Recipes from cookbooks we review, shared with full permission from publishers.
This is a classic pork vindaloo from Eleanor Ford’s The Nutmeg Trail and she describes it as “an assertive, almost pickle-sour braise“. Made from pork shoulder, this recipe brings together ingredients and ideas from three continents. Its roots are in a Portuguese pickled pork dish called carne de vinho e alhos, which melded with the ... Read more »
Reversing the usual way kebab meat is cooked and then served in or with bread, in this recipe for Griddled Pita Stuffed with Sumac-spiced Meat from Eleanor Ford’s The Nutmeg Trail, the meat is wedged into a pita before being cooked over a griddle. Hailing from the Middle East and Levant the dish is known ... Read more »
Although this delicious Garlic Clove Curry from Eleanor Ford’s The Nutmeg Trail is suggested as a side dish, it’s so good that it deserves to be the star of the meal! Hailing from Sri Lanka, whole cloves of garlic are cooked in a savoury curry of coconut milk and spices. Despite the relatively short cooking ... Read more »
If you love a bit of chilli heat on the side, this delicious Tibetan Sepen recipe is for you! From the Taste Tibet cookbook by Julie Kleeman and Yeshi Jampa, this condiment combines the fiery heat of hot chilli flakes with the tingling numbing sensation and flavour of Sichuan peppercorns, the latter an especially loved ... Read more »
You might think that a recipe featuring home-made noodles would be fiddly but the noodles in this delicious vegetable soup are really straightforward and easy to make. They are served in a nourishing soup of vegetables and broth flavoured with Sichuan peppercorns, garlic, soy sauce and Chinkiang black vinegar. Serve with sepen (hot chilli dip) ... Read more »
This recipe for Tibetan Rice, from Taste Tibet: Family Recipes from the Himalayas by Julie Kleeman and Yeshi Jampa, is a speciality of Yeshi’s older father, a dish he makes for lunch every Tibetan New Year. Unlike barley – which grows well in the high mountain climate of the Tibetan plateau – rice must be ... Read more »
This Tibetan Meatball Soup is a simple dish made from a short list of ingredients that come together to create a delicious, nourishing and wonderfully comforting dish. The recipe is from Taste Tibet: Family Recipes from the Himalayas by Julie Kleeman and Yeshi Jampa and is typical of the traditional meals shared throughout the cookbook. ... Read more »
I’m a sucker for biscuits made with dark molasses, like these Pevarini – white pepper biscuits hailing from Venice. White pepper is combined with cinnamon and molasses to create a warm and mellow flavour. This recipe is from Cinnamon and Salt: Cicchetti in Venice: Small Bites From the Lagoon City by Emiko Davies. Read our full ... Read more »
As a lover of liver when it’s cooked just right, I adore it in the Venetian style. Rich, meaty liver and sweet, caramelised onions marry with white wine vinegar to create a wonderfully balanced dish. This is traditionally made with veal (calve’s) liver but we’ve also made the dish using lamb’s liver with great success. ... Read more »
We love eating cicchetti in Venice and one of the dishes we often order is Mozzarella in Carrozza alla Veneziana. The battered and fried mozzarella sandwiches often pair the soft, melty cheese with anchovies or ham, and make the perfect accompaniment to a glass of wine, a beer or an aperol spritz. This recipe is ... Read more »
The Place of Onions, in old Lille. After last night’s rainstorm the intense sticky heat has broken and today is cool, breezy, fresh… I love it! A drop of… [more]
We went to Star Wars: Secrets of the Empire at The Void this morning, an amazing VR experience where we got to be Rebel Alliance members going undercover as… [more]