Jam. Jam. Jam. I love how the word becomes so many different things. A musical session. Something being stuck. A tight squeeze. A collection of traffic (also no doubt in a tight squeeze). And a solution of fruit, sugar, and sunlight in a jar. One of my early memories is visiting my grandparents in Edinburgh, …
Author archives: alison
Duck
Time to start on those ingredients I love intensely, but haven’t yet been courageous enough to try cooking at home. First up, duck. I’m feeling vindicated in my choice, since the joint winners of Masterchef Professional both chose it as part of their final menu. That’s OK by me too. I don’t quite know where …
Prawns
Once upon a time, on a dark and snowy January afternoon, a little girl was collected by her daddy from school as a surprise. They went off into the big city, went to the cinema, watched Snow White, then went to a Chinese restaurant with a moving waterfall picture. Just as it couldn’t get any …
Gooseberries
The best pudding in the world is Gooseberry Fool. Fact. Forget sinful chocolate mousses, boozy trifles and the like – you want the honeyed sweetness, the ‘slip down easily’ nature of a soft pudding. Turning a hard green hairy berry into bliss? That’s kitchen alchemy of the highest order. To be honest, I thought that …
Mushrooms
I start this post, and a Sylvia Plath poem about mushrooms goes through my head. Can’t remember it all, but the last few lines suggest that, one day, mushrooms will take over the world. From my point of view, that wouldn’t be a bad thing…if I got to eat them. Mushrooms. A great divider. Some …