Little Mr Muffet sat on his tuffet eating his curds and whey.

Migneron de Charlevoix, unpasteurised cow's milk cheese from  Charlevoix (Baie-Saint-Paul), Quebec (left) and Petit Basque sheep's milk cheese from the Pyrenees, France (right).

It's true that when it comes to stenographers you really get what you pay for. When Irving Berlin dictated the lyrics to the song that we are familiar with as "Cheek to cheek", he originally intended it to be a homage the American dairy industry. "Cheese to cheese", as it was entitled, would have had the following lyrics had Irving not unwisely recited the words to a close friend who had deafened himself by dancing the grizzly bear and the chicken walk too close to the the orchestra in New York's ragtime clubs (for the record this friend redeemed himself by making Berlin's "White-mould Christmas"more readily accessible).

 

"Heaven, I’m in heaven

And my cholesterol makes my heart beats so that I can hardly speak

And I seem to find the happiness I seek

When we’re out together feasting cheese to cheese"

Recently I discovered Les Amis du Fromage and I would have to say I that I concur with Mr Berlin when I say that I was in heaven. Les Amis du Fromage is the best cheese shop that I have ever been into, it's three hundred and sixty degrees of cheese.

It stocks not only some of my all time favourites like Petit Basque (and it's Pyrenees brother Etorki) but possibly more exciting is the range of Canadian cheeses that they have available. These include local British Columbian cheeses from Poplar Grove and the Kootenay Alpine Cheese Company as well as from Quebec, Canada's provincial outpost for cheese eating surrender monkeys.

If cheeses such as the delicious washed-rind La Sauvagine are anything to go by, it would appear that being of French derivation endows people with super-human abilities. They have retractable, sterilised, stainless steel claws for cutting curds; hidden rennet excreting glands that allow them set vast, vats of milk; from their wrists they can sling a webbing of cheese cloth that allows them to drain curds from any structure and finally they possess chameleon-like abilities transforming from white mould to ash coated to an orange washed rind in seconds. Little is known about how these beings came to live amongst the Canadian population but in a sick twist of fate it has come to light that these dairy demi-gods are rendered powerless but many of the alien Canadian dairy products in particular orange cheese (otherwise known as the Quebecois Kryptonite).

We live in a frightening world full of refrigeration units stocked with substances called Homo, Half and Half or simply 2%. Thankfully while most milk falls a long way from the udder these days, there are still a few remaining strongholds such as Le Amis du Fromage where we can be fortified by the unadulterated, unpasteurised, full fat nectar of the teat.  

Etorki sheep's milk cheese from the Pyrenees, France; La Sauvagine, pasteurised cow's milk from Quebec;  La Besace du Berger pasteurised goat's milk cheese from France (left to right).

Small & Oats: You Make My Creams Come True

For this dish I drew on the David Chang (Momofuku) "Cereal Milk" dessert for inspiration. I appreciated his idea infusing milk with a cereal (in his case toasted cornflakes) before using it to make a dessert but departed from his more avant garde approach of pairing it with avocado puree and a "chocolate hazelnut thing." Instead I chose a more homely combination, one that shied away from excessive sweetness, that possessed a certain lightness and an almost savoury quality. Having rolled oats as my starting point lead me to make something that mimicked the flavours of a fruit crumble.

Wobbly Crumble (Serves 6)

1/4 cup rolled oats

300 ml thickened cream

100 ml sour cream

50 ml milk

1/4 vanilla bean (seeds scraped)

20g brown sugar

10g caster sugar

generous pinch of salt

2 gelatin leaves (4 grams)

Preheat oven to 150C. Toast oats on a tray until they are a golden brown (around 20 minutes). Once they have cooled for a couple of minutes add them to 200 ml of the cream and the milk and allow to sit for 45 minutes.

Strain out the oats and use a rubber spatula to gently extract 200 ml of liquid (some will have been absorbed by the oats). Transfer the cream/milk into a saucepan with the vanilla bean, sugars and salt. Place over a low heat, stirring regularly, to dissolve the sugar. While this is happening bloom or soften the gelatin leaves in cold water (I like to do it in ice water) until they become floppy (2-3 minutes). At this point remove them remove water and squeeze them to get rid of excess moisture, then stir them into the milk mixture until dissolved. Strain into a bowl (you can rinse and reserve the vanilla bean for another use). Cool to room temperature.

Fold in the sour cream and pass ensure that there are no lumps. Whip the remaining 100 ml of cream to soft peaks and fold into the mix. Divide the mix between six, lightly greased, molds (around 100 ml capacity). Allow to set in the refrigerator for around five hours.

To serve, unmold the set cream (to do this gently use a finger to pull it away from the mold on one side creating an air-pocket that should allow it to slide out onto the plate). Scatter the plate with the apple and blackberries and the reduced fruit syrup. Finish the plate with the caramelised rolled oats.

Stewed Fruit 

3 Granny Smith apples (peeled, cored and cut into a large dice)

1 punnet of blackberries (washed)

2 tbsp butter

1/4 vanilla bean, seeds scraped

brown sugar

caster sugar

white wine

 a generous pinch of .salt 

lemon juice

Ratios for this are difficult are inexact as the ripeness of the fruit will dictate how much sugar is required, how much liquid cooks out of them and how much lemon juice is required to provide balance to the sauce.

To a large frying pan over medium/high heat add the butter, apple, salt, vanilla bean and sufficient brown sugar to coat the apple. Once the sugar has dissolved and the apple has started to soften, add the blackberries and deglaze the pan with white wine. Cook until the apple is soft but still has bite and the blackberries have bled some colour but not collapsed. Remove the fruit from the pan and reduce the syrup until it has thickened (adding caster sugar if necessary). Adjust the flavour with lemon juice to achieve the desired balance between acidity and sweetness.

Caramelised oats

1/4 cup rolled oats

2 tbsp caster sugar

pinch of salt

1 tbsp butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 150C.

Combine the oats, salt and butter, then sprinkle evenly with the sugar.

Bake on a lined tray until the sugar caramelises and turns a deep golden colour ( at least 20 minutes). 

Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

Store in a sealed container at room temperature for up to a week. 

Quintessence

I have an abiding memory of my mother wolf's description of tasting the quintessential orange. It was on a ferry ride in Istanbul, in 1968, that she had the orange against which all other oranges would be compared.
The notion of encountering the quintessence of an ingredient is a culinary holy grail quest.

It is the convergence of simplicity and completeness in a single bite. The distillation of the purest form of an ingredient. It makes me feel like when I look at sculptures by Alberto Giacometti, at times they are not the most attractive representations of form but in stripping away the superfluous elements, somehow they capture the most vital part: the soul. Giacometti's portraits are at times unnerving, in that as a viewer you feel like you are prying into the inner most thoughts and secrets of the bronzed figure before you.

Encountering the essence of a person in a sculpture may be both moving and unsettling but when you come upon this quality in an ingredient it is heavenly. The wonderful thing about tasting quintessence is that it defies hype, superlatives, best of's, it cannot be revisited or competed against; it just simply is. In that mouthful, at that moment in time that person was part of something complete and incomparable.

Some chefs are true Crusaders in their unflinching resolve to capture this culinary last covenant but few have the skills, knowledge, patience and empathy to complete this quest. Dan Hunter from The Royal Mail in Dunkeld, Victoria, is truly a knight of the covenant. Since eating at The Royal Mail over two years ago I have held the unwavering belief that it will come to be recognised to be not only one of Australia's best restaurants (it has already been named the best regional restaurant in Australia for three consecutive years by Gourmet Traveller) but one of the great restaurants of the world. Set against the breath-taking backdrop of the Grampians, Dan Hunter produces exquisite dishes driven by location, seasonality and purity of flavour. It was particularly this last aspect that struck me when I ate there, reflecting on my meal I have never had a succession of courses like that where everything on the plate tasted like it's truest form. It takes remarkable talent and conviction to achieve this feat once but particularly to repeat this day after day, service after service.

For the rest of us mere culinary mercenaries who can't afford to eat the ten course omnivore degustation at The Royal Mail everyday, we have to seek solace in the fact that each day brings the possibility of a chance encounter with a sublime mouthful.
The following are some the wonderful things that have passed between my lips recently:

• Agassiz hazelnuts- These nuts come from a town not far out of Vancouver and they are like no hazelnut that I have ever had. These fresh hazelnuts are sweet, rich, smooth and completely without any tannic, bitter aftertaste.
• British Columbia white anchovies- Hand filleting pounds of these small fish is no chore when at the end you get to eat white anchovies that have been freshly marinated with lemon juice, garlic, parsley and olive oil.
• Red Fife flour- Recently we started making the bread at work with Red Fife flour which is a heritage Canadian bread flour that was saved by the Slow Food movement in Canada. The difference in flavour between bread made with flour such as this or a generic white flour is worlds apart. This bread is full of depth, character and structure (it reminds me of Baker D. Chirico's bread) and it demands to be eaten warm and lathered with butter (note this means good butter and not some namby pamby spread with various additives that are supposed to benefit your heart) or toasted and topped with fresh white anchovies.
• Butter fish- This fish is also known as Black Cod (although not technically a cod) and Sable fish but to paraphrase the bard (or Anne Hathaway who was probably more likely to have done the cooking in the Shakespeare household) "What is in a name? That which we call a Sable fish Would by any other name taste as sweet." This is quite simply one of the most delicious tasting fish I have ever eaten, its' firm flesh giving way to yield its' creamy, buttery flavour. At home I seared the skin side before poaching it in a tomato and fresh tamarind prawn broth with Savoury clams and okra. 
• La Ghianda's Vitello tonatto ciabatta- Often restaurants are guilty of over complicating food and a sandwich like this is a salient reminder of the joy of simplicity. Vitello tonnato is by it's nature an ugly dish that makes for great eating. The temptation is to pull a Professor Henry Higgins and try and turn cold veal with a tuna sauce into Audrey Hepburn. La Ghianda (the deli associated with the restaurant La Quercia, where I can't wait to eat) to their credit have simply dressed Eliza Doolittle in modest ciabatta and sent her out into society.

I will never know how that orange tasted in the warm Turkish sunshine of 1968 but even in the cold, abrasive Vancouver daylight, the possibility exists for my own moment of tasting quintessence.     

Hedgehogs, Black trumpets and Watermelons: A Dinner for Surrealists

Watermelon radish. 

Hedgehog (left) and Black trumpet mushrooms (right). 

I picked up these wonderful ingredients at the Granville Island Market today for dinner.

They became a wild mushroom and pinenut ragout that went with sauteed ricotta gnocchi and a simple green lettuce, basil and radish salad.

Sauteed ricotta gnocchi with pinenuts.

I was so pleased with how the gnocchi worked out that I thought that I would share the recipe.

Sauteed Ricotta Gnocchi

500g ricotta, drained

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 whole egg and 1 egg yolk

1 cup plain flour

Combine the ricotta, salt and eggs in a bowl and mix well.

Add all of the flour and mix thoroughly then blend for a short time in a food processor or with a stick blender.

Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and allow to rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

 Dust a bench with flour and divide the dough into six portions. Roll each portion to form a log with a 1 cm diameter and using a floured paring knife cut into 1 cm lengths. Note: Use sufficient flour for dusting  to prevent sticking and use a plastic bowl scrapper to lift the finished gnocchi onto a floured tray. 

The gnocchi can be frozen at this stage and defrosted for use at some later date.

Blanch the gnocchi in small batches in a large pot of boiling, salted water until they all rise to the top. Drain and serve immediately or refresh quickly in ice water then drain.

To saute the gnocchi heat olive oil and butter in a wide frying pan over medium heat. When hot enough add the refreshed and drained gnocchi, ensuring that they separated. Leave the gnocchi alone without moving it to allow it to develop a golden brown colour then turn them over and do the same on the other side.

To finish, toss with sauce and serve.

Kimchi: A Cinderella Tale

 Recently we added a delicious new dish to the menu at work, braised pork cheeks with house made kimchi and a flash fried egg. During this time I also received a copy of David Chang's Momofuku cook book and discovered an excellent Korean supermarket called H-Mart. This confluence of events has drawn the waft of spicy, fermented cabbage to my attention.

Driven by my compulsion to make my own paechu kimchi (napa cabbage kimchi) I turned to the power of the internet for instruction.

The Ultimate Kimchi offered an interesting and unusual methodology. It required the broccoli (?) to be "cut into byte-sized pieces." I was not sure whether this meant that they need to be cut into eight bits or just an indication that the broccoli is to be sliced so infinitesimally small as to be negligible in the finished product. As I read through the recipe I came to the following passage:

"After sprinkling salt, gently stir it into the cabbage. Do this with your hands, rather than with a tool. (We'll discuss more on this later.) Use your hands like you're hugging the cabbage. Move them gently around the sides, and then gather them into the center. Then push the cabbage to the sides (gently) and pull your hands around the edges like you're swimming with a breaststroke.

The hugging motion is gentle. Generate love while you're doing it. Its hard to overstate the importance of this step. Whenever we make Kimchi, it comes out good, but nearly as good as Grandmaster's. We're pretty sure that the missing ingredient is love. No one generates love with the intensity and purity that Grandmaster does. Its interesting to watch Grandmaster at times like these, too. If someone speaks to her, she may nod, or smile, or she may not react all -- but her concentration never wavers. She is completely absorbed in what she is doing. She is also completely aware of everything going on around her -- who is saying what, who is doing what, and where they are -- but she has her attention focused on one thing -- and that concentration makes a big difference in her kimchi." 

Eternally grateful for receiving such insightful tips I set about preparing for my first kimchi. I indiscriminately hugged all of the cabbages in the local grocers until they asked me to leave because they confused my expression of love for making out with the savoys. Apparently they also found my behaviour inappropriate at the local indoor pool where they took issue with my "swimming with a breaststroke" technique.

Having plastered the apartment with Post-it note reminders to not forget to include love, I thought it would be advisable to cross-reference with a second website.  Maangchi You Tube tutorial was highly instructive and more significantly I wasn't left emotionally crippled by the feeling of inadequacy at having to compare to the Grandmaster.  

 Drawing on these lessons and using the recipe for paechu kimchi and kakdugi (radish kimchi) from the Momofuku cookbook as a guide, I devised the following recipe.

Nappa cabbage and radish kimchi

1 medium and 3 baby Napa cabbages, outer leaves removed and washed

1 medium Korean mu radish, cut into 3cm cubes and juliennne the scraps 

4 tbsp coarse sea salt

3/4 cup and 4 tbsp sugar

30 garlic cloves

30 slices of peeled ginger

3 tbsp salted shrimp

3/4 cup kochukaru (Korean chili powder)

1/2 cup fish sauce

1/2 cup usukuchi (light soy sauce)

1 bunch of spring onions, sliced

1/2 bunch of garlic chives, cut into 3cm lengths

1 large carrot, peeled and julienned

Cut the cabbages in half and cut the medium cabbage into 3cm pieces. Salt the cabbage and cubed mu radish, add the 4 tbsp of sugar and refrigerate overnight.

Mince the garlic, ginger and salted shrimp. Add the fish sauce, kochukaru, usukuchi and remaining sugar. Adjust the dressing with water to achieve a thick sauce consistency.

Thoroughly drain the cabbage and combine with the dressing (be sure to be wearing gloves for this stage). Then stir in the garlic chives, spring onions, julienned carrot and radish.

Refrigerate for at least a week. The flavour will develop the longer it is allowed to sit.

Having completed my kimchi today I was struck not only by its' intoxicating potency of flavour and colour but it reminded me of the Cinderella ingredients that are part of so many Asian cuisines. As with the salted shrimp in this recipe often there are these elements that smell and taste like sucking on the ugly step-sister's toes. However wave the fairy god mother's stick blender over them and they transform into something with depth, interest and a complex, exotic beauty that brings harmony and balance to the land. 

The Weekend Ahead

Napa cabbage (or Chinese cabbage) for my Kim Chi.

It's 1:30 AM and my weekend has begun.

I have big plans for the next two days, these plans include, in no particular order, the following:-

Make kimchi (the process is already underway as I salted the napa cabbage and Korean raddish before starting work today).

Undertake a solo polar bear swim in English Bay (cue manly inspirational music and a montage of me climbing stairs). The Polar Bear swim is a Canadian New Year's day tradition where willing (and ideally blubber insulated) participants take the plunge into the icy ocean. Despite the best of intentions I missed the opportunity to partake in this annual event so instead I have created a one-time exhibition swim called "The Chiller in Van-illa." Stay tuned for details as one man in board-shorts pits himself against the might of the Pacific Ocean.

Make the trip across the Burrard Street Bridge to West Broadway to sample the reportedly delicious pastries from Thomas Haas.

Watch the Vancouver Canucks as they seek to continue their best winning streak in their forty year franchise. This streak has the Canucks leading the entire league and chasing their ninth straight win as they take on their closest rival in the Western Conference; the Detroit Red Wings. Exciting times to live in this success starved hockey town as this immensely talented and well balanced team builds towards great things. 

A pistachio croissant and selection of macarons from Thomas Haas plus the best coffee I've had in Vancouver from 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters.

Discustation

Discustation is a concept that I threw up a while ago, it refers to a meal of small tasting courses where each course endeavours to be more repellent than the one that preceded it. Having coined this term I feel well within my linguistic rights to change its definition.
The new meaning of discustation is far broader in its scope and refers to any use of language that makes food or eating less appetising. I won't endeavour to conceal the primary objective of this new term which is a search and destroy, culinary witch hunt. Places offering Asian tapas have been served notice the Larousse Inquisition will soon be knocking at your door. Menus will be excommunicated and non-believers char-grilled at the steak. Please feel free to dob in offenders. Your efforts will make this a safer world for the appetites of your children and your children's children.

A less than glossary of terms:
Floats: Ice cream sodas otherwise known as 'spiders'. Floats just makes them sound like buoyant dead bodies.
Steamers: Although the term steamer brings to mind images of warm dog poo on a cold day, they are in fact steamed burritos.
Jerk chicken: A Jamaican speciality of hot spice marinated chicken that's smoked over an aromatic wood. Undoubtedly this is a delicious dish but is it named such because it has to be produced an obnoxious Rastafarian. Probably even more disturbing is the moment a male colleague assured that "I have to try his jerk sauce."
Dredge: It is going to make difficult viewing when an American Food Network presenter exhumes a cadaver while dredging fish fillets.
Broil: Not content to grill food, North Americans insist on broiling, a medieval practice of torturing people with overcooked, rubbery food.
Smokie: A smoked hot dog coupling the public love for sausages with the addictive powers of carcinogens.
Tube steak: A beginners guide as to how to make a processed meat sound even more unnatural, apply a very literal description to the product.
Japa dog: An iconic Vancouver hot dog with Japanese influenced accompaniments. Where this product goes wrong is to create a subconscious connection between the frankfurt and the source of the unspecified meat. Shiba inu? Akita inu?
Potstickers: Generally speaking you wouldn't name a style of dish after a dinner party disaster which leaves you with the cremated remains of beef bourguignon in the bottom of your Le Creuset and hours of scrubbing ahead of you.

Blacklisted Eateries:
The Dog House: There are unquestionably some gourmet dog food products on the market but if you are going to brand yourself a family restaurant don't expect to have anyone on less than four legs salivating at the prospect of eating at The Dog House.
The Beaver and Mullet Bistro: A misguided Canadian attempt at surf and turf or lodge and school.
Ho Ho's Yummy Food: Risking being accused by ghosts of Christmas past of failing to see the enduring appeal of associating a Chinese restaurant with Santa's rumbling chortle, yo no hablo Chino .
Beard Papa's: A successful international franchise that makes unearthly light cream puffs but why associate a choux pastry range with a hairy, pipe smoking mariner?
The Smoking Dog French Bistro: Apparently having cigarette ash and dog hair in the Ratatouille is a drawcard.

This is merely the beginning, a drop in the spittoon of life but I will not tire in this culinary crusade until taste buds across the globe are free from the tyranny of discustation.

Christmas Cake

This Chocolate, Raspberry and Creme Fraiche layer cake was my contribution to Christmas dinner. This photo was taken post operation after the corrective surgery required to remove the baking paper from under each layer of chocolate cake. Thankfully I realised the error of my baking ways in time and didn't ruin Christmas. 

Comfort Food

An almond and chocolate croissant from Boulangerie Chopain

Above my head Vancouver is making a concerted bid to impress international delegates to name it "the Greyest city in the World." Despite the horizontal rain and an umbrella that prefers to invert itself and masquerade as a portable satellite dish, I am exceedingly happy. On my lips remains the sweet grit of sugar that dusted the apple filled donut from Lee's Donuts in the Granville Island Market. The simple delight derived from biting into the yeasted dough to be greeted by the ooze of cinnamon infused apple sauce reminds me of the great comfort that food can give.

The term comfort food is synonymous with fried food and rich Winter fare but to me it is the taste, the smell of anything that makes you feel at home. What makes it even better is that food can be a fantasy home entirely removed from your own. It can be a Mexican hacienda, a rustic Tuscan villa or a refined, ultra-modern condominium with sleek lines.

Some dishes through no fault of their own fall out of favour or even worse into being cliched.  Chicken cacciatore is one such victim of over-exposure and poor execution. Having cooked it on a couple occasions recently I have found it to be every bit as comforting as it would have been to the cacciatore (or hunters) who originally prepared it. What's not to love about golden, braised chicken falling off the bone with the sweetness of sweated onion, garlic, oregano and red pepper; the salty edge of capers and plump olives in a shimmering, rich tomato and white wine sauce.

At times home can be constructed from the most unassuming of materials. Beef cheeks are some of my favourite lumber for building a snug log cabin in the woods. Given time they reward you for your patience as the beautiful, gelatinous texture melts away in your mouth. For a dinner party I braised some with red wine and thyme at 95C for twelve hours and served it with a celeriac puree. To serve with the meal, I made a salad with a new building material for me; fresh chickpeas. I paired the blanched chickpeas with shaved golden beetroot, kohlrabi, parsley, shallot and dressed it with lemon juice, olive oil and dried oregano. It proved to be a fresh new addition in my beef cheek cabin.

Every so often strangers provide you with a home away from home. At the moment I have an insatiable hunger for my two new homes (La Tacqueria and Bread & Meat) both in Gastown that has me constantly thinking "homeward bound I wish I was."

La Tacqueria is hole in the wall Mexican taco shop serving their addictive fillings in double soft corn tortillas. The simple answer to the question how do you choose between the Pescado (grilled fish with pico de gallo) and the De Cachete (braised pork cheeks from Chilliwack) is you don't. You order both plus the sauteed mushrooms in chipotle sauce (De Picadillo), the braised beef cheeks with pickled onion and hope that you have room left for the Rajas Con Crema. 

Conveniently only a block away from La Tacqueria, an Australian ex-pat and his Canadian mates have established a stubble chic shrine to carbs and protein; Meat & Bread. The concept is as simple as the name, on the altar of warm, freshly baked bread is placed delicious portions of fattened sacrificial beast. It might be harissa braised lamb shoulder with jicama and coriander served on the paper lined wooden chopping board along the house mustard and truly excellent sambal. Ultimately it's all about the porchetta, a rolled roast of Two Rivers pork. The slices of herb stuffed porchetta are sweet, succulent with the textural contrast of the crunch of golden crackling and finished with a bright, punchy salsa verde.

Although I will be risking accusations of being a home wrecker I may well have discovered a comfort food that will tear me away from my Gastown digs. Ramen Santouka offers Tokusen Toroniku Ramen, a bowl of buttery flavoured, salt broth full of noodles. The pork broth is accompanied by bamboo shoots, jelly ear, slices of melting boiled pigs jowl and finished with a pickled plum.

Every so often I encounter a person who cooks so effortlessly and with such soul that I cannot help but be envious. The latest is Delilah a joyous Columbian kitchen-hand who calls me (and everyone else) honey. One night as she had promised, Delilah brought in some of her home cooking, deboned chicken thighs stuffed with potato and peas and cooked in a "coconut milk gravy" as well as a simple salad. Some people cook as they live and I am thankful to have met and eaten Delilah's food.

  

The plight of being a culinary orphan is a very pleasant affliction, taking comfort and being nurtured by all foods that open their doors to me. In the words of another ravenous street urchin, I am left asking "Please sir, can I've some more?"  

Salted chocolate caramel

Toby's Recipe

This is a remarkably simple but decadent and delicious dessert. It can be served as a petit four or alternatively form the base for a plated dessert,  recently I served it with a roasted chestnut puree and candied walnuts.

Salted Chocolate Caramel

1 cup caster sugar

1/2 cup glucose (honey or corn syrup can be substituted)

1 cup cream

60g couverture chocolate

1 tbsp butter

Place the sugar and glucose in a saucepan. Over medium heat bring to a caramel.  Just before the caramel starts to burn remove from the heat and add the cream. Return to the heat and bring to 115C (use a sugar thermometer to check the temperature). Fold in the chocolate and butter then pour into a lined tin.

Allow to cool the transfer to the refrigerator. Portion once set. Serve at room temperature and finish with a pinch of good quality sea salt flakes. 

Won't You Take Me To Fungitown.

This was an exciting selection of mushrooms that one of the suppliers brought into work.  From the delicate miniature shitakes, the majestic king oysters, the beautiful lavender toned blue foot mushrooms, the clusters of blue oysters, brown and white honsemiji . The box of goodies also included these gorgeous, little home grown chickpeas.

These beautiful mushrooms became a simple and delicious breakfast.

Mushrooms on toast

Selection of mushrooms (blue foot, blue oyster, king oyster, miniature shitake and button)

1 brown onion (sliced)

4 garlic cloves (minced)

1/2 tsp thyme (fresh or dried)

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

1/2 tbsp  Dijon mustard

1/2 cup chicken stock (or water)

1/2 cup milk

Sweat the onion in butter and/or olive oil. Add the garlic, spices and saute. Add the mustard, stock and milk, reduce to form a sauce.

In a pan saute the mushrooms with olive oil over a medium/ high heat until they have a golden brown colour. Add the sauce and simmer. Season to taste.

Serve on good quality, toasted bread.

Mi Mexican condiments (Casa Remus)

  Recently I made Baja Fish Tacos and to accompany them I produced some  Mexican condiments: the ubiquitous pickled red onions; a texturally interesting ensalada de nopalitos (the first time that I have prepared fresh cactus) and delicious spicy Mexican pickled vegetables.   

Spicy mexican pickled vegetables

12 garlic cloves
1 medium onion (cut into wedges)
3/4 cup olive oil
4 medium carrots (thinly sliced)
1 tspn black pepper corns
1 1/2 cups white vinegar
2 cups water
5 whole jalapenos
1 medium cauliflower (in florettes)
3 tbspn salt
3 medium zucchini (thinly sliced)
12 small bay leaves
3/4 tspn dried majoram
3/4 tsp dried oregano
5 whole sprigs of thyme

Saute garlic and onion in hot oil for 3 minutes.
Add carrots and peppercorns, saute for 5 minutes.
Add vinegar and jalapenos; cover; reduce heat, simmer for 3 minutes.
Stir in water; cover and bring to the boil.
Add cauliflower and salt, stir well, cover, reduce the heat to medium and cook for 5 minutes.
Add zucchini, bay leaves, majoram, oregano and thyme. Stir well and cook for 2 minutes.
Transfer and cool for at least 8 hours before serving.

Ensalada de Nopalitos (Cactus Salad)

1 piece of cactus (peeled, then grilled or boiled and chilled)

1 shallot (diced)

2 tbsp coriander (chopped)

3 tbsp vegetable oil

4 tspn white wine vinegar

1/4 tspn salt

1/4 tspn dried oregano

 black pepper

Combine cactus, shallot and coriander.

Combine the remaining ingredients and dress the salad.

Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.

Mexican pickled red onions

1 medium red onion (halved lengthways and thinly sliced)

1 habanero (deseeded and thinly sliced)

1/4 cup fresh orange juice

1/4 cup fresh lime juice

1 tsp dried oregano

1/2 tsp salt

Boiling water

Pour boiling water over the onion, allow to soften (15 minutes).

Drain well and combine with the other ingredients.

Asparagus Syndrome

What does it mean if your most meaningful social interactions are with a kaffir lime leaf? What if your tears are not caused by propanethiol S-oxide, but flow from some deep seated empathy for the brown onion that lies in rings on your chopping board. Is it odd to try and see the potential for good in thymus gland of a dead cow?
There are a great many ingredients in this world, probably too many to know in one lifetime. Of those that I have met some have proven to be valuable colleagues, others passing acquaintances, regrettable one night stands and a select few my most trusted confidants. Having spent a little time living in this realm of produce I know that it is only through respect and understanding that I can make the most of the friendships that I forge here.
This insight does not mean that I have never tarried from the path of culinary enlightenment. At my hands anglaise has become vanilla flecked scrambled eggs and like a misguided Moses I have split seas of mayonnaise. Sometimes I have unreasonably asked two conflicting elements to co-habitat a plate or invested too much time and energy on new ingredient and neglected those that have been good to me.
Faithfulness is a great challenge in cooking where there is the constant allure of the unknown. New love affairs can be formed in an instant, the thrill of the new sensation as the first taste fills your mouth, nose and thoughts. You want to own it, so that you can constantly relive that initial sense that your world had expanded.
My choice of culinary companions is at times as much a reflection of my xenophobia and prejudices as it is of my better judgement. It is easy to forget that there was a time when the pungent odour of shrimp paste would merely have induced disgust and the notion of ingesting engorged goose liver would have seemed repugnant not indulgent. My narrow mindedness is not only directed towards things that are foreign and mysterious, at times it is the most commonplace ingredients that I offer least respect. Familiarity can breed complacency and disregard and it is only a chance encounter with a cabbage in another context that makes you realise how wonderful this modest plant can be.
Cooking can be one of the purest acts of empathy as you take elements and endeavour to understand their nature, their great qualities, flaws and needs. Then armed with this knowledge the challenge is to shape conditions to generate an environment that is most conducive to fulfilling the potential of the ingredients at your disposal.
Care and respect have a very distinctive flavour, one that cannot be synthesised or replaced through technical wizardry. Understanding is not solely the domain of those that can perfectly set a protein in a sous vide bag.
I guess that this is why I find myself in a polygamous relationship with cloves of garlic, sticks of asparagus, rounds of Camembert and half shell scallops, in the hope that one day I will be able to extend to them the friendship that they have offered me.