Places to Eat: Pizza Pilgrims

My friends and I weren’t that impressed when we ate at the Pizza Pilgrims Pizzeria in Soho. The pizzas were good but didn’t stand out from the crowd, and there is a lot of competition in London. I did enjoy the portobello mushroom and truffle oil pizza I ordered, because the mushroom was thick and earthy, and the base was nice and doughy without being stodgy, which is how I like my pizza. My friends however didn’t think the bases were crisp enough. We were a group of five men and were sat in an alcove in the small basement dining room occupied by a glass-topped foozeball table. So of course we spent about an hour playing foozeball and drinking beers, which were very good Oro di Milano blonde beers.

A simple starter: tomatoes stuffed with feta

This is a very easy to make starter and is a fun dish to serve. Hollow out as many cherry tomatoes as you want to serve, cutting a wedge out of the top and using the handle of a teaspoon to scrap out the seeds and flesh inside. Pour a small amount of olive oil into each tomato. Cut the feta into small cubes and squeeze one cube into each tomato. Grind black pepper over all of the tomatoes and garnish each with a basil leaf.

Fennel, red cos and parmesan salad

I made this luxurious salad for lunch last weekend. I love fresh fennel; combined with cos lettuce it creates a salad with real crunch. I sliced two small fennel bulbs very finely, two sticks of celery in the same manner, and combined both with a red cos lettuce, roughly torn into pieces. Into this mix I added a dollop of light creme fraiche, several shavings of parmesan, and black pepper, as well as a drop of white wine vinegar. A surprisingly filling lunch.

Minestra di Zucchini

This Italian recipe for courgette soup is quick and easy, and produces a delicate, thin soup that would be good as a starter or as a light lunch. I added croutons made from stale bread that I’d cubed, drizzled with olive oil and shaken together with a pinch of mixed herbs.

Courgette Soup

Chop 350g of courgettes into small chunks and put in a pan with 3 medium sized tomatoes, chopped into quarters. Add 450ml of milk and a quarter tsp of cayenne pepper. Bring close to boiling slowly, then turn down the heat and let simmer for 15 minutes. Beware the milk doesn’t separate! Blend in a food processor and strain through a sieve to remove the tomato skins and skin of the courgette. Pour into bowls and add a swirl of single cream.

Frangipane cake

This is probably one of the easiest recipes I’ve ever followed and it produces a delicious cake. I made this one to take to work and it was an easy way to impress my colleagues!

Frangipane cake

Pre-heat the oven to 180C. Cream together 150g butter and 150g golden caster sugar (I used normal caster and it was fine). Add 150g of self-raising flour, 150g of ground almonds, 2 large free range eggs, 1 tsp of vanilla essense and mix together in a food processor.

Line a round baking tin with baking parchment and pour half of the mixture in. Dollop about 12 half teaspoons of raspberry jam around the mix and scatter over 150g of fresh raspberries. Pour in the remaining mixture, scatter 50g of flaked almonds over the top and bake for 40 minutes.

A simple starter: eggs and mayonnaise

 

I put together this very quick and simple starter at a recent family get together in Cumbria. It struck me as being very French; the boiled eggs and home made mayonnaise make me think of classic French cuisine. The mayonnaise was made with a thick olive oil which made it almost green in colour and actually a little too heavy and pungent. A good splash of walnut oil would have improved it by adding a nutty flavour to dampen the peppery olive taste. The lamb’s lettuce was a nice accompaniment, but it was the eggs, laid by the chickens in the garden, that really shone. You can’t beat eggs laid that morning for freshness and taste.

Places to Eat: Ottolenghi

I recently visited the Estorick Gallery in Islington for the first time and saw a wonderful exhibition of sketches and etchings by Giorgio Morandi. After this feast for the eyes and soul, I felt in need of a literal feast and wandered down Upper Street to Ottolenghi, a restaurant I’ve wanted to eat in for some time. A colleague told me more than a year ago how good it was and since then I’ve been given Jerusalem, which is a wonderful cookbook and gave me more reasons to go to the restaurant.

Overall, I thought it was a lovely place to have lunch. My party of three had to queue for a space at a long communal table, but not for long, and the restaurant is a pleasing space to be in: minimalist and chic. I ordered delicious lemony roast chicken with coriander seeds; it was very well done, not dry at all, but succulent and zinging with flavour. We also ordered sweet potato with a satay sauce; the potato was delicious but the satay seemed redundant. The grilled aubergine was very good, as was the sweet red pepper. The hummus was as good as I hoped it would be. We finished our lunch with coffees and a sweet, crumbly pear and raspberry frangipane. We weren’t blown away by the flavours and there was nothing necessarily new, but everything tasted very good and was well executed, and the bill was certainly reasonable for lunch in London.

Ricotta, roast vegetables and harissa tart

Having blocks of puff pastry in the freezer means you can put together an open or closed tart with pretty much any ingredients you want in almost no time, as long as you remember to get the pastry out of the freezer well in advance.

This tart combines soft. crumbly ricotta cheese with fiery harissa paste and roast red peppers and courgette.

Banana bread

It’s hard to believe, but some people just don’t like bananas.

I have to admit I don’t like bananas when they’re brown and mushy, when the only good use for them is in banana bread. This bread, or cake, is easy to make and if baked well, comes out of the oven deliciously moist. This recipe is one from Rose Elliot. It doesn’t specify the size of banana to use, but I think the more banana in the mix the better.

Pumpkin and spinach curry

I really like the sweetness of cooked pumpkin and it seems to work well with spinach’s earthy flavour.

Pumpkin and spinach curry

In a heavy pan, over a medium heat, fry half a tsp each of cumin and brown mustard seeds in 2 tbsps of corn oil or ghee. After a minute or two, add a tsp each of turmeric, coriander powder and ground ginger. Stir the spices briefly and add 2 cloves of garlic and 2 medium onions, both chopped finely. Fry until the onion starts to change colour.

Add about 200ml of water to the pan and then 1.5 tsps of tamarind paste. Add about a quarter of a medium pumpkin, cubed. Blanch 300g of spinach leaves and roughly chop. Leave the pan to simmer for about 20 minutes until the pumpkin has softened, then add the drained spinach, stir, and finally add a few good pinches of chopped fresh coriander and salt to taste.