Some delicious cakes ...

One of my simple pleasures during the week is getting up early on a Saturday morning – before the rest of the household has woken – to browse the international papers on the ‘net.   I usually confine myself to the Melbourne Age – where I come from! – then the UK papers  - The Guardian, The Independent and The Telegraph, and then across the pond to the US – The New York Times, The LA Times and the San Francisco Chronicle.
What distinguishes all these papers - aside from their extensive coverage of international affairs from various perspectives – is that they all have brilliant food and dining sections.  

Dan Lepard

Apart from sporadic coverage in all papers at various times during the week, the Saturday edition is when they all post more in-depth articles and recipes about food and travel-related stories from around the globe.


One of the columns I eagerly look for in The Guardian is that of Dan Lepard, a London-based baker, photographer, cooking teacher and writer.   Funnily enough, Dan Lepard was originally from Melbourne but has lived in the UK for many years.

Aside from his regular weekly column(s) in the newspaper, Dan has written a number of books on baking including “The Handmade Loaf” – about various European artisanal bread styles, and most recently “Short & Sweet: The Best of Home Baking”.

“Short & Sweet” is a comprehensive compendium of baking and is on par in its depth with Stephanie Alexander’s “A Cook’s Companion” (see my earlier post) and Nigella Lawson’s first book “How To Eat”.  It’s index covers the whole gamut of baking – breads, cakes, biscuits, desserts and suppers – and its wide reaching and original recipes and concise and clear delivery are truly impressive.  

Two recipes I have tried just in the past week are the ‘Jammy Lamingtons’ and the ‘Bourbon Pecan Brownies’ (which I altered slightly ingredients-wise); both recipes were easy to follow and the results - according to my kid’s taste/level of interest index- were outstanding.

Jammy Lamingtons 

I had to make these as the first recipe to try in the book as they are an Australian classic – well some would say ‘cliché’ but I would say ‘retro-classic’!   Lamingtons are one of those iconic Australian recipes that our mother’s used to cook for afternoon teas in the 1950s and ‘60s.   They were subsequently lampooned mercilessly by Australian comedian Barry Humphries’ alter ego Dame Edna Everage during his/her stage shows in the 70s and 80s.

Basically a lamington is a sponge cake cut into brownie-shaped squares with fruit jam in the centre and rolled in chocolate and coconut flakes.   Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

For the cake:   3 Indian-sized eggs, separated    150g caster sugar   75g butter, softened   1 t vanilla essence   200g plain flour   2 ½ T cornflour   2 t baking powder   150ml milk  
For the coating:   4 T cocoa   125g icing sugar   125ml boiling water   25g chocolate, chopped   125g fruit jam   100g desiccated coconut
Method:

1/.   Heat oven to 180C or 160C fan forced.   Line 17cm square tin with baking paper.
2/.   Beat egg whites & 50g sugar to soft meringue stage.   In another bowl beat remaining sugar, butter, vanilla and egg yolks for 3 mins.  
3/.   Sift or mix flour, cornflour and baking powder together & then beat into the sugar, butter and egg yolks alternating with the milk.   Then beat in the meringue and scrape into cake tin.   Bake for 35 mins.
4/.   For the coating, whisk together cocoa, icing sugar and boiling water then stir in chocolate and put aside.   Trim cake into 8 rectangles, slice though the middle and spread jam across one side.  Put back together and then dip in chocolate on all sides then roll in coconut & rest on a plate.

Bourbon Pecan Brownies (my Indian version!)

I followed the basic recipe for these brownies but swapped the bourbon and pecan nuts for more readily available ingredients in India - dark rum and almonds; they still turned out very moist and chocolatey!
Ingredients:

200g cooking chocolate   125g butter   2 eggs (I used 3 Indian-sized eggs)   125g brown sugar      100g caster sugar   75ml of bourbon (I substituted dark rum)   2 t vanilla essence   175g plain flour   1 T cocoa   125g pecan nuts (I substituted unpeeled almonds), roughly chopped   

Method:

1/.   Heat oven to 190C or 170C fan forced.   Line a 20cm square cake tin with foil. (Note: this saved on buttering or papering the pan and worked really well.)
2/.   Melt chocolate with butter and mix (I used a microwave- pulsing for 20 secs at a time and  stirring at the intervals.)   Beat eggs with the 2 different sugars until mix has integrated and become creamy beige.   Beat chocolate and butter into egg & sugar bowl & mix.   Add rum and vanilla essence.
3/.   Sift flower & cocoa in a bowl (I just stir them together several times), and beat into chocolate mixture.   Then mix in chopped almonds.
4/.   Scrape into the cake tin and cook in oven for 25 mins.   Rest for 15 mins before turning out and cutting into square bars.  

Hope you enjoy them!

Tony saab/Hyderabad   June 2012

Edna Lewis's Roast Pork with Black Currant Sauce

 Not being American by birth nor that familiar I have to admit with the vagaries of American regional cuisines, I had never heard of Edna Lewis until quite recently.

Her name came to my attention when I was looking up lists of classic cookbooks; I have evolved this scam where whenever my partner, Juhee goes to the US on business I order a number of second hand cookbooks (from Abebooks- which has a data base of some 3.5 million pre-loved books!) and get her to bring them back to India.

So on a number of the lists I was perusing  a cookbook on regional Southern cuisine, “The Taste of Country Cooking” – first published in 1976 – kept appearing.   The book’s cover describes it as a celebration of  “the uniquely American country cooking Edna Lewis grew up with some 50 years ago (now closer to 80 - sic) in a small Virginia Piedmont farming community that had been settled by freed slaves.”   The book is credited with reviving the nearly forgotten genre of refined Southern cooking while offering a glimpse into African-American farm life in the early 20th century.

Edna Lewis was the granddaughter of a former freed slave in the American South and was born in 1916, one of eight children.   By the time she died in 2006 she had been a highly sought after seamstress, ran a pheasant farm, written 4 cookbooks – of which “The Taste of Country Cooking” was the most well known – and had cooked in restaurants in New York as well as the South.   Late in her life she was instrumental in helping to revive a nationwide interest in the quote “close-to- nature” style of Southern country cooking.

I liked the line in her New York Times obituary where her editor described her as “a lover of Jack Daniel's, Bessie Smith and understated conversation.”

The pork roast covered in coarse salt

“The Taste of Country Cooking” – a copy of which of course I had to buy after discovering the above story – is divided into four sections coinciding with the seasons of the year.   And the chapter headings give you some idea of the writer’s approach to recipes – “ An Early Spring Dinner after Sheep Shearing”, “Putting Up Fruits and Vegetables and Wine”, “Breakfast before Leaving for Race Day” and “A Dinner of Chicken and Dumplings and Warm Gingerbread”!   I can't wait to cook my way though this book over coming months.

The carved meat after 90 mins cooking

Here is an Edna Lewis recipe which I discovered on the internet.   It’s a side of roast pork that is first cooked in a heavy layer of salt – which is washed off during the cooking time – and then swathed in a rich black currant jam sauce.   Really delicious and my kids loved it!

EDNA LEWIS’S ROAST PORK WITH BLACK CURRANT SAUCE

Ingredients:

3 kg of pork – trust with cooking twine  (I cooked just a 1.5kg piece),  black peppercorns, bay leaves, coarse salt, black currant jam

Method:

Pre-heat oven to 240C.   Cut slits in fatty side of the roast and insert 3 peppercorns and a bay leaf in each slit.   Cover entire roast with layer of coarse salt.

Place on rack in oven and cook for 5.00 mins and then reduce heat to 175C. And roast for 30 mins per ½ kilo.

30 mins before roast is done remove from oven and pour cup of iced water over the meat ... (not clear from recipe but I drained  the water off.)    Let cool for 3 mins and then spread black currant jam over entire roast and return to oven.   Baste 3 times during last half hour of cooking using juices from the pan beneath rack.

When cooked remove from oven, let rest for 10 mins then carve meat into slices.   I served this with roast potatoes and a salad.   Lovely.

Roast potatoes on the side

Tony saab/Hyderabad June 2012

A Sri Lankan Crab Curry

A crab curry from Sri Lanka

Its crab season again it seems here in Hyderabad ... if you can call it a 'season' as the city is several hundred kilometres from the coast.   But our regular fishmonger - who brings various seafood selections to our gate on a weekly basis - brought us some crabs the other day.

We usually cook them either as an Indian curry - in a slurry of mainly chillies, onions and coconut milk - or Chinese Malaysian style - with black beans, soy and more chillies!   (Chillies are a BIG ingredient in our household.)

However, having recently been gifted a book on Sri Lankan cuisine I thought I would try the following recipe.   Its from Peter Kuruvita's book "Serendip: My Sri Lankan Kitchen", written by an ex-pat Sri Lankan who is now a successful and well known chef in Australia with a popular Sydney seafood restaurant chain, a couple of television cooking shows under his belt and at least two cookbooks of which this is the first.

I had a memorable meal with an old Sydney friend at his restaurant "Flying Fish" several years ago.  It's a beautiful restaurant located on an old pier in Pyrmont, one of Sydney's many seaside suburbs and, whilst at the time I didnt know much about the chef in their kitchen, the seafood was superb.   I seem to remember having a seafood laksa - the Malaysian meal-in-a-bowl of curried noodles, with various fresh seafood and a base of chilli and coconut milk.

The book is written in the now familiar family nostalgia/travelogue style of cookbooks with lots of old photographs of his extended Si Lankan family and some beautifully shot contemporary pictures of various scenic spots on the island along with pictures of the recipes set amongst old family antiques and table settings.

Since the end of the civil war there in May 2009 I have been 'imagining' a holiday trip to Sri Lanka following reports from friends of the beauty of the country and its people and the apparent abundance of seafood and other delicacies of this region.   Plus its less than an hours flight from Chennai! Yet I am troubled by continued criticism of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa's regime and its reported use of torture and abuse of human rights both during the civil war - particularly in the final days of crushing the Tamil Tiger rebel forces - and since then as well.   Only this week he was forced to cancel a speech in London during the Queen's Jubilee Celebration due to the threat of massive demonstations by UK-based Tamils and human rights activists.

Do you boycott holidaying in a country whose government is continually criticised internationally, or do you go anyway and in a small way help the country's tourist industry and larger economy get back on its feet after years of civil war and terror?   Havent finally decided how to resolve this dilemma.

Anyway, the recipe for crab curry from "Serendip" was incredibly tasty with the pungent aromas of curry leaves, lemongrass, fenugreek, chillies and coconut milk.

Crab Curry from Peter Kuruvita's "Serendip"

Ingredients:

1.5 kg of crabs, cleaned and halved on the shell
400ml coconut milk
1 piece of Goroka - or Kokum as its known in India
1 T chilli powder
2 t roasted & ground cumin seeds
5cm cinnamon stick
1 t fenugreek seeds
1/2 t tumeric
50 gm of ghee (or oil)
3 small red onions, chopped
2 cm piece of ginger, chopped
2 sprigs of curry leaves
1 stick of lemongrass, bruised
3 green chillies, chopped
1/4 t dill seeds
1 C coriander leaves, chopped
1 drumstick (or Murunga as Sri Lankans know it)
juice of a lime

Method:

1/.   Place crabs in large bowl with coconut milk, kokum, chilli powder, cumin, cinnamon, fenugreek and tumeric.   Combine well and leave for 30 mins.
2/.   Heat ghee or oil in a wok over high heat and add onion, ginger, curry leaves, lemongrass and chillies - cook for 5 mins.
3/.   Add dill - cook for 2 mins - and then add crab mixture.   Cover and simmer for 12 to 15 mins until crab is just cooked and sauce has thickened.   Add coriander, drumstick and lime juice plus salt to taste and heat through till ready.

We served this with rice, a vegetable dish and a Bengali prawn curry a friend had dropped off for us to try.   Great meal and I will be cooking again from this book sometime soon!

Tony saab/Hyderabad   June 2012