Barry is such a tart. A tart for tv programs with lists. More of the “100 greatest albums of all time”, and not so much the “When cats go bad” kind of programming. Tonight, he’s watching “40 great scary movies”. I gave up half way through from all the screaming and wide-eyed terror in people’s eyes. One thing new I learnt while watching it – there are quite a few well-endowed female characters in Scream.

Thankfully, he’s also a tart for cooking programs with a twist. We recently watched a BBC program called In Search of Perfection, in which Heston Blumenthal attempts to create his perfect version of classic British dishes. In the first episode, he uses his own scientific approach to making bangers ‘n’ mash and treacle tart. Supposedly you can recreate these recipes at home too, but I can’t really see myself making toast-water to flavour sausage mince, and I haven’t a clue where to source dry ice from (though if I did, I certainly would be purchasing a small amount for some home-made ice-cream!).

An example of a recipe that you don’t really want to mess with, is a freeform tart. It’s as simple and as rustic as it gets – although, if you want to trick it up a little to impress your friends, you can tell everyone you made a crostata. There’s something about a crisp berry tart that just speaks of relaxed Sundays, even though this particular Sunday was soggy and grey. I used a recipe from a book I got from last Saturday’s Food and Wine Fair. The original recipe by Maeve O’Meara calls for fresh figs, but as we are figless at the moment, I settled for raspberries and blueberries : the colour of our impending summer. Blueberries are my favourite berries. Not only are they delicious, but high in anti-oxidants as well. One of those happy collisions between eating something that’s good for you, and that tastes good at the same time.

For the tart, a shortcrust pastry is rolled to form a large circle, over which you strew almond meal (to soak up the juices from the berries), then the berries that have been macerated in Marsala. The edge of the pastry is pleated to form the rim, and the whole is baked until golden brown. What you end up with is a mound of juicy berries cradled by crispy sweet pastry, and 1 very heavenly smell that cheers up the entire house instantly. Maeve serves this with honey flavoured ricotta, but there’s nothing I like better than a big ole fashioned scoop of vanilla ice-Scream!

After our walk around Piccadilly Circus, we headed over to Parlour at Sketch for some tea and treats. Sketch is a bit of a concept destination, which some consider exciting, playful and elegant while others can’t get past the prices on the menu. Sketch is divided into several sections, including a restaurant and a brasserie/bar, and an art space. Parlour is the cafe and patisserie section. The chef patron of the establishment is Michellin-starred French chef, Pierre Gagnaire – he designed the menu, but he doesn’t actually cook there.

As we didn’t wander around, I can’t speak for the other sections (I’ve been told that even the toilets are .. interesting), but Parlour has an artsy/bohemian feel to it, with it’s elaborate chandeliers, plush armchairs and paper menus tucked between the pages of old books. Almost Melbourne-ish. There are little financiers, brownies and tea cakes you can order from the display, or you can also have something from the menu. B selects a chocolate cake elaborately tiered with matching chocolate/caramel mousses and ganaches while I opt for the violet flavoured (thankfully not violently coloured – pastel purple is OK) macaroon topped with blueberries. Both are delicious. To drink, I request a chai tea from the long list of available teas. It arrives in a flowery pot with a dainty bone china cup to pour the tea into – which really makes an occasion out of taking tea!

As we were having dinner late, we stopped by Harrods in Knightsbridge first. Harrods is a bit of a maze inside. You could walk from one room to another, almost never encountering the same room twice. What I really wanted to see, after negotiating the perfume and cosmetic rooms, and the shoe and handbag rooms (which did stop me in my tracks for a moment or two) was the food hall. It’s like the David Jones Food Hall, but x2 in size, opulence and extravagance. And you can’t eat your purchases in there, which I think is a bit silly. All the unpasteurised cheeses in the Fromagerie made me drool. We bought a bit of Fleur du Marquis for N and M. There was also a La Maison du Chocolat counter (where we later got a florentine and a round chocolate thing that looked like a rum ball but tasted better), and a branch of Laduree. We bought a selection of macaroons at Laduree, for nostalgia value, having visited the Laduree in Paris. Fans of SATC might recall that the Parisian Laduree made a brief appearance in an episode when Carrie goes to live in Paris with the Russian. In one scene, she is in the tea room, looking glamorously lonely amongst the beautiful cakes and pastries. No photography was allowed within Laduree, and inexplicably, we didn’t end up taking any pictures of the macaroons we were too busy eating once we were out of the building. Let me just say though, that the salted caramel macaroon was the best of the Laduree macaroons that we tried that day (the other two were pistachio and red fruits).

After Harrods, it was off to St. John in Smithfield for dinner. St. John is famed for head chef (and co-owner) Fergus Henderson’s Nose-to-Tail approach to eating. Walk through the smoking room, the bar and bakery, and up a small set of stairs and you have reached his restaurant, which I’m told is mostly patronised by the artsy crowd. It’s a sparsely decorated room with a partially visible kitchen to the left. I like the coathanger hooks that line the walls of the room. Great for if you’re paranoid about having your coat taken away from you. The simplicity of the room carries on to the lack of pretension with which the dishes are presented. It made me feel as though the quality of the ingredients were allowed to speak for themselves. We started with a salad of skate, bread and a green sauce. For the main, B had a special of Hare with Braised Cabbage which he couldn’t stop raving about. The hare was barely cooked; just seared on the outside and was so beautifully moist and tender. As for me, I couldn’t go past the famed Roast Bone Marrow with Parsley Salad. La Sala in Sydney does a similar dish, but I’ve been told it’s not a patch on the St. John original. Four tree stumps of marrow-filled bones stand tall on the plate, which you delve into with the provided crab picker. The scrapings of marrow can then be spread onto pieces of grilled sourdough, sprinkled with grey sea salt and topped with some parsley salad to add balance to the richness of the whole dish.

For dessert, B had the Apple Sorbet with Polish Vodka and I had the Eccles cake with Lancashire Cheese. You may remember that I had a go at making Fergus Henderson’s Eccles cakes in the past. The result was pretty good, but I wondered what it was really meant to look and taste like. Well now I know. The cake is incredible with the slice of crumbly Lancashire cheese. Cutting through the pastry unleashes the sweet and spicy currants within. I was quite full at this stage, but couldn’t stop nibbling at more cheese and more of the sweet, crispy cake, until it was all gone. Later, we stumbled out, very happy and very full. Of all the places we ended up visiting during our time in London, this (and later, Le Gavroche also) was one of the restaurants we definitely wanted to return to.

Parlour at Sketch
9 Conduit Street,
London W1S 2XG

Ladurée at Harrods
87/135 Brompton Road
London SW1X 7XL

St. John Restaurant
26 St John Street
London EC1M 4AY

Next : Day 3 : Borough Markets, South Bank, Paul A. Young, Petrus and a surprise.

There were two good reasons to make this fudge. Firstly, I really loved reading my copy of Alice B. Toklas’ cookbook from which this well known recipe comes. The book is filled with interesting recipes (a fish cooked for Picasso, for example) interspersed with stories of her time spent in France during the Second World War (Gertrude Stein and Toklas driving in a Model T called “Aunt Pauline”, while volunteering for the American Fund for French Wounded). She writes so evocatively, and with great humour.

I love the way in which she likens killing a carp to a Dashiell Hammett novel :

I let go of my grasp and looked to see what had happened. Horror of horrors. The carp was dead, killed, assassinated, murdered in the first, second and third degree. Limp, I fell into a chair, with my hands still unwashed reached for a cifarette, lighted it, and waited for the police to come and take me into custody. After a second cigarette my courage returned and I went to prepare poor Mr Carp for the table.

Having enjoyed the book, I had every intention of attempting the fudge recipe but for awhile after, both the book and the recipe slipped completely from my mind. Then recently, I came across an article on Allegra McEvedy who features the recipe in her latest release. I don’t know much about her but apparently in the past she ran the kitchen at Robert De Niro’s New York restaurant Tribeca Grill, has been involved in cooking for President Clinton, and is now a founding partner of Leon in London, which won the 2005 Observer food award for Best New Restaurant. When she got married to her partner Susi Smithers, they had a tier of cheeses worth $2500 as a wedding cake. And if that wasn’t enough of a foodie’s dream come true, Heston Blumenthal was also on canape duty that day!

Having been reminded of Alice B. Toklas, I resolved to make this fudge, but sans the hash, which I don’t have any of. Hashless or not, McEvedy recommends the fudge as a figgy, sticky, spicy treat. In her version of the recipe, she substitutes the seeds of a vanilla pod for the 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon because she doesn’t like cinnamon). On tasting, B said that this sweet reminded him of all the components of boiled cake, but in fudge form : most definitely a good thing. My drug of choice while making this was Idlewild’s 100 Broken Windows, which quite coincidentally has that track Roseability in it.

Hashish Fudge :

1 tsp black peppercorns
1 tsp coriander seeds
a scratch of nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
a handful of stoned dates (ha ha, she says)
a handful of dried figs
a handful of flaked almonds
a bunch of Cannabis sativa leaves (or you can just crumble in some hash or weed)
140g light brown sugar
125g butter

Toast the peppercorns and the coriander seeds in a small frying pan on a high heat until they start to smell wonderful. Put them with some nutmeg scrapings and the cinnamon (if you wish) into a pestle and mortar/coffee grinder and pulverise.

Chop the fruit and nuts and mix them in a bowl. Sprinkle on the spices and add the cannabis in whatever form you have – if it’s leaves they will have to be pounded first (i.e. in the pestle and mortar with the seeds and cinnamon), but hash or weed can be crumbled in with the other spices.

Dissolve the sugar and the butter in a heavy-based sauce pan over a low heat. When the sugar has melted, the mixture will be separated : melted butter floating on top of a slightly bubbling brown sugary goo. SLowly bring to the boil – don’t let it catch on the bottom of the pan -stirring briskly with a wooden spoon until the mixture starts to boil and come together. Keep stirring until it is a thicker, foamier texture. Mix in the fruity bits, take off the heat and beat thoroughly. The fruit will break down and make it even smoother. (If you are left with a little melted butter in the pan, drain it off, and use some kitchen paper to de-grease the fudge mix.)

Line a tray with a piece of buttered greaseproof paper and push the fudge into it, or Alice suggests rolling it into individual walnut-sized pieces. Cool to room temperature in the larder overnight, in the fridge if you’re in a hurry, or in the freezer if you’re desperate.

Shelf life : weeks and weeks.
Best kept: in an airtight box in the larder or fridge.

(On a more savoury note, we just got back from a quick meal at a little hole-in-the-wall called Ryo’s Noodles in Crows Nest. B went here once with Calamari, and it’s only now that he’s taken me to try their ramen – I can’t believe he’s been keeping mum about this place for so long. Ryo’s Noodles is great – it’s tiny, the entire menu is plastered on the wall in Japanese, the piping hot bowls of noodles come to your table quickly and it’s all immensely satisfying. I don’t know how it compares to the more well-known Ichi-ban Boshi, but I reckon it’s definitely up there. If you go, order the Ramen with Spicy Pork Soup – moist slices of pork and bouncy noodles in a deliciously slurpable hot sauce – you’ll love every bite of it.)