curlywurlyfi

I have a fond memory of an open tart made with small boiled potatoes, wilted rocket, sticky onions and hunks of melting Taleggio. But I appreciate it's not strictly a cheddar'n'onion pie. Doesn't Tamsin Day-Lewis have one, though, in The Art of The Tart (oh how I rue the day that I put my cookbooks in storage)? Something about five minutes before the end you switch up an egg and some cream + seasoning in a jug then pour into the pie through the hole you have strategically left in the puff pastry lid, then put it back in the oven for five minutes?

well, I have just ordered me one of these. DO YOU SEE THE POWER OF EGULLET?? (or maybe just Maggie ) Fi

my brother claims he can tell the difference between Irn Bru from a tin and Irn Bru from a glass bottle. oh, the discerning palates in my family.

and a tin of Irn Bru. or an Irn Bru float, if you're hungover.

oh my god, Marco, I swear, you have brought a tear to my eye.

now THERE'S a thought. bet that would be delicious on a bacon sarn. which must be made with soft square white sliced totally processed to hell no fibre no goodness bread. Any deviation from this is actually punishable by law.

handful of raw sugar snap peas eaten whilst standing in the kitchen waiting for the pasta to boil, then a plate of linguine with chili, garlic, flatleaf parsley and lots of Monino Gran Fruttato olive oil + Maldon sea salt. And some merlot.

au contraire! I'm a firm believer in malt vinegar - and plenty of salt - on chips! I'm not a great fan of skinny frites (can't taste the potato - what's the point)? But the chips in The Union on Greek Street in Soho, which are fat and covered in huge salt flakes, get mayonnaise. mmmmm.

I hesitate to inject a dissonant note into this hymn to brown sauce, but... FECH, you people are all WRONG. brown sauce lives only to serve the scrambled egg and, somewhat curiously, the cheese souffle. it has no place in a bacon butty. the only correct thing to put on a bacon butty is... MORE BACON. I will have no truck with abominating them with brown sauce. Now, sausage sandwiches, on the other hand, get slathered in English mustard and a layer of Ma Kirkpatrick's Seville orange marmelade. oh yes. Fi

Yup. A filled roll is a plain white bread roll, split open around its equator and filled with whatever you desire. on the west coast of Scotland you ask for "a roll an' sausage" (ie sausage in such a roll) as distinct from "a piece an' sausage" (which is a sausage sandwich made with sliced bread). of course, you do know that in Scotland sausage is square and flat? if you want a normal tubular shaped sausage, you have to ask for 'links'.

Apple Almond Cinnamon Cake Very handy for apple glut season. Do read the recipe through before you start, as it is in three distinct parts, like the cake. Thanks to my room-mate Simon's mother, Mrs Lund! Almond Cake Base 4 oz self raising flour 2 oz soft brown sugar pinch salt 3 oz butter (unsalted) 2 oz ground almonds beaten egg few drops lemon juice Apples 1 lb eating apples, peeled cored + sliced 2 oz soft brown sugar Cinammon Topping 2 oz self raising flour 5 oz soft brown sugar 1 tsp cinammon (or more if you love it) 2 oz butter Preheat oven to moderate (170-180C), and butter and base-line a deep cake tin (round or square). Rub together in a mixing bowl the flour, sugar, salt, butter and half the almonds. Bind with the egg (you will probably only need half) and lemon juice. Spread in tin and sprinkle with remaining ground almonds. Pack the sliced apples over the almond mixture and sprinkle with the sugar. Finally mix together the topping ingredients and blob over the apples (you don't have to be perfectionist about this, it spreads out as it cooks). Bake for about an hour. Best warm with thick cream. Keywords: Dessert, Cake, Easy, Fruit ( RG878 )

Apple Almond Cinnamon Cake Very handy for apple glut season. Do read the recipe through before you start, as it is in three distinct parts, like the cake. Thanks to my room-mate Simon's mother, Mrs Lund! Almond Cake Base 4 oz self raising flour 2 oz soft brown sugar pinch salt 3 oz butter (unsalted) 2 oz ground almonds beaten egg few drops lemon juice Apples 1 lb eating apples, peeled cored + sliced 2 oz soft brown sugar Cinammon Topping 2 oz self raising flour 5 oz soft brown sugar 1 tsp cinammon (or more if you love it) 2 oz butter Preheat oven to moderate (170-180C), and butter and base-line a deep cake tin (round or square). Rub together in a mixing bowl the flour, sugar, salt, butter and half the almonds. Bind with the egg (you will probably only need half) and lemon juice. Spread in tin and sprinkle with remaining ground almonds. Pack the sliced apples over the almond mixture and sprinkle with the sugar. Finally mix together the topping ingredients and blob over the apples (you don't have to be perfectionist about this, it spreads out as it cooks). Bake for about an hour. Best warm with thick cream. Keywords: Dessert, Cake, Easy, Fruit ( RG878 )

do your kids enjoy music? there are some great Brazilian compilations out there at the moment. Other than that, what about fried plantains - mmmm. Fi

exactly! which is why I was so disappointed that mine were swilling about in a good two inches of liquid after 12 hours on low overnight. and remember, I didn't add any extra liquid - just a good lump of butter (prob 50g) and a good slug of olive oil. Also, they weren't quite cooked - were still a little crunchy (which I guess I should have expected, since when I make stews in my slow-cooker the veg often remain crunchy). I tried boiling mine down but I never got the glorious treacly stickiness that I wanted. I think I'll have to stick to stovetop for that one. Unless I try one more time on high... For heaven's sake, onions are CHEAP! I can afford to experiment! Anyway. The failures were a great addition to my tagine on Sunday night, and I have frozen the rest of the onions in one-onion portions for when I next do a recipe that opens 'brown one onion'.

I'm in, if you + Jack need a dining companion. We could do early doors one night - or lunch?

- houmous + crudites + black olives served on the breakfast bar in the kitchen to everyone hanging around whilst I tinkered with the main course: - chicken, apricot + prune tagine with a few mushrooms + whole almonds fried in butter - couscous with lemon + coriander - steamed green beans tossed with spinach sauteed in garlic, squeeze of lemon - cubes of potatoes roasted with chunks of fennel, fennel seeds, saffron, garlic + EVOO (didn't really go but I hadn't made them in ages and I love them) then the BLOODY oven died halfway through the tarte tatin. None of the neighbours were in (on a Sunday night? where WERE they??) so we brought forward the cheese course slightly (Gouda, Dovedale Blue and an Epoisses that was verging on inedible it was so runny), and I pacified the mutterings with some jelly beans and chocolate raisins while I picked the flaccid pastry slab off the apples and finished them off on the hob + served with creme fraiche - they turned out delicious, buttery and caramelly - but I kicked the oven a LOT. Fi

Marlene, my sympathies, I had parallel problems with my crockpot confit last night. Chucked in about eight large onions with butter + oil, no extra liquid, no sugar, started it up about 9pm, left overnight on low, checked this morning at 8am and onions sort of pale tan rather than treacly brown, and totally awash in juice. I'm in again tonight and will be boiling them down in a normal pan. They tasted good, very sweet, but I wonder if to be entirely successful I should have either had them on high overnight, or started them off frying in the normal way and then transferred them to the crockpot when they'd got a bit of colour (and driven off a bit of liquid)? Any thoughts? Fi

OK Tarka so it's been nearly three weeks, am I allowed to tempt you now...??? Did you see the piece in today's Times saying that detoxes are actually BAD for you (I knew it, I knew it)? Fi

Physalis are also good dipped in caramel. I sometimes take them to tea for friends who have toddlers because, while the taste is a bit too sharp for your average child, they adore peeling the papery husks back. and then I get to eat the fruit. Or dip it in chocolate. Child labour? yes indeedy, bring it on. Thanks for great blog, Marlena - cream cheese + jam - mmmmmm.

there was a piece in the Sunday papers about the best olive oil and the one whose name came up most often was Seggiano. Naturally I chucked out the paper this morning so can't help you with any more info than that - how helpful is this, on a scale of 1-10? At home at the moment I'm using Monino Gran Fruttato which is grassy and peppery and thoroughly delicious for bread-dunking.

or there was one kicking about somewhere (in last month's Delicious?) for pork belly roasted on shallots with orange + cardamom, which I shall be trying on Sunday, oh yes. Though the Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall way - chop thyme with coarse salt, then rub into skin getting well into the grooves* then roast - is simplicity itself and absolutely delicious. mmmm - hawg fat. Fi * cue any amount of 80s music puns here

the charmingly named Gorilla Snot Shot. Take a mouthful of Baileys, hold it in your mouth, then add a mouthful of Rose's lime juice cordial. Instant curdling of the cream in the Baileys. Like holding a wad of paper fibre in your mouth. Seems to be something about third year at university...

Delia Smith has a really delicious recipe for dried apricot chutney with orange, cloves + ginger.

Cut to February 2001. I went to Malta from London for a long weekend for my mother’s birthday. Was welcomed back into the bosom of my family with much gladness (in my family, this means a large gin and a handful of peanuts all round). After three days of solidly meat-based meals Mum finally heeded my pathetic pleadings for green vegetables. Fresh local broccoli - lovely. We sit down to supper - me, my parents, my brother and my brother’s girlfriend, Sharon. Sharon is the first to see it. “Oh my god, what is this, is it a worm?” And sure enough, yes it is, hiding along a length of floret, a little green worm about an inch long. Fortunately steamed to death. We shriek with laughter, throw it away and carry on. Until, seconds later - and note instantaneous, totally back-of-the-brain reversion to seven-year-oldness - I injudiciously turn over another bit of broccoli. Cue scream. “MuuuuuuUUUUUUMMMMMM - mine’s BIGGER...” Much larger, much fatter, pale green caterpillar with visible eyes and feet. Also, mercifully, steamed to death. Well. Five stomachs heave in unison, supper is consigned to the bin, and it’s cheese on toast all round. All together now? “Nobody loves me, everybody hates me...” Couldn’t wait to get back to London. And I’ve never complained about frozen vegetables since. Fi

Inspired by this thread, and Jackal's tip about aging ordinary beef in the fridge, I conducted my own steak taste test last night. Bought four supermarket sirloins: 1 x standard Tesco, 1 x standard Sainsburys, 1 x Waitrose organic (previously lauded on this thread), and 1 x standard Tesco aged for one week in the fridge as Jackal prescribes. Aided by my beautiful assistants Matt and Matt, we set up the tasting table in the kitchen. There were sauces - Thai dipping sauce and Roquefort sauce - and a ficelle for juice-sopping, and spinach with lemon + garlic, but I insisted we taste the steaks naked first. [Not LITERALLY naked, guys, come on, eeeeeuuuuwww.] Salt + pepper only for the first sampling. Fried the steaks in a little olive oil to rare, rested them for five minutes and sliced them onto the sampling plate. The results were surprising. The head + shoulders runaway winner was the Tesco bought that afternoon, which had good depth of flavour and good texture. Second was the Tesco bought a week ago - slightly rubbery and less flavour. Waitrose organic was next - chewy and only a little beefy. Which leaves the JS steak, which tasted of absolutely nothing at all and was frankly rubbish. We fought not to have to eat it. Picture a pack of squabbling vultures, however, for the remaining strips of the Tesco steak. I was sorely disappointed in the fridge-aged beef - it had gone a wonderful dark red and was much drier than the other three steaks - very promising - and yet it tasted dull. Yes, these were all supermarket steaks so the potential for dullness was never far away, but I had had higher hopes for this method. So there you have it. An entirely subjective and non-scientific Steak Trial. Followed up with a bottle of Passito di Pantelleria and some cantuccini. Fi