Eating Out

I have done an abnormal amount of eating out in the last two months, which will surely stop in a minute.  There was some birthday eating out (Jojo's in Whitstable, Eddie Gilbert's in Ramsgate, Elizavet's in Sandwich), then some emergency eating out (Esma's in Broadstairs, Milo's in Margate) and some celebratory eating out (the 3 Mariners at Oare, Mauresque in Canterbury).   I feel I have run the full gamut of East Kent eating - of course none of the expensive places (no Sportsman, no Age & Sons, no Rocksalt) were included, but on the whole, the experiences have been good - and curiously I have eaten calamari at each of these places.   The best calamari was probably at either Jojo's or Elizavet's (although the overall experience at Elizavet's was less thrilling).

The most enjoyable were probably the 3 Mariners (new to us) and Jojo's -  but today was lovely, went to Mauresque with Anna T and shared a seafood starter platter - it was all I needed really.   Had such a raging conversation!  I'm sure it would have been deeply satisfying to any eavesdroppers... ranging over sex, love, illness, old age and depression.... actually, I have a lot of conversations about illness, old age and depression, so getting sex and love into the mix was a vast improvement.

Roman Feast

I forgot to photograph this damn!

We had a Roman Feast for 11 on Thursday.  It was pretty successful.  The Romans ate 3 course meals with a variety of dishes at each course.  This is what we had.

Olives, onion relish, cheese relish (a dip), Apicius' pork morsels, fish dumplings, barley bread, spelt bread

Ferculae:(roasts) pork with cumin sauce, chicken with ginger, lentils and chestnuts, green beans with coriander sauce, a salad (which consisted of mozarella, nuts, cucumber, capers, chicken livers with a thick dressing containing mint and egg yolks.

Apples, soft cheese, honey cakes, olives, Alexandrine dates

I think the third course was the least successful - probably because I didn't serve snails - a common feature of the last course.

Roman food is unusual, but quite good.  People really liked the fish dumplings, the onion and the cheese relish,  and the roasts.  I loved the salad - it was great.  I think the dates were a bit over cooked, the honey had got like toffee so they were crisper than they should have been.  Robert suggested we should do another Roman meal, but I need to think about whether I want to broaden this - get more people to join the mailing list and do this a bit more often.  

Ides of March

Tomorrow is the Ides of March and I am having a Food Odyssey dinner - I have been unable to source any silphium or make any garum - but I'm hoping to do something reasonably authentic.

Roman dinners were 3 courses of mixed dishes: first some hors d'oeuvres - a variety of little dishes, then the middle course was roast meats of various kinds, the third course had both sweet and savoury elements - which might include snails.  Dormice were served as a starter.

There is an earnest temptation to make the food more civilised: I remember making a Roman cake once which wasn't very nice, because I think it had no fat/oil in it.  I think when I make it tomorrow I will put some in. Similarly there are some Roman fish balls that I'm going to make which are really rather like the Turkish fish sticks I sometimes make, only missing an ingredient - and some of the date pastries are not unlike something in Claudia Roden's book.

This evening I prepared a little, first by straining yoghurt - to make some soft cheese, and by soaking some dried chestnut to make a chestnut and lentil dish, also defrosting some fish (for fish sticks) and some chicken livers for a salad.

I think the menu will be roughly:

1: Olives, radishes, cheese dip, pork morsels al'Apicius, fish balls
2: Pork in wine honey sauce,  Chicken in a fruity sauce, chestnuts and lentils, mussels?, green beans, a Roman salad
3: Roman cake, apples, pears, nuts, yoghurt cheese, custard

I think I've left something out.  And lots of nice bread (I am trying to make sourdough and it's not working - too cold I think, although I made some 2 weeks ago).  I bought some fresh yeast so I'm making a starter tonight, hope that will help. The most challenging thing about these are that the methods are slightly different, and the ingredients and combinations ditto.  I will have to be chained to the cookbook.

All this means that cooking for my mother-in-law on Mother's Day will be very laid back in comparison.