When God gives you lemons, make lemonade. Two things. Firstly everyone who blogs up a lemonade recipe starts with this proverb and secondly there is no God. There is however a Waitrose, which is where we got our unwaxed fruit. So more accurately, when you go to Waitrose to buy lemons to make lemonade, make lemonade.
Vegetarian
Gooseberry Sorbet
They had gooseberries at the fruit and veg stall on Saturday morning and so I just had to buy some. When I got home and set about working out what I was going to do with them I realised that gooseberries are generally cooked up and mixed with cream, just in various different ways. I didn’t really fancy that so …
In Search of…the Perfect Pasta Sauce No 2
Butter & Rosemary There is a pasta dish called ‘La pasta col tocca d’arrosto’ or literally ‘with a touch of the roast’ which is essentially made with the rich meaty/garlicy/herby juices left over from a Sunday roast. This is a clever approximation of that sauce which takes minutes to make and is very, very tasty.
In Praise of…J-P’s Hand Pressed Olive Oil
How do you take your olive oil? Pure, virgin, extra-virgin, hand-picked, first cold press, single estate, non-filtered, Greek, Tuscan, Andalusian, Carbonell, Bertolli, Filippo Berio, Il Padrone, Masia el Altet, Tesco’s finest? Boof, here at yumblog we have bespoke olive oil! Olive oil personally pressed and kindly donated by a handsomely moustachioed Frenchman who goes by the moniker of J-P. A …
In Search of…the Perfect Pasta Sauce No 1
Butter & Tomato Sauce A recent trip to the magnificent St John led to a visit to their website which in turn resulted in the purchase of a Fergus Henderson-endorsed cookbook called The Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan. It’s perfect bedtime reading and has an intriguing section on simple tomato-based sauces for pasta – with three ingredients …
Fresh & Friendly
In the light of ongoing shenanigans at Westminster and with the desire to be always open and transparent with you, dear reader, perhaps this posting should be called an ‘Advertorial’ or possibly a ‘Blogvert’. This is because the mixed organic fruit’n’veg box below was supplied to us completely free of charge; in a complimentary manner; gratis; or if you like, …
Stinking Bishop with Jersey Royals
A couple of weeks ago we had a slap up anniversary feed at St John in Smithfield, and this dish was on the menu. Obviously visiting the home of ‘Nose to Tail eating’ and plumping for the vegetarian option is like… (Note to Blogger-D: Please insert apt and amusing analogy here.) (Note to Blogger-R: Can’t think of one. Don’t worry, …
Savoury Rhubarb Soup
I know what you are thinking. Rhubarb soup? Savoury rhubarb soup? Never heard of that before. Sounds intriguing. Could be tasty. Could be unpleasant. Could be a toxic coupling of sour fruit and salty meaty water. Must get some rhubarb and give it a go. Well that’s what I thought anyway. Besides, the recipe was in Colin Spencer’s ‘Vegetable Book’ …
Baked Herbed Ricotta with Roasted Tomatoes
The plan is at some stage to make our own Ricotta from the whey left over from Yumblog Amalgamated Dairy Industries yoghurt-making enterprise. However I suspect the quantities involved will be minute and certainly a lot smaller than our massive combined appetites.
Labne
The obsession with yoghurt continues – this time using it to fashion a traditional Middle Eastern-style cheese called Labne. Once made it is rolled into small balls, coated with fresh herbs, placed in a jar and covered with olive oil. Simple and delicious.
Potato, Carrot & Feta Rosti with Herbed Yoghurt Sauce
I got this recipe from an article called ‘Five ways with potatoes’ in this months OFM. Nigel Slater calls it ‘Potato pancakes with herb and youghurt sauce‘ but I changed the name as for me the feta was the main event and therefore deserved higher billing. I’m also not sure my brain can accommodate yet another variation on the spelling …
Cucumber Soup No.2 with Wasabi Pea Relish
As you might have guessed, I got a job lot of cucumbers from the market – three eye-wateringly large shafts of Cucumis Sativus for a credit crunching quid. Unlike the previous version, this soup is entirely prepared in the blender and requires no cooking – just a blender.
Cucumber Soup No.1
Funny how you wake up one morning and decide that the thing you want to do most in the world (ever) is to make cucumber soup. Maybe it’s a form of neurosis that all food bloggers share and perhaps writing these blogs is a therapeutic, legal and relatively harmless outlet for our collective obsession. Who knows. Who cares. Just had …
Yoghurt – A Work in Progress
The making of yoghurt has been the most exciting discovery in the yumblog kitchen since the finding of a forgotten and unopened Kellogg’s Variety Pack at the back of the cupboard. There are a multitude of techniques for transforming milk into yoghurt, but our objective was always to do it with the least amount of faff, equipment and financial investment. …
Mediterranean Vegetable Pie
There’s that fork again.
Griddled Spring Onions with Harissa
Here’s a simple spicy little snack/starter from Gregg ‘beefy beefy mushrooms’ Wallace.
Sweet Pickled Watermelon Rind
Who’d have thought you could pickle and eat watermelon rind?
Halloumi Wrapped in Red Pepper
In accordance with government guidelines and the criteria laid down by the Foods Standards Agency (FSA) (and because you are all, dear readers, lazy obese mollycoddled porcine cretins incapable of making a decision unless the myriad complexities of an issue are reduced to a simple 3-digit number) yumblog will in future state the calorific value of all published recipes. Olive …
Linguine with Peas & Mint Pesto
Hi Guys, Just wanted you to be the first to know that at 2:46 this morning, Jools gave birth to a beautiful baby girl!! She weighed 6lbs 10 and we have called her ‘Petal Blossom Herbal Essence Bonjela Aviva AmbiPur ScarletDivision Clinique FlavourShaker Twitter Pantene Pro-V Sky+ “Ooooh Danone” Sainsbury’s Tefal Yulumba Rainbow Oliver’. Both Jools and ‘Bonjela’ are doing …
Brussels Sprout & Caramelised Onion Soup
I didn’t have high hopes for this soup when I started it, mainly because it contains little more than the humble sprout and onion. However, it turned out to be quite a clever ‘everyday’ soup and would be an ideal way to use up any sprouts you might have knocking around from Christmas. It’s a Sophie Grigson recipe, so clip …
Kwik White Bread
‘Eating lots of white bread raises the risk of a cancer that kills thousands of Britons every year … those who eat five slices a day are almost twice as likely to develop the most common form of kidney cancer compared to those who have one and a half slices.’… or so says that putrid voicepiece of everything that is …
Baked Feta Parcel
Yet more allegations that Yumblog, 42, has been having a sordid (and utterly predictable) affair with a desperate publicity-seeking blonde slapper, 37. This is of course untrue, and to prove our innocence we bribed bought Mrs Yumblog, 33, a fucking massive diamond ring from fucking Theo Fennell!
Patatas Bravas
Rumours abound that Yumblog Holdings has breached its banking covenants (whatever that means) and that perhaps the Yumblog franchise is not the cash cow it once used to be. We would like to rigorously refute these allegations and point out that all of our ventures (including Yumblog at Claridges, Yum in Grosvenor Square, Ad Nauseyum on Royal Hospital Road, J.D. …
Linguine with Pesto and New Potatoes
A double hit of carbs here – like a chip butty – only posher – innit.
A Sunday Lunch in Clapham
Lemon Dhal Soup
It’s MasterChef final week, yeah. Such a shame that the nice Greek guy was dumped last Thursday as he was our favourite, we actively liked him. Now it’s down to the young one, the posh one and the beardy baldy cry baby one who sounds like Tony Blair. The posho is bound to win, but he is unfortunately a tad …
Cauliflower & Cheddar Soup
… or cauliflower cheese in liquid form. A perfect winter warmer for the snowiest (and therefore the most exciting) day in 18 years.
Mozzarella
Ok, pay attention. Blogger D’s archaeologist sister (from hereonin known as ‘Sherdkicker T’) came to Yumblog Towers for dinner. She brought along her ‘friend’ who is also an archaeologist and so for continuity should be known as ‘Sherdkicker J-P’. However Sherdkicker J-P is a handsomely moustached Frenchman and so perhaps needs to be translated as ‘Pulseur de poterie J-P’. ‘PdP …
Lentil-stuffed Flatbreads
Another recipe purloined from Dan ‘Pour some sugar on me’ Lepard, which was in turn of other provenance, but such is cooking, dishes are passed from one to another and in doing so they evolve. Talking of Darwin, he was 200 the other day you know and Google honoured this on their homepage. I wonder how many deluded creationists boiled …
Nut Roast
Few words when paired together drain the soul of joy quite as much as the foreboding coupling of nut + roast. Obviously there’s the odious David + Cameron or the thoroughly depressing Cold + Play, but these are both far too loathsome to be mentioned in this little corner of the blogosphere. Nut Roast conjures up the image of a …
Onion Soup
Yumblog is now being swamped with spam. So to all those spammers trying to flog us Arcoxia, Atarax, Augmentin, Buspirone, Cardizem, Celebrex and a whole alphabet of other ‘meds’ – fuck off. To the spammers who think we’re so dull-witted we’d publish their comments because they write a generic ‘I completely agree’ – fuck off. To the spammers who have …
Creationism
“I’ve started to drift towards a belief in God, creationism and intelligent design. When I look at something as complete and intricate and detailed as Professor Dawkins I think, ‘Surely that can’t just have happened by chance’.” A quote from the comedy genius Stewart Lee. This and many more designs available from our shop
Semolina-crust pain de mie
This Saturday I had the urge to spend all day in the kitchen and there is no better way of achieving this than embarking on one of Dan Lepard‘s more involved and elaborate recipes. This loaf takes the best part of a day to create and requires the making of two separate doughs – one for the inside and one …
Yuckblog 8: Drei Deutsche Imbisse
Like a dog returning to its vomit, here we are once again preparing three unappetising platefuls of instant pasta for this, our eighth yuckblog taste test. Thus far much of what we have tried has been of such a lamentable quality it can barely be described as ‘food’, so this time we have travelled further afield and purchased our specimens …
Honeyed Tomato Soup
Phwaaar! Great flavour combinations. You’ve got the sweetness of the tomatoes, then an explosion of fragrant basil, finishing with the floral kiss of honey. Yes, MASTERCHEF!! has returned to our screens. Actually this is a delicious and unusual dish. If you can only summon the enthusiasm to cook one thing this year, make sure it is this soup. “Agony and …
Spicy Tomato Ketchup
‘A true taste of Mediterranean tomatoes to bring a touch of sunshine to British fish and chips. It’s the ultimate sauce to enhance your haddock or perk up your pollock’. Not my words you understand, but those of Jme (Champion of the people) Oliver describing his ‘Real Tomato Ketchup’ which he is flogging on his website for an impressive £3.50 …
Rosti (potato pancake)
This recipe is for my dad who misses the rostis my mum used to make but has so far been unsuccessful in his attempts to recreate them. There are many ways to rosti a potato – purists would have you boil them first and leave to rest overnight before peeling and grating; others would urge you to add egg or …
Hund T-Shirt
If you’re fond of dogs and like t-shirts, then you’ll love this dog t-shirt. Go on, consume and make your life worthwile. Happiness is a click away. Many more designs available from our shop
Yuckblog 7: (Un)Savoury Rice
I had fond memories of Batchelors Savoury Rice. I remember it magically appearing sometime during the 1970s and becoming a regular teatime favourite along with butterscotch Angel Delight, Dream Topping and Arctic Roll. However, having just sampled three miserable variations, I now know that 30 years can play terrible tricks on the mind, and memories, like failed fireworks, should never …
Happy New Year
This time last year we posted a recipe for ‘Minted Pea & Lettuce Soup‘ with the uplifting introduction “Happy New Year. It’s 2008 and it looks like the year ahead is going to be shit”. Predictions don’t come more accurate than that. So what of 2009? Shitter. Much shitter. Shittier than Shitty Jack McShit after losing his car keys at …