Scandinavian Pickled Green Tomatoes

Green tomatoes are really hard to find, so the best solution is to grow your own. This will be doubly satisfying if you do. It is important that the skins don’t split while they are cooking. Gardener’s Delight is a really good variety to try- they grow easily, have a great flavour and are unlikely to split while they are cooking. This makes a lot but if you’re going to the trouble. You may as well really go for it.

2.25kg green tomatoes – about an inch in diameter

1.2l malt vinegar

6 cloves

2.5cm cinnamon bark

½ a nutmeg

1tsp salt

450g sugar

600ml white wine vinegar

It’s almost a shame not to grow these to full red ripeness but the boy does love this with a crumbly mature Cheshire cheese.  I’m putting on a CD of Wagner duets as I think an epic recipe deserves an epic soundtrack. Much gentleness is needed for the first part though.

Big pan. Tomatoes and malt vinegar in. I love cooking with malt vinegar. Bring it to the boil then turn off the heat. The kitchen smells of pickling. Drain the tomatoes, but keep the vinegar for making other chutneys or pickles. Do it gently so you don’t break the tomato skins as you do need to discard any whose skins have split. So you now have a colander full of green tomatoes.

Bring the white wine vinegar to the boil with the cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg. Once it comes to the boil, pour over the tomatoes and leave them for 24 hours. Keep the liquid. The boy thinks this is a complete waste of time. I think a tsp of chilli flakes would work well here so I add them to the hot liquid.

In the morning, pour the liquid into a pan and gently add the tomatoes. Bring the heat up to an almost boil. Fish out the tomatoes with a slotted spoon and put into sterilised jars. Let the liquid turn syrupy and then pour over the tomatoes.

Pour over, making sure the fruit are completely covered. Eventually these hard, sour green things will become soft green fruit. But you need patience. They need to go in the cupboard for 3 months. By this time I will have forgotten them and it will be a nice surprise.

Spaghetti Pomodoro

It’s Twelfth Night so I want something simple. Besides I’m trying not to mix proteins with starch at the moment. Sometimes the simplest dishes can be the most tasty. I’m not sure what the difference is between a Pomodoro sauce and a Marinara Sauce. In any case this version is described as Napolitana. I just want spaghetti in a simple tomato sauce. This is it.

2x 400g cans tomatoes

1tbsp good extra virgin olive oil

1tbsp butter

1 large clove garlic

Salt and pepper

½ tsp dried marjoram

2tbsp chopped parsley

1 pack of good dried spaghetti

Gently melt the butter in the olive oil. Mince the garlic and cook it as slowly as you can to get all the flavour into the oil. Meanwhile push the tinned tomatoes through a mouli or a sieve. This has so few ingredients, it would be crazy not to use the best. In recent tests Lidl own-brand tomatoes have topped the polls. I’m keen to try them but am using my favourite brand, Cirio, for now.

Pour the tomato sauce into the garlicky oil. Salt it well and add a good grind of pepper.

Mix well and add the marjoram. Oregano will do if you don’t have marjoram.

Simmer uncovered for half an hour, until the sauce thickens - it should reduce by about half.

Meanwhile cook the spaghetti. [For the boy I am cooking bacon lardons until crispy and will stir this into his helping, along with a tbsp. of cream. This will make it Spaghetti Amatriciana.]

When it’s thick and sauce-like, drop the drained spaghetti into the sauce and add the chopped parsley and toss to mix.

Serve with a salad of chopped lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber and black olives dressed with vinaigrette. And maybe a glass of Chianti or San Gianovese.

Prawn & Courgette Linguine

I think linguine is my favourite pasta. We need a quick supper and this will do the trick. I prefer De Cecco brand (pronounced Day-check-oh). They have been making pasta since 1886 so I’m pretty sure they have it right.

3755g linguine

3tbsp grassy olive oil

3 garlic cloves, chopped

1 courgette. Diced

6 ripe tomatoes, diced

1tbsp tomato puree

1 red chilli deseeded and finely chopped

300g raw king prawns

Handful flat leaf parsley

Open a bottle of sauvignon blanc. Sample some. Cook the linguine in boiling water and heat the oil in a frying pan. Gently fry the garlic, courgette and chilli. I think the courgette should be soft but not really browned. The boy is home and is interested in the sauvignon blanc. The chilli is deseeded as a concession to him. It’s a big fat one so it won’t overpower this.

Add the tomatoes and as much of their juice as you can save. They do need to be nice ripe ones so they will be hard to chop unless your knife is really sharp. Stir in the tomato puree and a couple of tablespoons of the starchy water the linguine was cooked in. Give it five minutes to come together before adding the king prawns. Once they have turned pink and the sauce is a nice coating consistency, it’s done. If it doesn’t seem to get sauce like, add a little butter.

Drain the pasta and gently toss it through the sauce. Sprinkle with the parsley. I love how many of what look like weeds in our garden turn out to be herbs. I’ve found mint, lemon balm and coriander so far, all from plants grown and abandoned for dead years ago.  Parsley only lasts two years so we have had to buy it this time. Come Good Friday I will sow enough for this and next year.

Chou Rouge / Red Cabbage

One of the best things about the colder months is red cabbage. This is classic French, from Lorraine, in the north east which is full of dairy farms and orchards. In Britain we tend to just have it pickled which under utilises this lovely vegetable. 

1 red cabbage

2 onions

125g smoked bacon lardons

1tbsp lard

300ml red wine

300ml chicken stock

Salt  pepper

A bay leaf

A large apple

Unsurprisingly, the boy isn’t that fond of cabbage, but the apple sweetens it so he doesn’t mind this if he isn’t given too much. Quite a bit of chopping so a Saint Saens cello concerto on the CD player to keep me company as there is no way the boy is helping.  First core the cabbage. Quickest way to do this is hold it in one hand at the top and bash it core side down, on the counter, quite hard. If you have done it hard enough, you can just pull the core out. Remove a few outer leaves and chop quite coarsely. Blanch in boiling water for 5 minutes and drain.

Chop the onions and core and chop the apple. Sweat the bacon and onions in the lard. If you can’t find lard, a decent olive oil would do and streaky bacon could substitute for the lardons, though make sure it’s dry cure so it isn’t half water.

Tip the onion/bacon mix into a large casserole along with the cabbage. Add the stock, wine, salt, bay leaf and pepper (lots of pepper) and the apple. Mix well.

Cook in a medium oven – 190 / Gas 5 for 60 to 90 minutes. The French would have traditionally done this for 2 hours but I think tastes have moved on so check after an hour. Jane Grigson says that the longer it stews the more nutty the flavour, but even so....

Elizabeth David offers a dish similar to this but omits the bacon, stock and wine, and adds another apple, 2tbsp port, 2tbsp wine vinegar and 2tbsp sugar. Instead of any pre-cooking, layer the cabbage, onion and apple in a casserole and add seasoning and salt as you go. Push a bouquet garni in the middle and spoon on the port and vinegar. Personally I think it needs another tbsp. of each and another of water. Cover and cook in a low oven (150/Gas2) for 3 hours. Again I think tastes have changed so check after 90 minutes. How good would this be with some small Toulouse sausages and potatoes fried with sage? I think the boy would really like this version though he would miss the bacon.

I’ve read various other versions that seem to be variations on these, dating from 1806 onwards. The only temptation is the one that adds some brandy. We have about an inch in the bottom of a bottle of Spanish brandy that has been gathering dust for months. Hope the boy hasn’t been keeping an eye on it for anything else. Calvados would be good – wish we had some.

Croque Monsieur

This is a New Year’s treat for the boy. Over the years a Croque Monsieur has been reduced to a ham and cheese toasted sandwich, which is only half of the story. It needs a smooth béchamel to make it velvety and rich.

5tbsp salted butter

1tbsp plain flour

2/3 cup full fat milk

Sea salt

Grated nutmeg

½ tsp Dijon mustard

4 thick slices white bread

4 slices of decent ham

2 slices Gruyere cheese

(This makes two - scale up accordingly)

A run down on the ingredients first. The bread should really be white, but not “plastic white sliced”. I love Amanda Hesser, on whose New York Times Cookbook this is based, but disagree with her assertion that sourdough bread shouldn’t be used. My only concession is that sourdough loaves can be quite small, in which case, just make more sandwiches. Ham should be sliced from the deli. I like Wiltshire or Yorkshire ham, preferably with some white fat on them. Never the square watery stuff that comes in plastic packets. The cheese – AH recommends Gruyere and I agree, though Jarlsberg would be good too. Any cheese with holes is a good clue here.

Get the sandwich toaster heating up. You can do this in a skillet if you don’t have one.

Confession – I have never been good at making Béchamel. For this reason I have Schubert’s Octet on the CD player to steady my nerves. Melt 1tbsp of the butter slowly, so it doesn’t burn. When it starts bubbling, add the flour and whisk for a minute until you get what looks like a thick paste. Slowly add the milk and keep whisking so you don’t get lumps. This is where I usually go wrong. Using a whisk rather than a spoon helps, as does adding the milk bit by bit. Stir in the Dijon. Raise the heat until it comes to the boil and thickens.

Remove from the heat and season with salt and nutmeg, freshly grated over.

Melt the rest of the butter.

Spread 2 slices of bread with the béchamel and place two slices of ham on top of each, and then a slice of the cheese on top of that. Put the other two slices of these on top and press down.

Brush both sides of the sandwich with melted butter. Our sandwich maker is non-stick, but the butter will add to the luxurious taste of this. Toast well, or in a skillet until it is really well browned and the cheese is like lava.

Serve with sliced dill pickles. Not very French but the boy likes the sharpness against the creaminess and I tend to agree. Otherwise I think grilled tomatoes would be a really nice accompaniment, along with a small green salad. The boy is clear that the green salad needs to be quite small.

For another day, a Croque Madame is the same is the same but with the addition of a fried egg. I think I wouldn’t try this in the sandwich maker as this is best as an open sandwich. Toast the bread, add the béchamel, ham and gruyere and put under the grill until melty and lovely. Top with a fried egg, ideally with the yolk still runny. Spoon over a little more Bechamel and black pepper. The boy's view is that a sandwich that needs cutlery isn't a sandwich and thinks this heading into Eggs Benedict territory. He says it needs a different name. It can form one of his many sandwich campaigns.

There are endless variations to the classic Croque Monsieur but this original 1910 recipe is the best. I’ve seen versions that have other ingredients or swap them around (salmon, pineapple, herbed mayonnaise, creole seasoning), but to me it’s like Tandoori Chicken Pizza. Just don’t. Tandoori Chicken – Lovely! Pizza – Lovely! Tandoori Chicken Pizza – Not Lovely!!!! Same with a messed about Croque Monsieur.