, roast potatoes and parsnips, and some spinach leaves tossed in the usual dressing of rapeseed oil (3tbsp), white wine vinegar (1tbsp), a little honey and a little mustard. For pudding we had a pear and almond dessert cake, which was followed by lots of washing up.

The lemon vodka started in week 23 tastes good so it has been strained into bottles. I bought some cut glass decanters from a charity shop for a few pounds each and have used them but I have also used other smaller and less glamorous bottles. These will make fun presents.

 

Related articles

Going Slow Week 23 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 22 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 21 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 24 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Week 21: "You can tell a lot about a fellow’s character by his way of eating jelly beans" – Ronald Reagan

Week 21:  (mostly) Slow in London by our community manager

Not endorsing his political views mind. I recommend you rummage in your freezer. I did, accidentally, and found 2 good meals I'd forgotten. Also, I keep making laksa.

Monday 10 November

The usual breakfast of  a boiled egg with or without E5 Bakehouse sourdough toast, and a cup of Colombian coffee with raw milk.

A bought brie and cranberry toastie, another coffee. A banana.

Some pistachios. Later yo sushi: pumpkin korreke, vegetable gyoza, salmon and avacado hand roll, aubergine, some salmon maki, crisy skin iso.

Tuesday 

The usual breakfast.

A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee. A banana,

Back at the Southbank and slim pickings on offer. Brought some  pistachios and bought an egg and cress sandwich.

Some cheese at home.

Wednesday 

The usual breakfast.

A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee. A banana,

Back at the Southbank, Brought some  pistachios and a tuna and cheese toastie.

Some Jarlsberg at home. And a Picnic bar.

Thursday 

The usual breakfast.

A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee.

Out for real ale, I had some Doom bar and later delicious Thai. Shared a great vegie platter including summer (cold) tofu rolls, corn fritters and tempura. a tasty adn fresh vegie tofy curry and egg fried rice.

No chocolate bar, some Jarlsberg at home.

Friday

The usual breakfast.

A bought brie, rocket and tomato baguette.  Another coffee.

I had left over laksa sauce from Saturday (Just low fried freshly grated ginger, chopped garlic, cloves x3, and British chillis half red and half a green, plus fresh coriander at the end and freshly squeezed lime juice, no vegetable stock, only mostly coconut cream and some milk. ) I roasted some pumpkin with black pepper and lava salt in olive oil, cooked the noodles, reheated the sauce, threw in some  coriander, lime juice, and spongy tofu bits.  

 Saturday

The usual breakfast.

Another coffee at the market. Didn't buy much except for fairtrade bananas (to eat at work), organic eggs, Isle of Wight tomatoes. I also forsook my usual E5 Bakehouse Hackney Wild for a 2 for 1 offer at the Degustibus stall, getting a delicious slice of focaccio, and sourdough - but the sourdough is not as lovely and moist as the E5.

A  toasted sandwich with soy and sweet chilli fried tofu  + egg,  tomatoes, mayonnaise, hommous, Jarlsberg, pickled cucumber, Sriracha sauce

Chocolate, I think Daim bars.

 Sunday

The usual breakfast.

A Caribbean vegie pattie with Isle of Wight tomato chiili sauce which is delicious.

I'd accidentally rummaged in the freezer during the week and rediscovered a fish cake, and a I think lemon sole fillet from Fin & Flounder. I recommend a rummage in your freezer if you haven't done so for a while. For dinner I had the fish cake with roast potatoes, yellow courgette, onion, garlic.

Chocolate.

Read: Week 20: "At the table with good friends and family you do not become old" – Italy

Read Week 19: “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy" - Benjamin Franklin

By our community manager Georgie Knight @slowfoodLondon aka @mermaid99.

Related articles

Week 13: "Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon." - Doug Larson

Week 14: "Food is an important part of a balanced diet." - Frances Ann Lebowitz

Week 15: "Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first." - Ernestine Ulmer

Week 16: "One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well." - Virginia Woolf

Week 17: "It is easier to halve the potato when there's love" - Ireland

 

Going Slow Week 24 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Slow Food London set a challenge: could regular Londoners go slow for an entire year? Would it be easy? Would it be hard? Would there be times when it would (slowly) start to go wrong?

Here, Susan Paul talks us through her twenty-fourth week:

The vegetables from the Farmers Market continue to be fresh and good and cheap. This week I spent £8.50 for a bag brimming with potatoes, onions, thyme, cauliflower, spinach, leeks, Brussels sprouts, tomatoes, swede and parsnips.

We are not getting tired of the all the apples and pears for breakfast – they are still delicious and cheap. This week we have had Cox’s apples and conference pears and I also stewed some Bramley apples, which took very little time and effort. We ran out of pears towards the end of the week so I substituted some chopped dried figs.

 The quinces from a couple of weeks back were still firm so I decided to try making jam with them. Again this did not take much time or effort (I grated the quinces including the peel) and I was pleased, and surprised with it to be honest – I am not known for my jam making expertise.  I will probably use the resulting luxurious deep pink and aromatic mixture as a filling for almond cakes or something more exotic.

I have to apologise for a mistake with the cheese last week. I said we had Rosary Goat’s cheese, which actually we tried in week 18, but in fact we had Innes Brick – also a goat’s cheese, which we ate with red onion jam and thyme in a pastry tart.

This week we have tried the stunning Montgomery’s Cheddar  - this is cheese royalty and I think it would be a good addition to our family Christmas dinner. We had some in sandwiches made with good wholemeal bread and butter and some finely sliced red onion - a fabulously fresh and classic sandwich which is just not possible to buy ready-made I think. We also had some in an omelette with potatoes and thyme at the base together with some watercress and finely sliced red onion.  I am not sure for how much longer the watercress will be available – at £1.50 a bunch from the greengrocer it seems rather a luxury compared to the prices at the Farmers Market.

I am going to use the rest of the cheese with the few leftover roast walnuts from the party last week, to make some shortbread biscuits to freeze and keep for Christmas.

I have experimented a little more with alternatives to bagged salad leaves, which were part of our diet, regardless of seasonality, before the “Slow Food Challenge” – we tried some finely sliced raw Brussels sprouts this week and were pleasantly surprised to find them delicious although I can’t quite believe I am saying this. They are excellent with a dressing of rapeseed oil and vinegar with a tiny bit of sugar and some mustard but they are also good with no additional ingredients at all. We have also tried raw grated parsnip in place of swede in the salad I have mentioned in the last two weeks and that is absolutely delicious too.

The drinks party for our neighbours last week was good and lots of people expressed an interest in Slow Food. One of the things we had were some roast walnuts with rosemary. They are easy to make so I thought I would give the recipe here:

Preheat the oven to 180c

Put 200g of shelled walnuts on a baking tray with 4 peeled and finely sliced garlic cloves and 2 or 3 sprigs of fresh rosemary. Bake in the preheated oven for 8 – 10 minutes  - they are ready when the nuts are starting to brown and smell delicious. Remove them from the oven, sprinkle with salt and allow them to cool. They will keep well in an airtight jar for a couple of weeks.

Related articles

Going Slow Week 23 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 22 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 21 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Going Slow Week 20 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Week 20: "At the table with good friends and family you do not become old" – Italy

Week 20:  (mostly) Slow in London by our community manager

 This week I'm turning Japanese (did you hear the 80s pop song in your mind?) It's all soupy noodles and sushi trains.

Monday 3 November

The usual breakfast of  a boiled egg with or without E5 Bakehouse sourdough toast, and a cup of Colombian coffee with raw milk.

 A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee. A banana.

Some pistachios.Later yo sushi: pumpkin korreke, vegetable gyoza, salmon and avacado hand roll, aubergine, some salmon maki.

A chocolate bar.

Tuesday 

The usual breakfast.

 A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee.

 Japanese for dinner: aubergine in a spicy sauce, salmon teriyaki, Asahi.

Cocktails at a near by bar. I get ridiculously disappointed when I order a martini and it comes in a champagne saucer not a martini glass.

A chocolate bar.

Wednesday

The usual breakfast.

 Lunch: left over from Sunday spelt spaghetti with capers, yellow courgettes  in a tomato sauce with grated cheddar. A banana.

Dinner: left over Saturday takeaway: local Indian veg samosas, a paneer dish, paratha. I cooked my own rice.

Thursday 

The usual breakfast.

A homemade sandwich: sourdough, Jarlsberg, tomato, pickled cucumber adds a good piquancy, and mayonnaise. Another coffee. A banana, a mandarin, a plum.

Vegie ramen and gyoza, Asahi out.

No chocolate bar, some Jarlsberg at home.

Friday

The usual breakfast.

A bought brie and cranberry toastie, another coffee. A banana.

A  toasted sandwich with soy and sweet chilli fried tofu  + egg,  tomatoes, mayonnaise, hommous, Jarlsberg, pickled cucumber, Sriracha sauce. A lager.

2x chocolate bar! It's Friday.

Saturday

The usual breakfast. Another coffee at the market. Didn't buy much except for fairtrade bananas, organic eggs, Isle of Wight tomatoes and ingredients for tonight's pumpkin and tofu laksa for friends, as I knew I'd be out most of the week. And bread nearby, my favourite E5 Bakehouse. The inspiration for the laksa was an Australian (of course) recipe I read. I went to Longdan for more coconut cream and those spongy tofu pieces you use in laksa. IThe recipe said to peel and roast the pumpkin. I settled for just roasting with black pepper and lava salt in olive oil.

During cooking had a piece of spelt toast with hommous and fresh tomato as I'd skipped lunch. Had bought laksa paste previously but again I didn't use it. Just low fried freshly grated ginger, chopped garlic, cloves x3, and British chillis half red and half a green, plus fresh coriander at the end and freshly squeezed lime juice. Noodles, no vegetable stock, only mostly coconut cream and some milk.  I'm not that fond of bean sprouts so they didn't get a look in. Plus they're one of the few vegie foods that could be contaminated. Those delicious fried shallot sprinkles on top when served. Even if I say so myself, the laksa was delicious.

Red wine, during Doctor Who prosecco and home made cookies that my friend brought and whisky during sci fi scrabble. I argued the case for bront as an abbrieviation for brontosaurus and got away with it.

Sunday

Argh. The usual breakfast. More coffee. Dishes. Cycled to the cinema to see Interstellar. Hhmm. A glorious mess is the best non spoiler I can do (and pinched that from someone else). Pistachios and home made cookies.

Home to a toasted sandwich with soy and sweet chilli fried tofu  + egg,  tomatoes, mayonnaise, hommous, Jarlsberg, pickled cucuymber, Sriracha sauce. And Chocolate bar.

Read Week 19: “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy" - Benjamin Franklin

By our community manager Georgie Knight @slowfoodLondon aka @mermaid99.

Related articles

Week 13: "Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon." - Doug Larson

Week 14: "Food is an important part of a balanced diet." - Frances Ann Lebowitz

Week 15: "Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first." - Ernestine Ulmer

Week 16: "One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well." - Virginia Woolf

Week 17: "It is easier to halve the potato when there's love" - Ireland

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Going Slow Week 23 - A journey of the highs and lows of eating Slow for a year

Slow Food London set a challenge: could regular Londoners go slow for an entire year? Would it be easy? Would it be hard? Would there be times when it would (slowly) start to go wrong?

Here, Susan Paul talks us through her twenty-third week:

We are hosting our neighbourhood drinks party and so I have used lots of my “kitchen time” on that. I have resolved to keep the food as “local and seasonal” as possible. The plan is:

• Hot Cumberland sausages with maple syrup and sesame seeds
• Fresh crab crostini with lemon and parsley
• Quail’s egg and smoked bacon tarts
• Roast walnuts with rosemary
• Quickes cheddar shortbreads
• Rosary goat’s cheese (the chosen British cheese for this week) with red onion jam and thyme leaves, in filo pastry
• Ginger, cherry and pecan Florentines

  Susan's Delcious Florentines

We have done all the shopping for the party locally. This local shopping has become a very enjoyable routine for us and this week we rounded it off with a lunch of lamb, spinach and flageolet beans at the Olympic Cinema in Barnes.

Despite all the party preparation, we have managed to eat well and “slow” albeit more simply than usual.

One of our sons recommended that I try cauliflower mash. I did and it was really  very good. I pureed some cauliflower which had been cooked until just tender and added a little of the cooking water, some nutmeg and some grated Wyfe of Bath cheese but I think almost any cheese would be good. It all needed reheating in the oven – 15 minutes at 180c. We ate this with slow-cooked beef casserole laced with English mustard, garlic, wine vinegar and finely chopped parsley.

The grated swede salad with carrot and parsley was so good last week that I have made lots more. Other good things have been: the red peppers and tomatoes, bought at the farmer’s market, which I roasted with some anchovies and thyme - we ate them with potato and rosemary sourdough toast; more bacon, spinach and barley soup with lemon zest – this has become a firm favourite; and a simple omelette of fried potatoes with thyme.

I am making a few things in
anticipation of Christmas as I am going to be busy with other things over the coming weeks and so need to be super organised. This week I have put some lemons in large sterilised jars and added sugar and vodka to make some lemon liqueur for Christmas presents. This will only take a couple of weeks to “brew” and then I will strain it into bottles. I use a similar process to make an orange gin but that takes much longer to “brew” – I started mine last January using some Seville oranges but it will be ready in time for Christmas.