eG Foodblog: Jackal10 - Bread and Apples

[hjshorter]

Thanks from me too, for the opportunity to share your meals this week.

You have probably been over this somewhere else, but here goes again...

Are you the main cook at home or does your partner cook too?

Edited September 22, 2004 by hjshorter (log)

[jackal10]

I do most of the cooking. Jill, bless her, does most of the clearing and washing up...an endless, vital but often an unseen and thankless task

Last batch of pictures.

Went into College to check the arrangements for tonight

M. Reverchon Head of Catering in the cellar; the saddle of Venison (from the Denham estate http://www.denhamestate.co.uk/)

Let me correct the idea that Cambridge college life is just about eating and drinking, lest I give the wrong impression. While the environment is supportive, and the networking important, a lot of hard work goes on. The College came top last year in the Cambridge table of academic excellence, measured by the examination results, and is also high in sporting achievement league tables, in what is arguably the best University in the world. It works hard to ensure equal opportunity, with special emphasis on attracting those from disadvantaged backgrounds, although there are many good candidates for every place. It is very tough to get in, but once here it is also tough to fail (or leave) One way of attracting the best and the brightest is the quality of the life... John Harvard studied here, and I believe did good work in the then colonies. More is given on the website (www.emma.cam.ac.uk ).

College Hall, the main dining area. High table, where the Fellows of the college dine is on the slight platform at the top. After dinner the fellows retire to the Parlour, where port is drunk and serious conversation is had.

The servery, normally a self-service canteen for the students, backing onto the kitchen

Upper Hall, the venue for our meeting, and the Gardiner Room, laid for our dinner

New Court, new in 1824. The Hall is on the left, the kitchens ahead of you with the Upper Hall above the kitchen. The court, being next tot he kitchen is laid out as a herb garden. The Chapel (designed by Wren) is undergoing restoration

While in the centre of town I had a quick walk round the market, on your behalf, dear eGulleteers. The Market is a square, and this is the left side. In addition to produce stalls there are clothes and all sorts. However late on a grey Monday afternoon was perhaps not the best time, as most of the stallholders were packing up or had already gone. The Market has declined somewhat since the City Council made the centre of town a pedestrian area. Also the city centre, like city centres elsewhere, is now mostly shops and offices and tourist places, rather than residential.

The left side of the market, and one of the better produce stalls.

They had fresh cobnuts, and new season wet walnuts; local raspberries

Squashes, corn and new carrots, but I don't think the asparagus was local. Nest stall has wholefoods

The fish man was packing up; this "Caffe Mobile" was neat

There is a stall with interesting breads, I think from Bury St Edmunds

The Dinner itself.

Two candidate companies presented themselves, and we also discussed funding for a new approach to diagnosing and treating Alzheimers, and ways of accessing information about charities, and in particular how to measure their efficiency, for example in how much of the donated money actually reaches the intended recipients, rather than is used for adminsitration (surprisingly little in some cases):

We had

Sweet Pimento and Crab Soup

Bassermann-Jordan Jesuitgaren 1990

Roast Whole Saddle of Venison with Caramelised Pears and a Redcurrent Jus

Nuits St George Dom D'Arlot 1995

Warm Linzertorte with Armagnac ice cream

Ch. Coutet 1988

Cheeses

Coffee, Petit Four

Port

That's it... I'm off to bed, an the baton passes to the next blogger. It's been fun. You picked a good week - although I did nothing different just because of the blog, we don't have such parties every week.

If you are planing on passing this way drop me a note...

Edited September 22, 2004 by jackal10 (log)

[ludja]

Thanks jackal10--the party was of course very fun to attend "virtually" and thank you also for the nice peek into some of Cambridge's food life.

cobnuts! interesting never heard this term before but found out something via this link: all about cobnuts

Just to clarify though--is the term hazelnut or filbert used also? From what I understand from the link; only fresh (green?) hazelnuts are called cobnuts?

Thanks again and hope the rest of the semester is good.

Edited September 22, 2004 by ludja (log)

[SobaAddict70]

Thank YOU Jack, and best regards. It was a pleasure to be with you this week.

The eGullet Foodblog will now take a short break for a couple of days before resuming again.

Soba

[jackal10]

Just to clarify though--is the term hazelnut or filbert used also?  From what I understand from the link; only fresh (green?) hazelnuts are called cobnuts?

←

I don't really know. To me, all three terms are used, pretty well interchangeably. I think there may be slight variety differences (e.g. Kentish Cob is a distinct variety

Cobnuts tends to refer to the green whole nut in its shell, as off the tree

Hazelnuts tend to mean the nut kernals (or the trees)

Fibert is a rather old fashioned term

[bleudauvergne]

Jack, do you remember the names of those two blue cheeses?

[jackal10]

Jack, do you remember the names of those two blue cheeses? 

←

I think one was a Stilton, and the other a Shropshire Blue. Probably from Long Clawston Dairy. Like Stilton, but coloured with Annato, like Leicester cheese.

[Anna N]

Thanks, Jack. It has been fascinating.

[Dejah]

Thanks, Jack for a great week!

That saddle of venison looks wonderful. Local? What seasonings?

Haven't been to Cambridge since 1979...Seeing the great pictures may just put the firs under me.

[jackal10]

Thanks, Jack for a great week!

That saddle of venison looks wonderful.  Local? What seasonings?

Haven't been to Cambridge since 1979...Seeing the great pictures may just put the firs under me.

←

Golden days....We often get an Indian Summer around this time - coming up for the start of the University term.

The saddle was from the Denham Estate in Norfolk, as referenced above. There were two for 24 oeople. Plainly roasted, then filleted, carved and re-assembled for ease of serving. Tender, lean and flavoursome. I think that was a little spurious choppe parsley on the top. I'd maybe consider something fruity and autumnal, such as a blackberry or bramble sauce as an alternative to what we had.

[jackal10]

Thanks, Jack for a great week!

That saddle of venison looks wonderful.  Local? What seasonings?

Haven't been to Cambridge since 1979...Seeing the great pictures may just put the firs under me.

←

Golden days....We often get an Indian Summer around this time - coming up for the start of the University term.

The saddle was from the Denham Estate in Norfolk, as referenced above. There were two for 24 people. Plainly roasted, then filleted, carved and re-assembled for ease of serving. Tender, lean and flavoursome. I think that was a little spurious choppe parsley on the top. Its the sort of thing the kitchen does best.

Not that what we had was not good, but I'd maybe consider something fruity and autumnal, such as a blackberry or bramble sauce, as a garnish as an alternative to what we had. Baked or lightly pickled quince might also be good. Little early for medlars.

Edited September 22, 2004 by jackal10 (log)

[GG Mora]

Thanks, Jack, for another brilliant blog.

I have a question about your photos. I generally don't keep up on photo-heavy blogs since, being on a dial-up connection still, it just takes too damn long for all the pics to load. You've obviously whittled down the resolution – to no visual detriment, but they load very quickly. What res are you using? Perhaps future bloggers could take a cue...

[jackal10]

The photos are taken originally with a Sony DSC F717 5Mpixel camera, at highest resolution (except the cell phone camera ones).

I then post processed them with Microsoft Photodraw; usually the contrast and brightnes needed tweaking, and the sharpness improved slightly. I save them as .jpg with a compression level of 50 and a resolution of 320 x 240 or 640 x 480 for the larger pix. This is good enough for screen work, but will be a bit grainy if printed full page. If anyone wants the high resolution originals, ask. I'm aware of the difficulties to heavy pictures cause, which is why I used the maximum reasonable compression. The average weight is only about 20Kb.

The webcam is a Logitech webcam that was uploaded to a private site using ftp and ConquerCam.

I asked if people prefer the smaller or larger pix, and the page layout (2 pix + text), but got no response. I'd still be interested.

The new Imagegullet is good, but I miss being able to upload eight pix at once; also having all the foodblog pictures in one flat directory is not optimal.

Edited September 22, 2004 by jackal10 (log)

[Susan in FL]

I want to add my thanks for sharing your week with us. It was too much for me to keep up with during this particularly busy week, and I didn't get to "interact" as you wished us to, but I will be reading both your blogs more thoroughly at a later time! Thanks again for the inspirations.

[GG Mora]

Thanks, Jack. I haven't done any uploads to the New ImageGullet, but I suspect I'll curse having to do them one-at-a-time.

I must have missed your query re: page layout. I do like the photos 2 up; the pages get pretty "leggy" otherwise.

[saskanuck]

Gorgeous food, gorgeous blog, jack.

[Mottmott]

Jack a wonderful blog as before, and shared a cider making festival few of us have ourselves. I guess there was a time when this would be a normal part of many people's lives. It is a great contribution to eG as are your other offerings.

I've just finished bottling up some of Suvir's tomato chutney and of course went to your lesson on preserving to finish off the process. It's been 25 years since I've bottled anything for a longer stay than the fridge allows. Your bread class was also an inspiration and lead me to my first own sourdough experiencce. You'll be amused to hear (or not) that my DIL disposed of the "imported" starter that was living in the back of the fridge (thinking it was just something that had been there too long and had to be nasty). I can replace the starter, but oh the sentimental value.

Barbara