I don’t know about you, but I adore la cucina casalinga – Italian regional home cooking – so simple, so hearty, so life-affirming; but dependent as it is on the quality of ingredients, my heart used to sink whenever a recipe called for fresh ricotta. There’s no such thing for sale in my home town, no [...]
Archive for the ‘herbs’ Category
I gotta ricotta
Posted in Summer, artisan bread, herbs, ingredients, recipes, slow food, tagged buttermilk, food, homemade cheese, ricotta on July 19, 2008 | 2 Comments »
a better idea for borage
Posted in Summer, herbs, ingredients, tagged borage, cocktail, edible flowers, garden herbs, herbs, omelette, recipe, recipes, summer drinks on May 19, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Ah, true sunny delight: the borage is in bloom. Such pretty periwinkle blue flowers, all set to adorn a glass of Pimm’s® for whiling away an English summer afternoon. Wood on willow, polite applause, chin-chin…you get the scene. But there’s something wrong with this picture, surely? Firstly it’s most likely raining and secondly, is not Pimm’s [...]
tarragon & hyssop – separated at birth
Posted in herbs, ingredients, tagged culinary herbs, herbs, hyssop, ingredients, tarragon on May 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Yesterday I happened upon a little pot of tarragon at the local flower stall. I’m a big fan of tarragon’s manifold culinary applications and at a mere £1 it was irresistible, but while scrabbling in my wallet I thought I glimpsed another one, so with my £2 coin I bought the pair. So, you’re thinking they look completely different, eh? Well [...]
pound that pesto
Posted in Summer, herbs, ingredients, recipes, slow food, terrific tools, tagged basil, basil pesto, dips, linguine sauce, mortar and pestle, pasta sauce, pesto, pine nuts, slow food, spreads, Summer, wet garlic on May 12, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Nothing so good as pure old-style, old-school pesto. Particularly when made in the old-fashioned way, with a mortar and pestle and while sitting outdoors with basil’s best friend – summer sunshine - for company. Because the basil leaves are not cut as they would be in a food processor they preserve so much more of their [...]
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