Notting Hill for fussy eaters (and ambitious cooks) – part 1

When you start working in a new area of London it’s always very exciting. As well as the new workplace there is also a new area to discover, and this can be really refreshing.
After working for three years in Battersea and enjoying one of the most beautiful parks in London I now work in the trendy Notting Hill.
The Notting Hill described by the brilliant novel "The Lonely Londoner" by Sam Selvon, (a recollection of the Caribbean that moved to London in the late 1940s) is just a memory, now its population is mainly ultra rich, fashion conscious and the houses are amongst the most expensive in the whole of London.
However the area is beautiful and Portobello Market is still one of my favourite things (both the vintage and the veggie) and for people who like to cook there are two gem addresses:

Books for Cooks 
4 Blenheim Crescent
W11 1NN

Tel 020-7221-1992
Fax 020-7221-1517


It’s the best place to find inspiration (it has also a lovely little café’ at the back), because let’s face it, Amazon is very often a cheaper option but with the cooking books you have to fall in love with.

Just opposite there is another wonderful shop where you can buy all your spices.
I buy Juniper Berries that are hard to find anywhere else and dried organic pears and that are the little treat that I buy in my worryingly short lunch break

The Spice Shop
1 Blenheim Crescent
W11 2EE
Telephone: 020 7221 4448
Fax: 020 7229 1591



And if you are just trying to find a vintage outfit and you find yourself starving on Portobello Road?
A reasonably cheap takeaway (really simple wholesome food) where you can buy vegetarian/vegan food but you have to hope in a sunny day as this place is take away only...

The Grain Shop
269a Portobello Road
W11 1LR
(sugarless cakes, brown rice, veggies, and natural juices)


… more to come!

Tofu and fresh herbs tart

I am getting really upset about the "English summer", this is becoming like a big joke, it seems like it's never going to stop raining and I almost got used to go to work by bike and get inevitably wet.
If we have to look at the bright side I could say that this weather gives me the chance to bake that is one of my favourite cooking methods.

Ingredients for the shell:
50 grams buckwheat flour
50 grams wholewheat flour
50 grams all purpose flour
1/2 a teaspoon of salt
4 teaspoon of sesame oil
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 teaspoon dried majorain
1 cup water (or less, add the water slowly till achieved the right consistence)

For the filling:
1 silken tofu pack
2 tbsp soy milk
Fresh herbs: Basil, terragon, oregano, chive etc.
1 bunch chopped spring onion
tamari to season

Mix all the ingredients for the shell and create a dough (elastic but not too wet). On a lightly floured surface with a floured rolling pin roll out dough into a 3 mm thin pastry and fit into a 10- or 11-inch round tart pan with a removable rim. Prick dough all over with a fork.
Preheat the oven to 180 C°, bake tart shell for 10 minutes, or until almost cooked through but still pale.
In a food processor blend the ingredients for the filling and stir in the herbs at the end.
Pour the ingredients in the shell and bake for 20 minutes (the filling should set).

Sarah brought a slice to work today and she thinks that it could go well with chutney and salad.

A meat substitute: homemade Seitan

In Italy when you turn into a vegetarian you eat a lot of seitan, as it’s probably the closest thing you can get to meat.
In the UK this is not really popular, and I have to explain fairly often that what I am eating is not chicken…

Seitan and watercress in brown mini pita bread



I used to buy it from health shops at ridiculous prices, but once I arrived in London I just stopped having it.
Thanks to a lovely food blog written by Vera a Vegan girl from Naples that has a brilliant blog (in Italian).
I started making my own.

Seitan is a meat substitute, very high in proteins. It is a meat looking product obtained by the wheat gluten that is left once that the starch has been washed away.

Ingredients:
• 1 kg wholewheat flour (I use the Waitrose one and it works well for me)
• Salt
• Shoyu
• Herbs to taste, and fresh vegetables to make fresh stock
The objective is to make quite elastic dough, by an energetic kneading; the dough should be compact but soft.

Leave the dough to rest for one hour.

Fill a big bowl wit water and immerse your dough (cold water is better), try to massage the dough and keep it together…
Change water often till it becomes clear; you can use two bowls as this makes the job easier.
Once that the process is finished you end up with a sticky ball of gluten.
In the meantime prepare the stock with fresh vegetables, water (I added kombu seaweed too.)
Wrap the dough in muslin so tight that it doesn’t fall apart and boil it for 30/40 minutes.

You can now slice your seitan and use it like if it was a cold meat, or a sliced tofu…
I quickly sauté a couple of slices with garlic, added some soy sauce and used it as a filling for a sandwich with watercress and mustard.
From a dough you can get a reasonable quantity for the week so if you are having a lazy week (like me) you can just grill a slice, or even make ragu’ (bolognaise sauce) with it etc.

Pressed salads

I just moved to a new flat, and I have been too busy to look after my blog.
I haven’t really been cooking either, and in the past three weeks this is the first time I can relax on a Sunday, buy some ingredients and put the apron on! It’s nice that time when you start feeling home, in my life I moved to so many different places (certainly more than 20) that this feeling is rather familiar to me.

Today I prepared the pressed salads, which are a fermented dish and a classic of macrobiotic cooking, they are going to last me for a while and they’d help my tummy when I have a drink too much (I know I shouldn’t but these are tough times!).
I finely sliced some vegetables: cucumber, red spring onion, radish, celery and carrots. Everything was seasonal and British, a part from the red spring onion that were French and I bought them at Waitrose as I have never seen them before. I should have taken a picture, as they were so pretty!
I put the slices in a glass container and covered them with a liquid made from half shoyu, half water that has been brought to the boil for 30 second and then left to cool down to room temperature.
I put a little saucer on top and then some weight (a bag of pulses would do) so that the vegetables are all under the liquid.
Normally I leave them out and just put them in the fridge the day after. I find that they go nicely with boiled grains, silken tofu, and they are they ideal start of a meal. Sometimes I add some grated ginger to add a little zing ☺
I am preparing quite a few things to have in the fridge to take to work; it’s great that you can quickly add them to your brown rice to take to the office. So to all the people that ask me how can I always find time to cook my own lunch, Id like to ask them, how can you eat that Tesco sandwich or that sad salad every day?

Semi whole spelt pasta with Hiziki seaweed and capers.

When I bring my lunchbox to work, the most common qustion is always: “where do you find the time to do that?”
I believe I just plan ahead and while I have a shower, make a phone call or answer to my private emails at home I simply cook some brown rice, everything else is more or less quick, ok, there is the sourdough, but that’s normally a weekend thing anyway ^_____^
For pulses I just put them in water before I go to bed, and steaming or blenching are two cooking methods that make everything faster!
I have to admit that when I come home from the office sometimes I just want to eat immediately, but still I want something healthy and that doesn’t make me feel tired or bloated after, so here’s a good one:

for two people (or for dinner+lunchbox for the day after)

½ cup hiziki (Hijiki) seaweed
200 gr whole spelt spaghetti
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablesppon shoyu or tamari soy sauce
a handful of capers
Coarse crystal sea salt

Soak the seaweed for 25 minutes (it will double the volume), then drain I and boil it in water for 25 minutes.
Finely chop he garlic, heat up the olive oil and fry the garlic till pale golden, stir in the capers, the seaweed, and the shoyu ,turn the heat to very low and let it simmer for other five minute with a lid on.
Boil the pasta in salted water, till “al dente”, and drain.
Stir the spaghetti into the seaweed sauce.
Serve hot.

My pasta is from Probios

Sourdough bread

When you follow Macrobiotic, you mainly eat whole grains. Whole grains are more nutritious than cracked, milled, or flaked ones.
People that eat wholegrain hardly ever have cravings as their energy is released slower, 60% of my diet is based on brown rice, millet, wheat, amaranth, quinoa, as this is the food I feel is natural for me to eat and I can have it every meal without failing.
I eat bread sporadically and this is one of the several reasons why I like to live in the UK, in Italy there is just bread everywhere, and if it’s not bread is focaccia or pizza and either you decide you want to live an ascetic life and don’t go out anymore or you just cope with it : )
Having said this even I sometimes feel like making bread, but I just find the smell of commercial yeast such a put off…
So I made my own sourdough.
I love the fact that in Italian sourdough is called Pasta Madre that means “mother dough”, and indeed this is going to be the mother of your bread for (hopefully) long long time. The commercial sourdough bread is outrageously expansive and you can find it in natural food shops or in very few local bakeries but making in your house is a complete different experience.
The idea is: flour+water+warm temperature= bacteria = natural yeast = bread that is easy to digest.
How many people auto diagnosed themselves wheat intolerant? But are they really or is the yeast in those horrible commercial English bread loafs? (they even come in a plastic bag… yuck)
I have got no intention of writing my recipe for the sourdough as the Internet oozes with suggestions and very good step-by-step recipe.
Personally I am fascinated about this as I am about any fermented food. I just find the whole bacteria culture an amazing natural phenomenon, so I am a big fan of Miso, sauerkraut, umeboshi and beer ^____^

So this is the recipe that I follow from egullet, and now I have been using my starter twice, and it works wonderfully, my only suggestion is “love your starter”.



Dan Lepard is my baking hero.

Have fun and bake! (The weather is going to be miserable this Bank Holiday so you may as well turn the oven on!)

The recycled house and recycled burgers

Last weekend I had a great day out visiting one of the artist’s open houses at the Dulwich festival.
The house was beautifully and eclectically furnished with items found in skips, charity shops, carboot sales, so virtually a house made gorgeous without any environmental impact.
I had a tour of the house, the couple that made it are these very inspiring people, that created the most elegant of places, they are planning to live in a caravan for some months travelling around Europe with their two daughters, but for now they enjoyed this paradise, just few stops away from London Bridge.
I loved how everything was made of old bits including the shed in the garden and the girls’ room.

info on the festival

Inspired by this visit I put together everything that was in the fridge to make these tasty recycled burgers:
1 cup of cooked mung beans
2 cups cooked brown rice
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
1 celery
1 onion
Cumin
Salt
2 tbsp sesame oil
2 tbsp buckwheat flour

Quickly sautéed the diced vegetables in a lightly oiled wok pan (you can use a little brush to make sure you use just enough)
Cook the vegetables till they are cooked but still crunchy.
Make patties with all the ingredient and use a little flour to prevent them sticking.
Bake on a lightly greased oven dish for 20 minutes or until they are golden on both sides.

I served them with a tahini dressing (2 tbsp water 1 tahini mixed thoroughly till smooth) and pressed salads with radish and cucumber with greated ginger.