How to Eat

by Nigella Lawson

  My way is to get cocktail sausages from my butcher and then roll them in a roasting pan in chili oil to spice. (You can also “make” cocktail sausages by twisting thin-diameter regular sausages to divide them into smaller links.) If the chili oil isn’t ferociously hot, add some drops of Tabasco. Cook them for about 35 minutes in a 350°F oven. Fabulous. But don’t forget finger bowls. Cooking them in the oven is the easiest way, but if that creates problems with the chicken, cook the sausages in a frying pan on the stove.

  If you balk at oysters, replace this course with something that strikes some of the same notes, such as ceviche, in which the cold, soft flesh of the fish is offset by some searingly hot and salty crouton-sized cubes of garlicky roast potatoes. If you’re making this potato-spiked ceviche, you will have to miss out the potatoes with the chicken.

  CEVICHE WITH HOT GARLIC POTATOES

  Ceviche—fish that is “cooked” by the acids of a citrus marinade—is about as effortless as you can get. Often, the fish is served with avocado, but I feel that the texture somehow is both too samey and too squashy. I prefer it like this.

  The recipe lists turbot, scallops, and salmon, but you could use a cheaper combination of fish if you wanted, substituting brill, sole, or flounder for the turbot if, in any case, the latter is unavailable. You must, anyway, get the fish from a fish seller rather than a supermarket, and explain that you will be eating it raw. The fish seller will tell you which fish are fresh enough and suitable. And don’t be put off by the idea of raw fish; it does actually taste—and look—cooked by the marinade.

  ¼ pound very fresh salmon, cut into ½ × 1½-inch strips

  ½ pound very fresh turbot, brill, sole, or flounder, cut into ½ × 1½-inch strips

  4 sea scallops, each cut into 3 discs

  juice of 3 limes

  juice of 2½ lemons

  juice of 1 orange

  1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar

  ¾ pound new potatoes, cut into large dice

  3 tablespoons olive oil or 1 tablespoon olive oil and 2 tablespoons garlic-infused oil

  3 garlic cloves, if not using the garlic-infused oil, peeled and smashed or minced

  1 bunch watercress

  salt

  3–4 tablespoons chopped coriander, for garnish

  Put the fish and scallops in a large dish, cover with the citrus juices and balsamic vinegar, and leave in the fridge for 6 hours. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Put the potatoes in a plastic bag with 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and the garlic, or the garlic-infused oil only. Transfer to a roasting pan and bake for about 40 minutes, or until the potatoes are brown and crisp.

  While the potatoes are cooking, put the watercress on a large plate, and take the seafood out of its marinade and arrange it on top. Take out 3 tablespoons of the marinade, put in a cup, and stir in the 1 tablespoon olive oil and make a dressing (add more oil if you like) to pour over the creviche and watercress. At the last minute, sprinkle some salt on the potatoes and toss them over the watercress and among the seafood. Sprinkle the coriander on top.

  THE TENDEREST CHICKEN

  The title tells no lie. The buttermilk marinade stops the flesh from drying and turning stringy, even after it has been blitzed in a hot oven. Although I would advise getting a proper free-range chicken, this method will work miracles on inferior supermarket birds. Incidentally, despite its name, buttermilk is very low in fat, which makes it useful if you want to keep a skinless portion (for virtuous reasons) as moist as possible.

  1 quart buttermilk

  10 garlic cloves, minced

  2 tablespoons Dijon mustard

  1 tablespoon soy sauce

  2 large chickens, about 4 pounds each, each cut into 8 pieces

  3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

  3 tablespoons olive oil

  salt and freshly milled black pepper

  Pour the buttermilk into a large bowl and stir in the garlic, mustard, and soy sauce. (You may find this easier to do in 2 batches in separate dishes.) Add the chicken pieces, turning to cover, and then pour the entire contents into 2 plastic bags and tie with elastic bands. Leave in the fridge for at least 8 hours.

  Remove the chicken from the marinade and wipe totally dry with paper towels. Preheat the oven to 425°F. Combine the butter and olive oil; season with salt and pepper. Arrange the chicken, skin side up, in 2 oiled baking dishes, brush over with the butter mixture, and bake. It’s difficult to say exactly how long it will take; evidently it depends on the size of the chicken. Poke and test. I tend to give the dark meat portions 30–40 minutes, breasts 20–25. Either take the breasts out first and keep them warm, or put the thighs and legs in 10 or so minutes before the breasts.

  GARLIC POTATOES

  The chicken can be kept warm, but the potatoes most definitely cannot wait; they must stay in the oven till the very last minute, so put them in the oven 35 minutes before you plan to eat the starter. For 8 people, I’d get 8 decent-sized (about 8-ounce) baking potatoes, and leave them unpeeled but cut into square chunks of about 1 inch. Get 2 heads garlic and throw the cloves, separated but unpeeled (or use garlic-infused oil), with the potatoes into a roasting pan. Slick the potatoes and garlic with oil and cook at 425°F for about 45 minutes. When you take them out of the oven, sprinkle with coarse sea salt and fresh chopped parsley.

  GREEN SALAD

  As for the green salad, go for one with plenty of crunch and absolutely no garlic in the dressing. And I’m presuming you’ve had bread on the table since the first course, so we needn’t even mention it now.

  Now, for dessert. First, the logistics. You want this warm, not hot, so you can cook it before putting the chicken in, taking it out in time to allow the oven to get hotter for the poultry. The sausages can go into the oven with the dessert at 350°F, but for 10–15 minutes longer than if they’re cooked at 400°F. Reheat them on the stove and they’ll brown up in the pan then.

  CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY PUDDING CAKE

  I call this a pudding cake because its texture is simply a mixture between pudding and cake, though lighter by far than that could ever imply. Think, rather, of a mousse without fluffiness; this is dense but delicate. And it’s heavenly tepid, when the cakiness of the chocolate sits warmly around the sour-sweet juicy raspberries embedded within, like glinting, mud-covered garnets. This should be eaten an hour or so after it comes out of the oven. It gets more solid when cold, and loses some of that spectacular texture. If you have any left, wrap it in foil and heat it up in the oven, or warm it up a slice at a time in the microwave before eating it.

  Use fresh raspberries or well-thawed frozen ones, adding more if frozen. But the cake works unfruited, too. Just replace the raspberry liqueur with a tablespoon or so of dark rum and serve with coffee ice cream.

  This is so easy to make (a little light stirring, that’s all) that it’s almost more work to type out the instructions than to make the cake itself. Serve it with lots more fresh raspberries, and yogurt, whipped heavy cream, or crème fraîche.

  1½ cups all-purpose flour

  1½ teaspoon baking powder

  pinch salt

  1/3 cup best-quality unsweetened cocoa powder

  8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter

  1 tablespoon framboise

  ½ cup superfine sugar

  ½ cup light muscovado sugar or light brown sugar

  8 ounces best-quality bittersweet chocolate

  ¾ cup black coffee and ¾ cup water, or instant coffee made up with 2 teaspoons instant coffee and 1½ cups boiling water

  2 eggs, beaten slightly

  8 ounces raspberries plus more, for serving

  confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

  Preheat oven to 350°F.

  Butter an 8-inch springform pan and line the base with baking parchment. Sift the flour, baking powder, salt, and cocoa powder together in a bowl and set aside. Put the butter, framboise, sugars, chocolate, and coffee with water in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and stir over low hea
t until everything melts and is thickly, glossily smooth.

  Stir this mixture into the sifted flour and cocoa. Beat well until all is smooth and glossy again, then beat in the eggs. This will be runny—don’t panic, and don’t add more flour; the chocolate itself sets as it cooks and then cools.

  Pour into the prepared pan until you have covered the base with about an inch of the mixture, and then cover with raspberries and pour the rest of the mixture on top. You may have to push some of the raspberries back under the cake batter by hand. Bake for 45–50 minutes, until the top is firm and probably slightly cracked; don’t try to test by poking in a skewer as you don’t want it to come out clean—the gunge is what the cake is about. When it’s ready, take the cake out of the oven and put on a rack. Leave in the pan for 15 minutes and then turn out.

  When you’re just about to eat, dust the cake with the confectioners’ sugar tapped through a strainer. Serve with the additional berries, piled in a bowl.

  Sancerre, the perfect wine with oysters, will not be overawed by the spicy sausages; a good Bordeaux has the harmony and complexity to suit the garlic and buttermilk-marinated chicken.

  TARTED-UP HOMEY DINNER FOR 6

  * * *

  ENDIVE AND MUSTARD SALAD

  HAM WITH PEA ORZOTTO AND ROAST LEEKS

  POACHED PISTACHIO-SPRINKLED APRICOTS STUFFED WITH CRÈME FRAÎCHE

  One of the reasons I love this menu is for its central side dish, if this is not a contradiction in terms. The pea orzotto is a kind of barley risotto or stew, only this is better, sharper, smarter. Because pearl barley has less gluten than rice, it doesn’t get sticky if it stands around after it’s been cooked. It’s true that the actual stirring and whole process of the absorption of the stock to make a risotto takes longer with pearl barley than with rice, but an extra fifteen minutes’ effort in advance is nothing compared to the hell of having to get everything ready from scratch at the last minute.

  But another reason I’m keen on this menu is that it shows how by changing the details you can change the whole; with boiled potatoes and carrots, the ham in cider is a not particularly partyish weekend lunch (which, indeed, is where you’ll see the recipe; turn to page 212, only lose some of the veg); with the orzotto and oven-charred leeks, the endive salad and the pistachio-sprinkled apricots, it is dinner-party food that knows not from trinked up and tweaked. The ham takes some time to cook, so you’ve either got to get home from work early or do it on the weekend.

  The endive salad is just the right starter; the salt-sweetness of the ham, peas, and barley needs the near-wincing astringency of those sword-sharp leaves; the soft-bellied tenderness of the poached dried fruit and its Arabian Nights aromatic muskiness complement and elevate what’s gone before.

  ENDIVE AND MUSTARD SALAD

  1 tablespoon sherry or cider vinegar

  1 scant tablespoon Dijon mustard

  large pinch salt

  2 tablespoons crème fraîche

  6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

  leaves from 6 small or 4 large heads Belgian endive

  To make the dressing, use a fork to whisk the vinegar, mustard, salt, and crème fraîche together in a little bowl and, whisking still, very slowly pour in the olive oil so that you have a smooth, thick, emulsified dressing. I like this with punch. You may prefer a different balance. Divide the leaves among 6 plates and pour over the dressing.

  PEA ORZOTTO

  You can very well use crème fraîche for this instead of the heavy cream specified, as you need crème fraîche anyway for the dessert, below, and the salad dressing, above. Though in which case, use a little bit more cheese. If you have no homemade stock, use best-quality commercial stock or bouillon cubes.

  about 2 quarts chicken or vegetable stock

  6 tablespoons (¾ stick) unsalted butter

  drop oil

  1 medium onion, minced

  1¼ cups pearl barley

  ½ cup white wine or vermouth

  1 10-ounce package frozen young peas, thawed

  salt

  ¼–½ cup heavy cream or crème fraîche, plus more, if desired

  2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan

  Heat the stock in a saucepan and keep it just simmering.

  Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter, with the drop of oil to stop it burning, in a large, heavy pan. Put in the onion and fry for 5–7 minutes or until it is soft but not brown. Then add the pearl barley and stir well, for about 1 minute, until the grains are coated and glossy with fat. Pour in the wine and let it bubble and reduce, and become absorbed into the onion and barley mixture.

  Add a ladleful of the hot stock and, stirring, wait for it to be absorbed. Then add another ladleful, and so on until the stock is all absorbed and the barley cooked al dente. After the first 10 minutes or so you can add a couple of ladlefuls at a time and you needn’t be quite as diligent as earlier about stirring, but don’t walk away from the pan. This process will take 35–45 minutes. You can leave it now and come back and finish the dish off à la minute. If you are leaving the orzotto for only an hour or so, then leave it in its pan, adding just a film of stock or hot water so that it doesn’t dry out. If you are leaving it for longer (and I have successfully made it a couple of days in advance), you must decant it into a wide dish so that it will cool quickly and not carry on cooking. Cover and put to one side.

  Now for the final touch; sauté 1 cup of the peas in 2 tablespoons of the butter for 2 minutes or until just cooked but still sweet, firm, and pea-like. Put aside and sprinkle with a little salt. Sauté the remaining peas in the remaining butter, this time for 4–5 minutes. Add a ladleful of stock, let it reduce, and then purée the peas in a blender. Just before serving, heat up the orzotto and stir in the whole peas, the puréed peas, the cream to taste, and the Parmesan. (If you were eating this without the ham, you should probably triple the amount of cheese.) Let stand, loosely covered, for 5–10 minutes (you could eat the starter while it’s resting), as this somehow lets the textures and flavors more exuberantly and exquisitely cohere.

  If you want to create your own orzotti, use this recipe as a guide or follow any risotto recipe, remembering that barley takes longer to cook, requires more stock, and has to have cream for the final stirring or mantecatura. (I particularly recommend making a saffron orzotto in place of the usual risotto Milanese to accompany osso buco.)

  ROAST LEEKS

  As for the leeks: preheat the oven to 450°F and pour some good olive oil into a couple of roasting pans. I figure on 1 medium, fairly trim leek, well cleaned and dried, per person, based on the supposition that each one gives you 3–4 segments. Roll the leeks in the oil, sprinkle with coarse salt, and bake them about 25 minutes all told, turning them once. Obviously, if they’re those huge fat ones, add about 10 minutes. When done, they should be bronze and glistening, and burnt in places. Remove to a plate and sprinkle with a little more coarse salt. They’ll keep the heat well, so if it makes it easier to take them out of the oven when you eat the salad, do so.

  POACHED PISTACHIO-SPRINKLED APRICOTS STUFFED WITH CRÈME FRAÎCHE

  This recipe comes via The Cooking of the Eastern Mediterranean by Paula Wolfert (she of the food of southwest France and Morocco). This is another dish you need to start preparing in advance, but as the very fact of a dinner party suggests planning (unless you’re calling friends at the last minute, in which case we’re talking about a slightly different thing), this is an advantage, surely.

  Paula Wolfert suggests a mix of mascarpone and heavy cream as the best imitation of kaymak, the thick Turkish buffalo-milk cream properly used to stuff the apricots, but I prefer crème fraîche, which is lighter and less cloying. You could also use full-fat yogurt.

  10 ounces good dried apricots, preferably Turkish

  1/3 cup sugar

  seeds from 6 crushed cardamom pods

  2 scant teaspoons lemon juice

  1 cup crème fraîche

  4 ounces shelled pistachios, chopped very finely or grou
nd using a pestle and mortar

  Soak the apricots in 2½ cups of water overnight.

  Next day, preheat the oven to 300°F and put in it a nonreactive ovenproof baking dish large enough to hold the apricots later. Pour the apricot-soaking liquid into a saucepan and add the sugar, cardamom seeds, and lemon juice and bring to the boil. Add the apricots and then pour them and their liquid into the heated baking dish. Cover with foil and cook for 1½ hours. Remove from the oven and let the apricots cool in the syrup. Chill well.

  Before you want to serve them (and I have done this a good half-day before to no deleterious effect), lift out the apricots to drain. Carefully open each one and stuff with 1 teaspoon crème fraîche. Place on a flat plate or serving dish, spoon over some syrup, and dust with the pistachios. It is this final touch that makes all the difference, so don’t be tempted to leave it out. And don’t, either, serve this straight from the fridge; too-cold food kills the taste and the whole pleasure of it.

  This is one of those desserts that is so simple that it almost cannot help but become an instantly reassuring part of your kitchen repertoire.

  A Barbera from a great Italian grower, such as Angelo Gaja, will be ideal with the mustard, the ham, and the peas.

  EARLY AUTUMN DINNER FOR 6

  * * *

  GUACAMOLE WITH PAPRIKA-TOASTED POTATO SKINS

  COD WRAPPED IN HAM, WITH MASHED POTATOES AND SAGE AND ONION LENTILS

  HAZELNUT CAKE, WITH RED CURRANT AND PEACH SALAD

  This is the sort of food I want to eat when I’m holding onto summer, despite the sad, gray-skied truth of the actual weather on the streets. These are the strong flavors of hotter climates—lime, chilies, coriander, the honeyed saltiness of cured ham—banked down, with mashed potatoes, cod, buttery sage, for northern palates. After this starter, the culinary equivalent of a mariachi band, you need to strike some calmer notes, and the unexotic fish, potatoes, and sage-and-onion-spiked lentils do exactly that.

  Dessert is another version of cake with berries; here the hazelnut, almost meringuey, sponge and the sharpness of the red currants and peaches provide a foil to the dominant tastes beforehand. When red currants aren’t around or available, or the only peaches you can get are stone-hard and green-tasting, substitute whichever fruits you want, but think of something, even if it’s just a thawed package of frozen mixed fruits; the cake wouldn’t work, here, just on its own.