As discussed at some point last week my lack of diet-watching. I eat when I'm hungry (usually), and eat whatever I like. Even though I'm really really picky, I absolutely love eating the food that I actually do. I've gotten a lot better recently with things like vegetables, but still, all green things must die. As adventurous as I have become comparative to my youth, I still operate with the same sort of approach to food - separation of wet and dry food, close attention to textures, and flavour combinations that I'm used to. I originally learned to cook as a measure of control, because I am so picky. Unlike other people with wide-ranging tastes (especially when I was much younger), I really can't eat just anything. I can eat what I like exactly how I like it, because I have done it for myself. From this very, very simple and inward looking reason, I now enjoy cooking a lot; I'm certainly nothing in comparison to a pro, of course, but I like to think that what I make at least smells, tastes and looks interesting. There's nothing worse than boring food.
I didn't completely teach myself how to cook, it was one of the few things that I truly needed help with, aided and abetted by the fearsome person of my mother, who had been trained professionally many years previous. Mother used to run a kosher kitchen in her own house, and used to be able to purchase the ingredients for a Sunday Lunch for three people for less than a fiver... when a fiver meant something. Mother taught me basic methods in mains, but not pastry or sweet cooking; while I used to love desserts I hardly ever have them, especially now I'm lactose intolerance, and I'm not a pastry fan - for saying I've been in Cornwall for almost two years, the amount of pasties I've eaten is still in single digits. I was packed off to university with some classics under my belt - super basic pasta sauce, foolproof rice, stir fry, roasting meat, frying... Nothing hugely thrilling, but making sure I'd never starve. The things that I don't eat, like minced...anything, mashed potato, green vegetables, tomatoes... This is down to texture just as much as flavour. I have been known to abandon meals because I don't like how they feel. I am a strange person. Get over it.
A large part of my traveling library is made up of recipe books. I'll be honest, I don't often follow the contents. Cook books are a funny thing to me, I love looking at the pretty pictures but often just can't afford the ingredients. Jamie Oliver is a particular figure, there are three of his books on my shelf, and I hardly ever use them for anything but general reading. The problem really, is that Mr. Oliver's kitchen is fully stocked with all manner of spices and seasonings, a range of utensils for each and every job, appliances and all, perfectly equipped to deal with any meal he should so desire. I do not live in an environment such as he does. The Scholary kitchen is... well, it is a nightmare plain, pure and simple. Unlike the galley at Bury street, there is one way in and no way out. It is usually unwashed, sides strewn with a graveyard of plates, cutlery, utensils and roasting dishes... While I may have resolved to clean and tidy only my own things now to try to break out of the pattern of doing everything, it still makes me uncomfortable. Also, the fact that I tend to wash my own things regularly, it seems that this increases the frequency of their use, as they are usually the first to be used again by anybody. I travel with a kitchen, not the room but the contents so I'm always comfortable with everything. I usually travel with my heaviest knife if I go to cook anywhere as well. It must seem ridiculous, true, but think about it! If you go to someone else's place to cook, what can you guarantee? Nothing, really. Living in student accommodation taught me that you can't rely on every oven to be the same in any way shape or form. If I can guarantee the knife, my primary utensil, I can at least feel comfortable enough to take on any other insane variable. My things are there to be used, but I get fed up if they don't get respected...or cleaned.
Due to my still limited tastes, I work on some very basic templates. Rice, Pasta or Potatoes form a 'backbone' to any meal usually, then meat, then vegetables. I like to think I can maintain a pretty balanced diet following this easy formula, I mean, let's look at my typical stir fry recipe:
- Rice or Noodles
- Meat - usually turkey leg, pork chop (or loin), rarely chicken, sliced thinly
- Vegetables, usually sliced into ribbons rather than sliced and diced
This is only three types of ingredient. Meat and veg cooked in a super-hot wok, rice made in the usual foolproof manner or noodles simply boiled alongside. When I went to Norwich last October, I basically invented a dish from sauteing cubed potatoes with sliced red onion and chopped up smoked bacon that accompanied chicken thighs that I had fried in a pan. Okay, sure there's nothing green there, but should the inclination take you, it would be a simple job to add some boiled or steamed veg too. I don't season too heavily, because I have quite a powerful sense of taste still. That said, I like to use decent ingredients that have decent flavour themselves, and not have to salt and pepper the hell out of what I've got just so it has some modicum of taste. I usually don't slice veg up to finely because of this (unless I'm going to grind an onion paste up for a curry which I haven't done in an age anyway).
My top meal for years and years and years, though is simply Chicken Wings and Rice. That's it. My favourite treat: the first meal I get when I get home, and the last dinner I have before I leave again. For saying how much I enjoy curry in Nepalese, Indian, Japanese, Chinese and Thai form, authentic Oriential foods, fresh pasta dishes... I don't care. I really just do not care. Roasted Chicken Wings, seasoned lightly with salt and pepper, served on top of a bed of rice prepared in my trademark fashion:
- Heat a pan on a high heat, and melt a knob of butter therein
- Once the butter is melted, pour in the amount of rice you want and stir up to cover all in the butter
- DON'T LET THE BUTTER BURN
- Pour in boiling water, make sure it's TWICE as much as the amount of rice
- Stir up, and once the water is boiling, put a lid on the pan that fits (ideally the matching lid) WITH A CLOTH
- Once you put the lid on, turn the heat down to the lowest without it being switched off
- Leave it like that for 15 minutes.
- Once 15 minutes is up, turn the heat off. Do not disturb the lid
I am slowly improving my skills. Not having any formal catering training, and having low hand-eye co-ordination my knifemanship is quite mediocre in comparison... more slow and steady. I have knives for different reasons and different seasons, and keep them on a magnetic grab on the wall. I may not be a top chef, but I care about what I eat and how I prepare and eat it. I treat my ingredients and my kitchen with respect, and like to think I benefit from it. Food can always be glorious, from a 15 course banquet to the the cold cuts from yesterday's roast fried in soy sauce. It's just about caring about what you do.
That's all. For now.
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