Sweet potato gnocchi with spinach

Just a quick picture post, no recipe. Last winter, when sweet potatoes were abundant and I had a weekend off, I made sweet potato gnocchi. They’re not the prettiest for sure as it’s only my first time making gnocchi, but the sweet, vibrant orange dumplings juxtaposed with the earthy green of the spinach, brought together with some melted butter made me a happy girl.

Lavender macarons with salted caramel

When I purchased a miniscule container of edible dried lavender from Whole Foods, I hadn’t even thought of what recipes I could use it in. Unfortunately, every trip to Whole Foods ends in heavier shopping bags than I expect, as it’s a gourmet heaven in a sea of Sainsbury’s and Tesco supermarkets – and I can’t resist picking up specialty items.

I thought of various applications that lavender would have worked well in: brownies, panna cotta, shortbread, ice cream. Yet nothing appealed to me, and desserts, rather than sweet treats like cookies, aren’t ideal since they should be all consumed on the day. A pack of ground almonds in my pantry suddenly conjured up lavender macarons in my mind. I figured that most of the flavour from macarons comes from the filling, while the shell just serves simultaneously as a delicately sweet, textural contrast and vehicle with which to accompany the filling. Lavender has a pungent enough aroma to perfume the entire shell, which would give an additional layer of flavour than the ordinary macaron.

Whatever application I’ve tasted lavender in, it’s always been intensely sweet and floral. Macarons can be sweet to the point of cloying, so I thought that a robust salty filling would work as a juxtaposition against the floral notes. Salted caramel, one of my favourite flavour combinations, immediately sprang to mind.

Unfortunately, I’ve lost my exact recipe since, but since I follow a ratio of ingredients, you should be able to replicate this recipe without major variations. (This is why I’m such a bad blogger – I made these macarons almost exactly a year ago!) I use Syrup and Tang’s ratios; he also has an incredibly detailed guide to making macarons that has been very helpful for me. In brief, decide how many egg whites you want to use, then weigh them and scale the rest of the ingredients up according to the ratios given.

I used three egg whites and ended up with approximately 24 macarons.

Having measured your egg whites, grind the almond meal, icing sugar, and dried lavender together in a food processor to remove any clumps of powder and set it aside.

Beat the egg whites until they’re soft and foamy, and add the caster sugar little by little. Continue beating until the egg whites have formed a thick and glossy meringue.

Add your dry powder in batches and fold it into the meringue with a firm hand, but making sure you don’t over-mix the batter.

Once your dry ingredients have been just incorporated, fill a piping bag and pipe circles onto a lined baking sheet. As you can see, I have no piping skills. Rap the underside of the sheet against the counter to remove air bubbles and any peaks that refuse to dissolve. Then it’s oven time! I don’t have pictures of making the caramel, but it’s dead easy – all it involves is opening a can of condensed milk and stirring.

Lavender macarons with salted caramel

For the lavender macarons:

• egg whites (g)
• 1.3 x egg whites (g) ground almonds, minus the weight of dried lavender (see below)
• 1.6 x egg whites (g) icing sugar
• 0.8 x egg whites (g) caster sugar
• 5-10g edible dried lavender – final weight is to taste; don’t add too much, otherwise it’ll taste soapy

For the salted caramel filling:

• can of condensed milk
• 0.5 tsp sea salt, to taste

Preheat the oven to 160C, fan-assisted.

Start by pulverising the ground almonds, icing sugar, and lavender together in a food processor until everything has been blitzed to a fine consistency. You want to avoid any clumps of moist almond that will make your macarons grainy later on, so after it’s been processed, sift the almond mixture.

Grab a clean bowl for your egg whites. Make sure it’s really clean, as any oily residue will affect the ability of the egg whites to form a meringue, and you’ll still be beating 20 minutes later. Beat your egg whites until soft and foamy, then add the caster sugar little by little and continue beating until the egg whites have formed a thick and glossy meringue. Any peaks lifted up by your whisk should also stand against gravity at this point.

Add your almond mixture in batches to the meringue, and with a firm hand, fold it in by scooping around and under the meringue and back over onto itself. Once everything is fully incorporated, stop and check the consistency of the batter. Any ribbons of batter dropped from above should disappear within 30 seconds. Be careful not to over-mix it, however: err on the side of under-mixing here, as overstimulation will result in a runny batter. Any food colouring can be added at this point, but I rather like the natural colour of macarons, so I didn’t add any. The flecks of lavender are pretty enough as it is!

Fill a piping bag (or if you don’t have one, a ziplock bag with a corner cut off will do) with the batter and pipe even circles onto a lined baking sheet. To remove any air bubbles or peaks in your batter, rap the underside of the baking sheet firmly onto the counter before placing it into the oven. Many recipes tell you to leave the piped batter to dry on the counter before baking, but I’ve tried both ways and it didn’t seem to make a difference. Bake for about 8-10 minutes; the exact time will depend on the temperament of your oven and how accurate it is. Watch for any browning and rotate the baking sheet as necessary to facilitate even baking.

After taking them out of the oven, don’t try to lift them straight away. Leave them for a few minutes on the baking sheet before lifting the macaron shells off the baking paper with a gentle twisting motion. If you’re having trouble, spray the underside of the baking paper with a tiny bit of water while the sheet is still hot to create a little steam, which should release the shells more readily. Leave to cool on a baking rack.

While cooling, you can get started on the salted caramel filling. Pour the condensed milk and salt into a thick-bottomed saucepan and set it on a low flame. Stir every so often until it turns a lusciously golden colour; this might take up to 20 minutes. Take care not to let it catch on the bottom of the pan. Burnt caramel is a flavour you do not want in this macaron! Once it has transformed into a thick, sugary caramel, take it off the heat and let it cool; it will firm up as it cools. Pair up the macaron shells and pipe the caramel filling on one side of the shell. Sandwich it gently with the other shell using a twisting motion, pushing the filling out to the sides. It takes a bit of practise so that the filling doesn’t ooze out of the sides, but you can eat those. Baker’s treat!

Lastly, the most important step: place the filled macarons in the fridge and let it sit for 24-48 hours. It will be difficult to resist eating them straight away, I know, but allowing the shell and filling to mature in the fridge improves the flavour combination so much. The lavender mellows out and melds with the salted caramel; the contrast doesn’t seem as jarring, and the flavours just marry elegantly after a couple of days.

Let them come to room temperature before consuming, to bring out the best flavour.

Enjoy with a cup of tea!

Rioja Tapas Fantasticas 2011

This past weekend, blessed with the sun and soaring temperatures, saw the arrival of the two-day Tapas Fantasticas festival hosted by Rioja. I didn’t think it was well-advertised at all; I only found out on the first day of the festival and made sure to go the next day. It was taking place near Tower Bridge, which is only a short tube ride away from my flat. Not to mention the gorgeous weather (um, heat wave? You can live in Hong Kong for 17 years and then try to tell me that 28C is a heat wave) and free entry – so off I went to indulge in food.

Of course, the event was not just about food; plenty of wine was also on offer. I didn’t try any because I’m not a huge drinker and would probably not tolerate it well in the heat, but it would have cost £3 for a glass with 4 sample tokens, which gives you a rather small volume to taste. There were also cooking demonstrations (I just missed one by Jose Pizarro, unfortunately), live music, and even a children’s play area, which I felt was a thoughtful gesture. But onto the food! The first plates we tried were from Camino’s stall. Check out that grill next to those blistered chorizo sausages!

Chorizo sandwich, £4

I also had the following beauty – the best part was actually the tomatoes. Refreshingly tangy and sweet, drizzled with olive oil and accompanied by translucent slices of jamon, this plate really hit the spot as the sunshine relentlessly bore down on us, with most shady spots taken. The juicy tomatoes definitely made for messy eating – the tomato juice and olive oil was practically running down my arm. I probably looked pretty barbaric eating this right in front of the festival’s entrance.

Spanish ham with tomatoes and bread, £4

At this point I was still hungry, so we found another stall whose name I can’t remember and bought their chilled rice pudding and baked rice with chorizo, meat, and something else. The rice pudding was a huge stodgy portion for £3, which probably would have been better had it been halved and sold for £2, as I couldn’t finish it even with another person to share it with. On the other hand, the baked rice looked deeply savoury with each rice grain glistening in a most tempting shade of brown and studded with various bits of meat. The portion was a little stingy for £4, but it was tasty nonetheless.

With the addition of the two rice dishes, we were now properly stuffed and couldn’t sample any of the other food stalls’ offerings. Perhaps it would have been good to go on both days to avoid a total binge-fest within the space of 2 hours; I will keep that in mind for next time. It was a lovely way to spend a few hours on a Sunday! Remember to keep an eye out for this event next year in 2012.

Rioja Tapas Fantasticas
Potters Fields Park

Launceston Place, Kensington

Note: I dined at Launceston Place in December 2009, so the contents might be slightly outdated. However, to this day, it remains one of my favourite dining experiences in London.

My 20th birthday was celebrated in a pleasant manner, although the events that would come in the months following my birthday had a huge impact on my memory of winter 2009/2010. But there were  a few fun moments in December that I do remember and want to write about. This is one of them.

Two of my friends took me out for lunch at Launceston Place, part of the hugely successful D&D restaurant empire in London. I had heard that while serving competent food at reasonable prices with stunning interior decoration, most did not have the capability to truly grasp a customer by the collar and say, “This food is going to knock your socks off.” Launceston Place is the exception. It honestly deserves more accolades than it has right now, as it remains one of my most memorable meals to date.

When we arrived, the restaurant was nearly empty; it didn’t fill up the whole time we were there, but perhaps that was due to the fact that we went on a weekday and that the location isn’t prime for drawing in businesspeople. We were sat right in front of the cheese trolley, what a temptation! (None of us ended up with cheese at the end, however.)

Nibbles were presented as soon as we sat down – parsnip crisps. As a rule, I do not eat parsnips in any form. But I did try some of these, and to my surprise, they didn’t have that awful, rotten-carrot-like flavour of parsnips that I abhor.

We were then given an amuse bouche of a hot and cold pea cappucino, served in a shot glass with cold mousse on top and hot soup on the bottom. This was absolutely delicious, though completely out of season. I would have happily devoured an entire bowlful of the soup. Also, they spotted my very conspicuous Canon and came over to ask for a picture! Of course I obliged.

All of us went for the 3-course set menu, priced at a wholly reasonable £20; the a la carte would have blown all of our wallets into oblivion. Both of my friends had the cep risotto, Spenwood cheese, while I busied myself with potted foie gras, Maldon sea salt. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to try the lobster soup with brandy & saffron, which sounded like the perfect antidote to an icy day. The risotto came in a cute copper pan and was quite a large portion for a starter; my friends couldn’t finish theirs. I loved the presentation of my foie gras starter; although it might be seen as tacky and overdone, food served on slabs of slate is my weakness. Again, the portion size was extremely generous for a starter. The foie gras itself was smooth and sweet, with the crunchy sea salt intensifying the rich taste and contrasting nicely with the creamy texture.

Next to come were my friends’ mains of smoked trout, watercress, potatoes. The trout was cooked beautifully; the fish was flaky, firm, and moist with a delicate flavour that wasn’t overshadowed by the accompanying watercress and thin shavings of new potatoes. My main of braised wild hare, pistachio butter, chicory and pear salad was a little more complex with varied textures and contrasting flavours, but the hare had been a touch overseasoned. That being said, I really liked how the toasted pistachio topping offered a much-needed crunch to complement each tender forkful of hare. I wasn’t too fond of the salad, but it was only a matter of personal taste (I have yet to appreciate the merits of blue cheese). The chicory was bitter, the pear was sweet and juicy, and the blue cheese was pungent. If I’m being honest, I thought it worked perfectly without the blue cheese, since the hare was quite salty.

After our mains came a pre-dessert palate cleanser. Unfortunately I failed to take note of what it was – it tasted of berries and mulled wine topped with candied orange peel. Very appropriate for the season, and whetted our appetite for dessert, even though we were all full to the seams by then.

After a 15 minute wait in which my friends and I tried and failed to take a decent picture with all of us in it, our desserts arrived: apple tart, homemade clotted cream (for two), and banana sticky toffee pudding, Guinness ice cream. My friend’s sticky toffee pudding looked excellent, but I didn’t really have any as my apple tart was enormous. The apple tart, which was a tarte tatin, came in a large copper pan with a little cup of thick clotted cream. It was absolutely the best dish of the day. The pastry was flaky and caramelized, and the apples were sweet, still with a bite to them, glossy with the shade of burnished caramel thanks to the butter and sugar. Served piping hot with a dollop of cold clotted cream, it was the perfect end to a lovely, relaxing meal.

We actually spent nearly 3 hours at Launceston Place, which was helped by the fact that our bottoms were comfortably sat on lush, plump cushions. The service was outstanding, with the chatty waiters engaging us with humour, topping our drinks up often and checking to see if everything was all right, without being too obtrusive. Prices have increased now; it’s £22 for the 3-course set lunch menu, but it changes every so often and is still great value for money. If only I could afford to live closer and visit more frequently.

Launceston Place
1a Launceston Place, Kensington

The Harwood Arms, Fulham

Note: This was actually written on November 29, 2009, before the Harwood Arms received their Michelin star, but never published. I’d taken photos using my phone, but never had the chance to upload them, and now my phone is dead. To be honest, I’m not sure why I didn’t just publish it earlier without photos, but never mind – in an attempt to revive the hiatus of Little Spoon Eats, a resurrection of a yet-to-be-published draft was necessary.

It was a long trek out to southwest London all the way from the eastern reaches of the Jubilee line, let me tell you. Not only that, but we ended up half an hour late from our reservation at 6:30pm on a Saturday because we couldn’t find our way from the tube station. Also, in my hunger-induced haze, I forgot to note down their phone number so it took a lot of frantic phone calls to various friends to see who could look it up for us. Fortunately, the man who answered the call at Harwood Arms seemed used to customers’ cries of “I’m lost, please help”, so we finally ended up outside the modest-looking gastropub at 7pm.

This was my first experience at a gastropub, and among the most highly regarded at that, so I had no idea what to expect (aside from great food, and game in particular). It’s cozy inside, with wooden floors and furniture and rustic decoration. It’s actually rather small – I was afraid they wouldn’t give us our table, being so late and all, but it was waiting for us. I had expected the pub to be busier, but it was mostly full of drinkers rather than eaters. Perhaps it was a combination of the persistent rain outside and it only being 7pm. I always think it’s odd when people book tables for 8pm and after because I get ridiculously hungry, but I’m veering off course. Let’s talk about the food.

One thing I must say and will probably repeat: the bread at Harwood Arms is the best I’ve ever had in my life. Ever. They brought us two thick slices each of a dark and white bread placed in a linen bag. The dark one might have been rye or pumpernickel (probably the latter, though I admit now that my knowledge of bread is pretty dismal) and I have no idea what the white bread was, just that both were excellent, crusty and warm and chewy. It’s not often that I eat bread without butter, but I ate almost all of my rye/pumpernickel one unbuttered – the flavour was unbelievable. Harwood Arms should just turn itself into a bakery (assuming the bread was made on-site) and I would make the trek from southeast London every week. (It’s an hour-long journey, if not more!)

Did I mention the bread was fantastic?

Sorry, I’ll continue with the rest of our courses now. For starters, it was a half dozen Hereford snails with oxtail braised in stout, parsley crumbs and bone marrow (£7) for me and Berkshire hare stewed in ale with chestnut dumplings and Lincolnshire poacher (£7.50) for my dining victim T. The snails arrived in delicate ceramic cups (for quail’s eggs, perhaps) arranged on a wooden board, with a little snail-pick. Unfortunately they didn’t provide any snail-holders (my snail-as-food terminology has clearly developed well) so I had to place my fingers on the burning hot shells to extract the chewy nuggets inside. They were delightful: little savoury bites that hit like an injection of umami straight onto the tastebuds, most likely from the oxtail and marrow. The hare didn’t taste very strong (not sure if that’s a good thing), but I could detect some of that “gamey” taste.

My main of whole rabbit leg stewed in cider and mustard with smoked bacon, prunes and Swiss chard (£15.75) arrived shortly after, along with the second main of roast pheasant breast and green peppercorn sausage with pearl barley, butternut squash and black cabbage (£15.50). I’d never had rabbit before, so I was surprised at its lack of gameyness. It was so tender that the knife was nothing more than a tool to push the meat onto the fork rather than separation. Personally, I found the liquid a little too salty, but I suppose that’s what the prunes were for! (I had to pass on the prunes – they’ve never appealed to me ever since my dad offered one to “aid digestion”.) Here’s where the bread would have come in handy had we not emptied the bag at the beginning of the meal. Creamy mashed potatoes offered a suitable subsitute to soak up the gravy, however.

The pheasant was pleasant (haw haw) but I only had a bite before it was gobbled up, so I can’t comment much. Tasted like a chicken with more complexity.

The bill came to just under £60 for two, with service and two non-alcoholic drinks. Service was flawless (I was allowed to keep a copy of the menu, although it’s all creased now), the ambience was buzzy if a little loud from tipsy drinkers within the same room, and the food was spot-on. Also, bonus points for the bread because I would seriously go back just to eat their bread for dinner.

The Harwood Arms
27 Walham Grove, Fulham

Addendum:While I raved about the quality of the bread back in 2009, I’ve had better at St John Bread & Wine since then. In the last few years we’ve seen a huge surge in the quality of gastropub offerings such as Bull & Last and  Anchor & Hope; I believe Harwood Arms is still one of the best places to go for game when the season is right, but there are definitely other gastropubs out there that rival the rest of the British food offered by the Harwood Arms.