What are you cooking now?

[teamsaint]

I thought I wouldn't like sweet potato (being sweet, I thought) but when I saw the recipe I had to try it as I love kimchi. Very healthy combination! My hawthorn jelly has been going down very well with stilton too. Really worth doing.

Will bear the hawthorn jelly in mind. We have two trees, but Mrs TS tends to use the berries to make hawthorn tea. The jelly sounds nicer, although stilton is a no go for me. Wish I liked it.

[french frank]

Will bear the hawthorn jelly in mind. We have two trees, but Mrs TS tends to use the berries to make hawthorn tea. The jelly sounds nicer, although stilton is a no go for me. Wish I liked it.

You don't have to have stilton with it! It's just that the hawthorn is strong enough to cope with stilton. I'd have it with any French cheese but not sure about any other English cheese. Not sure they have the right taste but to each his own. Any way you can just have the jelly on ordinary bread and butter. I've got one small jar of rosehip jelly left but I don't think I'd have that with stilton. With camembert maybe.

[oddoneout]

I thought I wouldn't like sweet potato (being sweet, I thought) but when I saw the recipe I had to try it as I love kimchi. Very healthy combination! My hawthorn jelly has been going down very well with stilton too. Really worth doing.

I find I need something sharp tasting or salty with sweet potato. The kimchi sounds like a good option and I got a small jar from Lidl recently so might try that out.

[french frank]

I find I need something sharp tasting or salty with sweet potato. The kimchi sounds like a good option and I got a small jar from Lidl recently so might try that out.

I had it again today! Plus a proper helping of cabbage becaiuse I like it (yesterday was just a bit of leftover which I chopped up and put into the kimchi). If you like kimchi, I reckon this is a winner.

[oddoneout]

I had it again today! Plus a proper helping of cabbage becaiuse I like it (yesterday was just a bit of leftover which I chopped up and put into the kimchi). If you like kimchi, I reckon this is a winner.

I had "proper" kimchi a good few years ago at an interesting session put on by an organic gardening group about fermentation and other methods of preserving produce. The person doing it had developed various versions including one that wasn't so heavy on the chillies, which I very much liked.
My reservations are that the ingredients are very much ones that now do not agree with me, but in theory the kimchi process should make them more digestible. I know that the jar/tin version is different from the fresh/home prepped version and so some of the benefits may not be the same, due to pasteurisation, but as it is only a small jar and didn't cost too much I felt it was worth a try. I just need to plan it so that the following day is free from meeting people/going places in case things don't go well! I do need to get some more sweet potatoes though; they seem to store indefinitely, only starting to sprout after months (I grew some plants last year from the sprouts - the "slips" that you can buy from seed catalogues, just out of interest), so worth having in stock even if I don't use them that much.

[french frank]

A frugal soupe au lait: Very finely chopped leek, rinsed and broken up to form 'strings'. Sautéed in whatever (olive oil this time could be butter, spread, meat fat). Add some small broken up cauliflower florets because they were in the fridge, though ususually it would be potato cut into tiny dice to cook quickly. Freshly dried thyme. Add mix of boiling water plus veggie stock cube. Think whether anything else can be chucked in. Simmer. Add milk (dairy or plant) to add a better colour. Bring up to simmer temperature again. Serve topped with freshly grated nutmeg (essential). Shall I dry roast almond flakes to scatter over top? Might, might not. No, I don't think I will. I might have added a glass of white wine, but only had red so didn't.
À la soupe!

[JasonPalmer]

Turkey sandwiches are a big thing at the moment at my house.

[french frank]

Snapped up a packet of pork belly strips in the Coop clearance cabinet (Use by 17 Feb) this morning so am now cooking Rillons de Tours for later consumption over the next week. My slightly healthier version of a confit. Good for an aperitif or with salad for a main course.

[HighlandDougie]

Snapped up a packet of pork belly strips in the Coop clearance cabinet (Use by 17 Feb) this morning so am now cooking Rillons de Tours for later consumption over the next week. My slightly healthier version of a confit. Good for an aperitif or with salad for a main course.

Eek! Now I know what “healthier” means in the FF kitchen. Being familiar with rillettes but not ‘rillons’ the recipe I’ve just read suggests 3kg of pork belly (‘but not too fatty’), 1 kg of good old ‘saindoux’ aka lard and an entire bottle of Vouvray. I suppose that confit-ing the meat would have involved 1.5 kg of lard. But, it sounds delicious - and open to some experimentation with flavourings. Allspice or star anise and a very generous pinch of piment. Would no doubt evoke horror in Tours (lovely place) but, devoured with a fresh baguette, very yum-yum.

[french frank]

Eek! Now I know what “healthier” means in the FF kitchen. Being familiar with rillettes but not ‘rillons’ the recipe I’ve just read suggests 3kg of pork belly (‘but not too fatty’), 1 kg of good old ‘saindoux’ aka lard and an entire bottle of Vouvray. I suppose that confit-ing the meat would have involved 1.5 kg of lard. But, it sounds delicious - and open to some experimentation with flavourings. Allspice or star anise and a very generous pinch of piment. Would no doubt evoke horror in Tours (lovely place) but, devoured with a fresh baguette, very yum-yum.

My 'healthier' version uses olive oil instead of fat, so it's is a very non-French way to confit (duck fat for duck, goose fat for goose, pork fat for pork). The fresh pork was very lean but even so the idea of stewing it in pork fat ... There seems to be an argument about how healthy/unhealthy the method is. I think it's not as unhealthy as it may sound because of the long cooking (I simmered it for 2 ½ hours and really the fat is largely rendered out and remains in the liquor left behind - it says here ). The cooked rillons are drained and dried very thoroughly and it all tastes (and feels) like lean meat. Masses of thyme, sage, rosemary, bay and garlic - and the cooking gives it a very deep, rich flavour. Also unFrenchlike, I added a slosh of El Plonco blanco from the Coop. But I ate a few cold with tomatoes, gherkins for lunch today and - as you so rightly say - warm crusty baguette. Heavenlyl!

Funnily enough, I've never made or eaten rillettes though they do seem to be more commonly found than rillons. Is it more like a pâté or terrine?

[Barbirollians]

I now feel like drinking Vouvray.

[HighlandDougie]

Funnily enough, I've never made or eaten rillettes though they do seem to be more commonly found than rillons. Is it more like a pâté or terrine?

I'm tempted to describe "Rillettes de Mans" or "Rillettes de Tours" as Shippam's Meat Paste on steroids. More terrine-like in texture than pâté. But not really like either. As you say with the rillons, the slow-cooking renders the fat away so one is left with lean meat, albeit lubricated with slightly more than a whisper of fat.

This recipe (in English) is a bit of a faff - and I would bin the neat cloves in favour of them being part of 'quatre épices' - but it would do the business:

https://noseychef.com/2020/10/25/rillettes-de-tours/

I'm very fond of rillettes - on toast as well as with good bread - but I have terrible tastes in food (I love Heinz Sandwich Spread and Primula 'Cheese' - sic - in tubes for instance) so am very much not to be trusted.

[french frank]

I'm tempted to describe "Rillettes de Mans" or "Rillettes de Tours" as Shippam's Meat Paste on steroids. More terrine-like in texture than pâté. But not really like either. As you say with the rillons, the slow-cooking renders the fat away so one is left with lean meat, albeit lubricated with slightly more than a whisper of fat.

This recipe (in English) is a bit of a faff - and I would bin the neat cloves in favour of them being part of 'quatre épices' - but it would do the business:

https://noseychef.com/2020/10/25/rillettes-de-tours/

Can you still get meat paste and salmon paste in those little jars? The British answer to pâté and terrine! I thought I'd created a new dish but when I'd made it I discovered someone else had thought of it first: black bean tapenade. I stewed some black beans with capers and garlic until it was soft and the liquid evaporated; then added olive oil and mashed it all up into a rough paste - a bit like the consistency of rillettes. Chilled on bread or toast it was pretty good. I found out that capers are the key ingredient - the sine qua non, in my view - of tapenade because the word comes from tapenas, the Provençal word for capers (so I've read - not verified). Not sure whether the stuff made with olives or mushrooms have capers though.

I'm very fond of rillettes - on toast as well as with good bread - but I have terrible tastes in food (I love Heinz Sandwich Spread and Primula 'Cheese' - sic - in tubes for instance) so am very much not to be trusted.

A late friend of mine was half French and I always marvelled at his schoolboy taste in food and lack of interest in gastronomy. I thought it was in their genes but perhaps he took after his English mother.

[HighlandDougie]

Can you still get meat paste and salmon paste in those little jars? The British answer to pâté and terrine! I thought I'd created a new dish but when I'd made it I discovered someone else had thought of it first: black bean tapenade. I stewed some black beans with capers and garlic until it was soft and the liquid evaporated; then added olive oil and mashed it all up into a rough paste - a bit like the consistency of rillettes. Chilled on bread or toast it was pretty good. I found out that capers are the key ingredient - the sine qua non, in my view - of tapenade because the word comes from tapenas, the Provençal word for capers (so I've read - not verified). Not sure whether the stuff made with olives or mushrooms have capers though.



A late friend of mine was half French and I always marvelled at his schoolboy taste in food and lack of interest in gastronomy. I thought it was in their genes but perhaps he took after his English mother.

Yo! Vegan meat paste. Beans cooked like that would indeed not be a million miles away texture-wise from Rillettes. There is also that rather wonderful bruschetta topping made with broad beans, savoury and pecorino, which again has a similar slightly mealy texture. Oops! Enough gastro-porn.

[Keraulophone]

Can you still get meat paste and salmon paste in those little jars?

Memories of the Shippams factory in Chichester during childhood hols in Selsey. It closed in 2002, but the wishbone sign survives in situ to this day.