Colombian ajiaco is a miracle of soups. It’s luxurious, convivial and fresh. The basic idea is this: a bowl of rich chicken broth with lots of potatoes and chunks of sweetcorn, personalised with sliced avocado, capers, a tomato-coriander salsa and cream, followed by another bowl, or two. Do try it.
A Sort of Ajiaco
Proper aijaco requires some ingredients we lack, so this is a Leamington approximation. I think it’s delicious but apologies to all Colombians.
Ingredients
the stock
1 whole chicken, or chicken pieces, of about 1.6 kilos in weight, but you needn’t be precise.
1 large onion, chopped fine
4 litres of water
1 tablespoon salt
6 whole peppercorns
the additional soup ingredients
4 potatoes, cut into chunks — the Canalside potatoes we’re currently getting are ideal as they are the mealy variety that disintigrate when you boil them. That’s what you want here.
3 potatoes, cut into thinnish slices—ideally, use waxy potatoes of the sort that will not disintegrate when you boil them. Real ajiaco uses different varieties of potato but even if you use only one the result will be delicious.
200g runner beans, sliced in to 1-inch chunks
2-3 ears sweetcorn, shucked (i.e. husk and silk removed) and cut into 3 chunks
the delightful extras
2 avocados, cut into slices
1/4 cup capers
1/2 cup double cream (I suppose you could use single cream)
tomato-coriander salsa
4 tomatoes, chopped into small cubes
1 medium onion, chopped fine
1/2 cup fresh coriander, chopped fine
1 green or red chilli
salt to taste
Preparation
Put the soup ingredients into a large pot for which you have a lid. Cover and bring to the boil. Once it begins boiling turn the heat down so that it simmers gently. Cook for 75 minutes.Meanwhile prepare the other components. Put the avocadoes and capers in two attractive little dishes and place the cream in a jug. Then prepare the salsa: put the tomato, onion and coriander into a little serving bowl and mix. Cut off the end of the chilli and the slice it in half. If you don’t want the salsa to be too hot remove the seeds, and then mince the chilli into tiny bits. Mix it into the salsa and add salt to taste. Let it mellow while you finish the soup.
After the soup has been cooking for about an hour and a quarter the chicken should be tender and the broth rich and flavourful. If for any reason the chicken still seems a bit rubbery or under-cooked, let the soup simmer for another 15 minutes or so. Fish out the chicken and let it cool a little. Once you’re able to handle it, remove the meat from the bones, and, if you like, shred it a bit into bite-sized pieces. Return the meat to the pot and bring the soup back to the boil.
Add the chunks of potato and cook for 20 minutes. The potato should disintegrate. If chunks still remain give the whole thing a little mash with a potato masher to encourage them to break apart.
Add the sliced potatoes and runner beans nd cook for another 10-15 minutes, until they are tender.
Add the chunks of corn and cook for 5 final minutes. Check to see if it needs more salt or pepper.
To serve: bring the soup to the table and give each diner a bowl brimming with chicken, sliced potatoes and runner beans, topped by a piece of corn on the cob. Pass around the little bowls of avocado, capers, and the salsa, and the jug of cream. Each diner can adorn their bowl with whatever they fancy.
This is superb! Potatoes in a silky sauce of onions and green peppers—the slow cooking works a kind of alchemy, transforming the simple ingredients into something really wonderful. Serve this as part of an array of tapas-style dishes, or on its own with some steamed green beans dressed with olive oil and basil, or perhaps quartered hard-cooked eggs arrayed atop a platter of sliced tomatoes, and drizzled with olive oil and shredded basil.
Patatas a lo Pobre [Poor Man’s Potatoes]
Serves 4
Ingredients
15 tablespoons olive oil (you might not need it all)
3 large onions, sliced fine
5 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped
2 green peppers, cut in half, de-seeded, and roughly chopped
4 bay leaves
1kg potatoes
salt and pepper
Preparation
Heat 4 tablespoons of oil in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Once it’s hot add the onions, sprinkle with a pinch of salt, and reduce the heat to low. Cook for 20-30 minutes, stirring regularly so that the onions don’t burn, until the onions have collapsed into a golden, sweet-smelling, tangled mass. Add the garlic, peppers and bay leaves, and continue to cook over low heat for another 15-20 minutes. Add a bit more oil if at any point the mixture starts to stick.
Meanwhile, prepare the potatoes: cut them into thick chip shapes. Put them in a sieve and sprinkle them with a little salt. Leave them aside until the onion mixture is ready.
Now add another 4 tablespoons of oil to the onions and turn up the heat a little bit to warm the oil. Once the onions are bubbling happily add the potatoes, stir, and again reduce the heat to low. Simmer until the potatoes are soft, between 20 and 35 minutes. Season with pepper and serve. It’s also delicious cold, with a hard-cooked egg, for lunch the next day.
(Recipe adapted from Sam and Sam Clarke, Moro: The Cookbook (2003).)
This, like all the Thomasina Miers recipes I’ve tried, is easy and, as she’d say, utterly yum. I’ve never used the prawns but since the original recipe calls for them I thought I’d include them. You choose. You can get black rice noodles at Gaia. This makes a fresh, quick, mid-week dinner.
Black Noodles with (or without) Prawns
Serves four
Ingredients
2 ears of corn
1-2 dried chillies
200g French beans, topped, tailed and cut in half
250g black rice noodles
3 tablespoons sunflower oil
1 large red onion, peeled, halved and thinly sliced
3 fat cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
1 handful peanuts (if you’re not using the prawns increase this to a very big handful)
450g prawns (optional)
1 tablespoon fish sauce
Juice of 1 lime
1 handful mint leaves, roughly chopped
salt and pepper
Preparation
‘Shuck’ the corn: peel off the leaves and remove the corn silk—the delicate threads that surround the cob. By the way, it’s best not to shuck corn until you’re ready to use it. The kernels dry out quickly. Cut the kernels off each cob. Do this by standing the cob upright, on its end, on a board or in a wide bowl and slicing down along the length of the cob.
Chop the chillies. Remove the seeds unless you’d like the dish to be very hot.
Steam the beans for four minutes, until tender but still with a little crunch. Lift them out, set them aside, and then use the steaming water, topped up if needed, to cook the noodles according to the instructions on the packet. Drain them, rinse in cold water, toss with 1 teaspoon of oil so they don’t stick to themselves, and set aside.
Heat the remaining oil in a wide pan over high heat, and stir-fry the onions, kernels of corn and chilli for a few minutes. Season generously with salt and pepper, add the garlic and peanuts, and stir-fry until the garlic starts to go translucent. Add the prawns (if using) and stir-fry for a few more minutes, until they turn pink and look a little caramelised around the edges. The corn should by now have also taken on some colour. Taste, add more chilli if you want more spice, and then add the fish sauce, lime juice, beans and noodles, and toss to heat through. Add more lime or fish sauce to taste, scatter over the mint and serve in deep, warmed bowls.
(Recipe adapted from Thomasina Miers, The Weekend Cook.)
My Austrian grandmother was a rather difficult person, but an excellent cook. Here is her recipe for plum cake. It is easy and very tasty, and you can use other fruits in place of the plums. My friend Lizzie has invented a delicious variation that uses fresh pears and ground almonds (add half a cup along with the flour). This makes a small cake but the recipe can easily be doubled.
Pflaumkuchen (Plum Cake)
This recipe uses US cup measures, which equate to 8 fluid ounces.
Ingredients
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
zest of one lemon
3 egg yolks
1 cup flour
3 (unbeaten) egg whites
as many plums as you like, cut in half. You can also use other fruit in place of the plums.
icing sugar, for dusting on top
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 190C.
Grease and flour a 20cm cake pan.
Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Stir in the lemon zest, egg yolks and flour.
Add the unbeaten egg whites and spoon the mixture into the cake pan.
Place the halved plums on top, cut side up. ‘Do not push in’, says the handwritten recipe from my grandmother. You can place them close together or far apart, as you prefer.
Bake at 190C for 30 minutes, and then lower the temperature to 180C and bake for an additional 15 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean.
Dust with icing sugar when it is cool.
This makes a great lunch. It’s quick, crunchy and surprising. Cooking a cucumber intensifies the flavour and gives it a crisp edge. The richness of the haloumi contrasts with the sweet bite of the tomatoes and the sharp, herby dressing pulls it all together. Eat with some crusty bread.
When I made this I used some of the wild marjoram that grows all over Dorset, but I think it would work well with other herbs, or a mixture of whatever you have to hand.
Griddled Cucumber with Haloumi
Serves 2
Ingredients
2 cucumbers
8-10 cherry tomatoes
half a packet of haloumi, sliced into tranches
for the dressing
handful of fresh marjoram, or oregano, or coriander, or parsley or a mixture of different herbs
100ml olive oil
juice of one lemon
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin—for optimal flavour, toast some whole cumin seeds in a dry pan, let them cool, and then grind them with a mortar and pestle.
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika (hot or sweet, as you prefer)—or less, to taste
pinch of cinnamon
salt and pepper to taste
Preparation
Slice the cucumbers lengthwise into 1cm thick planks.
Heat a frying pan. A grill pan with ridges will leave attractive grill-lines on the cucumbers, if you have such a thing. Brush it lightly with oil and place some of the cucumbers in the pan. Cook for about 5 minutes, by which time the undersides should be attractively seared and the flesh should look a bit yellower. Turn them over and cook for another 3-5 minutes, until both sides are charred (but not burnt). Place them on an attractive serving platter. Griddle the remaining cucumbers in the same way.
Prepare the dressing while the cucumbers are cooking: whizz the fresh herbs together with the olive oil, lemon juice and seasonings to make a very thick dressing. Taste it to see if it needs more lemon juice. If it’s extremely thick you can thin it out with a bit more oil.
Slice the cherry tomatoes in half. Once the cucumbers are grilled, scatter the tomatoes over them.
When the cucumbers are done use the grill pan to griddle the haloumi. It should take about 3 minutes per side to develop a nice golden crust. Tuck the slices of haloumi amidst the cucumbers and tomatoes. Dot the dressing over the top and serve with crusty bread.
This is a two-hander. First you make some customised curry powder. Then you make a very quick courgette dish using the special spice blend. The coconut milk, and the technique of adding spices in two stages, gives a layered depth: no single flavour predominates. It’s very good with rice.
You can get curry leaves from the Oriental Store on the High Street, or at Sandhu’s on Russell Terrace—just ask them and they’ll fetch some from the back of the shop. They keep for a long time in the freezer.
The recipe for the roasted curry powder makes a lot. Keep it for use in future courgette curries, or in other recipes that might appear later this year. It’s really easy and worth the small effort.
Courgette Curry with Roasted Curry Powder
Serves 2
Ingredients
For the Roasted Curry Powder
1 tablespoon basmati rice (brown or white)
3 tablespoons coriander seeds
2 tablespoons cumin seeds
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1/2 tablespoon fenugreek seeds
1/2 teaspoon whole cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
For the Courgettes
2 medium courgettes, chopped into big chunks
1 teaspoon chilli powder
salt
3 tablespoons oil
1 teaspoon mustard seed
1 teaspoon fennel seed
a sprig of curry leaves
1 white onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 teaspoons roasted curry powder
300ml tinned tomato (or you can use fresh tomatoes)
150ml coconut milk
Preparation
For the Roasted Curry Powder:
Heat a dry frying pan over medium heat. Add the rice and toast it for several minutes, until it starts to turn brown (or browner, if it’s already brown). Add the other spices and toast for 3 to 5 minutes, until they start to darken but are not getting burnt. Turn the heat down if necessary and stir regularly.
Remove from the heat and let it cool. Once it’s cool you need to grind the mix. You can either use a spice grinder, if you possess such a thing, or ask someone else to grind it for you in a mortar and pestle. The latter is hard work, which is why I’d recommend asking someone else to do it.
Put the ground spice mixture in a jar and label it so you don’t forget what it is.
For the Courgettes:
Put the courgettes in a bowl and toss them with the chile powder and a pinch of salt. Set them aside.
Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium-high heat. When it’s hot add the mustard and fennel seeds. As soon as the mustard seeds start to pop and fly all over the cooker add the curry leaves and stir. Then add the onion and garlic and fry for 5 minutes, until the onion is starting to brown.
Add the curry powder, stir, and cook for a few minutes, to allow the flavours to emerge with the heat. Add the tomatoes and stir some more. Cook for another 2-3 minutes.
Add the courgettes, stir again, and cook for about 5 minutes, or longer, until the courgettes are tender.
Pour in the coconut milk, stir, cover and let cook gently for another 5 minutes or so. Now it’s ready. Eat with rice, perhaps.
(Recipe adapted from Rosie Birkett, Guardian 22 July 2017.)
‘This is an instant favorite of anyone who tries it’, writes chef Christopher Boswell. The delicate fennel combines with the tang of the Parmesan to create a very satisfying and subtle little salad.
Crudo di Finocchio con Limome, Prezzemolo e Scaglie di Parmigiano
(Shaved Fennel with Lemon Juice, Parsley & Parmesan)
Note that you do not toss the ingredients together. Instead you layer them directly onto the serving platter.
This might serve 4 as part of a larger meal.
Ingredients
3 Canalside fennel bulbs or 2 large ones
salt and pepper, to taste
1 lemon
60ml really good olive oil—such as that special oil from La Jimena
15 parsley sprigs
30g chunk of Parmesan or Pecorino
Preparation
Cut the bottom off the fennel and then slice off the top, leaving just the bulbous body. This is the bit you need for this salad but you can keep the wispy fronds to garnish some other salad if you like. Cut the bulb in half lengthwise. Remove any tough outer leaves and leave it to soak in lots of water for half an hour, to remove any residual earth.
Drain the fennel and then slice it into the thinnest strips that you can produce. Apparently a mandoline is ideal. Opinions differ as to whether you should slice it longitudinally or horizontally. I don’t know that it makes much difference. The key thing is to get it super thin.
Spread the fennel out on a platter and season it with salt and pepper.
Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice all over the fennel.
Drizzle the olive oil back and forth across the dish.
Remove the leaves from the parsley and scatter them artfully over the fennel.
Finally, using a vegetable parer, shave the cheese into thin wisps over the assemblage. Serve immediately.
(Adapted from Christopher Boswell, Verdure: Vegetable Recipes from the American Academy in Rome (2014).)
If you like carrot cake you will enjoy this variation. It’s spicy with fresh ginger, and sticky with a lemony glaze.
Courgette Cake with Crunchy Lemon Glaze
Ingredients
1 US cup measure = 8 fluid ounces.
For the Cake:
1 cup plain flour
1 cup whole-wheat flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
zest of one lemon
3 eggs
1.5 cups sugar
1 cup olive oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2.5 cups finely-shredded courgette (that’s about 2 medium-sized Canalside courgettes)
1 cup ground almonds
For the Glaze:
1 cup icing sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup lemon juice
Preparation
Heat the oven to 180. Grease a cake pan, and dust it with flour. I used a fancy tubular bundt pan that holds about 2.5l. You could also bake it in two loaf pans, in which case you’ll need to reduce the baking time a bit.
Sift the flour, salt, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and dry spices aside from the nutmeg, which probably won’t fit through the grater. Add the nutmeg, fresh ginger and lemon zest, and mix.
Put the eggs, sugar and olive oil into a mixer and beat on medium speed for 10 minutes. Stop periodically to scrape down the sides. Add the vanilla.
Add the dry ingredients and mix well for about a minute. Stir in the ground almonds and shredded courgette.
Turn the batter into the cake pan and bake for between 50 minutes to over an hour. (If you’re baking this two loaf pans instead of one large bundt pan you should start testing after about 40 minutes.) It is done when a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
While the cake is baking prepare the glaze: sift the icing sugar and stir in the granulated sugar and lemon juice. Note that this makes A LOT of glaze, and results in a very sweet, sticky, moist cake. If this is all a bit much, make half the amount.
Let cake cool for 10 minutes, then carefully remove it from the pan. Brush the warm cake with the glaze and leave to cool before eating.
(Recipe adapted from http://www.davidlebovitz.com/zucchini-cake-with-crunchy-lemon/)
Pasta with Green Beans, Potatoes and Pesto
Perhaps this recipe is from Liguria. In any event, it’s delicious and very summery. Pesto often includes garlic, but I think for this light, delicate dish it’s better to focus on the basil and vegetables. I like this with buckwheat pasta but you can use whatever kind you favour. And if you’ve never included potatoes in a pasta dish, well, you’re in for a treat.
Serves 4
Ingredients
The proportions for this dish are very approximate. And you can add little bits of brigh red cherry tomato, if you like.
For the Pesto
50g pine nuts
1 big bunch of basil (about 50g)
100ml olive oil (or a little more if the pesto seems too dry)
1/2 cup freshly-grated Parmesan or Pecorino cheese
zest of half a lemon
The Other Ingredients
300g potatoes (about 3 medium-sized Canalside ones)
150g green beans, topped and tailed, and cut in half if they are very long
2 teaspoons salt (for cooking the pasta)
400g long, thin pasta (fettucine, linguine, trenette, etc.)
freshly-ground black pepper, to taste
Additional cheese, to serve
Preparation
To make the pesto:
Heat a small frying pan over medium heat. When it’s hot, add the pine nuts (you don’t need any oil) and toast them until they are fragrant and lightly browned. Keep an eye on them so they don’t burn. Once they’re done tip them onto a plate to cool down a bit.
Meanwhile, remove the basil leaves from the stems. Stack up the leaves in a pile and shred them into fine strips.
Put the cooled-down pine nuts into a mortar and mash them up with the pestle. Pine nuts are soft, so it should be easy to reduce them to a crumble. Once they’re broken up and crumbly, add the shredded basil and the olive oil and mash them up into a rough paste. Add a little more oil if it seems too stiff. Stir in the grated cheese and lemon zest.
There’s your pesto. I think it’s nicer to have it a bit chunky, but if you prefer you can carry on mashing until you’re reduced it to a smoother, more homogenous consistency. Of course you can also do this in a food processor. Doing it by hand is pretty easy and gives you more control over the texture. Once the pesto is ready you can proceed with the rest of the recipe or set it aside for later. Pesto keeps for ages in the freezer.
To complete the recipe:
Place the potatoes in a pan of cold water and bring them slowly to the boil. Once they’re boiling reduce the heat to a simmer and cook them until they’re tender. The current Canalside potatoes are taking about 20 minutes for the medium-sized ones. Fish them out of the water and leave them to cool. DON’T discard the water, as you will use it to cook the beans. Once the potatoes are cool enough to handle slice them thick or thin, or cut them into 1cm cubes. Put them in a serving bowl.
Bring the water back to a boil and cook the beans for about 3 minutes, or until they’re as tender as you like them. Drain the beans and add them to the potatoes. Alternatively, you can fish the beans out of the water as you did with the potatoes, thereby keeping the water to use for cooking the pasta, as well.
Bring a large pot of water to the boil (or use your potato-bean water), add the salt, and return to the boil. When it’s really boiling add the pasta and cook to your preference. Drain the pasta, RETAINING ONE CUP OF WATER TO ADD TO THE SAUCE. It’s easiest to do this by to dipping some out of the pot (using a mug) before you drain it.
Add the drained pasta to the dish with the potatoes and beans. Add about half of your cup of water to the bowl and toss it about. Stir in several generous spoonfuls of pesto and toss. Now assess it: if it seems a bit dry stir in some more of your cooking water. If you’d like more pesto, add it. Season it with black pepper and serve. Bring a chunk of cheese to the table in case anyone wants additional cheese.