I wanted...I bought...I made

Smoked mozzarella on toast for breakfast

Mega hot forecast for the weekend - perfect for cold collation, and we so love them! The flat peaches were so good last week, I'm thinking more of those and lots of salty things, ham, chorizo, olives and radish from the garden plus a couple of hot things like baby morcilla and padron peppers it made a perfect Saturday night. Beat the heat big time. Sunday is football final, had been thinking Spanish but now think Indian with chicken and lots of veg side dishes and dill rice plain rice and salads and saffron yoghurt chicken with the lovely Vicki and MR Johnson over to share. Monday we are out, Tuesday there is some tofu in the fridge needs using it's still there as we had red cooked aubergine, steamed cabbage and rice, Wednesday I am out for a while so spag bol from the freezer the man had some and I had fried eggs on toast much later, Thursday a pie perhaps, as I bought a second hand copy of Tamsin Day Lewis's Tarts with Tops that I haven't used yet went to see Django Drom and had dinner before at St John. Friday probably omelette and salad thinking make garlic bread to go with the rest of the spaghetti and a crisp salad.

Hot it was - just like a proper summer. Borough was cool enough though and a pleasant way to shop. Had a chicken in the freezer so had nothing to buy from Ginger Pig. Headed straight to Booths instead. Spent about ten minutes sniffing melons to find a good one, finally decided on a rockmelon dessert Sunday night, also sniffed a few little flat peaches before choosing the final selection. Also bought cucumber, cabbage, fennel, bananas and padron peppers - £12.90

From Brindisa I couldn't resist a bargain so bought a tin of mussels and a jar of pepper and tomato sauce as well as mini morcilla half hot Saturday night rest in the freezer along with a spicy chorizo - £11.20

From the Isle of Wight I bought a vine of tomatoes, lovely shiny red fat ones for a brilliant tomato, mint and spring onion salad Sunday - £2

Chocolates from L'Artisan du Chocolat - £2

No Wild Beef, no eggs!

A fabulous Pecorino from Gastronomica - £10

Milk and yoghurt from Neals Yard - £6.60

Toast loaf from Flour Power - £1.10

Spent £45.80 - cheap! Also bought aubergines, coriander and spring onions at Brixton Market

Green Mango Salad

Through the week I no longer buy the Guardian in the morning. Obviously I can't live without it but I have taken to reading it online Monday to Thursday and then I return to the pleasure of the physical edition for the weekend, starting with Friday and the film reviews. Food and cinema - my twin delights. I cannot imagine life without them.

If Friday's rasion d'être is the movie pages, Saturday is food. In the last two decades their food writers have included the incomparable Matthew Fort most consistently for both restaurant reviews and recipes, and amongst others Heston Blumenthal and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall as well as Vistoria Moore writing on wine and Jay Rayner these days doing reviews for the Observer and lots of features to boot. My favourite Sunday of evey month is the one where OFM

is tucked into the fold.

To my delight this week's Saturday magazine was a special edition full of summer recipes from all and sundry. My plan for the week were a touch vague so I was fast engrossed in the possibilities laid out by 50 - count them quick and feel the joy! - sleb chefs. Jamie offered gravadlax. Sam and Sam Clark from Moro caught my eye with their accompanying salad of lentils, peas and herbs for tuna - it will be made, but not this week. Bill Grainger was spare ribs but I have favourites already, Fergus Henderson delights in ox tongue bap with horseradish - but I don't like horseradish! I don't like smoked mackerel either but I was intigued nonetheless by Rick Stein's thai salad that was otherwise green mango and carrot and a mix of crunchy salty sweet and sour. I'd seen him do it on the tele and liked the look of it and now I had the recipe in front of me. Got to be a sign.

I'd already bought a serious quantity of rump steak at the Ginger Pig so decided I could probably spare 250g to make the other dish I wanted immediately - David Thompson's beef stir fried with oyster sauce. It involves cooking the onions in a dry wok to caremalise them and I could readily imagine how good that could be. We were off to Brixton in the afternoon - to go to the Ritzy to see the utterly fabulous White Material. Loved it. Spilled back out into the late afternoon sunshine there was time to shop at my second most favourite London market - the extraordinary hubbub that is Electric Avenue. Easy as pie to find firm green mangoes, shallots and chilli as well as the silken tofu that was already had on my mind.

Tuesday night we sat down to a properly exotic meal with a myriad of textures and all the salt/sweet/sour flavours in deep bowls for the hot and tiny bowls on the side.

Thai Green Mango Salad

Generous side dish serving for 2

Asian shops are undoubtedly the best place to get green mangoes but most supermarkets sell their own produce hugely under ripe so you should be able to buy one there as well

1 green mango, weighing about 450g1 large carrot (about 75g)
Small shallot, very thinly sliced
1 red bird's eye chilli, finely chopped
2 tbspns roasted peanuts, roughly chopped
2 tsp palm sugar - substitute caster if you need to
1 tbsp fish sauce
About 1 tbsp lime juice (depends on the tartness of the mango)
1 tbspn Thai sweet basil, chopped

Peel the mango and carrot, and shred, ideally using a mandolin. (There is a classic Rick Stein moment on one of his tv shows where he outlines how dangerous it is to use a mandolin incorrecty then proceeds to cut himself badly and swear virulently. It is remembered by all who saw it but, sadly, I couldn't find it on YouTube)

Toss in a large bowl with the shallots, chilli, and peanuts. Mix the sugar with the fish sauce and lime juice, add to the salad with the Thai basil, and toss again.

Pile into the centre of two side bowls and serve.

There was a little bit over that the man had as a relish with pork pie for dinner. East meets west in Stockwell.

I wanted...I bought... I made

I am intent I think on steak for Saturday supper as it has been a while. And it was brilliant. Had it with the above garden salad - always thought saying 'serve with a garden salad' is an instruction akin to 'exit pursued by a bear'. Then I moved to a place with a garden. Sunday I am thinking a savoury tart semi disaster, used a loose bottom pan which simply drained all the egg and cream into the pan underneath, tipped it back in (!) but ended up with a creamy crust topped with spinach and cheese with salads and leftovers for lunches. Monday some tofu and some aubergine steamed omelette and salad, Tuesday chilli pasta beef stir fry and green mango salad, Wednesday I am out with the french ladies so the man will fend for himself, Thursday maybe chicken and salad cucumber stuffed with pork and prawns then steamed served with steamed ginger cabbage and chilli sauce, Friday omelette and salad hot viet rice paper parcels wrapped inside lettuce with herbs and a spicy salad. I love salad!

Saturday morning and the sun was shining. Again! Loving this weather. The market wasn't too busy which adds to the pleasure. Charlie was back at the Ginger Pig after time away in Glossop working with Mettricks Butchers. Sounds like a different set up to Borough but much of the same ethos of caring properly for animals and producing great meat. One day - hoepfully soon - Charlie will use all this accrued knowledge to open his own business. For some reason he's decided not to try his first t-bone steak till he has his own shop - I cannot imagine making such a decision, even if we only indulge rarely. I guess he doesn't know what he's missing - but he's in for a treat when it happens. I bought a nice thick slice of rump dinner Saturday and stir fry Tuesday and some pork mince a quarter still in the freezer the rest to stuff cucumbers Thusday and make little viet parcels Friday - £17.85

Next stop Booths where they had no good looking potatoes which is unusual but none of them called to me so I bought cucumber stuffed it and steamed it! and flat white peaches instead they had a perfect scent, the man had them in his lunchbox but there will be more this week - £1.90

At the Calabrian stall, which has been there in the green market for a while but I'd never visited, I sampled some olive oils in search of something interesting for salads. One was very delicate, one was seriously grassy - apparently the one that is most popular in the market - and one was somewhere in between, which I bought - £5.50 Also sampled a great honey.

Over at Wild Beef Lizzie was cheerful as she's off on holiday this week to Cornwall so I bought 2 boxes of eggs to tide us over - £3

Tomatoes from the Isle of Wight because they are such lovely sweet fruit - £3.50

Teds Veg had new potatoes at £3.50 a kilo which is too steep for me and their fennel looked a bit sad too so bought nothing

Secretts had Cornish new potatoes for £5 a kilo - soooo absolutely not!

Gianni seems very cheerful to be back at Gastronomica, the woman ahead of me was most delighted with the samples of goat and gorgonzola she tried, so she bought both. I needed a chunk of Parmesan, also bought a lovely piece of bra to go with the peaches and he threw in a couple of small smoked mozzarellas that need melting then eating for true delight - £20

Bought a small pork pie for the man for Wednesday tea from Elizabeth King's - £3.50

Milk and yoghurt at Neals Yard - £6.70

Bread from Flour Power - £1.10

So didn't get potatoes here at all - got some in my local veg shop and made potato salad which was okay but not great, might need rethinking! Spent £63.05

Later in the day I bought rice and peanut oil and mango and tofu at Wing Yip in Brixton to round out the week a bit then butter and salt and biscuits from the supermarket plus another cucumber Friday to have with dinner

Disappointments and laughter

Great wonton soup from last week

The lentil dish I have been planning to make for weeks now finally got made last night. It was bleugh. Not entirely nasty but not one I would make again, ever. Decided to be frugal and have leftovers for lunch which simply put me into a foul mood as it was really dispiriting to revisit a dud meal. So I threw half of it away, which also depresses me. Hate wasting food.

So as I can offer nothing by way of a recipe this week I will share instead a couple of things from other people's posts about Borough Market that I've read over the last few days. @ themostcake it was all about the delights of dating - Can we say how much we love dates? There’s something fantastic about the thrill of it all – dressing up, meeting up, setting off on some wild, unknown foray into… well. A bar seems to be most likely these days. But London is a city of many wonders, and your attempt at some kind of romance need not be a drunken fumble in some random pub.

... Borough Market is definitely one of my favourite places in London – and not just because I love the heck out of food. You and your date can walk through picking out ingredients for a meal to be made later, or simply grab a glass of prosecco from one of the wine stalls and have a wander, choosing from a variety of soup, curries, hot dogs and much more from the surrounding vendors

Seems lots of people think of love and Borough, though not necessarily with great outcomes. In a very funny post about the time and costs of dating opeanfootw writes 　MARCH 3: I have high hopes for Shaun, 32, an accountant. Thought seeing an older man might work. Remember Sex And The City’s Mr Big?

　　Arranged the perfect date at Borough Market, a food market in London. We strolled romantically around the stalls drinking warm cider. He had lovely hazel eyes but was obsessed with the new flooring he was fitting.

　　He couldn’t handle his booze and proceeded to tell me about his S&M fetish – I nearly choked on my drink! The dating rules state talking about exes is taboo, so rubber fetishes are a closed subject!

　　Desperately, I tried to turn the talk back to flooring.

　　COST: ? – new winter coat ? drinks ? fares ?

　　DATE TIME: 4hrs – getting ready 1hr, date 3hrs.

There are some who go more for the food but still find a different kind of love. William Baeck could feel the food love all the way back to its beginnings - On the advice of a Londoner that Aline had once met by chance at a farmer’s market in San Francisco, we took the Tube to Borough Market to buy supplies for dinner....

Trestles overhead kept the breeze away. Molecules of every kind of food sold there, perhaps every food sold since Emperor Claudius first sent his hungry troops to the south bank, grew denser the further I wandered, gradually precipitating out of the air to settle in a rich snow on my tongue. I began ranging open-mouthed through the aisles, sieving the air like a Blue Whale sieving for krill.

For The Urban Hiker there was tears and joy - Somehow after buying almost a kilogram of chocolate I ended up at another chocolate place that sold the most incredible smelling truffles. I bought several different kinds and decided that I had to get some real food before I could buy any more sweets. I settled on a lamb burger with lots of spicy English mustard that made me cry, as all mustard should.

Finally I decided that if I didn’t leave soon I was never going to so I bought some fresh squeezed apple cranberry juice for the road and left the market behind. (If I ever do run away from home Borough Market will be my destination.)

A sentiment I fully endorse!

I wanted...I bought...I made

This week I am also going to Borough Market for the shopping as well as doing the planning - the man may be pleased! It is finally properly hot like summer and has been for days. Forecast is for more. I am delighted.

So - I have food chain Sunday so Saturday will be busy busy and I am determined to go to the cinema that so did not happen! so I'm thinking salmon and parsley butter with new potatoes and salad will be quick and wonderful in the evening. Sunday we are heading to Richmond for a bbq with Jaey and Marie and their little dawgie Eddie -which I am seriously looking forward to totally brilliant afternoon. Monday is more bbq - but only for me see chef Adam above cooking burgers at The Avalon - so the man may well have pie and beans in front of the footie - difficult for him but I'm sure he'll cope. Tuesday I think tofu and cabbage omelette and salad with six cereal loaf from Paul. Wednesday I am still trying to get those lentils, I did and they were not good, too sad after weeks of anticipation Thursday I am wondering about spaghetti bolognese that I have in the freezer and it was good Friday we are out. An easy week.

Saturday was blue sky sunny and balmy from the off. Such a pleasure to be out and Borough was fairly quiet very early. Someone had parked an aston martin on the corner of Park Street and as we wandered up a big truck was trying to negotiate the corner and avoid the car. The disaster seemed so imminent there were plenty of onlookers curious to see the outcome.
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Coffee from Monmouth - bought while the man watched the drama - £11.50 - Too many watchers so the truck guy had to go slooooooooow and squeak past without doing damage. Not always the outcome...

No meat on the list so no visit to Ginger Pig - makes for a skewed Borough shopping sensation for me.

Went to Ted's Veg who had no carrots as they couldn't get any decent ones - bought onions, cucumber and leeks - £2.80

Chocolates from L'Artisan du Chocolat - a bargain £2

Went to the Green Market only to discover that the asparagus people were not there this week, which was disappointing. Bought eggs from Lizzie at Wild Beef - £1.50

At Booths they did have carrots, also bought garlic, jersey royals, celery, spanish plum tomatoes to see if they roast sweetly they don't, were slightly bitter so will buy Isle of Wight till later in the summer and bananas, including a second bunch of free bananas that were at the end of their life but should make good cake - £5,20

At Furness I bought two fillets of wild salmon that were thick and a lovely sludgy grey pink - £9,50 Expensive but sublimely good simply pan fried in butter for a couple of minutes each side then finished in the oven for a couple of minutes

Strawberries from Chegworth because they always have the best - £3.50 As I was waiting to pay I heard someone at the Gastronomica stall say 'lovely to see you back' so, stickybeak that I am, I looked around to see who it was and, much to my surprise, it was Gianni! He's been off crewing boats off Plymouth for about a year and he's back till December.

So of course had to go and buy some cheese, he told us he'd had a great time, offered us bits of cheese to sample while complaining that now he is behind a counter and all the cheese is refrigerated, even though it is not the best way to keep it but it is H&S European directive. Bought a serious hunk of a soft tangy cheese and a soft goat's cheese for £10

The over to Neals Yard for milk and cream and yoghurt - £11.80

Toast bread and a brownie for my lovely one - £3.10

That was all - £58.90 and back on the bus

Anzac Biscuits

I read some of the food boards on the web. Sometimes I learn a few things, other times I contribute something I know to the discusssion. One asked, the other day, what a woman could send her boyfriend on his tour of duty in Afghanistan. Something that would be a treat but would not spoil or be any other kind of disappointment on its arrival. Had to be Anzac biscuits.

Ate them all the time as a kid, an endless staple in school lunchboxes, that once I got to be about 12 I would make myself as my contribution to the week. Easy as they are I was still very pleased with myself when they turned out golden and chewy and fabulous.

April 25th every year we would march in the Anzac Parade, a day of national remembrance for the 8,000 soldiers who died in Gallipoli in their disastrous attempt to conquer Constantinople in the first world war.

Took me a while to make the connection between the bikkies and the parade but eventually I did wonder how they could both be Anzac. Their origins are somewhat murky. The story that seems most likely - or at least the one that I like the most - is that the wives and loved ones left at home made these to send overseas. There is nothing in them to spoil, so they would arrive pretty much as they had been sent to have bring joy to their recipients, carrying the love with which they were made from one side of the world to the other.

It has been years since I've eaten one let alone made a batch. I'm delighted to say they tasted as good as I remember - and the man loved them too which surprised me a little. Claims he doesn't like coconut.

Anzac Biscuits

The golden syrup adds a rich depth of sweetness, the bicarb makes it fizz like honeycomb.

Makes 24

1 cup rolled oats
1 cup plain flour
1 cup caster sugar
1 cup dessicated coconut
125g butter
2 tbspn golden syrup
1 tbspn water
1tspn bicarbonate of soda

Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4.

Line a baking tray with parchment.

Mix the oats, flour, sugar and coconut in a large bowl.

Put the butter, syrup and water into a small pan and stir over a medium heat till the butter melts into the syrup. Stir in the bicarbonate of soda - it will make the mix fizz up to the top of the pan. Take it off the heat.

Stir the butter syrup into the dry ingredients and mix well. You will have a mix that is ever so slightly crumbly rather than wet.

Drop teaspoonfuls into little mounds onto the baking tray a couple of centimetres apart - they will spread as they bake.

Cook for 15-20 minutes until golden. Cool on a rack before eating.

They will keep in an airtight tin for a very long time, though I've never been able to resist them to find out quite how long.


They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

I wanted...I bought ...I made

Me and the Masterchef men - and a lady who lunches!


Hugely excited. It is the lovely Vicki's birthday Saturday and we're all off to a special tasting menu supper at Trinity about which I have heard nothing but exceptional things. Should be a treat. It was indeed.


On Saturday I am off to Birmingham for the Good Food Show courtesy of Miele and, to a mix of delight and trepidation, they have booked us into an Invention Round with John and Greg and the whole Masterchef whizz bang lights and music. The man is off again by himself to Borough so he has decided it's a good week to get healthy for summer as we have nothing else planned. Think he's hoping for a lot of crudité! So Sunday shall be roast with salads gammon that he cooked in the afternoon with white bean and fresh herbs from the garden salad with leftovers for lunch, Monday I think salad composé in the french style asparagus and poached egg topped with a little friton for added joy, Tuesday lentils with halloumi and a side salad of yoghurt and dill because I was planning that for Thursday last week and it didn't happen chicken and mash and peas but I am still much taken with the idea. Wednesday steamed tofu, steamed aubergine peppers and black beans and rice, Thursday chicken and mash because the man loves that more than most things wonton soup as I bought wonton Wednesday at Jen café and didn't eat them, Friday omelette and salad. Healthy, no?

Had a brilliant day Saturday while the man stayed home and did stuff. Got to Birmingham by train and met up with everyone - Jo, Ali, Kavey, Mimi and James, as well as Roxy and Nicola from 1000heads. Was very surprised to discover the Masterchef experience was first thing. The bloggers collected in the back room got a list of pantry items to check for a few minutes then a peek in the mystery bag with two minutes to decide what to make. It doesn't get tougher than that.! Remarkably difficult to think straight at that hour with a few hundred people sat watching, a man with a movie camera flitting about and lots of questions from Andi Peters - a previous winner on the celeb version, so qualified more than most to be up there.

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My first thought was to make pasta with bacon and peas and some mascarpone but really I wanted stir fry so, despite the fact that there was nothing much to use to make a decent sauce, I went with chicken with crispy garlic and ginger over basmati rice. Partly because it could be done inside 30 minutes and partly because I could see eating hot shredded chicken in a way that I could not see eating creamy pasta before 11 in the morning.

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This year's Masterchef winner, Dhruv, and last year's winner, Mat, who will be known forever to readers of Nancy Banks Smith's Guardian column as Ming the Merciless both clad in Wild Garlic t-shirts roamed the benches and tasted and compared. Followed closely by Greg and John themselves, more charming and less shouty in real life, also doing lots of tasting and chatting. As well as Andi Peters and the man with the camera. No wonder my nerves were shaky.

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Thirty minutes later we were all plated up and - joy - given champagne. Mat and Dhruv had a short list of three for John and Greg to choose the winner. As the first guy brought his dishes forward - he'd done main and dessert - I abandoned hope of being on the list and started chatting to others to see what lovely things they'd made. Then Kavey was called with a great plate of raspberries and pancakes and she explained herself and her dish. Then it was me! That came as an unexpected surprise. So I shimmied up to the counter and watched while they tried my dish and there was serious love for the crispy ginger and garlic but, no sauce, too dry, I did not win. But yay! for Kavey if it couldn't be me.

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Check out the video's on Jo's blog if you fancy seeing the action.

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A wander round the show - madly busy - was followed by lunch in the Masterchef restaurant (where the picture was taken). Food was great - all of it dishes from previous winners - and being slightly away from the hustle was seriously relaxing. Jumped the rope to be back on the Miele stage for the follow up session, a cookalong with a Good Food journalist Barney. Weirdly this was much more difficult despite having no decisions to make and not being nervous at all. Made chicken skewers with pitta crisps and toffee berry tartlets - all in under 30 minutes, reinforcing my desire to have a total Miele kitchen as the whole lot came out perfectly.

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Total respect to all those who, after a three course lunch, sat down and ate the lot. I was happy to give mine to Kirsty, the trainer from Miele, who'd been working so hard she'd had no lunch. Good deed done and a great day out I was back on the train home, Masterchef apron safely tucked in my bag for an outing in the feast with bron kitchen, where invention rules.