Category: Sauces
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Crab Linguine with Tomato and White Wine
Toulouse is an unusual beast. It proudly displays its terracotta buildings as a badge of honour that declares it belongs in the Mediterranean. I mean, you won’t spot any buildings that glow in the sun in wet and windy Wales for instance. So, you come to Toulouse, bedazzled and seduced. And yet now, this city…
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The Perfect Bangers, Mash and Onion Gravy
Smoothies are all well and good, but I can’t escape the fact it is January. I didn’t expect the south of France to be sunshine and rainbows 12 months a year, but honestly, the other day it was warmer in Edinburgh than in Toulouse. And so, understandably, I’m in hibernation. The shutters are down, metaphorically…
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The Best Dressing for Asparagus
Ahhh asparagus… You’re the sneakiest of vegetables, yet we seem to love you for it. This will not be an ode to asparagus, although I could probably write one, yet I’ve already done that with blood oranges and sometimes I think the fruits and vegetables of this world just want our worship. Tell me what…
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Peanut Butter Fudge Sauce
In a week of Valentine’s Day and Pancake Day, here I am offering you peanut butter fudge sauce. It’s a poor replacement, I know. But I hope it counts, dear reader. During these ceaseless months of lockdown, I have become very attached to my food. I’m sure we all have. Instead of kissing the person…
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Quick and easy one-pot pasta
This is a story of two extremes. On one hand there is my compulsion to be extravagant and a show off, versus my need for ease and convenience. This dichotomy is reminiscent of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, except focused on food rather than evil. One will overrule the other in the end. And it’s…
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Miso and Lime Mayonnaise
The first dish we learnt to make at cookery school was mayonnaise. We all stood at our work benches, buttoned up securely in our fresh, spotless whites, hair snugly packed into caps, clattering a whisk around a metal bowl of egg yolk, slowly dripping the oil in off the prongs of a fork. Dip the…
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Lockdown 2.0: France – Coriander and shallot sauce
Amidst the tumult of the last few months; the pandemics and politics, the masks, the job losses, and the general upheaval, I’ve quietly moved to France. It really was quiet – it was just me and a suitcase or two – and after a tight hug with my mum at Heathrow, I donned my mask…
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Lentil and Olive Ragu
I don’t mean to break any hearts but here is a cold hard truth – it is a myth that you lose weight while travelling. In fact, it is more likely you will gain weight. I know this because of my reflection in any full-length mirror is ultimately a depressing sight these days. There have…
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Homemade custard
Finally, Easter weekend has come and gone, and with it so has Lent, hooray! Back I joyously skip into the arms of temptation and bury my face in the next cream tea or jar of jam I see. Although, I have to confess, my absconding from sugar took a dramatic nose dive these final few…
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Hot chocolate fudge sauce
If there wasn’t a day dedicated to it’s cooking and consumption, how often would anyone make pancakes? And I mean crêpe pancakes – the thin, lacy articles reminiscent of minuscule underwear. We would demolish them while holidaying in France, stuffed with molten cheese and stringy ham, or from the crêperie in the local park with…