Category Archives: Food
Breakfast for dinner
Breakfast for dinner should always be an option.
Last night, we went out for dinner at one of our neighborhood greasy spoons and ordered breakfast.
Eggs, bacon, hashbrowns, biscuits and gravy, pancakes. The whole nine yards.
Before the aforementioned vittles arrived, my husband reviewed the menu, which was an amalgamation of breakfast, lunch and dinner items and then asked, “Wait, are they still serving breakfast?”
Are they still serving breakfast?! Where exactly do you think we are? Welcome to America, my dear.
It’s one of those minor perks that are easily taken for granted, until you no longer have the option.
When I was living in Scotland, I remember how much I idealized the notion of going out for dessert. Just dessert. Not dinner. Not the full meal. Just a slice of pie or cake or ice cream or whatever at a regular restaurant, which was not well-received and I’m still not sure why. I guess restaurants didn’t want to take up space feeding someone dessert when they could be serving a main meal plus starter, drinks and dessert afterward.
Speaking of dessert, I should add that we did have dessert with breakfast. Something that should be illegal called a pie milkshake, which is precisely what it sounds like. They take a piece of pie of your choice (we went with a caramel pecan pie) and blend it into your standard vanilla ice cream-based milkshake. Who knew something so wrong could taste so right? God bless America.
A weekend of baking
With the challenge of Britain’s National Baking Week set before me, this weekend I did the unthinkable: I baked.
And baked and baked and baked.
I’ll admit I was a bit rusty. I warmed up by baking brownies Saturday morning, which might have been considered cheating. I used Trader Joe’s Ready to Bake Brownies, which has to be the most user-friendly brownie mix on the market. It dulls the intelligence. Anyone capable of opening a packet, pouring contents into a greased brownie pan and sliding it into a pre-heated oven can do it. The results are fantastic, but where is the sense of accomplishment?
Brownies for dummies. And yes, you'll notice I forgot to grease the pan. This mix was made for me.
On Sunday, I made a two-layer yellow cake using a recipe I found online last week (yes, I’ve baked two weekends in a row. This might be a personal record) and then after I put the cake pans into the oven, I realized with dismay that I had promised my son I was going to make cupcakes, not a cake!
He was very brave about it and told me it was okay. We could make cupcakes another day. Which made me feel even worse and so, there began the third baking project of the weekend – cupcakes, using the same winning yellow cake recipe. In the making of this batch, I ran out of granulated sugar and was not going to make my second trip to the grocery store so I subbed the rest of the measurement with brown sugar. It ended up working out very well – moist, delicious and not too sweet. Sense of accomplishment? Oh yes!
With the lack of granulated sugar in the house, I couldn’t make the homemade chocolate frosting I had planned and I didn’t have enough butter to do a traditional buttercream so I cracked open a can of Betty Crocker cream cheese frosting and called it a day. Or rather, a weekend.
Mission accomplished.
The Great British Bake-off
Almost 4 million viewers watched the finale of The Great British Bake-Off. Photo credit: Love Productions/BBC/Vicki Couchman
Mark my words. Never get in the way of a Brit and their mixer (or whisk, cake pan or pastry bag).
Brits take their baking very seriously. While the US only has one Martha Stewart, the UK has hundreds of them, dotted in towns and villages across the country. On any given weekend, they’re churning out fairy cakes and scones for village fetes and school bake sales like they’re going out of style. And those who aren’t baking (and even those who are) are watching baking shows. Almost 4 million viewers watched The Great British Bake-Off this month. Who knew that many Brits would find fondant icing and puff pastry so riveting?
This week marks National Baking Week in the UK – a national campaign to get the uninitiated back into the kitchen to enjoy the national pastime. In that spirit, I will be baking tomorrow and will report back next week.
National Baking Week runs through Sunday so it’s not too late to join in the fun. Have a lovely weekend (in or out of the kitchen)!
A British bento box
I’ve been shopping for bento boxes this week for my son, in the hopes of taming our daily use of ziplock bags and adding some fun to the standard (yawn!) packed lunch.
Look what I found! At first glance, it looks like a double decker London bus! But take a closer look!
And it comes complete with London bus chopsticks …
Sarnie heaven
I’m no fan of Subway sandwiches, or Quizno’s or any of the so-called fast food sandwich places that dot the American landscape.
It’s not that I don’t love sandwiches. I do. It’s just that every single deli sandwich I see here fails to live up to the standards of sarnies (translation: sandwiches) you can get in Britain.
Case in point: Pret a Manger, a chain sandwich shop in the UK.
Pret a Manger means Ready to Eat in French.
You run in and choose a sandwich, already boxed and ready to go, the cashier rings you up. Done!
The lengthiest part of that process is deciding whether you want the pole and line caught tuna and rocket (translation: arugula) or the topside of beef and watercress or the Moroccan falafel and humous. I love the variety of choices and the sometimes unexpected combination of ingredients.
Best of all, everything is made fresh on the premises that day. Quick. Inventive. Delicious.
It makes the menu at Subway look positively primeval.
Time Out’s Eating & Drinking Awards
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – London is home to some of the best restaurants in the world and this week Time Out is highlighting the best of the bunch in their 2011 Eating & Drinking Awards!
Even better, they’ve posted all of their picks on their website.
This year’s categories include best new restaurant, best sushi bar, best new bar and best new cheap eats.
I’ve already bookmarked it for my next trip to the Big Smoke.
A fool-proof béchamel sauce
Béchamel sauce and I have a love-hate relationship. I mean, I love it. I love the marriage of melted butter, flour and milk, whisked quickly over heat. I love it in macaroni and cheese and in an authentic lasagne (that is, one without ricotta. Sorry, I don’t like ricotta in my lasagne, which is sadly how most Americans make it). And I love the jaunty accent in béchamel. It might as well have a beret and smoke gauloises.
But I’d say 95% of my attempts at making béchamel sauce have failed, giving me an end result of a frustratingly thin sauce, when the goal is a thick, unctuous, creamy goo.
Last night, on the spur of the moment and with a head of cauliflower in the fridge that needed to be eaten pronto, I whipped up a cauliflower cheese. For the uninitiated, cauliflower cheese is a fantastic British recipe, particular for vegetarians in your life. It’s great when paired with a roast rib of beef, but also delicious on its own. The gist is not unlike a proper homemade macaroni cheese, except we replace the macaroni for cauliflower.
And it does involve making béchamel sauce. I tried a Nigella Lawson recipe from her Feast cookbook and voila!
Mmm ... cauliflower cheese
It was a resounding success! Not only did the sauce turn out exactly the way I wanted, but the cauliflower was cooked just enough to be bitesome, not mushy. Bravo, Nigella! You’ve made a believer out of me.
Cauliflower Cheese
1 large head of cauliflower
2 bay leaves
1 stick of butter
2 teaspoons English mustard
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
3 cups strong cheddar, grated, plus 1/2 cup for sprinkling on the top
Cut the cauliflower into small florets and and put in a saucepan with cold water and bay leaves. Sprinkle with salt. Bring to a boil, then drain and then refresh with cold water. Let the water drain in a colander. Then put the cauliflower in an even layer in an ovenproof dish.
Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. To make the cheese sauce, melt the butter in a saucepan and then whisk in flour and mustard, and cook over a gentle heat for 5 minutes. Whisk in the milk off of the heat, and then put it back on the heat and keep stirring until it becomes thick and begins to bubble.
Sprinkle in the 3 cups grated cheese and stir over heat until it has melted into the sauce. Pour the sauce over the cauliflower in the dish, and scatter remaining cheese over the top. Cook for 20 minutes or until the cauliflower is hot and bubbly and the cheese has browned slightly on the top.
Does my butt look greedy in this?
Gordon Gekko has never been to a Hometown Buffet.
Greed is good. Gordon Gekko’s famous line from Wall Street still rings true in restaurants across the US.
When I first lived in the UK, I was struck by the concept of greed as it relates to food. I was at a Christmas party and the host had set out a delicious spread of food so guests could help themselves, buffet-style. A British woman in front of me commented on how greedy she was for trying a little of everything. Her plate was modest. She was slim. But still, this concept of greed overwhelmed her – or at least commonplace decency welled up, enough for her to make that comment.
Over the years, I’ve heard these kinds of comments over and over by Brits. Most Americans simply aren’t programmed to think this way. We think of greed in terms of money and possessions, but not in terms of eating too much or supersizing our meals. Gluttony may have been one of the seven deadly sins, but the message seems to have evaded our collective conscience.
I challenge you to visit any all-you-can-eat American restaurant like Golden Corral or Hometown Buffet in search of this distinctly British mentality. I can already guarantee there will be no such modesty and no apologies, aside from “I’m sorry that I couldn’t have made room for that second piece of cobbler” or “I’m sorry I didn’t wear my fat pants tonight” variety.
And the best Scotch egg is …
A few weeks ago I blogged about the upcoming Scotch egg challenge.
Well, last night was the night we were all waiting for. Scotch egg heads gathered at The Ship in Wandsworth to taste and then crown the best homemade Scotch egg. Without further adieu, let me congratulate The Devonshire Arms in Chiswick.
Behold the winning egg!
And the winning Scotch egg was from The Devonshire Arms in Chiswick!
I’ve never eaten a Scotch egg. Their mere sight, particularly when cold and purchased at a service station, makes me want to gag. But I love the look of that gooey yolk and crumbly breaded exterior.
I could be converted.
When you don’t want to supersize …
Who needs this much toilet paper?
My British friend Helen officially moved stateside last weekend to live the so-called American dream.
As it turns out, the first thing that she’s noticed has been the overabundance of super-sized American products and dearth of everyday items in sensible quantities. She doesn’t want to buy six or 12 eggs. She wants four. (Who knew that British grocers sold eggs in four-packs?) She doesn’t want nine rolls of loo roll (translation: toilet paper). She wants two. She doesn’t want 20 rolls of paper towels to store in a closet or pack away in a garage. She doesn’t care if it’s cheaper in bulk. She only wants what she needs. No more, no less.
I love the Britishness of this sensibility.
And I understand it. I often forget this way of thinking, living here for as long as we have. But I love the size of a Soreen loaf. I love single packs of tissues and fruit that is not bagged or bundled together. I love small packs of batteries and buying detergent that won’t give me a hernia when I carry it into the house. It’s the antithesis of everything that Costco and Sam’s Club stand for and there’s something refreshing about it.
Welcome to the U.S., Helen. Don’t ever change.
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