Tuesday, 27 January 2009
A Good Day's Baking
There I have finished! 5 lovely big terrine's made from the gifts of pheasant from local farmers from the last shoot...now cooling under heavy weights ready for preserving with goose fat and vacuum packing with my little cryovac machine. 3 nice pots of chopped liver 1 for each daughter....I used the rest of the chicken livers in the terrine's.2 huge long split tin loaves are now baking in the oven and I have cleared everything ready for the marmalade making tomorrow.All the carcass bones are simmering away making soup for tonight and the house smells like France.There is a fine rack of lamb bought this morning at market waiting for a quick roasting when the bread comes out....the herb crust looks marvelous.This time of year is my time...when business goes quiet after Christmas and New Year and I can get my own little cellar and larder filled up once again with good things.Celairiac has been particularly good this year and jars of grated pickled root...some tinged pink with beetroot slices, sit in big gleaming jars on the cold stone floor. In the summer when drained and mixed with mayonnaise and grainy mustard it will make a delightful and tasty salad.I am now sorting the big jars for the rabbit confit...just waiting for those little varmints to get fat on new shoots first.I love the marmalade making...if you ever want to sell a house make marmalade in the kitchen when potential buyers come to veiw (even if you just warm a jar of it up in a pan) The smell of marmalade will clinch the deal quicker than any other thing...even the smell of fresh baked bread isn't as powerful.Now what shall I find to have with the lamb...purple sprouting broccoli should do the trick then I can use all the stalks for a broccoli and stilton soup tomorrow...I have a few ends of Stilton left over from Christmas they will be fine for soup.I love my work.....but my days off are far superior.....
Posted by Personal Chef UK at 09:56 0 comments
Friday, 23 January 2009
Illegal Dinner Parties...whatever next?
"fai da te" (DIY) restaurants have been springing up all over Italy since the financial crisis some years back. By 2005 they were an established phenomena enjoyed by many as an affordable night out with friends new and old. The cost for a home cooked 3 course meal with drinks was between £11-£16.00 per head so made dining out a very affordable option.Now the Italian Government want to make them all illegal.There is something delicious about doing something a little bit illegal...especially when people feel put upon and oppressed and very stretched for cash.Do we have Fai-da-te dining in UK...you betcha! Every dinner party I do for Hen Nights where all the girls club together at the end and pay me is in effect a fai-da-te and theoretically illegal..well it would be if it were held in my home. It does happen, in places like Notting Hill there are regular get-togethers where guests all contribute to the cost of the evening.How soon before the great clunking kitchen police barge in and close down home dinner parties? Let's hope never but you can never tell with this ever increasing oppression and stifling of freedom that seems to have taken over every aspect of our lives.Luckily I am a bona-fide company and produce invoices, pay taxes and altogether keep everything tickety boo.Not so those recently made redundant from top restaurants...the ever increasing army of chefs who are desperately seeking a way of making a living and paying the bills. How long before every decent kitchen/dining room has a 'regular clientèle' of happy paying guests eating good cheap food cooked by the hosts 'friend'...the recently redundant Micheline star quality chef who lives down the road?One of the main reasons for clamping down on this enterprise, apart from the non payment of taxes of course, is the claim that the Health and Safety brigade can't get a look in to protect the diners...PROTECT? ... you only have to tour some local restaurant kitchens and even the kitchens of those food production units that set up on small industrial estates all over London, to realise that Health and Safety officers just do not do their jobs, especially in these difficult days where money is tight and cost cutting is rife.I must admit that I finally lost all respect for the inteligence of such people when one of them diligently picked up a large black olive stone that had missed the bin and gingerly put it in a plastic phial with satisfied exuding 'Aha rats!'....after pestering me in my catering establishment for six months and never finding anything wrong.Don't get me wrong I believe wholeheartedly in protecting the general public from filth but these people do not do their job...they are hampered by the human rights laws where they cannot or will not shut down the true culprits and therefore take vengeance on decent establishments who do nothing wrong...after all they need to justify their job. Things have got a lot better since certain TV programmes exposed a number of awful supermarket practices but how long before the financial crisis causes more corners to be cut...more untrained cheap staff replace the knowledgeable and more foodstuffs get re-labeled and re-labeled again after the sell by date is reached.I wonder how long before front parlors become fashionable once more where little tea parties are set up hiding the Speak-easy style dining rooms behind...now wouldn't that be fun?Fay Olinsky
Posted by Personal Chef UK at 01:55 0 comments
Labels: Boot-leg dining "fai-da-te"
1 comment:
Very Interesting read and I can empathize with so many of your points.
I was a chef for many years and then taght culinary arts and eventually moved up to administration.
i do understand the governments concerns about health, however I also believe that when your bread and butter is dependent on a few regular clientele that only a nutter would not self regulate themselves to keep hygiene standards exceedingly high.
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