Some people will acknowledge spring’s arrival with the sighting of their first robin.  Others by the synchronized unfurling of hard, tight buds on their trees.  Me?  I’m more of a bud watcher than a bird watcher, and the bud I watch for is the forsythia, its overnight explosion of lemony yellow flowers on previously spindly, bare branches.  Once that happens, the air smells fresher to me, sweeter; spring is almost a sure thing.

But only almost.  After a long and cold winter, I need a little more convincing.  I need to see some rhubarb – shooting up from the ground, fanning out in clusters, its stalks ranging from palest celadon to vibrant raspberry pink, the crowning touch the ruffled elephant ear-like leaves.

Rhubarb, rhubarb, how do I love thee?  Let me count the ways.

I love you, soft and caramelized, on the upside down part of an upside down cake.  I love you preserved as a jam.  Or bottled into a chutney with walnuts and raisins and brown sugar and a splash of cider vinegar.  I love you sweetened just the slightest bit and stewed or blended into a fruit sauce still tart enough to make my mouth pucker.  And of course I love you on your own in a pie, your juices thickened and rosy pink, but you’re equally loveable thrown into a pie that’s been made sweeter and ruby colored with the addition of strawberries.

And I have a special fondness for you cut up, drizzled with honey and lemon juice, and scattered around a pork loin about to go into the oven; I love the resulting relish you will cook down to.  Rhubarb, you bridge sweet and savory with your bright astringency.

Sprouting like crazy from now through June, rhubarb also bridges the early and late parts of spring, helping to freshen up meals and desserts and palates, a true warm up act to the bounty of late spring and summer.  You’ve probably already seen some rhubarb in your market.  Grab what you can when you do, looking for nice firm stalks with shiny skins, and make something wonderful immediately.

If you’re lucky enough to grow your own (or to know someone who does), you can stroll into the garden and take what you need for the recipe of the moment.  To use, cut the stalks just above the root end, then trim and discard the leaves.  (Rhubarb leaves contain oxalic acid, toxic to humans if ingested in large quantities.)  After washing, cut the rhubarb stalks into pieces anywhere from 1/4–inch to ½-inch thick.  Your fresh rhubarb is now recipe ready.

You may notice that once cut, rhubarb tends to replenish itself rather quickly this time of the year, with new stalks shooting up as replacements.  You may end up with more rhubarb than you think you will use at the moment.  Rhubarb can feel like the zucchini of the spring.  On the off chance you can’t give some away, rhubarb freezes very well.  Trim, wash, cut up as described above, and freeze in heavy-duty freezer bags.  For the next three months you’ll have prepared rhubarb on hand to cook with.

Here are some suggestions for using rhubarb in your kitchen:

Rhubarb-Raspberry Crostata

(from Bon Appetit, May 2011)

for the crust:

• 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 1/2 Tbsp. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cubed
• 1 large egg
• 1 Tbsp. whole milk

for the filling:

• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 4 cups 1/2″-thick slices rhubarb (about 1-1 1/4 lb.)
• 1 6-oz. container fresh raspberries
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1 large egg, beaten

Plus: raw sugar or sparkling sugar for the crust

Combine both flours, sugar, and salt in a processor; blend for 5 seconds. Add butter; pulse until butter is reduced to pea-size pieces. Whisk egg and milk in a small bowl to blend; add to processor and pulse until moist clumps form. Gather dough into a ball; flatten into a disk. Wrap in plastic wrap; chill at least 1 1/2hours.

Can be made 2 days ahead. Keep chilled.

To make the filling, dissolve cornstarch in 3 Tbsp. water in a small bowl; set aside. Combine rhubarb, raspberries, and sugar in a large heavy saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until sugar dissolves and juices are released, about 4 minutes. Stir in cornstarch mixture and bring to a boil (rhubarb will not be tender and slices will still be intact). Transfer to a bowl. Chill until cool, about 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400°. Roll out dough on floured parchment paper to 12″ round; brush with beaten egg. Mound filling in center of crust; gently spread out, leaving 1 1/2″ border. Gently fold edges of dough over filling, pleating as needed. Brush border with egg; sprinkle with raw sugar. Slide parchment with crostata onto a large rimmed baking sheet and bake until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbly, about 45 minutes. Let crostata cool on baking sheet on a rack. Transfer crostata to a platter, cut into wedges, and serve with whipped cream or ice cream.

Rhubarb Crisp

(my adaptation of a Fannie Farmer apple crisp recipe)

• 5-6 cups rhubarb, sliced into ½-inch thick slices
• 2 Tbsp. lemon juice or water
• 1 Tbsp. sugar
• ½ cup all purpose flour
• 1 cup oats
• 1 cup sugar
• zest of 1 lemon (optional)
• ½ tsp. cinnamon
• ¼ tsp. salt
• 1 stick butter, softened slightly and cut into pieces

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter a large oval (or 13-inch by 9-inch) baking dish and set aside. Wash and dry the rhubarb, then cut it into ½-inch pieces. Place the rhubarb pieces into the prepared baking dish and sprinkle with lemon juice or water (your choice, depends on how tart you like your rhubarb), and sugar.

To make streusel topping, combine the flour, oats, sugar, lemon peel (if using), cinnamon and salt in a medium bowl to blend.  Add to this the butter pieces. With your fingers rub the butter into the flour mixture and blend this into a streusel containing some large clumps and smaller crumbs. Scatter the topping over the fruit, distributing evenly.

Place the dish in the preheated oven and bake until topping is golden brown and the rhubarb is nicely soft and its juices are bubbling hot, about 45 minutes.  Serve warm with ice cream.

Rhubarb Chutney for Grilled Pork Tenderloin

(from Bon Appetit, April 1994)

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
• 1 tablespoon ground garlic
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
• 4 cups 1/2-inch cubes fresh rhubarb (about 1 1/2 pounds)
• 1/2 cup (generous) chopped red onion
• 1/3 cup dried tart cherries or golden raisins (about 2 ounces)

Combine first 8 ingredients in heavy large Dutch oven. Bring to simmer over low heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Add rhubarb, onion and dried cherries; increase heat to medium-high and cook until rhubarb is tender and mixture thickens slightly, about 5 minutes. Cool completely. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and chill. Bring to room temperature before using.)

Delicious served with grilled pork tenderloin.

©2012  Jane A. Ward

The Bertinet Cookery School in Bath will accept individuals like us from all over the world for a one-day introductory bread baking class or a 5-day in depth bread course. Whether spending one day or five, owner-baker-instructor-fresh bread proponent-baking guru Richard Bertinet promises every attendee that all will leave the school armed with the skills for baking crusty, artisanal-style bread at home by applying a method long used by the bakers of France.

And this method  is what we had traveled for.

Before the morning I showed up on the doorstep of Bertinet’s school, I had racked up many years of baking bread both at home and during the two years spent as weekend baker at Quebrada Bakery in Arlington. Many a good sandwich loaf came to life under my hands: oatmeal, multigrain, whole wheat, white bread. What had eluded me, though, were the hearth-style loaves, those of thick crackling crust and airy but chewy crumb.

I had made attempts, found what I thought were reliable recipes and followed those, but my loaves turned out dense and heavy, with crusts that were sometimes thin, at other times leathery. I blamed the lack of a commercial oven, the dearth of proper flour, and my impatience for creating and nurturing the levains used by artisan bakers – those sour starters that take time and attention but give real bread depth of flavor and character. And yet, I would shrug, the standard method worked for me. Mixing, kneading on a floured surface, rising, deflating, rolling, shaping, rising again, baking: my bread was good. Tight crumbed but springy. Wholesome at any rate. Without chemicals or fillers. And from my own hands. I could have stopped learning given all that. The bread was fine.

And then in 2005, seduced by the promise of making a fougasse like the one on the cover, I added Richard Bertinet’s brand new cookbook, Dough, to my bookshelves. Another bread book for the collection. Except that it isn’t just another bread book.

In Dough, Bertinet asks bakers to come to bread baking freed from all previous experience with yeast dough. Approach bread in a new way, he urges, explaining in the book’s introductory Bread Talk, “the kneading technique that most people are taught in Britain and America is quite different from the one we use in France, which is all about getting air and life into the dough…instead of using the word kneading (which sounds too harsh), I prefer to talk about working the dough.”

The French way of working the dough first involves mixing a dough that is wetter and stickier than the stiff dough most bakers are used to. One must next master that sticky mass and transform it by hand over the course of 5 or 10 minutes from counter-adhering blob to manageable, silky, fleshy round without adding any additional flour through dusting the work surface, as bakers are also used to doing. A difficult transition, yes, but this instruction makes good sense. Less flour will result in a lighter interior.

Then there’s also the matter of how to work during that 5 or 10 minutes. Dough the cookbook comes with an 30-minute instructional DVD. Watch it and see Bertinet demonstrate the alternative to traditional kneading, watch him lift, slap, stretch, and flop the wet dough up and over itself, working repetitively and quickly in a near-balletic, all athletic motion as he adds air and finally tames the stickiness into smooth submission.

My few attempts at home with Dough and the basic white dough made from it lacked confidence…not in the method, but in myself. Sticky dough is difficult. Especially when one is used to something smooth, full of flour, and therefore easy to handle. The experience of easy bread and the old habits used to make it are hard to set aside, I found. Nagging at the back of mind as I tried to work in a new fashion was this: It doesn’t feel like what I know, the repetitions feel foreign, ergo I must be doing something wrong. The book went back to the shelf; I went back to my tried and true ways.

But thoughts of Dough and making good bread never let go of me completely. My intent to bake artisan bread at home resurfaced last fall when I saw mention of the Bertinet Kitchen Cookery School in a newspaper article, coinciding with the plans I was making to visit friends in England. DVD instruction is helpful, but as a hands on learner, I knew real time coaching would be even more helpful. And what better motivator than the challenge of mastering a skill that had been, until then, elusive?

So there I was in Bath for my one-day class, at a butcher block work station with Suzanne from Norway (by way of Texas), whose husband gave her the 5-day course as a gift; and Anne and Vivi, daughter and mother from Denmark, there to conquer their dislike of the feeling of dough sticking to their hands. We and the eight other students worked and Richard Bertinet made the rounds, looking over shoulders, stopping our mistakes when necessary, reminding us to “Show the dough who’s boss,” and “Trust the method.”

Watch words aside, Bertinet’s coaching held very practical advice. His voice carried through the room, the French accent occasionally slipping into a London-British cadence as he taught. Bread baking is an athletic activity, like a dance, he noted. Relax the shoulders. Remember to stretch the dough out wide as you also lift it upwards. One foot must be forward, one behind. Rock back as you lift and stretch the dough, rock forward as you slap it on the table.

And you must make a good thwack on the bench! You release your grip on the dough like a Frenchman shrugging. Allow the momentum of your efforts to thrust the dough over itself. This is the way you trap the air. Gather up the dough into a ball with the scraper. Don’t lose the top! Walk the dough around the table to keep it from sticking, move with it, walk! Stretch and fold, rock back and forth, over and over. Feel the dough change, feel it become elastic. Feel how alive it is! That’s how you know it is ready to rise. See the bubbles of air you have trapped inside. You want to keep that air, not beat it out. Remember this when ready to shape: We don’t punch down the dough.

And on and on went the day. We got our hands very sticky, we struggled with the sticky dough, and we got past those first discomforts and made fougasses and breadsticks and foccacia. We had our heads filled with technique that would, Bertinet promised, all come back to us, his voice in our heads, once we returned home and practiced what we had learned.

The school, the brainchild of the French-born baker and his wife, Jo, has enjoyed positive publicity since its beginnings in 2005 because of a number of illustrious features and endorsements from the likes of the BBC, Ruth Reichl, and both IACP and Julia Child cookbook awards. But it is Bertinet’s passion for bread and his ability (and willingness) to teach what he knows that makes the school a success.

“I grew up with bread in France,” Bertinet told us after we had gone around the kitchen and introduced ourselves on that Monday morning. “I have always loved bread, and I have been baking it since I was 14. But it was only when I started teaching that I got really excited about baking these four ingredients together – flour, yeast, water, and salt – to make bread. I love seeing the smiles on students’ faces when they take their first fougasse out of the oven. ‘Look! I made that!’” And it’s true: as the day progressed, his face broke into smiles at our delight when we brought our bread out of the ovens, teacher perhaps more excited than his students at the baking success.

After the baking was finished, lunch for the group was laid out on a long table. “The word companion comes from the Latin, meaning ‘with bread,’” our teacher reminded us as we sat. “So our companions are the people we choose to share our bread with us.” Instruction aside, students and teacher sat companionably and conversed about bread, artisan grains, travel, food, our homes, our work, all the dishes making up the delicious meal before us. We made up a gregarious crowd. Wine flowed. And there was our bread, the whole bounty of it, still warm from the oven.

Here’s the recipe for Basic White Dough (and a few notes about making it)

• 500 grams strong bread flour
• 350 grams tepid water (0r 350 ml, but weighing is more accurate)
• 10 grams fresh yeast (or 1-1/2 tsp. active dry yeast if fresh is unavailable)
• 10 grams sea salt

I’m going to refer you to the YouTube video of Richard Bertinet making dough below so you may watch the mixing and the working methods for yourself.

Alternately buy Dough and its accompanying DVD. You’ll have in addition to the white bread, recipes for Olive Oil Bread, Brown Bread, Rye Dough, Sweet Dough, and a myriad of variations on those.

Go the extra mile for the fresh yeast. Ask at your local bakeries, even ones that aren’t so local to you. Fresh yeast will allow the dough to rise slower, making the bread’s flavor and character develop better. You’ll note that I did use active dry yeast along with the ingredients I prepped for the olive oil bread. The small amount called for will also allow for a slow rise. Still, I find breads made with dry yeast have a bit of an aftertaste that’s not apparent with the fresh, so fresh is worth looking for. Fresh yeast will keep in the refrigerator if covered loosely for about 6 weeks. With dry, reach for active dry instead of rapid rise.

American flours have a different character than the ones Bertinet uses in his classes. There are plenty of good brands out there, but I find most of them “drier” and needing more water than the above recipe calls for. With the King Arthur basic bread flour and European-style bread flour I used, I upped the water content to 36o grams. And yes, a scale does beat a liquid measuring cup every time. Every glass measuring cup I own yielded a different amount of water when I measured it to the 350 ml mark.

Finally, before you start baking, if you have 30 minutes, click on Ruth Reichl’s name near the end of the post and watch the trip she made with Dianne Wiest to Bath and the Bertinet Kitchen Cookery School. Oh, to have been a fly on that wall.

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 475 degrees. Lightly flour a bowl and place the dough in it. Cover the bowl with lint free towels and let the dough rise in a warm place, but not on the stovetop, for about an hour – sometimes more, sometimes a little less – until the dough reaches the lip of the bowl. Gently turn the dough onto a well floured surface. You may use bread flour or semolina for this purpose. Cut the dough into equal pieces (one recipe will make about 4 to 6 fougasses, or 4 free form shaped loaves). Shape as desired, and again, refer to the video below or the photos above for shaping tips.

Reduce the oven heat to 450 degrees. Bake the bread on a baking stone if you have one, or a baking sheet if you don’t. Small fougasses will take about 12 minutes, larger ones slightly longer. Two loaves will take between 20 and 25 minutes or until golden brown.

The Bertinet Kitchen
12 St Andrew’s Terrace, Bath,
BA1 2QR, United Kingdom
Tel: 01225 445531
www.thebertinetkitchen.com

info@thebertinetkitchen.com

©2012  Jane A. Ward

Weeks before I arrived in England, Andrew mentioned to his college chum, Celia, that I was traveling to Bath for a day-long bread baking course at the Bertinet Cookery School. She and Michael, at one time a Bertinet student, asked would I like to stay with them for the night. They would fetch me at the train, provide a comfortable bed, and bring me to the school in the morning. Forget the impersonal hotel stay. I did, and canceled my reservation.

Over tea and later, wine, over a spectacular lemon-infused Spanish-style saute of mackerel, skate, and diminutive Cornish sole served up with homegrown purple sprouting broccoli, we three discussed American and British politics, books we had read or would read, food and the Bertinet School, our Scottish roots and Scottish football (soccer), our children, our work. Michael is both woodcutter and teacher of English to foreign students. He can also claim titles of chief cook at home and abroad, and bread baker extraordinaire. Celia once worked in Britain’s foreign office, then settled into federal government work, then regional, then local. She was, at present, just wrapping up a stint on the planning board of the 2012 London Olympics, and relinquishing her local government job as the two near empty nesters began planning for a new chapter in their lives.

They had, just the day before, returned from a singing holiday in the Orkney Islands, where a group of people unified only by a love of singing traveled together and rehearsed for two weeks in order to sing at a few churches and in a cave on the islands. Celia was the singing enthusiast, Michael went along to cook for the group of 30. In this remote part of Scotland, husband and wife grabbed a few moments alone and ended up running across a couple of properties for sale, one with the potential for becoming a bed and breakfast with function space, the other a charming set of tea rooms attached to a post office.

By the time the chocolate cake appeared on the table, Celia and Michael had admitted the prospect of hospitality work, even running the small island post office, intrigued and excited them; smiles crept across their faces and they glanced knowingly at each other as they told me their idea. I agreed they would be naturals. (It takes a certain temperament and personality to be able to invite a stranger in and make her feel at home almost instantly.) Michael already knows he can cook for crowds, making meals appear even when a touchy Aga stove breaks down, as one did while he was in the first days of cooking for the singing holidaymakers. Celia knows how to run things, how to make things happen in smart ways.  The whole experience – from singing with strangers to cooking for a crowd to stumbling across businesses for sale – was transformative and made them look at their future through a new lens. Maybe, just maybe, they thought, the next phase of their life together would move in new directions, maybe even on the Orkneys.

How fortunate I felt in that moment, landing there, meeting them! It is true, this business of travel can be transformative. For them, for me. One can find opportunity and often a hefty dose of clarity about life, too, when opening up to the strange and unknown.

Nigella Lawson’s Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake

(from How to be a Domestic Goddess)

This is the chocolate cake as Celia made it for our dessert, following Nigella’s instructions to the last detail. I urge you to as well. I also urge you to try, when possible, to make the cake using the original British weights rather than the translated version using American measures. I did it both ways, and the loaf just comes out better when made the way it was originally written. If you don’t use a kitchen scale, I have included the American conversions in parentheses following each ingredient.

Nigella writes in the introduction to the recipe, “This is the plainest of plain loaf cakes – but that doesn’t convey the damp, heady aromatic denseness of it…simply sliced, with a cup of tea or coffee, it’s pretty damn dreamy.” Celia served this with a spoon of cream and several raspberries. It is, as Nigella notes, also delicious plain.

• 225 grams soft unsalted butter (or 1 cup)
• 375 grams dark brown sugar (or 1-2/3 cups)
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 100 grams best dark chocolate, about 70%, melted (or 4 ounces)
• 200 grams plain all-purpose flour (or 1-1/3 cups)
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 250 milliliters boiling water (or 1 cup plus 2 Tbsp.)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Grease and then line a 9-inch by 5-inch loaf pan with parchment. The lining is important as this is a very damp cake. (I cut two pieces of parchment to fit the pan lengthwise and crosswise, see photo.)

Cream the butter and sugar, either with a wooden spoon or with an electric hand held mixer, then add the eggs and vanilla, beating in well. Next, fold in the melted and slightly cooled chocolate, taking care to blend well but being careful not to overbeat. You want the ingredients combined: you don’t want a light and airy mass.

Combine the flour and baking soda. Then gently add the flour mixture to the chocolate mixture by spoonfuls, alternating with the boiling water, mixing just to blend after each addition. (This works like this: flour-stir; water-stir, and so on until you add the last splash of boiling water.) The batter will be smooth and fairly liquid.

Pour into the prepared loaf pan and place the pan on a baking sheet for stability. Place the baking sheet on the oven’s middle rack and bake for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, turn the oven down to 350 and bake for about 20 minutes more. Check it after 15 minutes. The cake should have a cooked looking top; the cake underneath the center crack should look moist but not wet (see photo below). If wet, return it for 5 more minutes, as I did. Even when done, the loaf  will still be a bit “squidgy” inside, so an inserted cake tester or skewer won’t come out completely clean.

Place the loaf pan on a cooling rack and leave to get completely cold before lifting it out by the edges of the parchment. (I left my loaf to cool in the pan overnight, and it lifted out cleanly the next day.) Nigella adds, “I often leave it for a day or so: like gingerbread, it improves. Don’t worry if it sinks in the middle; indeed, it will do so because it’s such a damp and dense cake.”

To store (if there’s any left after serving), re-wrap the cake in its original parchment, then wrap it in foil.

©2012  Jane A. Ward

I don’t, however, like to show up at anyone’s home empty handed, especially when they are about to put me up for a few days, so Plan B was to find a good piece of cheese in London on Thursday afternoon and bring that along with some biscuits down to Lewes on the train with me later that evening. A & M also like cheese, I especially love buying cheese, and fortunately for me and my friends, Neal’s Yard Dairy in Covent Garden was only a short walk from Britain’s National Portrait Gallery, where I’d spent the morning.

The dairy was founded in 1979 by Nicholas Saunders. By 1986 Neal’s Yard were making their own cheese, buying the rest of the cheese on offer at the store from some of the best artisanal cheesemakers in the British Isles, and well on their way to becoming the British cheese mecca they are today.

We buy cheese from about seventy cheesemakers on farms around Britain and Ireland and we sell the cheese in our two shops in London and to shops and restaurants all over the world.

Earthy cheese perfumes the air at  the Neal’s Yard shop at 17 Shorts Gardens (a second location is at Borough Market) and the aroma is dizzying. So is the selection to a cheese lover. It was impossible to choose only one type so instead I chose four: a longtime favorite, Spenwood, a vegetable rennet-based sheep’s milk cheese made in the style of Sardinian Pecorino; a sweet and somewhat floral rare goat’s milk blue cheese called Harbourne; a piece of the densely creamy Stawley; and half a round of Neal’s Yard’s own Dorstone, an ash coated goat’s cheese well described to me by the counter person as bright in flavor and fluffy-textured.

Once I crossed the threshold of my friends’ home in Lewes, I passed off the carrier bag brimming with wrapped cheese and biscuit packets and was handed a delicious glass of Sussex vin mousseux in return. Didn’t know that the county of Sussex along England’s southern coast is currently giving France’s Champagne region a run for its money? Neither did I, but it is, with at least ten vineyards producing fizzy, festive sparklers, one of which outshone eight true Champagnes in a head-to-head taste test in 2010, ultimately winning the tasters’ “Best Sparkling Wine” award. Andrew told me the chalky soil and the climate of the South Downs is nearly the same as those of the Champagne region, thus the same chardonnay, pinot noir, and pinot meunière grapes thrive and produce strikingly similar quality wines. A sip proved this. It turns out that the Sussex sparklers celebrate gatherings and reunions just as deliciously as their French counterparts.

The sorrel soufflé that followed for dinner continued the celebration. A soufflé can convey the feeling of a special occasion like no other dish can. The preparation’s eggy, airy height, its golden brown crown, the cook’s mastery of classic technique – all these proclaim that the person in the kitchen clearly thinks his guests are special and worthy of attention. And at the same time, nothing is more homey than a soufflé: it is a dish best eaten in a home kitchen, where dish can go from oven to table in a matter of seconds before the whole ethereal concoction deflates. Andrew’s version was delicious and about as homey as it gets. The sorrel came from his own garden, the eggs from his hens. And yes, we ate in the kitchen. And had good British cheese for dessert.

If you can’t find the distinctive sour-tasting sorrel leaves in the market, do what I did and substitute the same amount of spinach cooked and then tossed with the zest from 3 lemons to approximate sorrel’s tang. And then promise yourself you’ll grow sorrel in your garden so you can one day soon taste the real thing.

Sorrel (or Mock Sorrel) Soufflé

• 1 colander full of either sorrel or spinach leaves
• zest from 2 washed lemons (if using spinach)
• 4 Tbsp. butter
• 5 Tbsp. flour
• 1-1/4 cups milk, warmed
• 3 ounces grated gruyere cheese, finely grated
• salt and ground black pepper
• 6 eggs, separated
• pinch of cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 375 degress. Butter a 2-quart straight-sided soufflé dish and set it aside.

Wash the sorrel (or spinach) thoroughly. Spin or shake it to remove most of the water. Place the partially dry leaves in a large saucepan set over medium heat, cover the pan, and let the leaves wilt. This will only take a couple of minutes. Remove from the heat when wilted. Remove the cover from the pan and drain the leaves in a colander, squeezing out excess water as necessary. Chop the greens and set aside. If using spinach, toss these now with the lemon zest and set aside.

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium-high heat. When melted, whisk in the flour and continue whisking until the roux is smooth. Cook for a minute or two to eliminate the raw taste of uncooked flour. Reduce the heat to medium and then gradually whisk in the warmed milk. Continue whisking as you blend to avoid lumps in the sauce. When all the milk has been added, continue stirring. The sauce should thicken quite quickly.

Remove the pan from the heat and add the chopped sorrel and the cheese. Stir to combine, then season with 1/2 tsp. salt and black pepper to taste. Blend well. Transfer the sauce to a large bowl and let cool slightly.

Once the sauce is warm but no longer hot, add the egg yolks to it, adding one at a time and blending well by hand after each addition. Set this mixture aside.

In a clean bowl using clean beaters, beat the egg whites with a pinch of cream of tartar until stiff peaks form. When stiff, spoon about a quarter of the egg whites into the roux-cheese-egg yolk mixture. Gently fold the whites into the sauce to lighten it.

When lightened a bit with this first addition, add the rest of the whites to the mixture and fold gently to combine. It’s fine if there are a few streaks of white remaining. Spoon the souffle mixture into the prepared souffle dish.

Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until risen and golden brown on top. (Check by looking through your oven’s window rather than by opening the oven door.) Souffle will begin to fall immediately after you remove it from the oven. Serve immediately with a green salad.

Note: The wonderful thing about a soufflé is you can make it a couple of hours in advance of baking it. Do what Andrew did and simply spoon the mixture into the prepared soufflé dish and refrigerate for up to two hours. When ready to bake, pop it in the preheated oven. When chilled, a soufflé may take about 5 extra minutes to reach doneness. Watch it through that oven window!

©2012  Jane A. Ward

If you’d like to learn more about Sussex sparkling wine:

Thirty years later and I was back in that luxurious and special place.

Over breakfast on the first morning in London, coffee cup in one hand and guide book with map in the other, I drafted my mental list of the day’s goals: the places I would visit; the route I would take to each one; where I might stop if hunger, fatigue, or other matter of nature called. Then came the moment when, plans set, I wiped my lips with the breakfast napkin, made sure my bag was packed properly for the day, and set my body in motion to do my mind’s bidding.

Between 9 am and 5 pm on that Wednesday I walked miles and miles of cobbled London pavement and scenic park paths. Strolled countless meters of shop floors and museum corridors. At the end of the day I alone had the weary legs and shoulders, and the blood blisters on the flat of my heels despite the sensible shoes, and the city seared into my memory. “Be here now” meant something.

Evidence of this mind-body harmony showed up at the Victoria and Albert Museum with its vast collection of design arts. Unlike the writing arts, design thoroughly marries mind and body, and the museum pays homage to centuries of the human brain’s ideas being interpreted to life by handcrafting in glass, jewel, fabric, silver, wood, metal, and ceramics.

Seamless integration of idea and activity also played out at Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. Between them the public spaces boast a palace, statues, waterfall and serpentine lake, floral gardens, and many gracefully meandering pathways all leading to one of the world’s most ornate tributes to love – the love of a queen for her Prince Consort. The parks remind how many minds and hands may tame nature, shape nature, and also enhance it according to an idea, bringing the intellectual concepts of enjoyment and even love to life.

What a fool I am for travel and London! An appropriate recipe to share, then, is a British favorite, the fruit fool. Served for pudding (dessert), the dish has a simplicity that highlights the fresh flavors of seasonal fruit and fine quality dairy products. I like my fools made with a plain yoghurt lightened with a bit of whipped cream, so that’s the version I offer here. I simply like the weight and the additional tang the yoghurt imparts, resulting in a dessert that isn’t too sweet and may be eaten at any time of the day without guilt. If you like, fold the slightly sweetened stewed fruits into only whipped cream for something more buttery in taste. Or blended into pastry cream, if you like your desserts sweeter. Rhubarb fool is a classic; this mixed berry makes a nice twist.

Raspberry-Blackberry Fool

• 1 pint raspberries
• 1 pint blackberries
• juice of one lemon
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 24 ounces good quality plain yoghurt (choose one with a creamy texture rather than watery; Greek style is too thick)
• 1/2 cup heavy cream, whipped

Wash the berries and place them in a small saucepan. Drizzle with the lemon juice and add the sugar. Set the pan over medium heat and bring the fruit to a gentle bubble. Cook the fruit at a simmer until it gives off its juices and the berries soften but do not fall apart. Once the fruit is soft, remove it from the pan to a bowl using a slotted spoon. Raise the heat a bit under the juice left behind in the pan and continue to cook it until it reduces and thickens, stirring occasionally to prevent scorching. When the juice is syrupy and darkened, remove the pan from the heat. Add the syrup to the fruit in the bowl, stir gently, and set the bowl in the refrigerator to cool. (For a visual of this step, please see the slideshow.)

When the fruit is cool, assemble the fool. In a large bowl, combine the plain yoghurt and the whipped cream. Fold these together gently. (For a visual of this step, please see the slideshow.)

Gently fold the chilled berry mixture into the yoghurt-cream mixture to your taste, either leaving the mixture streaky or blending thoroughly for a more consistent look and taste. Up to you. Spoon into individual dessert glasses or dishes and serve. (For a visual of this step, please see the slideshow.)

To go all nursery tea with your fruit fool, try passing some crushed digestive biscuits (either plain or chocolate) around the table to your guests for a mix-in. Delicious treat!

©2012 Jane A. Ward

The good “huswife” or cook in a large gentry kitchen using this book would have learned how to boil larks, “make a tarte that is courage to a man or woman” using the braynes of three or four cock sparrows, bake a classic pye of humbles (deer organ meat), and whip up a caudle of stale ale and egg yolks said to comfort the stomacke.

She also would have read the first known recipe for English Trifle.

Take a pinte of thicke Creame, and sea-

son it with Suger and Ginger, and

Rosewater, so stirre it as you would then

haue it, and make it luke warme in a dish

on a Chafingdishe and coales, and after put

it into a siluer peece or a bowle, and so serue

it to the boorde.

Not much like the layered sponge cake-boiled custard-sherry-whipped cream assemblage we know today as trifle, but within the recipe we see the modern dessert’s precursor, all creamy confection and also served in a large bowl.

Both the recipe’s simplicity and the dish’s custardy creaminess must have appealed to many, for not long after Dawson published his book in the late 16th century, trifle went a-traveling, picking up variations along the way. Eventually cooks all over England adapted it to include their favorite sponge cake and sometimes fruit jams or fresh fruit. Trifle headed due north of London into Scotland where the natives used the same basic structure but added their stamp. Their spiking liquor of choice was single malt scotch whisky or whisky liqueur, and the Scots called the resulting whisky take on trifle “Tipsy Laird.” (Translation: Drunken Lord of the Estate.)

Within only a few years, trifle made its way across the sea to Bologna in the time-honored way, British court cooks sharing recipes with the cooks for Italian dukes and earls. And in Italy the dessert became zuppa inglese, or English soup. Different cakes, different liqueurs, different pastry creams, but the same result – one big creamy mess of a dessert served out of a large bowl.

Today in Italy there are as many variations of zuppa inglese as there are of trifle in England and abroad. Fruit, no fruit; liquor, no liquor; whipped cream, no whipped cream; pan di spagna versus savoiardi biscuits. When my daughter asked for the zuppa for her birthday cake, I made my own favorite version sans alcohol. And here it is, part trifle, part zuppa inglese, and with a nod to tiramisu but nary a tipsy laird in sight. Try it this way, biscuits moistened with brewed coffee, or brush the savoiardi with sherry or kahlua, rum syrup or even grand marnier for an unforgettable birthday or family holiday or formal dinner party dessert.

Zuppa Inglese

• large glass bowl
• 2 recipes pastry cream: 1 vanilla, 1 chocolate (recipes follow)
• 1-2 cups brewed coffee, cold
• (2) 200 gram packages of savoiardi biscuits (crunchy Italian ladyfingers)
• 1 cup heavy cream
• shaved or grated chocolate for decoration

Make the pastry creams first (recipes below) and allow to cool according to recipe directions.

Pour the cold coffee into a wide shallow dish, such as a baking dish or pie plate.

Dip one side of the savoiardi biscuit into the cold coffee and place, coffee side up, into the bottom of the glass dish. Repeat with 6 or 7 biscuits until the bottom is covered.

Spoon about one-third of the vanilla pastry cream over the biscuits to cover.

Cover the pastry cream with another layer of coffee-dipped biscuits. Again, place these ladyfingers with the coffee side facing up. If your bowl has sloping sides, this second layer will use slightly more cookies.

When the vanilla custard is covered with savoiardi, spoon some chocolate pastry cream over the second layer of biscuits.

Repeat the dipping and layering two more times: another layer of coffee-dipped savoiardi, then enough of the remaining vanilla cream to cover; another layer of coffee-dipped savoiardi, then enough of the remaining chocolate cream to cover. The top layer will be chocolate cream.

Cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate the zuppa inglese for about 6-8 hours as the biscuits soften.

For presentation and serving, whip the cup of heavy cream until it is firm but still billowy. Remove the zuppa bowl from the refrigerator and gently spread the cream over the top. Grate a little dark chocolate from a chocolate bar over the top. Alternately you may dust the top with cocoa powder. Candle, no candle – you decide.

Use a large spoon to dig in and serve, keeping the layers as intact as possible.

Two Pastry Creams

For the vanilla:

• 2 cups whole milk, divided use
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 4 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup sugar, divided use
• pinch of salt
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 Tbsp. butter, softened

In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together 1/2 cup milk, 1/4 cup sugar, and cornstarch.  Add egg yolks and blend well.  Set aside.

Place 1 1/2 cups milk, 1/2 cup sugar, and pinch of salt together in a medium saucepan.  Heat to a gentle boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar.  Remove the boiling milk from the heat and add about a third of the mixture to the egg mixture in the mixing bowl in a slow stream, whisking as you add it.  After the yolks have been tempered with  bit of the hot milk, add the rest to the eggs in a stream, whisking well.

Return the mixture to the saucepan and place over medium heat.  Whisk constantly until the mixture begins to thicken.  When it begins to bubble remove it from the heat.  Still whisking, add the vanilla and butter and whisk until melted and smooth.

Turn the pastry cream into a small bowl and cover the top with a piece of plastic wrap, placing the wrap right on the surface of the custard to prevent a skin from forming.  Set aside to cool.

For the chocolate:

• 2 cups whole milk, divided use
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 4 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup sugar, divided use
• pinch of salt
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 Tbsp. butter, softened
• 2 ounces unsweetened baking chocolate, chopped finely

Make chocolate pastry cream in the same way as you made the vanilla cream.  When time to add the butter and vanilla to the hot, thickened custard.  Stir well to blend, then whisk in the chopped chocolate.  Whisk until thoroughly melted and well mixed.

Turn the pastry cream into a small bowl and cover the top with a piece of plastic wrap, placing the wrap right on the surface of the custard to prevent a skin from forming.  Set aside to cool.

©2012  Jane A. Ward

Yes, cold lamb is delicious, something I too believe and which Thursday’s leftover supper confirmed. I baked a batch of pita breads, whipped up some tzatziki sauce, and took thin slices off the cold boneless leg of lamb for homestyle gyros. Roasted just right the day before, the lamb was buttery tender, its sweet and somewhat grassy flavor enhanced by the parsley and garlic in the sauce.

But as delicious as the sandwiches were on Thursday, the lamb was not gone by Friday night. Alas, the pitas were, as was the opportunity for another supper of gyros. What to make instead? Cold lamb on a plate was certainly an option. But thinking of something more to do with leftover lamb seemed the better option. With four baby bok choy and a length of fresh ginger in the vegetable crisper, I left the Greece/Turkey influences behind and headed further east, in the direction of Mongolia where lamb and vegetables and Asian spices combine quite commonly in hotpots, or simmering soups.

More stirfry than soup and with no claim to being authentically Mongolian, the resulting lamb and bok choy was nonetheless delicious. We loved it. And you might too, a day or two after Easter when you are wondering what to do with your own leftovers.

Asian-style Lamb and Bok Choy

• 3 Tbsp. dry sherry
• 1-1/2 tsp. cornstarch
• 3 Tbsp. soy sauce
• 1-1/2 Tbsp. molasses
• 1 tsp. sweet chili sauce
• 4 small or 2 larger bok choy
• 2 Tbsp. peanut or vegetable oil
• 3 Tbsp. finely chopped peeled fresh ginger
• 2 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1 small onion, cut into thin slivers
• 16 oz. cooked leg of lamb meat, cut into thin strips

Stir sherry and cornstarch in small bowl to blend. Mix in the soy sauce, molasses, and chili sauce with a whisk and set aside.

Clean the bok choy and trim off the root end while leaving the bulb intact. For small bok choy, cut the dark leaves from the bulb and cut the leaves into ½-inch wide ribbons.

Cut each bulb end in half and then into quarters. Keep leaves and bulbs in separate piles and set these aside. (If using larger bok choy, cut the leafy part into ribbons as described above, and cut the bulb ends crosswise as you would cut celery, also in ½-inch wide strips. Keep separate and set aside.)

Heat the oil in a large skillet set over high heat. Add ginger, garlic, and onion slivers. Sauté until they begin to soften but not brown, about 1 – 2 minutes. Add to this the quartered bok choy bulbs and stir. Cook while stirring occasionally until the bok choy begins to get tender but not soft.

Add to this the bok choy leaves and cook, stirring occasionally, until the leaves wilt slightly. Next add the lamb and stir until it is warmed through, about two minutes or so.

Stir the sherry mixture in the small bowl if it has settled and add this to the skillet. Bring the mixture to a simmer, and continue to simmer until the sauce thickens and gets clear. Stir often while cooking for another two minutes or so.

Serve the lamb and bok choy with white or brown rice or buckwheat noodles (soba).

©2012  Jane A. Ward