Coppery Potness

I recently cleaned out some of the high inaccessible storage cupboards in our kitchen which need a ladder to look into (thanks Mr Architect!) with the aim of throwing out or giving away those items no longer needed, moving not so much used stuff in, and creating more room in the everyday part of the kitchen.

There were many things up there I had forgotten about, including novelty Y2K champagne glasses (remember Y2K? All the contracts we drafted had to have special Y2K clauses in them just in case everything re-set to Year Zero!  Seems so silly now), a huge lobster pot, old emission globes left by the previous owners and these two copper pots:

Okay, I obviously hadn't forgotten they existed.  They were there, in the deep recesses of my brain, but we had not used them for so long, they had slipped into a limbo area.  I got a nice surprise when I found them but they were almost black (with some green bits) and needed a really really good clean.  I got my husband to do that, and as you can see they are still not perfect.  

I have a very minimalist kitchen.  I don't really have anywhere to display these beauties.  But sometimes open shelving beckons me because I really love copper pots against stainless steel.  Something about the contrast of industrial modernity v an almost Gothic patina of age.  I so love this kitchen. 

This is a bit judgmental I know, but I just feel that someone who colour codes their cookbooks probably does not get much use out of these beautiful hanging pots. 

A lot of US and UK kitchens have a central hanging pot arrangement. It is not very common at all in Australia.   I don't think I could live like this but if you used your pots regularly it would be quite practical.   When I was a little girl I saw a story on Farrah Fawcett Majors in US Vogue.  It must have been about 1978 and she was at the height of her fame.  The story had a picture of her in her 1970's kitchen with a huge set of hanging copper pots.   She spoke of her love of cooking, and it made me look at her in a completely different light. 

This is a very English kitchen, complete with an Aga stove. 

This is Martha Stewart's kitchen at Turkey Hill.   Many famous chefs have kitchens which are copper pot heaven. Julia Child's, with her pegboard hanging wall, is very well known.  And this is Elizabeth David's:

Every kitchen should have a copper pot.  They are things of beauty not just practicality.  And they last forever. They are a pot to pass down to your children, if you can keep it clean enough! 

Apparently copper bowls are very good for whisking eggs.  But in fact I feel I only need one, the little pot, which can be used for cooking sauces.  These pots distribute heat really well, and can also be brought to the table for serving, just as is done at Vue de Monde as you can see below:

I must get out the copper cleaner again this weekend.  What a pity there is no miracle quick and easy way to clean copper. 

(Images (1) Marie Claire Italia (3) Raimondkoch.com (4) Badgley Mischka's kitchen via Decorpad (5) Coastal Living (6) House to Home (7) Martha Stewart (8) JohnnyGrey.com (9) Vue de Monde)

Tweet

Winter in Melbourne - Tomatoes and Mushrooms for Comfort

Winter is the time for newspapers and magazines to wheel out articles about comfort food.   What is the local celebrity chef's favourite 'comfort food'?    It's probably noodles, soup, a stew or braise or some other heavy carbohydratey, meaty concoction 

This is not comfort food to me.  

To me,  comfort food is a simple feast which evokes memories of childhood or a happy time.    That is what brings succour to the soul and explains why we cook these dishes again and again, and in the depths of winter when our thoughts can turn to the past.  

This is Wootton Manor, the 17th century listed house in Sussex in which Elizabeth David, cookery writer, grew up.   A number of extensions were added by family friend, the architect Detmar Blow, (Isabella Blow married his namesake and grandson) including a staircase hall, library, ballroom and nurseries, resulting in an interesting yet harmonious Arts and Crafts - Jacobean house.  

Is it any wonder Elizabeth David became such a sparkling writer?  She may not have had a completely idyllic childhood, but she was surrounded by wit and stimulating intellects:  Walter De La Mare and Rudyard Kipling were local and frequent visitors.  

Here is Elizabeth David (second from right) in 1923 with her father and mother Stella and Rupert Gwynne) and her sisters Felicite, Priscilla and Diana.

Like all children of that class and era, she was largely raised by her nanny, in her case, one Nanny Cheshire, who used to cook the girls little treats on the open fire in the nursery.  These were oases in a desert of junket, tapioca, boiled turnip tops and spinach, mutton and dry rice pudding.   Until they turned eleven, the girls were only permitted to dine with their parents once a week, at Sunday lunch.  

The dish which sticks in my memory, and of which Elizabeth David wrote so evocatively, was that of mushrooms in cream.

The girls would venture out in the early morning to pick the tiny button mushrooms which grew in the field beyond the bluebell wood.   They then brought the mushrooms back to Nanny, who would briefly saute the mushrooms and pour cream over them.    Once the cream has bubbled and reduced a bit, they would be ready to eat.  

This is a wonderful dish which I cook frequently finished with freshly ground pepper and chopped parsley. 

My comfort food is equally simple.   Cold tomato on hot toast.  My mother used to make this for me when I was little.    It is a little funny how something so mundane can be so good. But that is the way of life sometimes. 

Like all things so simple, there are a number of requirements which must always be met:

The toast must be proper thick sourdough.   It must be spread with butter.  Tomatoes must be sliced thinly and then drizzled with olive oil and Maldon salt.    The tomatoes have to come from the fridge, even though I don't usually keep them there.   

The contrast between the hot toast and coldish tomato is taste heaven.  Truly.   

And now I force my children to eat it too and they love it!  So the cycle continues.  

Tweet

Spice World

I have been rereading Elizabeth David's eccentric little tome 'Spices Salt and Aromatics in the English kitchen'. It is a short book, which reviews spices in the English kitchen, their use for preserves and pickles, the Indian influence in England and includes lots of recipes for things like pickled onions and a 1950s style curry.

She quotes Sir Henry Luke from the Tenth Muse (1954):

'To turn to spices, mace - that aesthetically beautiful by-product of the nutmeg tree, a network husk of deep and brilliant lacquer red while it is still fresh on the nut - enriches thick soups and the stockpot generally with its singularly piquant aroma. Nutmeg itself, grated, is also a help in soups no less than in a bread sauce and a rum punch. Saffron is as indispensible to a good Milanese risotto as it is to a bouillabaisse and a paella. A touch of cardamom or coriander seed transforms a humdrum stew with the aroma of a Middle Eastern souk.

And what a rich evocative aroma they have, those ancient vaulted bazaars of Aleppo and Damascus and the Old City of Jerusalem, of Qazvin and Meshhed and Isfahan, as you approach the streets of the vendors of spices. Here you inhale an amalgam of all the aboriginal savours and smells of the Orient: the pepper and cloves; the cinnamon and turmeric and coriander.'

I cannot wander an Arabian souk today, and this is the closest I have ever been to a Middle Eastern Spice market:

(Market, Singaraja, Northern Bali, 2005)

Isn't it incredible how the scent of spice can evoke a long dormant memory. For me, cloves take me back to when I was 10 and we made pomanders for Christmas by sticking cloves into an orange. Cinnamon reminds me of the cinnamon and sugar mixture I ate sprinkled on buttery toast when I was a teenager. And the mixture of pepper, nutmeg, blachan, galangal and turmeric brings back many meals from Bali.

I may have written about the pointlessness of muffins. Well here is a wonderful Nigella Lawson muffin recipe which has some spices, and last for a few days in a sealed container. Your kitchen will be filled with a spicy Christmassy ginger glow.

Gingerbread muffins

Ingredients

250 g plain flour

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp ground ginder

1 tsp ground clinnamon

1/4 tsp ground cloves

1 egg

50 g dark muscovado sugar

50 g light muscovado suger

150 ml milk

1/4 tsp balsamic vinegear

6 tbsp vegetable or corn oil

4 tbsp golden syrup

4 tbsp black treacle

Method

Preheat oven to 200 degrees celsius. Line a 12 bun muffin tin with muffin liners.

Combine the flour, bicarb of sada, baking powder and spices in a large bowl. Whisk the egg in a large measuring jug then add the sugards, breaking up any lumps. Add the milk and vinegar then measure in the oil with a trablespooon. Use the same oily spoon to add the syrup and treacle so they don't stick to it. Whisk the mixture to combine and add to the flour and spices.

Stir until mixed but still fairly lumpy - the mixutre may be quite runny but this is okay.

Spoon or pour the mixture ino the muffin papers and bake for 20 mins until the tops are browned - the muffins will still be squashy when you take them out to cool on a rack. Note you will not get the hump topped look of other muffins. This is a good thing.

And if you want to learn more of spice history, go no further than Giles Milton's Nathaniel's Nutmeg in which (amongst other things) the farsighted English, following a little spat wih the Netherlands, traded the tiny island of Run (part of the Banda Island chain in southeast Asia) with a rather larger rocky island off the coast of north America called Manhattan.

The transation was considered to be fair largely because Run had scores of nutmeg trees, and Manhattan had none.

(Images: (1)(5) Taschen (3) Flickr (4) Jane (5) Point Click Home)

Tweet