This week’s newsletter is not in keeping with my stated theme of contemplating British food, nor is it particularly relevant to Mothering Sunday. Instead, I have been captured in thought by the little peccadillos and culinary perversions we all indulge in out of sight of polite company, and all too rarely air out of doors.
In the Tuscany episode of Stanley Tucci’s, Searching for Italy, there is a wonderful scene in which he and his parents eat a homecooked meal of pasta with a side of nostalgia. At the end of the scene, they clink their glasses in a toast to Florence (the city in which they lived for a year when Stanley was a child, and the place which cemented his love affair with Italy). Charming. What struck me particularly though, watching this gently poignant moment was that the three wine glasses, filled with white wine and belonging respectively to Stanley, his father and his mother, all had a different adornment inside. Stanley, for his part, had dropped a few ice cubes into his glass, his mother had added a raspberry to hers, and his father, to be fair to him, had his white wine untarnished. There is no mention of this, why would there be, they are in a private apartment and have cooked a simple tomato pasta, they are as relaxed as one can be with multiple cameras recording their every move, but the wine glasses are very revealing for me. They hint towards all those things we might do in our own homes, culinarily you understand, when no one is watching. There are myriad potential explanations, perhaps here his old dad hadn't remembered to refrigerate the wine or some of them like a room temperature white, whilst Stan likes his chilled. We will never know. It did get me thinking though about some of the things we cook, or eat, or add to food, that we happily do in private, but might not do, or admit to, when we have guests, or when eating in public.
Last night I went for pizza with friends. As is de rigour in the sort of place we were in, a board on the wall offered a siren call of ‘specials’, one of which was for a ham and pineapple pizza. I ordered it. Partly out of intrigue - this was a good pizza restaurant, wood-fired oven, sourdough bases, the aesthetic and atmosphere knowingly trendy; but also to elicit a reaction, a tickle of shock around the table of like-minded friends with keen palettes and a sense of good taste. As hoped for, eye browns were raised; and of course, the pizza was absolutely delicious - it always is - the addition of finely sliced green chilli and plenty of fresh basil, enough to elevate the thing to the always impeccable standards of the house. I was always drawn towards Hawaiian pizza as a kid, yet had lately turned po-faced in standing in allegiance with Italian pizza firebrands when the Hawaiian was brought up, so this was the first time ever I had shown my hand in public. It was a freeing moment.
It is not my intention to use this platform as a confessional, much as I seem drawn to doing so, but when left alone at home for any length of time I am incapable of ignoring a few discreet pleasures. These are; one, processed cheese singles; two, cheap brioche-style buns; and, three, carton or bottle milkshakes such as Frijj, Yazoo, Chocomel and Cocio. A utopian scenario for me might see a grilled cheese sandwich made from inverted brioche buns, the open crumb of what was once the inside of the bun spread with mayonnaise (the best fat for lubricating a grilling sandwich, its superior burning point and naughty additives giving the best browning and crunch to the thing), the smooth glazed once-upon-a-time crown and base of the bun sandwiching four slices of processed cheese, arranged in a graduated star pattern so as to slightly protrude from the edge of the grilling bun and catch in the pan as the whole thing melts and fries. Two of these and a chocolate or banana milkshake is my private version of heaven.
As a young chef, I was shown a niche Italian way with Pecorino Toscano, freshly ground coffee and good honey. The simplicity of the dish has all the hallmarks of the best of Italian cookery, only the combination of ingredients is a little troubling. Anyway, this chef simply broke up some of the Pecorino, scattered it around a plate, drizzled the whole thing with honey and then coated each piece of honeyed cheese with a dusting of ground coffee. Easily persuaded, driven by curiosity and greed, I took a good chunk of the cheese and popped it in my mouth - suddenly my tongue was talking Mandarin whilst my brain only understood Arabic, I was discombobulated and euphoric in equal measure. This flavour in my mouth was nostalgic and brand new. It was salty cheese, floral honey, dark slightly bitter coffee, absolutely, but it was also flavours from someone else's childhood, a childhood, in that moment, that I coveted sinfully; but what was that flavour, whose childhood was I tasting? Then I had it. Of all the things in the world, from that combination of ingredients, I had in my mouth cheese strings and Nutella, I was sure of it.
Now, here's the rub; this little creation is awarded legitimacy by the sheer fact of its proximity to a cuisine and ingredients that exude quality. A quick google reveals that Jamie Oliver has recreated this dish (replete with an enthusiastic anecdote) with a serious mature English cheddar, and as the video in the link reveals, he seems pretty convinced by his creation. If however, he was to lean on Nutella and a nice Gouda or, better still, Coolea, the taste in the mouth would be the same, the discombobulating pleasure equal, yet the response would be more muted, the judgment more quickly felt.
The thing is about life and food; sometimes you just want to be left alone to enjoy ice cubes in your wine. Chilled wine is fine, sure, but there's something about the clink and rattle of those diamante cubes that take you somewhere else, fires open a different neural pathway. I watched a video about 12 years ago where an American chap makes a whole thing out of dunking his salty fries in his milkshake. I tried it, it is disconcerting in the first nano-second, after that it is very very good. A personal infraction is that, no matter how good the cook or how premium the setting, I find it very hard to resist squirting tomato ketchup over any and every lasagna I ever come across, similarly, I feel strongly that salad cream should be a legitimate option for almost all salading scenarios. I know I am not aligned with most of the world on both issues, but I know also that I don’t care. And neither should you.
I think what it boils down to is that I’m never sure who these customs and specificities are really there to benefit. Theoretically, you shouldn't order a Cappuccino after 11 am, for instance. Why the hell not? We shouldn’t mix seafood and cheese in a dish apparently. Who says so? For every culinary rule or restriction, there will be a dish or a culture where that same constraint is ignored, run roughshod over, never existed in the first place. If you want fruit or ice in your wine, then you should have as much. If you find a combination of ingredients or flavours that appeal to you, allow yourself to enjoy them. Perhaps it’s only me that lives with this dual personality when it comes to food and drinks? Perhaps you’re all out there having it just as you’d like it, each and every time. And if so, more power to you. If though, like me, you stop yourself short from having what you crave in certain scenarios, stop that. There will be someone, somewhere, who feels exactly the same way.
Below, I would like to offer up three recipes that we eat with almost rhythmic regularity at home. On the surface, they may seem exactly as you might expect, but I will illuminate each time a few quirks and deliberate missteps, if you need to call them that, that mean they’re exactly how we like to eat them, as opposed to how I might describe them if ever called upon in a culinary kangaroo court.
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