I don't know what you would call the weather we've been experiencing lately but it's not summer. Rain/cold wind/hail.....where is the sun??? Helllooo....big dude up there some sun would be nice....please?????
Ok so even without the sun summer does have it's bonuses. Peaches/Apricots/Strawberries/Plums/Blueberrys....and the list goes on!! Seasonality is hugely important in a kitchen. Any Chef worth their salt will reflect the seasons on their menu,I mean could you imagine seeing winter roast vege on a menu in the middle of summer?? It'd be like walking into a clothes store and the sales person selling you a ski jacket..."Yes even though it's 30degrees outside I'd love to wear the new seasons ski jackets and look like I'd just left the slopes even though the winter is still 6months away You Moron!".
I love watching the seasons changing on menus. Walking around the restaurants and cafes reading the menus can be a enjoyable experience. Quite often you'll see the same ingredients on the menus but it's the way that the Chefs use and interpret them that make the real difference. Myself personally I like the simple approach. Simple things done right with great flavours. I mean how wrong can you go with Strawberries and cream??
Fresh strawberries(quartered and tops removed) and some Chantilly cream.
Chantilly cream:
Fresh cream
Icing sugar - to taste
Vanilla essence -to taste
Whisk until soft peaks. Don't over whisk!!
Place Strawberries in bowl/glass/serving vessel and top with Chantilly cream,Done!
And Stonefruit....Mmmmm stonefruit. Again I like it simple.
Vanilla poached stonefruit :
1 Vanilla Pod
1 cup Sugar
2 cups Water
Stonefruit: 1 Peach/1 Apricot/1 large Plum/ 1 Nectarine (halved and de-stoned) should feed 2 people.
Split and scrape vanilla pods and put seeds/pod into the water/sugar mix and heat until sugar has dissolved then add the stonefruit and poach gently until soft. Put the fruit into bowls and drizzle a little of the poaching liquid over the top of the fruit and then top with Chantilly cream. Simple and delicious.
But progress progress progress. I have freed my whites from their banishment in the deep dark recesses of the wardrobe and damn did they look worse for wear. For some reason "Stains for the memories" came to mind when I saw them. The faded black marks from the charcoal off the oven tops,a faded orange stain on a sleeve-Pumpkin and Parmersen soup,a cut in a cuff-filleting salmon when the knife slipped...missed my fingers by about 5mm,pale red dots on my collar-tomato sauce being blitzed with a large whizz stick (it gets everywhere...trust me!!)
So it was into the laundry bucket with a heap of napisan(laundry whitener) and soaked for 2days then washed and well not bad...not perfect but clean......ok so the stains didn't move,no surprise I guess. Time for some new jackets then.
On the other front I've signed up to the photography website flickr.com and joined up to several food photography groups and posted several of my food photos and seem to be getting good responses so far. Small steps...but some none the less.
And also thank you to all my friends for their support,without you this would be a lot harder!!
Next post I'm going to attempt to explain the language of the kitchen,quick warning it could contain explicit language and a weird sense of humor.
You've been warned!!
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