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 forty-first week:
My husband made lots of the grated vegetable salad using: red onion, parsnip, swede, parsley and carrots and mixed with a dressing of plum vinegar, English mustard and rapeseed oil. We have found this to be a good thing to have in the fridge over the Winter months as it keeps very well for several days and is good to eat with many things – once this week with roast chicken; and another time with Aylesbury duck legs, and flageolet beans flavoured with garlic and rosemary; and also with a potato and soft cheese omelette and some rocket leaves. The leaves we have been buying at the farmers market from “Wild Country Organics” keep extremely well – at least a week and probably longer than that – they are good value too.
Other good things were: lemon sole, simply coated with seasoned flour and fried gently in a little butter with lemon, parsley and capers; roasted beetroot and Wild Country Organics rocket leaves with a dressing of blackberry vinegar and grain mustard;
Some unexpected but very welcome visitors meant a change to our plans including missing our usual shopping trip to the Barnes Farmers market and shops. We consequently found ourselves in the Walsingham Farm shop in Heacham, Norfolk where, I was surprised to find, we could buy enough “slow” food for the weekend and probably the whole week, and at a good price. This shop sells mainly local fruit and vegetables, local meat, fish, eggs and cheese and lots of locally made breads, pies (we bought a venison pie)and preserves amongst many other good quality local things. It was a pleasure to shop there and the food proved to be very good in terms of quality and value. We even bought some very tasty wine – Seyval Blanc, produced in Norfolk by Winbirri Vineyards.
This week’s British cheese we have tried is St Swithins, Norfolk soft cream cheese that I mixed with some fresh crabmeat, lemon and chives, which have just recently made an appearance in our garden, to make a delicious dip, which we ate with some spelt flour and sunflower seed toast.
More good things over the weekend included: the venison pie; some finely sliced leeks and bright green cabbage sweated and softened in butter; roast chicken and bread sauce; a pear dessert cake flavoured with elderflower cordial; a Mother’s day breakfast made by the children: very local and fresh poached eggs, local bacon, local sourdough toast and pea puree made with frozen, small English peas; oysters and a roast beef lunch overlooking the sea – all these things were delicious, particularly the breakfast, and were very much appreciated.
My husband has resurrected our pasta machine and has promised to make more fresh pasta next week.
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 fortieth week:
I have had a vegetarian diet for most of this week. There was no particular reason except that I thought I would try it. Lots of good things: Cauliflower soup with cheese and nutmeg; yellow split peas with onions, kale, parsley and spices; roasted beetroot with rosemary; carrot and lentil soup; cabbage soup with this week’s British cheese - Snowdonia Ruby Mist; boiled eggs; poached eggs; frittata layered with potatoes and softened leeks; finely sliced kale with plum vinegar dressing; raw cauliflower, carrots, radishes and sourdough bread with a warm anchovy dressing rather like Bagna Cauda . I didn’t miss having meat but I would not like to give it up altogether.
I sorted out the spices in our cupboard and I am afraid I had to throw several jars of ready ground spices away as they had turned to non-descript dust. Ready ground spices rarely last very long and I have resolved to do my best to avoid them in future. I made the spice mixture for the split peas by toasting some whole spices (fennel seeds, cumin seeds, a stick of cinnamon, star anise and cardamom pods) in a pan and then ground them to powder in a small coffee grinder – you could use a pestle and mortar instead but I would probably omit the cinnamon stick and star anise as they are probably too hard to make into a powder.
I did not force the vegetarian diet on my family and friends, so I have still been cooking meat for them; lamb chops with potatoes and spinach – all cooked in the same pan and then eaten with lavender jelly; slow cooked chicken stew with barley, lemon, bay, carrots, onions and parsley; slow cooked beef, potatoes, carrots and parsley with a dressing of oil, mustard, and my homemade horseradish vinegar. The beef, salted silverside, was a large piece, bought but not eaten at Christmas. So I had cut it into four pieces and frozen them. It was particularly good done in this very easy way and I am looking forward to repeating it. Indeed I have found all the “one pot” meals I have been making recently to be both delicious and easy to cook.
There was more rhubarb to add to the stewed Bramley apples for breakfasts but this week I baked the rhubarb in the oven with brown sugar. We still like Cox’s apples very much despite having at least one each day since September!
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 thirty-ninth week:
We have had even more good food than usual this week. Marrow bones roasted and eaten with toast, lemon, capers and parsley; Aylesbury duck, slow roasted with flageolet beans, thyme, garlic, mustard and honey; slow roast short rib of beef (enough for 3 for £9) with cauliflower in a Stilton cheese sauce.
A few days in Norfolk and so we had mussels – the last of the season I think. And oysters – we are trying to become experts in opening them. We also tried more local beers and a local white wine from Humble Yard which was surprisingly good.
My husband made pasta from scratch – using the “oo” flour I bought a few weeks ago. He used some to make sheets of lasagna, which he layered with béchamel sauce, fresh crabmeat and parsley - absolutely delicious. He also made a few ravioli stuffed with some Stinking Bishop (the British cheese we have tried this week) that were also delicious with a few drops of olive oil and some thyme leaves. We were both delighted that the pasta turned out so well at this first attempt – I am hoping he will become an expert before too long.
Lots of no meat meals too: omelette with a base of potatoes and Wensum soft cheese; cauliflower soup with Stilton cheese and rainbow chard; purple sprouting broccoli with anchovy dressing; free range eggs laid a few minutes from our Norfolk base, poached and eaten with toast and butter; stewed apples with raisins; stewed rhubarb with ginger.
A Sunday roast of a half shoulder of lamb slow roasted with potatoes, onions, garlic and rosemary with mint sauce made in the Summer - £8 and enough for two and also enough left over for a stir fried meal for two with added lemon, onions, garlic, mint vinegar and purslane. A simple salad of rainbow chard with a dressing of rapeseed oil and blackberry vinegar and melted Stinking Bishop cheese to end a week of delicious local and seasonal food for around £30 per person.
I haven’t mentioned it before but our increased use of fruit and vegetables has resulted in lots and lots of peelings. I have been dutifully composting these and this week I dug through the compost container to find to my delight that the bottom of the bin was full of dark compost ready to put on the garden – another benefit of the slow food challenge.
Two items of particular interest in respect of the food we eat this week. The first a report in the Sunday Telegraph last week about farmers being forced to convert their land from food production to other uses in order to stay afloat leaving us to rely more heavily on food from abroad. It a great concern to me that we could let ourselves become so dependent on other countries for our food.
The second is the publication of a new book by Joanna Blythman – “Swallow This: Serving Up The Food Industry’s Darkest Secrets” which contains some shocking but sadly not surprising food facts.
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 thirty-eighth week:
I have to start with a confession. Our youngest son has been home from University this week. He is an athlete and consequently keen on cooking and eating good healthy food. Always interested in new recipes and ideas we spent lots of time making good things: carrot, lentil and cumin soup; roasted kale; beef casserole laced with horseradish vinegar; lamb with lentils; hummus; beetroot dip; roast cauliflower; porridge with ground cinnamon – I really loved the time we spent together and I am delighted that he has turned into such a good cook.
We ran out of vegetables so unusually I had to buy more in the middle of the week and headed to a small (but expensive) shop in Wimbledon which sells lots of organic fruit and vegetables. He had mentioned that he would like to try a recipe he had found for a smoothie made with, amongst other things, kale, pears, bananas and blueberries. Oh that’s fine I had said except I can’t do the blueberries – sorry but there are too many unnecessary air miles involved so we will have to use apples instead and wait until the Summer for the blueberries. I found the kale, pears and fair trade bananas and loaded up the shopping basket. Then I saw them and without a second thought picked up not one but two packs of organic blueberries, flown all the way from I don’t know where! As if that act alone was not bad enough I then tossed not one but two avocados (he loves avocados) into the basket, headed to the till, paid and returned home with the bulging bag.
Our children have all bought into the slow food ideal even though they tease me about it, so of course they found my misdemeanor very amusing. My stepdaughter even feigned shock and horror and told me she had been to a supermarket recently for the first time in ages and had found the whole process so overwhelming and unpleasant that she had left with an empty shopping bag. Anyway, he ate the avocados and enjoyed them and he made the smoothie, which was delicious, but I am not going to buy any more blueberries until the Summer when they are in season here.
I have been thinking that if there was going to be a low point in this challenge it would probably be around this time of year but to my surprise I found two new things at the Farmers market this week. Rhubarb, which I have stewed with some brown sugar and ginger to eat for breakfast with yoghurt; and flower sprouts – a cross between kale and Brussels sprouts - a mongrel of the vegetable world. I used them, well washed and tossed in a dressing of sweet blackberry vinegar, mustard and oil and baked in the oven (200c) for 5 minutes. They are delicious.
I bought loads of other vegetables too. Winter purslane, which has become a favourite of ours, cabbage, cauliflower, potatoes, parsnips, carrots, leeks, onions, mushrooms, purple sprouting broccoli, swede and another new thing, rainbow chard leaves. So contrary to my fears of a lack of good vegetables at this time of year we have lots of lovely things and all for around £20.
I buy most other food at our local Barnes shops as I am a keen supporter of them – I like the shops and the people in them so I only buy foods at the Farmers market, which are not available in these shops. This week it was some Aylesbury duck legs and some beef marrow bones. I am thinking of roasting the duck legs with some beans. Having tried and failed to find a recipe for the marrow bones in my collection of cookery books, I have resorted to Google and found what looks to be a good idea from a collection of St. John’s restaurant recipes.
The dried figs I bought last week in Italy have been chopped quite small, covered in dessert wine and sealed up in a sterilized jar. I have done this before and I am confident that the figs will soften in time and soak up the wine to make a kind of chutney, which is particularly good to eat with cheese.
The British cheese we are trying this week is Bosworth Ash a goat’s cheese. I used it to make a tart with some dried figs, which was very good and easy as I had made the pastry base and frozen it several weeks ago.
I completely forgot about Shrove Tuesday but if I had remembered I would have made my pancakes very simply with sugar and lemon. I have allowed myself lemons all through the challenge – they can’t be grown successfully in the UK and they travel well and so do not need to be rushed by air.
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 thirty-seventh week:
We have been away for most of this week in France and Italy where the weather was mild, sunny and absolutely lovely. During our trip it occurred to me that taking part in the “challenge” and seeking out the local and seasonal foods in other countries makes trips abroad more interesting.
We stayed for several days in Le Broc, a small village in the Alpes Maritimes in the south of France. The road from Nice airport is dominated by an industrial estate with enormous supermarkets with the usual rows of brands and types of foods (amongst many other things including skis!) – all a bit overwhelming for me. To my delight we found a small grocery shop in the centre of the village, which specialises in Italian produce – the Italian border being only 30 minutes away by road. So, very seasonal and very local with especially lovely fresh vegetables and even some honey produced in Le Broc.
We ate out a few times but there was nothing locally to compare to eating and drinking at the homes of our friends in the area. Here are some of the things we had: black olive tapenade; fish soup with rouille and croutons; radishes; oysters and champagne; all kinds of cured sausages and hams; onion and fennel pastries; leek tart; little dishes of local delicacies; lamb chops with herbs, cooked on the barbeque; red wines in the evening and rose wine in the sunshine and, on one occasion, a glass of the famous Tesseron cognac. And the cheeses – French cheeses in France are delicious of course and we tried lots although the very local goat and ewes cheeses are not available until March.
A trip to Ventimiglia, in Italy, was a highlight of our week. There are numerous food and wine shops lining the busy streets, which surround the food market. To have such a place close to home is a delightful dream indeed for me and I confess to feeling envious of the local people. The market is open from 7am until 1pm on weekdays and all day on Saturdays. There is a whole section of homegrown and artisan produce where I bought olive oil and herbs, ravioli with mushrooms, and Pecorino cheese all of outstanding quality and at very reasonable prices. We later enjoyed all these things for our supper with some delicious Italian wine. After the market we visited one of the food shops which had so many lovely things to buy but I settled for some dried figs which I have plans for back at home.
Lunch was at a local restaurant in Ventimiglia– spaghetti vongole and tiramisu. It was a very good finish to our adventure.
Back at home on Friday and the cupboard was bare so I raided our freezer and found some lamb and lentil casserole, carrot soup and sourdough bread to last us until stocking up at the local shops in Barnes and of course the Farmers market for vegetables, fruit and bread. We bought lots of good things as we had visiting friends and family for the weekend: fresh crab with barley and purslane; another Phil Truin chicken; black kale, radishes and red onion; a shoulder of lamb; and lots of other vegetables including fennel, carrots, cauliflower, potatoes and parsnips; parsley, thyme and the usual eating apples, pears and cooking apples.
The British cheese we tried this week is Walsingham, which I used to make cauliflower cheese as it is rather like good cheddar.
My husband has decided to learn to make pasta and so has bought some “oo” flour – I am not sure what has brought this on but I am really hoping he does actually do it.