By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
Before refrigeration was invented fish would go off really quickly. Those lucky enough to live on the coast could eat that day’s catch. Those inland had to eat meat and two veg. And then one day salt (conveniently from the sea) was found to preserve fish. Not only that, it preserved fish and allowed it to develop its flavour. Salt cod (morue in French) …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
On Easter Sunday we thought we’d vary the usual lamb dish and go for mutton. We’d spotted some the day before at the excellent Snape Maltings Farmers’ Market. Mutton is basically older lamb, ie sheep, and so has more flavour though is less tender. It is technically at least 2 years old, lamb being under 1 and hogget in between the two. The advice …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
The line up
I spent most of last week helping judge wines for the International Wine Challenge and by the end felt just a tad wined out. Tasting wine all day sounds like some people’s dream pastime or job. But the main part of a wine taster’s remit is to separate the wheat from the chaff and …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
The proper package!
It was the 150th birthday of fish and chips the other day and I was in Aldeburgh on the North Sea coast and decided to mark the occasion with the bag of “rock ‘n’ chips” shown above. As an insititution, fish and chips was voted in a recent poll as Britain’s most loved (knocking …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
moules marinières
A rule of thumb I have when looking at a fishmonger’s slab is, if the fish look a bit sad and dull and not very fresh, I go for the mussels; at least you know that they’re alive and therefore fresh (unless they’re dead of course). In the picture below I am reacting to the fish man’s …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
Wine and food matching never excites as much debate as when the food in question is cheese. It is true that a corner of mousetrap or a wedge of supermarket Brie will take the rough edges off a glass of plonky red but great cheese deserves decent wine and the most pleasurable combination will often be with a white…
By Patrick Carpenter, http://www.patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
The Dock Kitchen
I heard on the grape vine that Thomasina Miers was helping out at a one off Mexican dinner at the pop-up restaurant Dock Kitchen. She is something of an authority on the food of Mexico having cooked her way around the country and she now owns three restaurants in London (all called …
By Patrick Carpenter, http://patrickcarpenter.blogspot.com/
One of the huge benefits of living on the coast in a place like Aldeburgh (in fact, the main benefit) is having a fisherman like Dean Fryer on your doorstep selling that day’s catch. Normally, when he catches lobsters in his pots he boils them and sells them pink and ready to devour cold with, say, mayonnaise. If you catch him early …
