DOS HERMANOS SUNDAY: PIE AND PEAS

It all went a bit pear-shaped on Saturday. The plan was to visit the gym (how do think I maintain a body like this – magic ?) , then visit somewhere for lunch with a swift return home to watch the FA Cup Final. A simple plan but ruined by an overindulgence in a mystery liqueur purchased on a recent trip to Lisbon and YouTube inconveniently having all my favourite music of all time ever that demanded to be watched. Result: a longer lie-in than usual precipitating Plan B.

A brisk walk down to Borough Market and its attendant hordes to get a couple of pies from Mrs King’s. A brief chat with Ian Hartland and I walked away clutching one Pork Pie, some Piccalilli and one of Mrs Kings Steak and Kidney Pies.

Re the latter you’ll recall HS’s post about being a judge at the 2009 British Pie Awards where he had the honour of judging the Vegetarian category (you can laugh but I had to deal with the fallout). Anyway, Mrs King’s PP was awarded a Gold medal but their S&K Pie made by Hartland junior was a Champion in its class.

Once I got back the all-important marrowfat peas went into boiling water with some bicarb. After an overnight soak I cooked them nice and slowly until they broke up and became, well, mushy. The pie was heated through and placed artfully on top of the peas.

An excellent pie with plenty of chunky meat within but even better was the pastry, all flaky and delicious.

Pie, Peas and a Pint – perfect (sorry just too tempting...the food I mean).

EAT MY GLOBE: TAKING THE BOOKTRADE ON A BINGE

And so it begins.

Although EAT MY GLOBE is not published in the U.K until April of next year, the sell in has begun in earnest and my publishers, John Murray suggested that a good way to show the book trade what it was all about would be to take selected members on an afternoon food tour.

So, on a cold, windy and miserable Friday, I met with a gaggle of assorted buyers and trade journalists for a swift pint at The Market Porter before taking them on a whirlwind tour of some of my favourite places.

The pub served a shockingly bad pint, but made a great meeting place particularly as our first port of call was Mrs King’s Pork Pies where the estimable Ian Hartland gave us a little talk before cutting up a prime large example for everyone to try all the while making sure that real customers were not neglected.

Next stop, around the corner, where the good people of Brindisa had arranged for Master Jamon Carver, Zak to give us a demonstration of fine art of ham cutting before he too distributed fine slices of Teruel and Iberico for our eager group to taste.

If everyone had been eagerly anticipating the first two stops, the next caused a little more concern as we hopped in some waiting cars and trundled off to Aldgate East and Tubby Issac’s Whelk and Jellied Eel Stall, which has been on the same spot for a hundred years or more. It was a first taste of old London for most, but they were all very brave soldiers as I doused bowls of cockles, whelks and, of course, eels with extra special, extra hot chilli vinegar and handed them around for everyone to try. Wonderful stuff although a shame to think with all the parking restrictions in that area now, the owner was doubtful about the long term future of the stall.

There is no doubt, however, that Paul A.Young has a very bright future and, although Paul himself could not be there for our visit, his Managers, Jakob and Brendan looked after us when we bustled in from a blustery Camden Passage and were soon giving us tastes of a rich brownie and handing over little goodie bags that Paul had asked them to make up. We took the opportunity to buy everyone a cup of Paul’s superlative hot chocolate before climbing back into our cars for perhaps the most unusual stop of the day.

I have written about Memhet at Embassy Electrical Supplies before, but now was the perfect time to visit as he has just taken delivery of some of his wonderful olive oil. On top of which he now has a new range of infused oils, some paprika dried in the Sun on the terraces his Cyprus estate and stunning wild oregano from his farm. As ever, Memhet was soon ladling out tastes of oil and olives and everyone was filling their John Murray shoulder bags with ideal Christmas Presents.

All this eating is thirsty work, so our penultimate port of call saw a quick stop at Hawksmoor where Nick Strangeway had created a special EAT MY GLOBE cocktail containing Compass Box Oak Cross Whisky, Jostberry Cordial and Palo Cortado Sherry. Very good it was too thanks to Tim and Noal who did the mixing and, with an added round of Martinis and a few plates of Iberico which we had picked up at Brindisa, it fortified us for the short walk to our final destination.

Where else could we finish a tour of this part of London than Tayyabs? It was, of course, already mobbed when we arrived, but we were shown to the private room and plates of sizzling lamb chops were put in front of us almost before our coats were off. As good as ever and as the food came, I took the opportunity to propose a toast to my new chums and to all the amazing and astonishingly generous old chums who had been so giving of their time and products to make the day such a success.

Thanks All.

BREAKFAST @ BRINDISA BOROUGH MARKET

In a slightly scary “Gilbert & George finish each other sentences” kind of way, when HP called to say he was about to tuck into the enticing looking food at the new branch of Brindisa, I had just finished doing the same at the Borough Market branch.

I needed the sustenance to keep up with the energy levels of my irrepressible chum, Lex who was experiencing her first visit to London’s food tourist Mecca. She had already been given a pork pie by Mr Hartland, a sliver of Jamon at Brindisa as well as finding every other morsel of free grub in the market like a heat seeking missile, but by 11am, she declared she needed something more substantial and announced she was treating her "Uncle" to breakfast as thanks for helping her find gainful employment in our city.

Remarkably, at that time we not only found a table at Brindisa, but also one outside in the last of the Summer sun. The brekkie menu is short, but the quality is good and Lex’s plate of chorizo, eggs and potatoes was soon a memory as were my own rather good scrambled eggs, which came with slices of manchego, mushrooms and tomatoes.

With some freshly squeezed orange juice, the bill came to £20 including tip (thank you, Lex) a good deal less, I suspect than HP was racking up at their new venture.

Wish he had brought some of those croquetas back with him though.

I GOTTA SAY IT WAS A GOOD DAY

She saved her nickels — it sure adds up
Now she’s got ‘em in a paper cup

It was HS who suggested that some Roast Pork for Sunday lunch might be nice. I dutifully made my way down to Borough Market on Saturday before the hordes had arrived to see what looked good.

Our Pork joint of choice is Loin but today day they all looked a bit lean. Then I spotted a Rolled Shoulder. It looked to have plenty of fat and enough skin to make some good crackling.

The night before I cooked it I dried the skin and rubbed in plenty of salt. I chopped up some sage, lemon zest and a little garlic and stuffed this into the joint at various points. In the morning I dried the skin off again – the salt having drawn out some moisture – and rubbed some oil in and more table salt. I finished off with some coarser sea salt. After coming to room temperature the joint went into a hot oven for about thirty minutes then I turned the over down to medium and basically left it alone for about four hours. In the meantime we drank a rather fine chilled Manzanilla with Almonds and Anchovy Olives.

After the joint was cooked I let it rest for a bit while I made a little gravy with some decent Cider. There was an Apple Sauce and some veggies on the side and a bottle of St Aubin to help it all down.

I haven’t had a Shoulder of Pork for a long, long time and it was a revelation. The meat was very dark, quite unlike the usual pale colour of Roast Pork. It came more in chunks than slices which is fine by me. The flavour, somewhat predictably, was fantastic. The fat had had kept the meat moist but had rendered off so that the taste was quite clean. We had no trouble in finishing off all but a small bowlful of the two and half kilo behemoth. HS declared the crackling some of the best he had eaten which if you know him is high praise indeed. Some sort of success then.

A DOS HERMANO SUNDAY

I was scrapin' bottom
Gropin' in the dark

For one reason or another it’s been a while since I’ve had a typical Dos Hermanos Sunday and even though HS wasn’t available I decided to put things to right today.

First a leisurely walk to Apostrophe for my usual double Macchiato and Cinnamon Swirl followed by a brief wander around the markets in the areas between Spitalfields and Brick Lane.

There are a number of new restaurants being built this year the most notable of which are The Luxe from John Torode and The Bouchon Breton. Less notably there will also be branches of Gourmet Burger Kitchen , Wagamama (groan), and La Tasca (please kill me now). And with that Spitalfields will be well and truly Covent Garden’d.

A swift walk home, The Dan on the stereo and fix myself a Beefeater Dry Martini. I’d shoved all the fixings and stemware in the freezer before going out so everything was good and cold. Nothing worse than a warm DM.

The meat of the day was a Loin of Pork from Northfield Farm in Borough Market. Like cooking steak I’ve got my procedure down pat so it’s pretty failsafe.

First make sure the skin is scored properly – they sometimes don’t do it properly in the butchers. Dry the skin with some kitchen towel and massage a bit of Olive Oil in. Apply a sprinkling of fine table salt that will get in the cracks and rub that in as well. Add final sprinkling of coarser Maldon Sea Salt. I sometimes sprinkle some crushed fennel seeds or juniper berries on as well.

I usually poke holes in between the fat and the flesh and poke in some sage and shreds of garlic but this time I just rested the joint on a bunch of sage and some crushed cloves of garlic. I bunched up some foil to get the skin level so that it crisped evenly.

Following the teachings of St. Hugh of Fearnley-Whittingstall, the patron saint of meat and meat products – the joint went into a hot oven (220C) to get the crackling going then the heat was turned down to about 160C for the rest of the cooking time. Followed by plenty of rest, of course (not for me - for the joint, stupid).

Meanwhile I made a Bramley Apple Sauce which I do without sugar - I like the tartness - but to which I added some shredded sage, cloves and crushed cardamom.

For my greens I had a packet of Pimientos de Padron knocking around (as one does) which made the meal somewhat Iberian.

And that was it. A nice Rioja to go with the pork and some English Strawberries to pick at. A little aguardiente (don’t mid if I do) followed to aid digestion. Perfect, really.

ROAST

ALONE IN MY CAVE IT'S CORNFLAKES AND CAMELS AND THE LONG RESTLESS SHADOWS OF MY LIFE

A favourite joke from a favourite comedian:

"I went to a restaurant that serves 'Breakfast at any time'.
So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance."

Breakfast, breakfast, breakfast. According W. Somerset Maugham that’s what you need to eat well in England. No longer true, in London, leastways. But it had been a long time since I had had the Full English (Got your big plate Alan?) so a Saturday morning, only slightly trammelled by the fug of a bourbon hangover, seemed the perfect time to revisit this quintessentially English custom.

Roast is the second restaurant of Iqbal Wahhab (the first being the Cinnamon Club). It had pretty mixed reviews when it opened. The bottom line was: nice room, shame about the food (and service). DH go down to BM at least once a week so I thought a visit from one of the gruesome twosome was overdue. The hottest day of the year seemed like just the right time. We suffer so you, gentle reader, don’t have to.

After a tussle with the Misery Line I entered the rather handsome (and thankfully air-conditioned) dining space and was shown to a nice table with a view over the market. A small cafetiere and a plate of decent hot toast soon followed. Too bad the joe, as I usually find with this delivery system was weak and rather thin. Still it did a job. I also got a glass of freshly squeezed grapefruit juice which was nice.

My eyes bypassed the delights of “Inverawe Smoked Loch Etive Trout with Scrambled Eggs” and “Tattie Scone with Ayrshire Bacon, Field Mushrooms and a Fried Egg” (whatever that is) and settled upon the “The Full Borough”. This consisted of…well look at the photo.

The sausages were pretty good - meaty and dense. The eggs were cooked well, but the bacon, oh dear oh dear. The small pieces of streaky tasted ok but had had only a brief introduction to the grill. The result was a flaccid piece of pork (something I am only too well acquainted with).

Unfortunately this was a real deal-breaker for me. A decent English breakfast must have good bacon. As Roast is only seconds away from stalls such as Ginger Pig & Sillifield farm it shouldn’t be beyond their wit to obtain a few pounds of decent stuff and cook it properly. It shouldn’t be, but it was. I was also irritated that the coffee refill that was offered came with an unannounced extra charge (shouldn’t refills be free?). The whole thing reminded me of a Conran operation - looks good on the surface but let down by the execution. On the plus side it is a nice room and the service was efficient and friendly. But as a place to have breakfast - not really.

JK Galbraith once said "It takes some skill to spoil a breakfast - even the English can't do it". Sorry Johnny-boy, I’ve found an exception to the rule.