good things of england: oh happy days!

Good Things in England

There is a particular joy of celebrating a glorious spring day with the purchase of a new (and soon to be treasured) cookery book. Yesterday, the daffodils outside my front door were jostling for position like footballers inside the penalty box as a grey wind sent them skittering in the early morning gloom. A day later and the sun is shining. The daffs are beaming beatifically and my mood is definitely sunny. I have finally got my hands on Florence White's Good Things of England. It's enough to bring a smile to any lover of food and history. 

Florence White was interested in retaining all of that culinary knowledge (both foods and techniques) that was in danger of being lost as a result of new fashions and technology. Sound familiar?

rhubarb & ginger bombay sapphire cocktail

As you can probably tell, I do like fruit flavoured cocktails. Let's face it, it is one of the few ways that I will actually eat fruit . . . with copious amounts of alcohol.

I am planning on celebrating the spring season by making some rhubarb liqueur, but while it is waiting to mature, I am giving you this fabulous cocktail for rhubarb lovers everywhere. It was originally created by mixologist Flavio Lorenzo, (from Nobu Berkeley), for the Bombay Sapphire pop-up bar at Somerset House, in the glorious summer of 2009. Hic!

what's in season: april

favourite spring flowers!

The sun was warm but the wind was chill.   
You know how it is with an April day.
When the sun is out and the wind is still,
You're one month on in the middle of May.
But if you so much as dare to speak,
A cloud come over the sunlit arch,
And wind comes off a frozen peak,
And you're two months back in the middle of March.
Robert Frost - Two Tramps in Mud Time - 1926

April is known as a "cruel month", not least becauseit is rather lean in terms of seasonal British produce. Stores of British fruit and vegetables are coming to an end and the new crops of vegetables are not up to maximum strength yet. Fortunately all the greens are beginning to appear, such as lettuce and watercress as well as spinach and broccoli, so it’s not all doom and gloom.

this being a tale of a quest for lemon perfection

I freely admit that I am not, and never have been, a baker. I've never really tried; something to do with being a little underwhelmed by anything sweet. This you may feel is something of a hindrance in the cake department, which, on balance, tends to be full of sweet things.
But I'm British for god's sake. Our cuisine may have been notorious around the world, our cooking ridiculed, but our cakes and pudding are renowned, and in a good way. So I decided that I needed to stand up and be counted; I hadn’t baked a cake since the dreaded Home Ec classes of my early teenage years (which put me off cooking until I was in my 20s) but I thought this might be a good challenge to take on. Besides, I had 22 lemons kicking around the kitchen after my Pancake Day party and I needed some satisfying ideas for a cold, damp day in March.

garlicky mussels with guinness . . . my goodness!

garlic and guinness mussels

I am going to nail my colours to the mast . . . I like green, I really do. It is one of my favourite colours. I’m a girl with green eyes; I love the ethos of “green” and I particularly like all things green in their natural habitat – such as plants and leaves and, in particular, vegetables; they are really ratherwonderful. What I don’t like is green in my drinks or in my cakes. Yes, you’ve guessed it, I’m feeling a bit bah-humbug about tomorrow’s Saint Patrick’s Day.

a tale in which I conquer a fear of pancakes!

I don't have a pancake phobia, but for some reason, illogical though you might think it, I had thought pancakes were difficult to make. They rather worried me. They involve batter and while I can usually make Yorkshire Puds, my Toad-in-the-Holes have been a bit dismal. But an article in a newspaper announced that 90% of Brits couldn't cook a pancake if their lives depended on it and laid down the gauntlet, challenging me to face my batter fears.

a favourite sandwich: hot-smoked salmon and goat's cheese

hot-smoked salmon and goat's cheese sandwich

My favourite sandwich is a pure serendipity; the happy accident of what I like and what is usually in my fridge. It is merely the assembly of slices of fresh sourdough bread (homemade, she says smugly), a smear of goats cheese (I include the rind as I like its tangy flavour and velvety texture), layer with a few slices of baby plum tomatoes and sprinkle with flakes of hot-smoked salmon.

what's in season: march

My garden leeks - M.P.Bruin

Nigel Slater says that March is a terrible month for cooks, for the greedy and for those who take good care of their tummies; it is not often that I am forced to disagree with the Sainted Nigel, but it’s really not all dire, although perhaps a bit monotonous. I am beginning to hate the sight of rhubarb!
Spring has sprung and winter is running out of steam, but in food (and gardening terms) this is very much the “hungry gap”. Between last year’s store crops and the advent of early vegetables (grown in poly tunnels. It is still a bit early for spring vegetables, although there should be purple sprouting broccoli to hand, so not all bad).

glamorgan sausages

glamorgan sausages

From Medieval times in Britain, most towns, cities and counties had a sausage of their own. These usually reflected the foods and herbs grown locally and the popularly used spices of the region. Think peppery Cumberland or zesty Oxford sausages.

Glamorgan sausages are first recorded in the 19th century, although I suspect that like many recipes had been around for much longer. Glamorgan sausages are skinless and don’t actually contain any meat, being a mixture of breadcrumbs and cheese.I am sure that any thrifty cook would have found these meatless sausages a bit of a frugal godsend, as well as being delicious.

mincemeat crumble traybake

mincemeat crumble traybake

I was a bit late last year in making my own mincemeat, so Christmas came and went before mine was really ready to eat and by then I was rather "mince pied-out". Several weeks later, I decided to have a go at making this traybake, essentially a shortbread biscuit base, topped with mincemeat and a scattering of crumble mix. What is not to like?

o frabjous day! calloo! callay!

She chortled in her joy . . . *

What, you may reasonably ask, am I on about? Quite simply I have managed to upload some digital photographs from my camera to my computer. Not in itself something that should be difficult but I was, as usual, flying a little blind.

leek and butterbean soup

spring leeks

A versatile recipe, one that can be used in several ways, is a thing of beauty and this soup recipe is one of the fairest of them all. While butter beans may not sound very promising, it is their bland mushiness that makes a perfect base for a soup that zings with flavour, even in the middle of winter. 

This soup is full of flavour; the tartness of the lemon and vinegar or verjuice makes it quite refreshing too. If you use all the green bits from the leek, this soup is the most tantalising lemony green colour. Really rather beautiful.