Thirty-seven

Almost eight years ago, at the age of twenty-nine-and-a-half, I swapped a love affair with cigarettes - sucked back with such delight, such seriousness - for a less-labored daily climb to my second-floor home. By the light of a flickering television, I knitted, furiously, a length of scarf not unlike Tom Baker’s Dr Who might sport, to wrap around and around and around. To hide within. As it lengthened, the stitches became calmer, looser, found a rhythm of their own. Six months later I emerged, smoke-free.

The Artist, rather fortuitously, turned up at roughly the same time. At thirty, an astonishingly gifted astrologer lunged for the polished chunk of rose quartz I wore around my neck, cooed and held it in his palm. I felt it almost burning as it fell back into place. ‘He must be dynamic, this fellow’, his tape recorded voice declares, ‘to have captured the eye of a Leonine woman’. He was. He is. I have listened to that recording of my younger self, chattering away merrily with the astrologer, many times since. In between the giggling, I hear forgotten hurts and a voice teetering, at times, dangerously close to tears. Des read me like a book. And I’m thrilled, each time, that he did.

I had plans - small ones - of a quivering jelly for this post, one to celebrate the ripening bounty of the neighbours orange tree and, in a smaller way, my 37^th birthday. Champagne mixed with freshly squeezed orange juice, some sweetness to tame the sour, all set to soft, shimmering wobbliness with agar-agar. A scientific kitchen challenge. But failure is not be tolerated on one’s own birthday.

So we sensibly drank the champagne in front of the fire instead.

I’ll stow the idea away for Christmas, perhaps, for warmer weather and other celebratory nights. Simplicity wins out every time. Besides, I know, somehow, you’d much rather this Apple and Olive Oil cake, adapted from that marvellous, wonderful, beautiful Anna Del Conte. In fact, I think you should down tools and go and make it right now. Think of it as my birthday gift to you.

Anna Del Conte’s Apple and Olive Oil Cake
The thing that irritates me most about baking is the butter. I have little patience with it anyway, but waiting for butter to soften drives me nuts-o in winter. This moist, delicious cake uses olive oil not as substitute, but in preference to the stuff. I mean, how clever is that?

120g (4 oz) of sultanas
Freshly brewed tea
500g (1 lb) of apples – about 5 small ones
150ml (scant 2/3 cup) of olive oil
200g (7oz) sugar
2 organic eggs
175g (6 oz) of wholemeal (wholewheat) flour
175g (6 oz) of ‘strong’, Italian ‘00’ flour
2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon
1 ½ teaspoons of bi-carb soda
½ teaspoon of baking powder
½ teaspoon of sea salt

Soak the sultanas in enough tea to cover. Set aside to plump for 20 minutes. Peel and core the apples and cut each into small dice.

Preheat the oven to 180 C (350 F). Grease and line a 20cm (8 in) springform cake tin.

Beat the oil and sugar together until well amalgamated. Break the eggs into a teacup and add them, bit by bit, beating all the time. You’ll end up with a creamy mixture. Set a sieve over the bowl and sift in the flour, cinnamon, bi-carb soda, baking powder and salt.

Mix to a stiff batter with a metal spoon – I cannot claim to understand the reasoning behind this, but do so as it is often suggested. You don’t want to go upsetting the baking gods. Drain the sultanas well. Fold through the mixture with the diced apple. This is a very stiff mixture and will be visibly studded with fruit.

Scrape into the prepared cake tin, smooth down the top and bake for at least 1 hour – mine took 1 hour and 20 minutes and needed to be topped with foil halfway through to prevent it from burning. Watch it closely and check for doneness with a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake. If it comes away cleanly, your cake is done.

I’m completely besotted.

Oh I do love a good birthday.

Reasons to be Cheerful

a seam of yellow

This month’s edition of Click!, brought to you by bee and jai of Jugalbandi, features Yellow as its theme. Yellow, more specifically, for Bri. With the help of the wider community, bee and jai are banding together to raise funds for Bri's battle with cancer. They have very nearly reached their target. Accordingly, that cheerful seam of yellow, there at the top, is my entry.

What could be more cheerful than bunches of organic rainbow chard for $1.99 each? I’ve arranged (well, alright, plonked) them in jars and vases around the house. Those impossibly bright colours are perfect fodder for The Artist.

The garden is bustling with the noisy, energetic antics of a family of brightly-breasted parrots, who have, just this week, discovered the bounty in the backyard trees.

Flickr. It’s my new (old) favourite toy.

There’s a tonne of work to plough through, and way more to come, but the task itself is cheerful enough.

Those nice people at Mealopedia have been sifting through and highlighting some older posts, things I had (very nearly) forgotten.

A project, something else very nearly forgotten - something offline, you know, out there in the real world - has been reactivated.

Yesterday’s salad of very thin shavings of celery (those tender, pale, inner stalks), fennel, witlof and two wee turnips made a startlingly good lunch. Dressed with teeny, tiny capers; the last of the hazelnut oil and a few fresh walnuts, toasted and broken up.

To top things of very nicely, it’s raining. Finally. Soakingly. I feel like dancing.

Many, many reasons to be Cheerful, don't you think?

Busy

We returned from a rare shopping expedition this weekend with six beautiful, useful things. An old, weathered eggbeater; a large pumpkin; one kilo of organic potatoes, still caked in red earth; a shiny new enamel-wear baking tin in red (am in love); and two old, scarred, breadboards. New props with which to play.

Thing is, I don’t have time to play. Shame, really, but things are busy around here just now.

So, while I get what needs to be done, um, done, here are a few new links worth your browsing time:

Crunchy Green Things

Kale for Sale

Cucina Nicolina

By Product

And last, but by no means least, The Yummy Mummy Cooks Gourmet

See y'all soon.

A useful weekend

Pottering weekends are ideal for playing in the kitchen. A tray of roasted tomatoes makes good seasonal sense right now, for adding to nearly anything you can imagine, as does a jar or two of pesto. Relishes, condiments, accompaniments. I’m rather fond of the delightfully old fashioned word tracklement. Said aloud, working your ear around those first syllables, it’s a beauty. Tracklements, condiments, call them what you will, they are the pepper and salt that make cooking, and indeed eating, exciting.

Mid week meals are made that much simpler by having a jar of this or pot of that, ready to spice up your cooking life. To transform staples into something new, something fresh. Preserved lemons are a constant in my fridge – I can’t imagine not having their cheery yellow-ness in there. They sit next to the last jar of Anglo-Indian chutney and another of seriously wobbly olive oil mayonnaise. I like these familiar things as much as anything else, but new jars are welcome, too. Here are three new additions to this year's collection.

Tomato pesto: At some stage during the 1990’s, the leathery sun-dried tomato, rightfully, fell out of fashion. The semi-dried tomato on the other hand, a softer and more luscious creature, has made a tentative comeback. Used judiciously, they can make a meal, and a girl, sing.

Roughly chop 1 bunch of chives (or the leaves of 1 bunch of parsley or basil) and whiz to a paste in a food processor with 2 cloves of chopped garlic. Add ½ cup of pine nuts and ½ cup of packed semi-dried tomatoes which you have snipped into smaller pieces with a pair of kitchen shears. Whiz again and trickle in 2/3 cup (about 150ml) of extra virgin olive oil with the motor running. Get out the Good Oil for this, especially if cheese ain’t your thing. Tip into a bowl and stir through ½ cup of grated pecorino cheese if you like and season to taste. Keeps for about a week if covered with a film of oil. Very useful.

Makes one jar. Purists may deny this little mixture the title of ‘pesto’, but does that stop me? In the words of someone I’m missing, no, it does not.

Beetroot, pear and ginger relish: I now add beetroot to my growing list of vegetal love. This beetroot relish is incredible with cheese despite the outrageous hue.

Set the oven to 180 C (375 F). Cut all but 2cm (3/4 inch) of the stalks from 400g (just less than 1 lb) of beetroot, wash them, dry them and wrap tightly in foil. Bake for 1 ½ hours. Meanwhile, peel and coarsely grate 3 pears, any kind, 2 onions and a thumb of fresh ginger. Put the pears, onions and ginger in a large, heavy based saucepan and pour in 1 cup (250ml) of white wine vinegar, a teaspoon of sea salt and 1 ½ cups of sugar. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat to a gentle simmer and cook for 20 minutes. Peel and coarsely grate the beetroot when ready and add to the simmering saucepan for a further 5 minutes. Spoon into clean, sterilized jars, seal and invert. Keeps for 4 months, unopened.

For the adventurous, the ‘Nori Condiment’ is a difficult thing to explain. In some ways, it could be described as a darker, muscular version of creamed spinach. Free of dairy, it’s lighter, too. But whereas a large dollop of creamed spinach on the side of nearly any plate I care to imagine is sheer heaven, a similarly sized serve of this wouldn’t be nearly as nice. It’s wonderful in its own, odd way; smooth and creamy, but not exactly pretty. I’m now quite partial to its Creature of the Black Lagoon shade of deep green, but then, perhaps things are just getting a bit eccentric around here. While I enthusiastically tackled the recipe, based on one in this book, The Artist was busy building a large nest with twigs in the backyard.

Tear 4 or 5 sheets of toasted nori into pieces. Cover with 1 cup of water in a small saucepan. Soak for 10 minutes. Heat the saucepan, add 2 tablespoons of tamari, 1 tablespoon of maple syrup, ½ a small onion which you’ve finely chopped and a crushed clove of garlic. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes, stirring often. Grate a small pile of ginger. Squeeze it hard over a small bowl to extract as much juice as possible. Discard the pulp. Add this juice and a few drops of toasted sesame oil, lower the heat right down and continue cooking and stirring for a further 10 minutes. Season to taste with wasabi or Dijon mustard. Keeps for 3 days, jarred and refrigerated.

Try it. I wouldn’t offer something this obscure without some ideas, so: it’s exquisite with potatoes (surprising yum), nice dolloped on egg-based dishes, and makes a great vegan, mineral-rich dressing for pan fried tofu. Think ‘sushi’ fillings and you can’t go wrong. I spread the last of it on crackers. Quite good – weird - but good.

A very useful day.

Heat and Ice

She, the dog, was useless on Friday. Utterly useless. By 4.30, the air had warmed up and the sun was beating on our backs. The park was practically empty, ours to wander, blissfully, without interruption. She panted in the heat, tongue lolling, seeking the shade of every, single, tree. I know how she feels. We are not alone in our dread of the impending Australian summer. It’s going to be a long hot one.

Saturday morning: armed with bags of soil, he filled the long wooden troughs, ‘rubbish’ rescued under cover of dark, each one stencilled, enigmatically, with the number 920. These wooden, movable garden beds are perfect for renters, keen to learn but lacking permanent roots; allowing us to discover just how much sun each plant can take. They’ll get precious little water, these babies. They’ll need to be tough. This garden is a jumble of pots, empty olive oil tins and found objects; a travelling garden of familiar, favourite bits. A little chaotic, but perfect for practice. Gardening, practical, getting-your-hands-and-knees-dirty gardening, teaches you things that books and even the odd interstate phone call to a gardener-father, cannot.

I watched on, sorting through packets of seeds ordered, on a whim, months ago. Crookneck squash, Bull’s Blood beetroot, French Breakfast radishes, silverbeet “Vulcan Red”. More rocket, so successful has it been. Basil, two kinds, and another pot of borage, though I’ve no idea what one does with the stuff. He lugged earth; I got my fingernails dirty. We were toasting thick slices of Challah and brewing a pot of ginger-spiked tea in less than an hour.

Clouds rolled in at noon, bringing heavy, delicious drops of rain that fell, briefly, satisfyingly, on the newly planted. As it passed, trailing fresher, cleaner air, the windows and doors were flung wide open. The temperature drop is immediate and reviving. Right now, before it’s hot enough to stagger the uninitiated and stupefy even the well-versed; before January’s bushfires hang, threateningly, in the air, hot days are something special. It’s like standing, toes tightly gripped, on the edge of summer. One hand grasping the last of the asparagus, in disbelief that spring – amazingly – has been and gone, the other reaching, longingly, toward the bounty of the months and, with some luck, our garden ahead.

Dessert is often an afterthought around here. The main event holds more interest to my way of thinking. But with hot days and nights snaking in, earlier than expected, and a gift in the shape of an ice cream churn to master (she’s a good sort, my mum), I’ve been thinking about the last course a lot more of late. Not something cloyingly sweet – too hot for that. Lemons, the very last of them, for a cool ending to Friday night and, as it turned out, Saturday night too.

Lemon Yoghurt Ice – for 4

My notes read, ‘Three to four lemons. All you’ll need.’ The tree in the front garden had exactly four fruit left worth eating. What are the chances? You’ll need both a food processor and an ice cream churn for this, but more people seem to have these pieces of hardware than I used to think. You can make it with all yoghurt too – 1 cup of vanilla swapped for the pure cream would lower the fat content considerably. Or so I like to think.

3-4 lemons, unwaxed and organic if possible
2/3 cup of caster sugar
1 cup of pure (single) cream
1 cup of thick, tangy natural yoghurt

Zest the lemons and whiz together for 1 minute with the sugar in a food processor. Squeeze the lemons, strain (you’ll need 6 tablespoons of juice) and add to the sugar and zest and whiz again – the sugar should start to dissolve.

Add the cream and yoghurt and pulse, quickly, 3-4 times, just to combine. Chill for 30 minutes before freezing, according to the manufacturers instructions, in an ice cream churn. Best eaten on the day it’s made, but for the next couple of days it will be good too – just make sure that you place the container in the fridge for 20-30 minutes before you serve to soften, just a little.

This is my entry for Weekend Herb Blogging #110 hosted this week by Truffle from What's on My Plate for Kalyn Denny, creator of this weekly event.

Eggs for one

eggs on whisky paper

Eating solo has many benefits. As Nigella Lawson has so often pointed out, you can eat exactly as you please without a thought for fellow diners quirks. In fact you can be as downright quirky in your eating as you like. With the Artist overseas for a few days, much further away I’m afraid to say than usual, I’m fast becoming the queen of the solo meal. Only thing is some of these meals aren’t worth noting in these pages, let alone photographing. Delicious, yes, just not so pretty. So there’s a drawing of eggs instead. Much more poetic.

This meal is however not quirky. It’s creamy, spicy and moreish. And fast. Just make sure you use the best eggs you can afford. That means, obviously, no caged eggs. An egg from a bird that’s been allowed to scratch around in the grass, peck out a meal for itself and stretch its wings is the best kind.

Lonely? Me? No way. I’ve got Nigel Slater (thanks Rosa for the reminder) and some beautiful, biodynamic eggs.

Parsee scrambled eggs - for 1
Adapted from Nigel Slater’s Real Fast Food

1 tablespoon of ghee, butter or oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
½ bunch of spring onions, greens too, finely chopped
Small knob of ginger, peeled and grated
Large pinch of chilli flakes
¼ teaspoon of turmeric
½ teaspoon of ground cumin
3 tinned tomatoes, drained
2 organic eggs, beaten with 1 tablespoon of milk or water
Sea salt
Small handful of coriander leaves, roughly chopped

Warm the ghee in a frying pan over a medium heat. Add the onion, spring onions, grated ginger and chilli flakes and cook, stirring often, for 5 minutes or so (the onion should have a tinge of gold to it). Add the spices and cook for a further minute. Add the tomatoes, breaking them up with a wooden spoon and continue to cook for 2 minutes.

Turn the heat down a fraction and add the egg mixture, a pinch of salt and the coriander. Stir gently until the eggs begin to set in places – mine took about 1 minute, yours may take less. You are aiming for a creamy texture rather than hard bullets. Serve on hot, buttered toast.

Parsley

Abundant rain has brought the garden back to life.

Parsley, picked when the sun broke through, for a fennel and walnut filo pastry pie.

The handpainted bowl, a gift from the Artist's ex-wife's holiday in Turkey.

I love it.

Horse

No food, just the light caught at the right moment.

One of the Artist's prized possessions.

New Zealand

Back from a week in New Zealand, tagging along with the Artist on a business trip to Auckland. Some work was done, but the ANZAC day holiday fell in the middle of it all. So, not a lot done either side of it really. Back to work today.

Highlights?

Perfect weather.

The sky. So expansive. So very much bigger, brighter and bluer than the sky here at home. Almost too big to take in. The photo, taken from the hotel room, does not do it justice. Achingly beautiful clouds. No rain.

A sculpture walk about an hour out of Auckland. Unbelievably good. The organic blueberry sorbet from Matakana, eaten in the car on the way home.

Miso soup for breakfast, standard hotel buffet-breakfast fare meant for Japanese tourists no doubt, but what a way to start the day. Tiny cubes of firm tofu, small, neat rectangular pieces of nori that melt in the warmth of the soup and, best of all, deep-fried shallots set out neatly for floating in your bowl. Habit-forming.

Panko-crumbed fresh snapper fillets, cooked by the Artist’s incredibly generous mum. Served with a dairy-free version of Jansson’s Temptation gleaned from the current edition of the Auckland-based Cuisine magazine. Really, really good.

A private viewing of an important collection of New Zealand’s finest art owned buy an old friend of the Artist’s family. Oh my god. I finally get Colin McCahon.

Nearly cried.

Passover: chicken soup for the vegetarian

As I’ve probably mentioned here before, my step sons are Jewish. The Artist too, though that was mostly in a previous life. But he is very much ‘lapsed’, greeting the mother of one of the Musician's friends at the front gate with a slice of toasted sourdough in hand this afternoon, much to her surprise.

Passover begins tonight and this was a bit of a faux pas on his behalf, however amusing I might find it. By now (Monday afternoon) most Jews have banished any wheat-based products from the kitchen cupboard, scrubbing the shelves until they gleam. Even the ones who enjoy the odd ham and pineapple pizza have at least got rid of the bread.

Me, I’m always happy to tag along with other people’s holidays when they revolve around food. And Jews it would seem are as obsessive about food as I am.

This year it will be totally vegetarian. Even the chicken soup. I can’t understand the attraction of matzoh balls (huge, solid, gluey lumps of dumpling) so mine will be tiny, saffron-hued and made with a small amount of fresh ricotta (and some matzoh - the Musician would be Very Unhappy if there were no matzoh balls). The soup will be a deeply flavoured garlic and herb broth. That's the idea, and I'm still toying with it. I'll post the recipe for these little morsels when I make them tomorrow. The soup's too easy.

Sephardic vegetarian food, here we come.

Garlic and herb broth – serves 4

From Deborah Madison’s ‘Savory Way’. Don’t be tempted to stint on the saffron by using turmeric; the saffron gives it a unique and haunting flavour that turmeric, much as I love it, just can’t replace. Though I have no actual scientific evidence to support my claim, a hangover can be cured (or at least tamed ) with this soup. Honestly.

2 whole heads of garlic

2 litres of water

8 branches of parsley

1 bay leaf

10 large fresh sage leaves

6 branches of fresh thyme

2 whole cloves (the spice)

Sea salt

1 tablespoon of good extra virgin olive oil

Large pinch of saffron threads

1 heaped teaspoon of Marigold bullion powder

Parmesan, grated

Finely chopped parsley leaves

Separate the cloves of garlic and rub off most of the papery-skins. Rap the cloves firmly on a sturdy chopping board with the flat side of your knife to break the paper. Peel each clove (the skins will come away easily if you’ve done this right). Put all of the ingredients, apart from the finely chopped parsley, into a large saucepan. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat to a lively simmer and cook, partially covered with a lid, for about 30 minutes. Add the bullion powder, stir well and taste - it is a subtle flavour at first - before adding a bit more salt if you feel it needs a lift. Strain through a sieve, return to the saucepan and serve sprinkled with the grated parmesan and the finely chopped parsley.

'Fish' and 'Chips': Potato pizza

February has been a month of mostly meals on my own. The Artist has been on numerous overseas trips, working in New Zealand and, as of this afternoon, Prague, so it’s just me. Not a bad thing at all. Indeed, I get to cook and eat whatever I please when I’m on my own. But I was starting to miss cooking for all of us.

Because the Artist’s been here so irregularly it was decided that the Actor, 16, and the Musician, 13, would spend last Friday night with us, eager eaters that they both have become. There was a time when the Musician wouldn’t have contemplated eating a meal based on fish and potatoes – he is the only child I have EVER met who claims to loathe roasted potatoes (madness, I know). Fish would rarely knowingly pass his lips. He’s a Bolognaise boy from way back. But something (was it his bah mitzvah last year?) has changed both him and his eating habits. He is now more adventurous than I’d ever dared to hope. Both boys, it would seem, love good food.

The peppery nasturtium plants in the back yard have finally begun to trail over the side of the wine barrel, a sure sign that they are ready to be picked and made into a salad, one with avocado and smoked salmon. Pizza, packed with potatoes, was the perfect choice for dinner.

The fish: Take 4 handfuls of washed and dried baby spinach leaves and toss into a bowl. Next add 2 handfuls of freshly picked nasturtium leaves. Drizzle with walnut oil, about 2 tablespoons worth and about 1 teaspoon of white wine vinegar and a pinch of sea salt. Toss until the leaves are well coated and glossy. Seed, peel and slice 1 avocado and add this to the bowl, tossing very gently. Transfer to a shallow serving plate. Toast a small handful of walnuts in a dry pan until fragrant (about 5 minutes) and break with your fingers over the top of the salad. Tear some strips of smoked salmon and drape over the whole lot. Pick a few nasturtium flowers and set on top as a finishing touch.

This worked really well, though the salmon wasn’t necessary, and it didn’t add anything special to the meal – I’ll leave it out next time. If you haven’t got nasturtium leaves, either omit them or use well picked watercress leaves – both are peppery and from the same botanical family.

The potatoes: Homemade pizza is something special. Something that never, ever fails to impress. A potato-topped pizza is one step better.

Pizza - makes 4 pizzas

120g of wholemeal flour

450g of plain flour

1 teaspoon of sea salt

2 x sachets of dried yeast

2 tablespoons of milk

4 tablespoons of olive oil

For the base, mix the flours together in a bowl. Add the salt, yeast, milk, olive oil and 250ml of warm water. Using you hands, bring the ingredients together until a dough starts to form. Place the dough on a lightly floured bench top and knead for 8-10 minutes (therapeutic work this bread making) then shape the dough into a ball. Place it in a lightly oiled bowl and rub the dough around to lightly coat it (this prevents a skin forming on the surface, one that would otherwise stop it rising properly). Cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a warm place for 30 minutes to rise.

For the potato topping

3 medium-large sized potatoes, washed and thinly sliced

5 onions, peeled and very thinly sliced

6 tablespoons of olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

Small handful of fresh thyme leaves

1 large globe of buffalo mozzarella, torn with your fingers (quite satisfying!)

Plain yoghurt

Shavings of parmesan

Bring the potatoes to the boil in salted water, reduce the heat and simmer for five minutes. Drain thoroughly and gently place in a very clean tea towel to absorb all the water – the potatoes need to be super-dry to work here. Set aside.

Fry the onion slowly in the oil until soft and golden (about 25 minutes).

Preheat the oven to 220 C.

Divide the risen dough into 4. Roll each piece out to a round of roughly 23cm (the more ‘rustic’ the shapes, the more charming the pizzas, so don’t be precious). Leave to rise on a baking tray in a warm place for about ten minutes. Evenly spread the onions over each base, followed by the potatoes, thyme, cheese and dot with yoghurt. Drizzle with oil, top with parmesan shavings and bake in the oven for twenty minutes or so, until the bases are crisp.

The photo doesn't really do the pizza justice - but I'd had a couple of glasses of wine by then...

'Fish' and 'Chips' 2: Poor man's potatoes

On Friday afternoon an old school friend of mine arrived in Melbourne for the weekend, someone I’ve known for a very long time. Our friendship was forged in 1985 during a rather heated debate about Duran Duran and Wham. As I said, it was a long time ago. Luckily we’ve both moved on in terms of both musical and fashion sense since then. Kylie was down here to farewell a friend of hers who is moving, following her heart, to Switzerland. So, as the visit was last minute and potentially frantic, lunch in the city somewhere was the best option.

After a beautiful meal of crab and red mullet ravioli and a few glasses of very well chilled white wine, it was clear that neither of us could fit anything else in. So, it would seem, my Friday night fish and chips post would be, well, empty. But I had a little something up my sleeve, a meal I had cooked and wanted to share; it’s just that there was no photo. No matter – words alone will have to suffice. Instead, here are two unrelated photographs; a close-up of one of the artists paintings, the other of our cumquat tree. I love that tree.

The fish: When the potatoes are well and truly ready, get your fish on the go – they will take only a moment or two of your attention. Over a high heat, quickly pan-fry King George Whiting fillets (or any thin, delicious white fish) in a little butter and grated orange zest. Cook for 2-3 minutes, skin side down. Flip over and cook for 1 minute longer. When nearly ready, douse with a good squeeze of orange juice and allow it all to bubble for another 30 seconds or so. Ready to go.

The potatoes: A peasant dish, Spanish in origin, of slowly cooked potatoes and capsicums (bell peppers). It’s yet another example of how the humblest of ingredients can be elevated something magnificent with little effort. The Artist moaned with pleasure over these. So did I. The fish, so sweetly scented with orange, were a good accompaniment, but these potatoes are a meal in themselves. Fresh bay leaves really do make all the difference here.

Patatas a lo pobre – serves 4

Or ‘Poor Man’s Potatoes’. All I can say is that things aren’t too bad if this is all you have to eat. Yes, that is a lot of olive oil and it’s not a misprint, but not all of it is eaten, rather it is drained away at the end. You can use it to fry onions (delicious) or anything else for that matter, just make sure that you put the oil in the fridge and use it within a couple of days.

1 cup of extra virgin olive oil

3 large red onions, sliced into thin half moons

6 cloves of garlic, sliced thickly

2 red capsicums, roughly chopped

1 yellow or green capsicum, roughly chopped

3-4 fresh bay leaves

1 kilo of waxy potatoes, desiree or kipfler for example, peeled

A couple of handfuls of cherry tomatoes

Sea salt and pepper

In a large, heavy-based frying pan with a lid, gently heat 5 tablespoons of the olive oil and add the finely sliced onion with a pinch of salt to release their juices. Cook on a low heat, stirring occasionally, for 20 minutes, until softened and translucent. Add the garlic, roughly chopped capsicums and bay leaves. Cook gently for another 15 minutes.

Cut potatoes lengthwise, then cut each piece into 3 chunks and salt lightly. Add the rest of the olive oil to the pan and when it has heated up, add the potatoes and tomatoes. Leave to simmer for 20 minutes with the lid on, then remove the lid and continue to cook for another 20-30 minutes, by which time the potatoes will have cooked through completely when pierced with a skewer. When ready, drain much of the oil off the potatoes through a sieve into a jug. Just enough oil will be left to coat them, making them very beautiful and luscious indeed.

The leftover oil is a boon – store it in a jar and fry onions in it when next making pasta sauce. It is richly flavoured and luscious.