Food

It’s Lent, and you know what that means? Fish, that’s what. Once, the point of the whole fast and abstinence thing was to eschew meat, which meant eating fish instead. Indeed, the fish-fasting association was so important for the fishing industry that when the Reformation came, much Catholic practice was jettisoned, but not the obligation to eat fish in Lent. Now, there’s a further rationale, two in fact. Brexit, plus Covid, a double whammy for the industry. Post Brexit, there are endless impediments to exporting to the EU, formerly an enthusiastic taker of British fish and shellfish, unless suppliers are lucky enough to be part of a bigger consortium which

I don’t often find myself longing for the industrial rigours of a factory when I’m baking in my kitchen at home. But as I patted the squiggle of fig paste with wet hands, corralling it into a rough sausage shape I thought ruefully of Charles Roser of Philadelphia and his patent for a fig roll machine. In the late nineteenth century, poor digestion was thought to be the cause of a number of wider ailments and, as with breakfast cereal, biscuits were seen as an aid to digestion – and figs, of course, were a particularly digestion-friendly fruit. Brought over from Britain to America, the fig roll tended to be

If you’re sick to death of Deliveroo, it’s time to take a look at the meat box. Forget vegan meats and plant-based pretenders. It’s dark and wet and we’re all stuck indoors — there’s no point making ourselves any more miserable. Steakhouses and brasseries have been moving their menus online and into cardboard boxes, with a bit of home prep involved to ensure it’s fresh on the plate. We’ve all got used to the idea that you can order anything over the internet — but there’s still something faintly thrilling in opening up an innocuous package and finding a Sunday roast staring back at you. And it seems bored Brits

Next Tuesday the banal humdrum of lockdown life will be interrupted, however briefly. No longer the sad, soggy Weetabix while listening to the daily hospitalisation numbers or Special K eaten at your makeshift desk. No, even if just for a couple of hours, next Tuesday is an opportunity to block out the Outlook calendar and have some fun in the kitchen. Shrove Tuesday. Pancake Day. It’s a funny old thing. We don’t have a celebratory day dedicated to trifle or sticky toffee pudding (though we should). Of course there’s logic to our scoffing our faces with pancakes on this day preceding Lent—it was traditionally the way to use up rich

In Britain, we mark the beginning of Lent with pancakes. Although nowadays relatively few of us strictly observe the Lenten dietary traditions which prohibit the eating of dairy and meat in the lead up to Easter, we happily leap on the annual opportunity to eat breakfast for dinner: sales of lemons and caster sugar soar, and we delight in filling ourselves full of pancakes. But pancakes are not the only Lenten final hurrah: the semla bun is the Scandinavian favourite. Following the same logic as pancakes, the buns are designed to eat up the dairy ingredients which would have been prohibited by Lent religious laws.  Semlor buns (semlor is the

This week I decided to bring all the fun of the fair into my kitchen and make churros. Churros are a dough enriched with butter and eggs, that are piped into lengths and fried in very hot oil until crisps and light. There’s nothing quite like the smell of sweet, hot dough, frying. In the days when I used to churn out hundred of doughnuts overnight in our small kitchen for events, I’d crawl to bed in the small hours of the morning, wearing the distinctive perfume of that pastry. There are different types of fried dough all over the world – bombolini, beignets, gulab juman, yum yums, funnel cakes

This February 14th might be the one night of Lockdown 3.0 when it’s no hardship to have to stay at home. Who really wants to go to a restaurant on Valentine’s Day, full of couples who never usually speak to one other? The food is invariably as naff as a Forever Friends foil balloon; everything comes drizzled with pink coulis and at some point you’ll be offered a single red rose for your beloved which has been flown half-way round the world, stiffened with chemicals and devoid of scent. But nor should you think of cooking — bar a bit of finishing off here and there. So don’t say it

I often find myself turning to lemon-filled recipes in January. I think it’s something my baking subconscious realises before I do – that cold, dark days require the antithesis, something bright and bold, something cheering. You know what they say: when life gives you lemons, make lemon meringue pie.  Unlike its austere, pared back French cousin, the tarte au citron, the lemon meringue pie is never going to be a subtle pudding: a lurid, chartreuse centre hidden by big billows of toasted meringue, piled ludicrously, disproportionately, toweringly tall. It quivers and wobbles on the plate, crisp and firm on the outer edge, giving way to a marshmallowy interior. But that’s