Adam Balic

An interesting read, I wish I could see the entire book, without the Independent's overlay. Some of the food reminds me of pre-1980's Australia Anglo-food. Things like "Apricot chicken" (can of apricot nectar, pack of dried Cambells french onion soup and pasta). As a kid I loved this dish and even though it was from tins and packets, the one my grandmother Pickles made tasted better then anybody else's. I haven't eaten it for ~20 years and I wonder if I would like it now, but as part of a family cookbook I would be happy to put it in, right next to the extrodinary, authentic, made from scratch Croatian food of my grandmother Balic and my mother's "Jelly slice" (although not her tuna with cheese and Campbells mushroom soup casserole, topped with cornflakes - shudder). That's what family cookbooks are about surely? I wonder in 50 years time if various decendents of mine will make comments like "Christ, would you look at this, sumac in everything and recipes that used real animals, not vat-meat" when they look at my recipes?

would that have anything to do with the fact that orange is our national color (and also the colour of our royal family)? ← Yep. One wonders what colour carrots would have been if Luther hadn't nailed his notice to the door. n.b. I wonder what you called red headed people before the 16th century? Most like they were just burnt at the stake, maybe.

But the chiogga beetroot, heirloom tomato varieties, the black potato I had sunday, the yellow carrot, the medieval cabbage, and many other ' weird' vegetables as listed on the farm's website, would be impossible to track down. They are simply not grown commercially. ← Oddly enough, it is though to be the Dutch that are responsible for the dominance of the orange carrot in the market. Sainsburys in the UK sporadicaly sells purple carrots, which are quite funa s they maintain there colour upon cooking.

Unfortunately, I don't have a garden. Otherwise I would grow them all at least once.

I imagine that the medieval cabbage is very similar to collared greens or (or just "greens" or "green cabbage in scotland"). I guess the medieval period went on for longer in some parts. Many fodder crops that are rehected by the upwardly mobile are still consumed by people, the swede ("Neep") in Scotland for instance. A very interesting project. There are a few different types of salsify, the most common are called white (Tragopogon porrifolius and balck (Scorzonera hispanica[i/]) salsify respectively. They taste similar. The forgotton veg I would like to taste is the Skirret (Sium sisarum), this was very popular in the 17th and 18th century, but seems to have been replaced by improved forms of the parsnip (which has a similar flavour). Its major fault is that like un-improved carrots and parsnips, the central core is tough and fibrous .

Jack do you have 'Traditional Foods of Britian: A regional inventory" (if not get it from Prospect Books)? The say that a modern method for producing beefings/biffens is to place them on a rack at 105C for approximately 5 hours. At this point they are removed from the oven, flattened a little the returned for another hour. Blackcaps are biffens that are cooked with wine, sugar and spics etc, there are recipes for these in numerous books, but mostly they don't mention the variety to use. Damn I am jealous of you garden (he says staring at his windowbox).

Hi Lucy - this image brings back happy memories from my first trip to Europe in '96. I have a photgraph taken from a similar angle in my album. This one of the first European markets I visited. I am very impressed by the chicken in a bladder, as although I have read about this I have assumed that it was a semi-mythical preparation that some chefs prepare occassionally! Everything looks wonderful and I must say that if I had your handwriting, I would keep a journal too.

Also, in Edinburgh I get up at the crack of dawn to get to the fishmonger and butchers (which do open early). But, this isn't for everybody and if we are talking about a real 'food revolution' (like the food press is always banging on about), it does have to be for are wider portion of the community, not just obsessives like myself. Most people will not go to a fishmonger at 7:30-8:00 am in the UK an store the fish in a work fridge, but they might go to a fishmonger at 6:30 on their way back from work.

If you use a layer of thin crepes, this should prevent the puff from becoming limp. It also gives you an extra textural element and you can use it to introduce discrete flavours.

I also live in Edinburgh. In my first weekend here I asked for a 'book of all the local markets and food shops' - obviously I was laughed at. There obviously was a tradition of markets in Edinburgh, as there are the remains of a few here and there (there is a market - now a lock up storage place off Broughton St) and there are plenty of historical references to fisher women coming up from Leith, veg sellers around the High st. No idea when it all disapeared though. I love markets, but welcome as weekly or monthly farmers markets are, if you can't do a complete daily (or thrice weekly) shop at a market then it isn't much use or even a real market. One issue is opening times, I am sure that independent butchers/bakers/green grocers/ fishmongers would do much better if their opening times changed to reflect the reality of when people have time to shop.

Two of the best European fish. Dover Sole (Solea solea) and John Dory ( Zeus faber). Actually, the latter has a wide distribution. Cute eh? This is the filleted smaller Dory (tossed in for free by the fishmonger) The fillet fish. And fish and chips with mushy peas.

Lucy - I can't remember seeing better food photography then what you have shown here. I think that you must have a different Sun in Lyon, as the quality of the light is so wonderful, I don't think I have ever seen so much 'texture' before. Nice egg coddler BTW.

Again it is the species that is important. The oregon truffles are a North American native that doesn't compare to he Alba and Perigord (Tuber magnatum pico and Tuber melanosporum) truffles. The English truffles will be summer truffles (Tuber aestivum), which are discussed above. The Australian truffles are Perigord black truffles (Tuber melanosporum) that have been innoculated onto specifically planted plots of young oak. I haven't had these, but there is no reason to thik that they wil not be a good product. I have seen some comments on the basis that it would be like comparing farmed salmon to wild salmon, but these comments miss the point that most of the French harvest comes from innoculated plots as well. There could be an issue of terroir, but this works in both directions. Maybe Australian grown Tuber melanosporum will turn out to be like NZ Sav. Blanc - giving another dimension to the flavour and aroma profile of an old world product. Time will tell.

Are excellent, than for the information.

Turducken was supposedly "invented" by Paul Prudhomme some years ago but that has been disputed. Then, I read somewhere that he really did and this was documented. So, yes, it does have a southern US origin, southern Louisiana to be specific. The original stuffings were Cajun style. It is a turkey stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken. Some even go so far as to put a quail in the chicken. If I can find it (been looking, no luck yet), jackal10 has a series of pictures somewhere that are an excellent record of the preparation for the gorgeous thing up-thread. ← So if the cajun flavours are no longer used, then what differentiates it from a ballontine, other then the exact choice of birds? I mean there are plenty of similar creations about and have been for hundreds of years (a Yorkshire Christmas Pie has turkey, a goose, a fowl, a partridge and a pigeon or variations for instance) is there anything distinct about it?

Ah, I know what it is then as it grows by the sides of roads in most places I have been, even the rural part of Australia were I was a youngling.

Mince pie? ← Right -- modern "mincemeat" has no meat let alone mints, mince, or mintz. But it certainly used to. The sweet kept the meat from spoiling. But that was then. I've always thought the Moroccan bistillah chicken pie -- the one with the powdered sugar on top -- would be a good dessert. Maybe do a version of that. Maybe do a riff on a Chinese sweet pork bun. I thought the toucinho do ceu (bacon from heaven) idea above was cute. ← Mincemince meat has suet in it even now. Or should. Here is a link to a recent discription of some modern Sicilian mince pies by Albiston. These contain beef, but you could substitute pork or ham. There were a lot of variations on these pies, tongue was a popular meat. They are also quite seasonal. Most people seem to go "ick" when they here about meat in a sweet pie, but they have never tasted them so what do they know. I have eaten them and the meat content is not really detectable, if anything it adds a textual difference.

Geese graze, so they taste quite a lot like beef (from cattle that have eaten grass that is), but also a little like wild duck or squab. To be honest I think that it really doesn't matter as long as it is fun for everybody and it looks like a celebration - which it is, of you friends and family. An expensive chicken or some pheasants is fine but, it is a little too normal for us, if you see what I mean.

Well she looks a little cold, but frozen may be over stating the case.

If you can get the flank (belly) in one piece, this is a good cut. It has more fat and then the rest of the animals mostly ends up as sausages for this reason), so it is great spread with a forcemeat or other stuffing, rolled tied and braised.

Puff pastry existed well before the 18th century, even in England. It is really just a variation on shortpaste after all. To make butter paste Take flour and seven or eight eggs, and cold butter and fair water, or rose water, and spices (if you will) and make your paste. Beat it on a board, and when you have so done divide it into two or three parts and drive out the piece with a rolling pin. And do['t] with butter one piece by another, and fold up your paste upon the butter and drive it out again. And so do five or six times together, and some not cut for bearings. Put them into the over, and when they be baked scrape sugar on them and serve them. The Good Housewife's Jewel, Thomas Dawson (1596) In 18th century England it was used much like we use shortcrust now and in some cases to line pudings , like a suet crust. Potentially, M. Feuillet developed a refined form of puff pastry, but it sounds a little to neat a story to me.

I will add a little to Ken's excellent post. When talking truffles, I think that it is best to work out the species names as then you can be sure of what you are getting. There are numerous species of truffles in Europe (over a dozen in Italy), not all of these are collected and only two are highly prized. The while truffle of Alba Tuber magnatum pico The Black Perigord truffle Tuber melanosporum These two are found ouside these regions. In these regions there are some other truffles and in some cases these inferior species are considered a pest. If you see a cheap "Perigord truffle" it will not be Tuber melanosporum. In the UK the other species you are likely to see for sale (and it actually grows in the UK) is; The summer truffle Tuber aestivum. The season for this truffle is quite broad and you see the fresh even now. These have a dark warty exterior similar to the Tuber melanosporum, but are quite pale inside. I have several times seen these for sale in the UK sold as "Black Truffles" and priced as Tuber melanosporum, which is terrible. As they are quite pale, they are sometimes passed of as white summer truffles in restuarants, which again is a con. There is nothing wrong with the summer truffle, it certainly isn't to be compared with Tuber magnatum pico or Tuber melanosporum and it is nice enough shaved on pasta (more aroma then flavour), but it should be sold as what it is and in season in Italy it is cheaper then parmesan. In the UK there is a type of puffball with a black interior, which when flavoured with truffle oil is sometimes passed off as 'Black truffle'.

Yes is is a problem. Goose is great, the best IMO, but it just doesn't go very far This site suggests that you allow for 700 gm weight per person (due to the high bone to meat ratio) and not to choose a bird over 6 kg as extra weight is essentially fat. My grandparents farmed them so we had them for Christmas every years as a kid, from memory this seems about correct. So the largest goose will feed just over 8 adults. This might be ideal for you given your group size. Turkey mostly is crap. As I mentioned above, thanks to Jack I now have an order for the one of the best Turkeys in the UK. I look forward to eating it. Another option is a ham. The UK produces some ultra-good ham, a large quality ham will feed a lot of people and the best hams are utterly delcious. This site has some interesting poultry. A few poncy chooks and and guinea fowl would be interesting. For my first Christmas here we combined with a few other lost souls, my wife and I provided a pork roast. Mixed roasts (beef, lamb, pork) are relatively normal for an Australian Christmas (but becoming less so as after 200 hundred years, people are noticing how hot it is at that time of the year). However, a some of the Canadian guests completely freaked and wouldn't touch it as "Pork at Christmas is not right".

Durum grains are very difficult to grind to a very fine grade using stone mills, so maybe this accounts for the textural differance. Infact "semolina" comes from the Italian "semola" which means "bran".

As Vsera said Spain is a little to far south for cranberry like Vaccinium spp like lingonberries and cowberries. There former was very common at the market in Lithuania a last month. Anyway, one suggestion is this. Does Madrid have an IKEA? If so you are able to get lingon berry products from there. Possibly they have frozen in stock, so you could contact them.