FOOD CULTURE ISSUE SEVEN
MICHEL
ROUX JR Simon Hulstone • CHARCUTERIE
RECIPES • Michael Caines
rio de janeiro • Food & Wine
Argentina • Panama City CUSTARD • LONDON FOOD GUIDE
EAT ME MAGAZINE - ISSUE 7 WINTER 2011/2012 - £4 EAT ME ISSUE 7 1
EAT ME ISSUE 7 2
EAT ME ISSUE 5 1
EAT ME MAGAZINE - ISSUE SEVEN EDITORIAL TEAM
GUEST
EDITOR & CREATIVE DIRECTOR
COVER SHOOT
Filippo Yacob
Photographer Bart Pajak
f.y@eatmeonline.com
Assistants Aleksandra Wojcik
EDITOR’S LETTER
Stlyling Eiji Takahashi DEPUTY EDITOR
Make Up Artist Larisa Chivlikli
Dave Drummond
Filming & Editing Ricky Mason
d.d@eatmeonline.com INSTANT EXPERT ONLINE EDITOR
Designed by Sneaky Raccoon
Becky Brynolf
Written by Jasper Akroyd
b.b@eatmeonline.com FOOD & RECIPE EDITOR Alice Brady
CONTRIBUTORS
Rosie Hogg WRITERS EAT ME CHEF
Stevie Martin, Coco Khan, Bompas & Parr, Alexander
Ernesto Paiva
Francis, Scott Chegwin, Edd Kimber,
e.p@eatmeonline.com
Nice, Rob Buckhaven, Kit Buchan, Jasper Akroyd,
Miriam
Lynsey Woods, Charles Audley, Laura Mannering, GRAPHIC DESIGN
Alice Sinclair, Rosie Birkett, Justin Yip, Kyle Howe,
Ting-Kai Chang
Douglas Blyde, Mark Anstead, Rachel England,
t.c@eatmeonline.com
Piers Harrison, Saul Wordsworth
Filippo Yacob
RECIPES
f.y@eatmeonline.com
Rosie Hogg, Bompas & Parr, Edd Kimber, Miriam Nice, Paul Witherington, Tony Conigliaro, Ernesto
WEB DESIGN & DEVELOPMENT
Paiva
Filippo Yacob, Tingkai Chang, Sarah McFarlane, Andrea Pizzigalli
PHOTOGRAPHERS Ben Ottewell, John Taylor, Ane Os, Oscar May, Helen
ASSISTANT EDITORS
Cathcart, Raul Lieberwirth, Oliver Spielbüchler,
Erin Eby, Dominique Hopgood, Krishan Nursimooloo,
Katie Shrieves, Liz Woolford, Rosie Birkett, Trent
Chris Murphy
McMinn, Alex Missen, Kaori Ito ILLUSTRATORS Reena Makwana, Harriet Seed, Ben Jensen, Clare Owen, Louise Abbott, Rob Johnston, Thomas Danthony, Sarah Tunstall, Will Robinson
PUBLISHER Brain Cube Corp. 23-28 Penn street
I hope you have all been good this year, coals a coming for many of us; but not if you are reading this! You are brilliant! So, thank you for picking up our 7th wonderful Issue of Eat me, many thought we wouldn’t make it this far, but alas we have and have produced another wonderful issue for you all to enjoy. As seen on the cover, we invited none other than Michael Roux Jr for this winter/festive (we’ve tried not to use the C word, as most of you will probably pick this up once “C” is over) issue to meet the master of all chefs. We also took a long trip to South America for you all to read and fantasise about, with insights on Rio de Janeiro, Panama City and Argentina, where we sampled wines until the cows came home… Then, once the cows came home we chopped them up and ate them. As per usual, our delicious recipe cards (cook the recipe, the card itself isn’t nice), selection of London’s best restaurants, chef interviews and toothy opinion pieces from the industry’s loudest mouths. We hope you enjoy this issue as much as we enjoyed making it for you.
London, N1 5DL
Much love, ISSN 2044916 BOARD OF DIRECTORS Filippo Yacob, Charles Audly, Gareth Hughes
Editor & Creative Director Filippo Yacob
SPECIAL THANKS 2&4, Lemonade Factory, Bess Harding
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INGREDIENTS FOOD & RECIPES 14. Eat Me larder Head chef at The Electric Brasserie on Portobello Road, and real life Australian, gives us a peek into his store cupboard. 18. Rip it, read it… This issue Ernesto Paiva brings you comforts from home. 21. Head to Head Turkey? God, everyone has turkey. We’re, like, so over it? Here we have a look at alternative Christmas dinners, cause we’re, like, so alternative? 22. Instant Expert Sneaky Racoon has combined forces with the brilliantly named Bacon Wizard to come up with this issue’s Instant Expert on charcuterie, specifically of the pig variety. PAGE 16. GIVE IT A TRY
6. The Chopping Board A slightly demented chopping board this issue: crime, eating dogs and making children cry. But there’s Edd Kimber talking about his Nanna too.
12. STAPLE DISH Try to not to let your Pavlovian response to custard be an almighty hurp at the memories of school dinners.
24. The Drinks Cabinet We take the history of sake, mixologist Tony Conigliaro’s inner thoughts, pointers on how to spot a wine snob and a festive pub tale, mix together in a shaker and serve it to you with a beautiful lime rind.
EAT THIS & TRAVEL 30. london food guide There’s a good collection of restaurants, bars and gastro pubs up for review this issue, from the high-end Awana in that there Chelsea, to the good-to-honest Havelock Tavern in Shepard’s Bush. There’s a good collection of restaurants, bars and gastro pubs up for review this issue, from the high-end Awana in that there Chelsea, to the good-to-honest Havelock Tavern in Shepard’s Bush. There’s a good collection of restaurants, bars and gastro pubs up for review this issue, from the high-end Awana in that there Chelsea, to the good-to-honest Havelock 37. travelogue: Argentina Deputy editor Dave Drummond heads over to Argentina for a really tough week reporting on the richly warm and humid climes. It’s a difficult job, but he really took one for the team. 42. quickstop: Rio de janeiro Charles Audley has a proper gadabout in Rio this issue and makes a nice little Steve Getz pun in the process (it’s a Girl From Ipanema thing… you’ll get it when you read it). EAT ME ISSUE 7 4
Page 42. quickstop: Rio de janeiro
44. Eat Me city breaks: panama city Laura Mannering gets swept away by the sophisticated charm of Panama City and handpicks the best places to see, stay, eat and drink
in this, frankly stunning, city. With a vibrant and growing food culture, it turns out there’s certainly a lot more to the city than the canal. Go.
INGREDIENTS FOOD CULTURE 54. Behind the kitchen door … with Michelin star chef Simon Hulstone. Douglas Blyde finds out the chef is a man’s man. One who enjoys foraging, cooking and killing. Turns out he’s not much of a fisherman though. 56. A THOUGHT On FOOD... … with Michael Caines. Dave Drummond makes a call to Dorset and talks about the current economy’s impact on the food industry’s competitive nature. 58. FOOD & WINE AREN’T TALKING Delicate matchmaking isn’t just confined pushing two of your single friends together and saying, “you have so much in common! Like… phht, crap… a face?” Turns out the same can’t be done with food and wine. Shame.
page 48. Michel RouX Jr.
48. Michel Roux Jr. If anyone is going to be able to tell you where you’ll find the best fish and chips in London, you can’t really go wrong with two Michelin star
chef and culinary star Michel Roux Jnr. Talking about his family, his vices and his politics, he opens up over a sack of potatoes.
60. FOOD IS NEW ROCK ‘N’ ROLL Piers Harrison contemplates our nearteenage girl level obsession with the food industry, and how we can go about capitalising on it before the fad dies out.
FOOD & STUFF 64. Good kitchen Things We’re indulging our need to snack over the festive season, so here we’ve got delicious things like cookies, candy canes and even a posh pot noodle type thing to tide you over between breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, brinner, and elevenses. To bring the state of your kitchen up to a respectable state however, we’ve gone all upmarket with some stylish designer gear from the likes of Joseph and Joseph and Green Pan. Splendid stuff – if we do say so ourselves. 68. Book Review for cooks A selection of excellent recipe books to flick through, earmark and swear you’ll use throughout the year as part of your new year’s resolutions. You might dust them off for the odd dinner party, or when you want to impress a date. Maybe.
page 64. Good kitchen Things
70. eat me X Zorokovich Vodka Rachel England spends an afternoon with selfproclaimed bumbling film-maker Dan Edelstyn, talking about his grandmother’s manuscripts and drinking the occasional shot of vodka.
74. sHORT sTORY Alexander Francis tells the tale of a young man who chooses to spend Christmas Day alone. A nice bleak piece to round off this issue.
76. FUNNY AFTERTASTE Gentleman Ponderer-in-Chief Saul Wordsworth takes us through the con that is the all-you-caneat buffet. EAT ME ISSUE 7 5
THE CHOPPING BOARD We’ve gone upmarket in this issue’s Chopping Board: how to fix a dog supper, DIY buckfast, it’s all here. Luckily, The Boy Who Bakes offers a little refinement with his Nanna’s gingerbread how to... make your own Christmas crackers Becky Brynolf indulges her domestic goddess and gets it horribly, horribly wrong (or right; depends on your family)
FOOD TIPS FOR THE CRIMINALLY INSANE The Helen of Troy of the food world, there’s not a lot you wouldn’t do for pie. Well, there’s not a lot Coco Khan wouldn’t do for a slice… Can’t do the time, don’t do the crime, or so the idiots tell me. But, riddle me this readers, what does one do if one enjoys the time, if one has never felt better than during the time and is quite the fan of the various Fortnum and Mason gifts sent by their fans (their mum) in aforementioned time? I’d sacrifice a little crime for that, because in truth, any crime would be one of passion. For food. It’s not ours to rhyme nor reason the driving force between one man’s passion for his gut. Many a great man has found themselves at the mercy of the culinary Goddess, the appetite idol, the loosest woman this side of Jamie Oliver’s recipe measurements.Yet finding myself in the doghouse locked up cruelly by the powers that be who simply do not understand that sometimes accidents happen when liberating pies from tyrants to their rightful owners (me), and that a couple of pie-filling-burned workers is a small price to pay for the return of natural order, I had a
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realisation. Good things after all come to those who wait. And I have been waiting a while. The pen might be mightier than the sword but the palette knife is greater than the flick. Your brutal inmates might not be the gastrotype but everyone has a currency, a price; a pie related price. So the big dog in prison has cocaine. Ha! Cocaine! You have a pheasant and cider pie! Do you realise what that can do to a person, reader? Not only can it quicken heart rates and inflate confidence, it can make grown men tremble, dribbling, weak at the knees. It can even make them yours. Next time you see the top cat, the daddy, the gruff and menacing figure lurking in the corner heaving weights, approach him, wafting your pumpkin puff pastry pie and he shall see who is boss. Readers, you must take heed, think laterally, think culinary and all the world awaits you. You know, my lawyer said a prison takeover couldn’t be possible, but really it’s as easy as pie.
ILLUSTRATION: Reena Makwana FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
Thread a cracker snap through a toilet roll tube and secure with sticky tape. Have a younger family member take a stab at decorating it. It’ll teach them that hard work leads to their efforts exploding in front of them. Yell this life lesson right in their optimistic little face when they pull their cracker later on. Now it’s time to fill the crackers. I’m a fan of jokes (What’s green and sounds like the sea? A pea!) or serious political messages that bring down the mood of the day (‘babies are starving in Africa you BASTARD’). Give children the gift of knowledge by inserting the truth about Saint Nick or the results of a paternity test. There’s the classic, “Help, I’m trapped in a Christmas cracker factory!” but your family know you made them and won’t be able to suspend their disbelief. Secure the ends with ribbon or string. Take a victory sip of mulled wine.
THE BOY WHO BAKES Winner of the first Great British Bake Off, Edd Kimber, sings baking’s praises and really wants you to get in the kitchen
EDD’S SECRETS Nanna’s Gingerbread This is my nanna’s original recipe for gingerbread with no alterations, no tweaks, nothing, just her classic recipe, which means it is at least over 60 years old. When I was looking through my family recipes and found my nanna’s original handwritten recipe, I had to do some research, as it was so old that the units of measurement were no longer used. The milk was measured in gills, for example! But that at least makes me feel that the recipe has stood the test of time.
My Christmas wish? For you to get in the kitchen and get baking. Cooking has been increasing in popularity over the last ten years and finally baking is experiencing the same sort of revival; it thrills me to see people back in the kitchen getting their hands dirty and baking at home again. In my mind there is nothing better than seeing a mixture of butter, sugar, eggs and flour turn from a batter to beautifully light cake. It’s the alchemy you don’t always get with cooking. When you roast a chicken you end up with chicken but with baking you take some basic ingredients and create something brand new. Yes, you can buy good products from supermarkets and there are amazing bakeries out there that I hope you will also support, but it’s baking at home that I want to see more of. It gives a sense of achievement but it’s also a lot
THE EGO MASSAGE
ILLUSTRATION: REENA MAKWANA FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
Scott Chegwin meets a woman with the incredibly ability to decode hidden messages in her dessert. She knows what it means The woman is waving at me. She’s standing up, and waving at me. “What can I do for you?” She turns her permed head, gurning like Bez on a big night and barks: “Truffles and Biscotti. Double the truffles.” The pudding arrives with two white lines of icing sugar dividing the truffles from the biscuits. I put the dish down and head back to the lift to gossip with Marie. A chair scrapes the floor and heels clack. It’s her, jaw swinging like Babe Ruth. She waves the pudding in my face. “What is this?” She slurs. “It’s your truffles and biscotti Madam.” “You know what I mean.” She snarls. “Yes I do Madam,” I say, keeping a straight face. “It’s your truffles and biscotti.”
of fun. When I bake I whack on the music and enjoy it; that’s the way it should be. It shouldn’t be thought of as difficult or onerous it should be a joy, so to help your baking along here are a few tips 1. Buy a set of electric scales, they’re not expensive and it will make your baking that much better. Baking is a science and electric scales will give you the precision baking needs. 2. Measure everything out before you start. It will make your baking easier and get rid of any stress, you don’t want to be half way through a recipe and realise you have forgotten a key ingredient. 3. Have fun! Unless you have a complete disaster your baking will almost always taste pretty good. It might not be perfect but so what, it’s still a lot of fun.
The woman passes her finger over the lines of icing sugar then slowly raises two fingers to my face. “They mean ‘Fuck You’. Where’s the chef? Get me The Chef.” I explain that it’s the middle of service and he’s a little bit busy. After repeated assurance that no one is swearing she calms down. She tells me that it’s been a pleasure but that the chef “is a dick.” And then, SNAP, she flips. She grabs my arm and insists an inexplicable 28% is removed from the bill. “You know what for,” she mumbles. I tell her I’m not sure if do but the offending dessert and the service will, of course, be removed from her bill. Calm washes across the room and everyone returns to their food. I am informed I will be left some cash. When they’ve gone I go to clear the table and don’t find a penny. There’s a kerfuffle in the street and the woman’s friends are scraping her up like gum from the pavement. Their heads are shaking and their tongues are wagging. And for the first time tonight, we know what for.
Serves 16 170g butter, plus extra for greasing 115g caster sugar 20g orange marmalade 350g golden syrup 2 eggs 210ml milk 2 tablespoons stem ginger, chopped 340g plain flour 3 teaspoons ground ginger 1 teaspoon allspice 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda pinch of salt pinch of cayenne pepper Preheat the oven to 150°C (130°C fan oven) gas mark 2 and lightly grease a 20cm square cake tin. Line with baking parchment paper, leaving about a 5cm overhang, making it easier to remove the cake later. Melt the butter, sugar, marmalade and syrup together in a medium pan over medium heat. Set the pan aside to cool. In a separate bowl whisk the eggs and milk together. Pour the butter mixture into the eggs and milk and add the stem ginger. Whisk together. Sift all the dry ingredients over the liquid mixture and gently fold together. Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 1¼ hours or until a cocktail stick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely. Cut into squares to serve. Tip The texture and flavour of this cake improves overnight.
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ILLUSTRATION: Harriet Seed FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
est. STAPLE DISH
Custard Custard is an age old delight waiting to be rediscovered. Miriam Nice says the proof of the pudding is not only in its eating, but its colour The walls in our new house are being thumped, scraped, sanded and sealed, eagerly awaiting the application of the perfect shade of matt emulsion. We’ve been quite daring with one of the staircases actually– it’s going to get a coat of Vert de Terre, but the through-lounge has got us creatively stumped. For some reason the previous owners deemed it appropriate to paint this light-devoid non-space a gloomy shade of foul known as “harvest beige”. I admit my mind has a tendency to wander back to the kitchen during most tasks and, whilst dazed by gloss paint fumes, ploughing through a pile of paint charts was no exception. Seconds after browsing shades of Dorset Cream, Nutmeg White and Almond White I found myself in front of the hob whisking eggs and sugar into a pan of hot cream. As the custard began to thicken it gradually turned into that appetising shade of pale yellow. I then began to realise that perhaps, right in the middle of the tonal range of colour between a violent yellow and a brilliant white lies the secret of good custard and - just maybe - a likeable living room wall. So, I think it’s safe to say that if a custard is a very bright yellow with a glow of radiation it is probably best avoided; it screams artificial and perhaps started its powdery life in a tin. Equally, this shade of highlighter is not the most relaxing on the wall. In small doses yellow can spark creativity but like custard, in a lurid hue it’s more likely to make everybody permanently livid. The softer end of the spectrum is nearly as bad. Like the leaking magnolia ceilings of my first flat: floury, lumpy, anaemic custard is the stuff of nightmares. When dining out, Crème Anglais can be another pale disappointment; it should still be custard and custard needs eggs - not just hot
cream (take note gastro pubs please). I think of Crème Anglais as the quiet admission by the French that by giving the world custard, us Brits have done something right in the kitchen for once. Far worse things lurked in the school dining halls of the 1980s where an innocent emulsion would sit resolutely in large aluminium jugs. Gingerly attempting to pour it out over a square of treacle sponge would yield nothing… until, suddenly, a frightening flood of opaque wallpaper paste would belch through the leathery skin engulfing the sponge, bowl and table and filling the room with the smell of flour and burnt milk. But let us not forget that some of the best things are made from custard: Bread and Butter Pudding, Ice Cream, even Quiche. But why aren’t we making custard more often? For me it’s the sieve. Of a weeknight I object to using equipment that takes infinitely longer to clean than it does to use, life is too short to spend half the evening tied to the sink. I hear the Romans made their custard very slowly in an earthenware pot, so I would wager they didn’t sieve it. Powdered custard, although not very delicious, is pretty fool proof. This is down to the cornflour, a discovery perhaps too helpful to omit from my recipe. You do get a richer result if you use egg yolks exclusively, but I will be the first to put up my hand and say that I have separated eggs with the intention of making a meringue the following day only to find said whites at the back of the fridge a month later… and not so much as an Eton Mess in sight. So, here goes; good, honest, yellow custard. Cooked as slowly as my patience will allow, with stabilising cornflour and lazy whole eggs.
HONEST YELLOW Custard Mix 250ml of double cream with 250ml of milk and heat gently in a pan. Stir the mixture occasionally as it’s heating to make sure it doesn’t catch and add a piece of a vanilla pod. If you haven’t got a vanilla pod, why not flavour it with a couple of drops of almond essence or a piece of lemon peel. When the milk and cream begin to simmer take the pan off the heat and add 3 tablespoons of caster sugar. Then whisk in 1 teaspoon of cornflour and 2 eggs. Whisk the mixture like mad until smooth and pale yellow and return to a gentle heat (stirring continuously) until it thickens. If it gets really lumpy then, go on, strain it but I’m not washing the sieve - I’ve got painting to do.
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CHARCUTERIE Whether it’s streaky bacon, honey glazed ham, succulent porchops, a gammon roast, or a whole baby pig – we found out some facts about the piggies that aren’t porkies!! Written by Jasper Akroyd Design by Sneaky Raccoon The true origins of curing are lost. Celtic myth has it that wild boar wounded in a hunt would run into salt-springs, to be fished out when the people were starving who found the meat preserved and still delicious. The first time people “domesticated” pigs (they actually came to us, rather like dogs) was almost 15,000 years ago, around the site of today’s
salt-saturated Dead Sea. It seems unlikely that brine and pig never met before being hung close to the safety and convenience of a fire (and therefore in smoke). On the same site and as early as 850BC, rain waters at the bottom of Mt Sodom (which is made entirely of salt) would first turn green with special algae and then crimson with an
ancient (and the only other) form of life that can survive The Dead Sea, called “archaea”. These red Neanderbugs produce amazing stuff for curing. From those ponds were taken great crystals of curing salts, which were later exported for a hefty premium and used for preserving olives, fish, meat and cheese. The crossed triangles of sticks used for growing
If you went into a pub and asked for a shot of water, how much would you pay for it? Well, that’s how much water is often added to a small pack of bacon from international producers.
At the price of bacon, a litre bottle of that water would cost £5-£8. Ouch!
The current recommended daily intake (max) for salt is 6g. On average, that’s 200g of bacon. An entire pack!
CURING FACTS
Gammon is half a pig cured and then the leg taken off, whereas Ham is the leg taken off and then cured. There is no other difference.
One of the main sex pheromones that adult male pigs release can be detected by humans and can taint the cooked meat: That’s just one reason why curers used to insist on using females only. About 15% of the population can smell it, of which most are women!
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a few PIGGY facts that REALLY aren’t porkies
Contrary to claims, this pheromone won’t attract countless nymphomaniac hotties: it is usually perceived as an odour akin to stale sweat. Except, that is, for 2-3% of those ladies, who find it the very height of masculinity.
Cured meats, especially smoked ones, are a great source of the 5th taste “Umami”. Like the man-made version MSG, it physically alters the way we taste food, making it extra savoury and delicious. Perhaps its purpose was to guide us towards concentrated sources of protein for better survival.
Strangely, a very subtle amount of this pheromone can be good for you, for the same chemical or close relatives can be found in jasmine and celery, and a trained sow is great if you want to hunt for truffles. Good luck stopping Miss Piggy from eating them though!
WEIRDEST CURES EVER – DON’T TRY THESE AT HOME ...
CURING RECIPE FOR YOU TO TRY 1 kilo skinned pork from happy pigs 30g total of all purpose curing salts and ordinary salt mixed 15g dark brown sugar 3g paprika (can be smoked!) 3g corriander seed
Design and art direciton: sneaky raccoon, www.sneakyraccoon.com for eat me magazine
2g ground nutmeg Curing in raw milk and honey (containing lots of the right enzymes and friendly bacteria)
An antibacterial cure that is based upon the make-up of human tears (poor piggy! *sniff*)
Curing in blood (didn’t we just take this stuff out?)
Dry cure in gunpowder by redcoats on the march in Napoleon’s France.
If you would rather just use 30g of salt and no curing agents, that’s fine. It won’t look the same, and maybe not taste exactly like bacon but it will be delicious. Never hang it and make sure you use it within 5 days, or from frozen.
those crystals formed The Star of David right at this early time in Israel’s history. The hidden secret to curing is that while the animal may be dead, the meat is not, no more than a cabbage is dead as soon as it’s picked. With plenty of salt to remove and bind water (which bacteria need) the remaining good bugs and enzymes continue to work their magic, and it becomes something special and different. All that is good for us in life is also great for curing once mortal coils have been suitably shuffled off and salt added. Vitamins? Got to have ‘em. A SMALL amount of alcohol? Never harmed anyone. And those antioxidants? You bet. The Middle Ages saw sugars come to Europe and alongside them some amazing spices. These took curing into its “Golden Age”; for not only do they add a world of flavour, but they are themselves of huge importance historically for the preserving of food. We even fought wars
for them. They are strongly antioxidant and antibacterial. Coincidence, huh? So you see, curing is a kind of ancient food alchemy, yet anyone can do it. Here’s how:
MAGICAL BACON
worlds’ oldest ham
MEATY RESTAURANTS
Probably the oldest edible ham in the world came from Chicago and now resides in Oxford Covered Market, UK. It was imported in 1892, so is at least 109 yrs old and was cured with Borax.
Charcuteries are actually the original restaurants of Paris, where you would have gone for a snack of something beautifully prepared and presented for you outside the home. A Charcutier had to process the meat by law, or be fined for infringing upon the rights of butchers. It’s also safer to keep raw and cooked/cured meats separate.
AMINO ACIDS
BACON All you really need to do is rub most of a cure-mix of large grained salt, curing salts, sugar and spices over the meat-side of pork and a little on the skin side (even if the skin is removed), and to massage the entire surface of the meat with clean hands. Choose either belly or back, and use a good butchers. This is kept in your fridge skin-side down in a covered tub at between 2.5˚C and 5˚C . Keep the pork lifted out of its juices on batons or better, a sloping board. After five days for streaky or seven for shortback, simply rinse it under a cold tap, pat it dry and hang it up for an hour in a clean
REDUCING SUGARS
Fancy a fry up after a big night out? Bacon really is a hangover cure! It’s the reaction between amino acids and reducing sugars when cooking that does it! Nom nom!
place to dry even more. It should now be put back in the fridge and is ready to use (but better the day after). It can also be hung and air-dried for a week if you have somewhere suitably clean, cool and breezy without flies. It will also last longer and taste better but only if you have somewhere suitable. It has over a week’s shelf life in the fridge too, but freezes very well indeed. In fact, it’s easier to slice when frozen. Or to make your own, simply buy all-purpose curing salts. These contain saltpetre and/or nitrite: the same stuff as the Chinese mined from caves thousands of years ago in order to preserve pork, and that was also in those amazing Judean salt crystals.
You can purchase cure mixes from www.finestbutcher.net
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LONDON FOOD GUIDE
57 Masbro’ Road, W14 0LS +44 (0) 20 7603 5374 Tube: Kensington (Olympia) www.havelocktavern.com
Gastropubs are so common these days, it’s rare that any particular one gets, or deserves any special mention. Too often, it’s too easy for a pub once frequented exclusively by bitter (used in both senses of the word) drinkers proficient in darts and knowing more about sport than everyone else, to tart up their finishings, hang fairy lights and add the word organic to 90 percent of the menu in order to get away with being a gastropub. It’s a trick getting a bit old. Yet to reject what has made the format run of the EAT ME ISSUE 7 12
mill and stagnant, often obscures what made it so popular in the first place; the homeliness and informality that comes with the traditions of any pub, both in the atmosphere and food. The Havelock Tavern is not a new gastropub, and this is one of the reasons why it doesn’t sink into being of a certain formula. Rather it helped create that formula, and it shows. Outside, the pub’s bare bones appear to have changed very little (save for upkeep) in the last century, exuding a sort of subdued air of confidence in its plainness. Arriving on a Thursday lunchtime there are few tables to spare, and the air is thick with a not at all unpleasant smoke escaping the kitchen (whose doors remain open for the duration of our visit). The menu changes daily depending on the ingredients available, but there is generally a good mix of about five meat, fish and veggie mains and starters in the gastropub mould – hearty, homely and classic. We start with a vodka and blackberry Bellini, which is fresh and bitter enough to cut through the heavy air. At £7 however, it is slightly pricey with the starters coming in at least a pound cheaper. We opt for a scallop, black pudding and rocket dish, served with an excellent apple chutney. The black pudding, diced into miniature blood nuggets, is just burnt, adding a complimentary crisp to the sweet of the chutney, and the salted scallops.
BARNSLEY LAMB CHOP On the menu, the dish is detailed further, but what makes it so good is its mix of simple flavours. The lamb chop, for starters is cooked perfectly; tender and seasoned well, it is satisfyingly intimidating, taking up the bulk of the plate. It sits on a bed of slow cooked and deliciously rich, pulled lamb shoulder, which sidles up next to a parsley root puree. The sweet puree diffuses the rich shoulder to great effect, which somehow lightens the load of the meat heavy dish.
REVIEW: dave drummond - PHOTOGRAPHY: Oscar may FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
The Havelock Tavern
LONDON FOOD GUIDE
Soif
REVIEW: rosie birkett - PHOTOGRAPHY: Helen Cathcart FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
27 Battersea Rise, Battersea, SW11 1HG +44 (0) 20 7223 1112 Rail: Clapham Junction
Those boys have done it again. Not content with popularising small plates and natural wines with their boundlessly successful Terroirs and cool little sister Brawn, Ed Wilson and Ollie Barker have just brought their restaurant flair to south London. Soif, which means ‘thirst’ in French, continues in the same mode as the other restaurants (if it ain’t broke, right?), offering a riveting wine list bursting with natural and biodynamic wines from small producers, and impeccably sourced, deftly cooked ingredients. The menu takes a more conventional approach however, in that it’s more about starters and mains than sharing plates – we are in the suburbs, after all – and portion sizes follow suit. After an aperitif of delightful natural Pet Nat Milliard d’étoiles (£40 a bottle) fizz from the Loire which is lovely and golden, we move onto a starter of clams with lemon and coriander (£8) – a thing of beautiful simplicity. It’s a generous bowlful, and the little molluscs are perfectly cooked so they’re soft and buttery, fragrant with wilted coriander leaves and fine slivers of garlic, and swimming in a thin, savoury broth of clam juices, olive oil and lemon. My Tête de veau (£13) main is a delight – the calf’s head, soft, delicate and wobbly and served in its broth with a crunchy, piquant sauce Ravigote: thick with cornichons, capers and red onion. My chum’s skate wing Dieppose (£16) is faultlessly cooked and surrounded by a sauce of brown shrimps, mussels and glossy button mushrooms. We drink a light red with these dishes – a soft Vendée from Thierry Michon of the Loire (£23 a bottle). We end with the Androuet cheese board (£10), and a soft and warming Domaine Dupont (£10.50), which leaves us with the glow we need to leave the bosom of the restaurant for the cold night. Soif is the best thing to happen to south London in ages. Go.
BLACK PUDDING AND SQUID To call the large, plump disc of boudin noir that comes topped by a piece of fresh, sweet squid, simply black pudding is really to do it a disservice. It’s much more than plain old blood sausage, filled as it is with chunks of beautifully yielding pig’s cheek, melting fat and heady with Basque piment d’Espelette, white pepper and ginger. It’s from a supplier called Christian Parra from south west France who’s famous for the stuff and also supplies the likes of Alain Ducasse. We drink glasses of cool, crisp, wonderfully fruity Ribeiro 2010 (£28 a bottle) with it. EAT ME ISSUE 7 13
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Photography: BART PAJAK FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
THE MASTER CHEF “That French chef off the television”, Michel Roux Jr is more than just a ‘telly chef’. Scion of the Roux family legacy, he’s the man that young chefs are clamouring to impress. He speaks to Becky Brynolf about his family, his vices, and the best fish and chips in London
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Kabuto Noodles www.kabutonoodles.com £2.95 Kabuto Noodles are essentially posh pot noodles. The convenience and preparation are very much the same as your bog standard studenty snack, but Kabuto Noodles edge out the competition with inventive packaging and flavours that beat ‘chicken and mushroom’ any day. Keep an eye for them in Waitrose stores for a snack suitable for the samurai warrior on the go.
Michel Roux Green Pan Range www.green-pan.co.uk Prices start at £50 Green Pan’s ceramic-coated non-stick cookware is free of Teflon, making it safer and more efficient to use. Designed with Michel Roux Jnr to come up to Michelin star standards, the collection doesn’t come cheap, but it is high quality and will last much longer than cookware that uses Teflon. EAT ME ISSUE 7 16
How delighted we were when we discovered that Joseph Joseph had married our two favourite things: pies and time. This 60-minute timer has a silky finish and also comes in grey, pink and aubergine. The graphic dial so you can clock how much longer you’ve got to keep ticking along (groan).
PHOTOGRAPHY: JOHN TAYLOR FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
Joseph Joseph Pie timer www.josephjoseph.com £17
Joseph Joseph No-spill mill www.josephjoseph.com £35 Don’t you just hate cleaning up leftover bits of salt and pepper from the tabletop or cupboard shelf? First world problems, eh? Sigh. Well Joseph Joseph hate it too because they’ve created this handevice. Squeeze and season, release and catch particles of salt and pepper before they mess up your day and give you more to clean.
GOOD KITCHEN THINGS In our round up of the products to get your mitts on, we’ve found a delectable mix of things that taste and smell delicious (regardless of what they do to your waistline) and kitchenware coupling brilliant design and quality product. It’s a mix fit for an incredibly stylish, terribly overweight king
Nudo oils www.nudo-italia.com Prices start at £5.99 These oils will liven up your meals and your shelves with fantastic flavours and rainbow packaging. Nudo oils are encased in tin to protect them from the light, and as tin weighs less than glass, they carry a smaller carbon footprint. Enjoy great flavours like lemon, mandarin, chili, garlic, thyme and basil olive, and do your bit for the planet.
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EAT ME X Zorokovich VODKA
After self-proclaimed ‘bumbling’ film-maker Dan Edelstyn stumbled upon his late grandmother’s manuscripts in an attic, he embarked on a mission to resurrect a Ukrainian distillery and bring high-quality, authentic vodka to the UK. He talks to Rachel England about hangovers, language barriers and his personal journey of self-discovery
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PHOTOGRAPHY: Dan Edelstyn FOR EAT ME MAGAZINE
“I’ll be honest with you. When I started this, all vodka tasted the same to me. Experts would swill it around in glasses or look at it against the light and I’d think, God, I can’t believe people are paid to do this nonsense.” Dan Edelstyn, by his own admission, is no vodka connoisseur. However, he concedes that he’s now drunk so much of it that he is able to distinguish the difference between brands. “Once you develop a taste you won’t go back to cheap supermarket stuff, that’s for sure,” he says. Indeed, many would agree that vodka – very much an acquired taste – makes for a peculiar choice of sudden, compulsive hobby, but as Dan animatedly regales his extraordinary tale while sat on a velour sofa in his warehouse office bursting with antique furniture, art and rails of fancy dress, it’s hard to imagine a more suitable candidate taking centre stage of this story. In 2005, Dan found a manuscript in the attic of his mother’s house, penned by his wealthy, privileged Grandmother, Maroussia, who was at the time a young woman living in
pre-revolutionary Ukraine. Through her writing, she painted a vivid, romantic picture her life in Eastern Europe, and revealed her links to the village of Douboviazovka. Dan was gripped by Maroussia’s story. “I was obsessed with it, to be honest. I even had fantasies about travelling back in time to meet her,” he says. “I wanted to get closer to her tale, so I travelled to Douboviazovka to see what traces of the family story we could find.” In her manuscripts, Maroussia mentioned a sugar factory, which served as a starting point for Dan’s adventure. Thanks to local knowledge, though, Dan soon discovered that his great-grandfather had owned the spirits factory in the village. “It was still open and seemed to be the only thing in the village delivering any employment to the locals,” he says. “It was at that point that I began to consider whether we could work with the distillery in a way that could help the area, which is so economically deprived. This was when the vodka brand began to take shape as an idea.” With the help of spirits specialist Alex Kammerling, Dan developed
Images taken from the film ‘How To Re-Establish a Vodka Empire’, documenting Dan’s path from bumbling filmmaker to Easternblocvodka entrepreneur
his own vodka recipe using artesian spring water from a well in the village and richly-harvested wheat from the region’s thick, black earth. The result is a fresh, sweet, almost creamy vodka, with a hint of aniseed, packaged in Ukrainian glass and screen printed with the silhouettes of swallows taking flight (inspired directly by Maroussia’s writings). Dan’s first consignment of Zorokovich 1917 Vodka arrived in December last year. “It’s a bit of a nightmare on the logistics side,” he says. “Ukraine is not the easiest country to deal with. There’s a lot of red tape and bureaucracy, and of course there’s the language barrier.” Indeed, on the Zorokowich website a small footnote reveals that much of the process is conducted through ‘sign language and Google translate’. Dan also reveals that his activities in the village have sparked a certain kind of ‘interest’ from officials. “In the early days, we went to one particular archive to get some documents out and the archive’s director insisted on meeting us and having a very official conversation. They sat on one side of the table, we on the EAT ME ISSUE 7 19
other – very much an interrogation situation. He seemed to warm to us but made it very clear that the archive could ‘benefit’ from new photocopiers and roof repairs.” Dan laughs. “For God’s sake, even if we had that much money why that would be the priority – when there’s no shortage of other places in the area that need money – is beyond me.” Indeed, Dan hopes that when Zorokowich becomes profitable he’ll be able to drive some of its revenue back into the village. “It’s not just about stimulating the demand of the distillery,” he says. “That is very much a goal, but in the future we want to make small, enhancing developments; build playgrounds and improve public toilets and so on. When I go to the village, I have to be careful not to strut around saying, ‘Sure, I’ll solve all your EAT ME ISSUE 7 20
problems’, because as yet we’ve not achieved anything and I’m reluctant to make promises in case, well ... we deliver fuck all.” The focus now, then, is on raising awareness of Zorokowich in the UK, and the team realises that this is no mean feat. “A lot of vodka brands have marketing budgets of thousands and thousands of pounds,” says Dan. “We simply don’t have those resources, so we need to be creative.” Their challenge is exacerbated by their desire to keep the brand cult, too; when asked if he’d like to see Zorokowich in UK supermarkets, Dan is quick to answer: “I think that would kill us off, actually. We’d lose our appeal as a small artesian brand, and alienate a lot of our audience.” Their audience at this point comprises frequenters of cool London cocktail bars and
Selfridges, but Dan has ambitions to grow Zorokowich’s fanbase with a presence at events and festivals: parked outside the office is the red and gold Zorokowich shot wagon, ready and waiting to be wheeled out to events in keeping with the brand’s values. “We can’t compete with other vodka brands on a traditional playing field, so we’re working with our own playing field,” beams Dan, who says that they’re making the most of their East London location. “There’s a huge number of artists per square mile here, and we’re connected to the Hackney arts scene in a really positive way. We’re thinking about gypsy jazz club nights and Eastern European film events and aligning the vodka with marginalised immigrant voices. I’d really like to get Gogol Bordello on board!”
Zorokovich Timeline 1904 Ilya Zorokovich, Dan’s late great grandfather opens a spirits distillery in their Ukrainian hometown: Douboviazovka 1917 The Bolsheviks invade, driving the Zorokovich family out, and seizing the distillery. Dan’s grandmother – Maroussia – sets to work on her manuscript. 2005 Dan, exploring his attic, comes across Maroussia’s manuscript and is instantly enthralled 2008 In search of his Ukrainian Jewish roots, Dan travels to his grandmother’s homeland: Douboviazovka 2010 The first batch of Zorokovich 1917 arrives on UK shores.
At this point, Dan turns to Gina, his ‘righthand man’, and the conversation spins off into a maelstrom of sudden inspiration and aspirations. It’s clear that Dan and his team are creative, ideas-driven people, and he admits that this can be a problem. “None of us have a background in sales entrepreneurialism, so we do have to balance our creativity with an effective model that will deliver sales.” Indeed, before Dan became caught up in this vodkaventure he was focussed almost solely on his film company, Optimistic Productions (hence the wonderland of props and outfits adorning the office), making commercials and corporate films. However, as creatives are wont to do, he has masterfully aligned the many facets of his world; feature film How to Re-Establish a Vodka Empire premiered at the London Film
Festival this year and tells the story of Dan’s journey into Maroussia’s past, and the early days of Zorokowich. “We’re hoping that the film’s television debut next year will help to raise the profile of the vodka,” says Dan, who says he now finds himself concentrating on the vodka side of the business more than anything else. But surely, working in an office literally full to the rafters with cases of the spirit can prove distracting? Dan laughs. “Not really. We occasionally have a vodka with lunch or at the end of the day, but in Ukraine their drinking culture is wildly different to ours in the UK. They don’t set out to binge drink. Besides, my hangovers from days gone by were legendary so I’m very careful!” It’s obvious that Dan is enjoying every step of this unexpected adventure: “We all muck in
and do these different tasks to make it work. It’s a hybrid life we live now and it’s great fun,” he says. But he does reveal that his personal connection to this ‘hybrid life’ runs a lot deeper than simple fun. “My father died when I was three, so I think that was one of the reasons I was so interested in my heritage. Before all of this I didn’t know anything about my roots or where I came from. I was pretty dispossessed, I guess. This whole journey has been a learning experience on a personal level, and I feel much less adrift these days.” Suddenly, Dan slaps his hands on his knees and launches to his feet. “But enough, have you had a sample?” he asks. “The liquid is the hero in this tale. The back story is important, of course, but we’re very much looking ahead now.” EAT ME ISSUE 7 21
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With clients including Michelin-starred restaurants, themed restaurant groups, individual bistros and gastropubs, Jeffreys Henry is one of the UK’s leading Chartered Accountants to the restaurant industry. For further information, or to arrange a free initial consultation, please contact:
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