Weekend Cooking/Cook the Books: The Language of Food by Annabel Abbs

 

When I saw that this book was the selection for February/March for Cook the Books, I wasn't 100% sure if I would read it or not as it would be a reread for me and I don't generally do rereads. However, FOMO is real and so I did end up reading it again, and I am glad I did.

I have a potted history with this book, which is also published under the title Miss Eliza's English Kitchen. Originally I tried to read it on an Easter road trip back in 2022. I struggled to keep interested so I put it down, only picking it up again 6 months later. I had to start reading the book again, and this time I thought it was quite good! However, I think it is a book that grows on you because when I started it again for this post, I struggled to be able to put it down. It's a book that seems to get better each time you read it!

The Language of Food tells the story of Eliza Acton and her assistant Ann Kirby as they developed what is credited as the first cookbook targeted at domestic cooks. She was also the first person to include a precise list of ingredients as part of the recipe, although she had it at the bottom rather than at the top.

It is a shame that Eliza Acton is not more well known, as her story is interesting and she has left a  lasting legacy. Interestingly, she started as a poet but when her poems were rejected she was tasked with writing a cook book. At the time, she couldn't cook at all. However, when her family fortunes are decimated, she and her mother find themselves running a boarding house for respectable people in the town of Tonbridge. Eliza is determined that she can do better than the cookbooks that were available at the time, and so she starts to teach herself to cook and write the recipes, testing the recipes for preciseness and taste.

Ann's story is also interesting, albeit almost opposite to Eliza. She came from a very poor background with a father with a penchant for drinking and a mother who is demented. Her local priest finds her a place with the Actons. She soon shows that she not only is a hard worker but she has a good sense of taste and cooking skill. Soon Eliza is talking about her book as "our book" with Ann, which suggests a closeness but both of them are keeping very big secrets from each other.

When I read a book for Cook the Books, I am always on the look out for what it is that I am going to cook so I take note of all of the mentions of food. I am glad I didn't keep a list for this book because there are SO many mentions of food the list would have been more than a page long. However, as soon as I got to a particular section, I knew that I at least had a direction, partially due to the fact that I have recently visited India.

At one point in the book, Eliza has a suitor named Mr Arnott who is a spice merchant, which seems an ideal match for her. Mr Arnott loves curry, and there is a mention at one point of egg curry, and that was my decision made.

Last year, I wrote about a cook book called Everything is Indian. I previously shared a recipe for delicious Curried Sausage Rolls, but one of the other recipes we have tried from the book was an Egg Curry, and so today, that is the recipe that I am going to share today.

The next selection for Cook the Book is called The Call of the Camino by Suzanne Redfearn. I see some Spanish food in my future!

This book counts for the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge which I host here and Foodies Read hosted at Based on a True Story.

Rating 4.5/5

Egg Curry (Anda Tarkari) - Justin Narayan

6 eggs, at room temperature
1/4 to 1/3 cup (60-80ml) light olive oil
1 large brown onion, thinly sliced
15-20 fresh curry leaves
2 bird's eye chillies, halved lengthways
1/4 teaspoon cumin seeds
1/4 teaspoon black mustard seeds
1/8 teaspoon fenugreek seeds
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon chilli powder
1 large ripe tomato, roughly diced or 1/2 x 400g (14oz) can diced tomatoes

Pour some iced water into a bowl. Bring a saucepan of water to a gentle boil, then add the eggs. Boil for 6 minutes, then immediately transfer them to the iced water. Once cool enough to handle, peel the eggs.

Line a plate with paper towel. Heat the oil in the frying pan over medium heat. Fry the boiled eggs until golden brown al over, about 1-2 minutes. Drain the eggs on the paper-towel lined plate.

In the same pan, add the onion, curry leaves, fresh chilli and whole spices and cook until the onion is golden brown, about 3-4 minutes. Add the powdered spices and a pinch of salt and mix. Add the garlic and tomato and cook until the tomato has completely broken down, about 5-6 minutes. Return the eggs to the pan and simmer for 2-5 minutes so all the ingredients get to know each other. 

Taste and adjust with salt. Garnish with coriander and serve with roti and rice. 

Tip: If you don't have fresh tomato, use half a can of tomato and you'll get the same result. Use the whole tin if you want it to be saucier. 

Weekly meals

Saturday - 
Sunday - Chicken and Chorizo Orzo
Monday - Bacon, mushrooms and zucchini pasta
Tuesday - Eggs on Toast
Wednesday - Beef and Broccoli Noodles
Thursday - Egg curry
Friday -

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page

Weekend Cooking: Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

I know I am very late to the party but I have just finished reading Lessons in Chemistry. This book was voted as best debut novel in the Goodreads Choice Awards in 2021 and it was even a Cook the Books choice earlier this year. I did start reading it then, but review books got in the way so put it to one side.

This month, my read on a theme book club theme was science and so this was my chance to finally read the book. Actually I wasn't the only one to read it as several people in the group chose this book. I also listened to a book called The Botanists Daughter by Kayte Nunn so it was a busy science themed month for me.

So after the good intentions and the false start, what did I think? I really loved it. Once I restarted it again, I read the whole thing in less than 24 hours and I loved it!

Elizabeth Zott is a very unusual for her time. The role of a typical 1960s woman is not for her. Not staying at home to be a housewife, not waiting for her husband to arrive home with dinner on the table. She is first and foremost a scientist, but that is not easy in a world where people, or more precisely the men in charge, don't believe that women have what it takes. She has had to deal with sexism and much worse. She ends up working at Hastings Institute and you better be sure that she isn't going to put up with anyone's rubbish. There she meets fellow scientist Calvin Evans, a man who is destined to win the Nobel Prize. After a rocky start, Elizabeth and Calvin realise that they are destined to be together, and so they build their unconventional life together. 

When tragedy strikes, Elizabeth finds herself out of work and so she sets up a laboratroy in her kitchen so she can continue her important work, even helping out her previous colleagues, for a price. After all, now she is a single parent to her daughter Mad and owner of Six-Thirty the dog. 

Elizabeth knows that it is important to ensure that her daughter's nutritional needs are fully met. She is therefore incensed when she realises that one of her daughter's school friends is eating Mad's carefully planned lunches. She confronts the child's TV producer father who is stunned.  He sees an opportunity to start a cooking show starring Elizabeth. Right from the beginning she is perceived as being difficult as she will not conform to the norms. For example, she insists on wearing a lab coat, and she insists on speaking scientifically. The bosses don't believe that this is what the viewers want to see, but for the women watching it is a breath of fresh air, empowering them one recipe at a time

Meanwhile, we learn about both Calvin and Elizabeth's pasts, about science, rowing, food and so much more. The book is very clever, it is funny and it is also sad. I recommended this book to my former boss and when she finished it she texted me at 7 o'clock in the morning to say that she had cried and it was all my fault. She is not normally a crier at all!

It would be remiss of me not to mention the secondary characters, in particularly Six-Thirty the dog. He is one of the more unusual animal characters in fiction.

I am sure you can tell that I really enjoyed this book, and I am very excited about the upcoming TV series which is due out in October. Here's the teaser trailer:

I thought I would share a quote from the book where Elizabeth is making...well....I am sure you will be able to tell what she is making, although I haven't ever seen it described this way before!

Holding an egg in the palm of her hand, she turned to him. "Here's a tip, Six-Thirty: never crack eggs on the side of a bowl - it increases the chance of shell fragments. Better to bring a sharp, thin knife down on the egg as if you're cracking a whip. See?" she said, as the egg's contents slipped into the bowl.

Six-Thirty watched without blinking.


"Now I'm disrupting the egg's internal bonds in order to elongate the amino acid chain," she told him as she whisked, "which will allow the freed atoms to bond with the other similarly freed atoms. Then I'll reconstitute the mix into a loose whole, laying it on a surface of iron-carbon alloy, where I'll subject it to the precision heat, continually agitating the mix until it reaches a stage of coagulation.

"LaLanne is an animal," Calvin announced as he wandered into the kitchen, his T-shirt damp.

 

"Agreed," Elizabeth said as she took the frying pan off the flame and placed the eggs on two plates. "Because humans are animals. Technically. Although sometimes I think the animals we consider animals are far more advanced than the animals we are but don't consider ourselves to be." She looked to Six-Thirty for confirmation, but even he couldn't parse that one.

I am also sharing this review with the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge and with Foodie Reads hosted at Based on a True Story

Weekly meals

Saturday -  

Sunday -  Out for dinner

Monday - 

Tuesday - 

Wednesday - Pork Nachos

Thursday - Thai Red Beef Curry 

Friday - Takeaway

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page

Weekend Cooking: Chorizo and Sun Dried Tomato Tortilla

One of our most useful kitchen acquisitions of the last year has been the slow cooker/pressure cooker that I received for my birthday in June. At the time, I had no idea that I needed one, but we have used it quite a lot.

One day we were at Kmart and found a cookbook which has recipes for both uses. We then bought volume 2 of the book, and once again we have many, many recipes that we want to try. On Sunday we decided that we needed to pick one to try and we chose a recipe for Chorizo and Sun Dried Tomato Tortilla, because it isn't your normal casserole/stew type recipe.

We did, however, come a bit unstuck. Firstly, my husband who does most of our cooking got called out to a job with the community service organisation he volunteers for, so I had to cook. And then secondly there was an issue because the recipes calls for the tortilla to be layered up into a 20cm cake tin and then put inside the pressure cooking. The only problem is that my 20cm cake tin has small handles on the side, which prevented it from lowering into the pressure cooker. So because I was couldn't use the pressure cooker, I cooked the potatoes in a saucepan.

I therefore had to improvise, which is not my strong point. I am not someone who can open the pantry door and take a bit of this and that and then create something delicious. I am a recipe follower so an obstacle such as the one I mentioned above is one that causes me to panic a little! Well, I am a recipe follower until I'm not. 

I was therefore quite pleased with how this worked out given that I had to adapt the recipe! Instead of following the recipe as written below, I cooked out the zucchini, onion and chorizo a bit more, and then baked it in the oven for around 45 minutes covered in foil, then another 15 minutes without the foil. I also forgot the garlic, but I only just realised this now! And that I put 25g of parmesan in instead of the cheddar cheese. The parmesan was supposed to go on some rocket to accompany the tortilla which we didn't want to have.

Sun dried tomato isn't one of our normal go-to ingredients.  We did enjoy it as is but we are thinking that you could adapt the ingredients quite easily. We are thinking about maybe doing chorizo, red capsicum and onion and get a delicious tasting lunch dish that we could prepare on the weekend and have for lunch during the week.

Chorizo and Sun-Dried Tomato Tortilla

Serves 6.

3 medium potatoes (600g)

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 large onion (200g), sliced thinly

2 cloves garlic, crushed 

250g (8oz) cured chorizo sausages, thinly sliced

3/4 cup (135g) semi-dried tomatoes, chopped coarsely

2 medium zucchini (240g), grated coarsely, squeezed dry

10 eggs, beaten lightly

1 cup (120g) coarsely grated cheddar cheese

Peel potatoes and cut into 5mm (1/4in) slices. Place in a 6 litre (24-cup) pressure cooker; add enough cold water to just cover. Season with salt. Bring to the boil and cook for 5 minutes or until three-quarters cooked; drain. Spread potato slices on a tray to cool

Dry pressure cooker. Heat half the olive oil over medium heat; cook onion, garlic and chorizo, stirring for 5 minutes or until onion is soft. Stir in tomatoes and zucchini; season to taste.

Lightly grease a 20cm (8in) cake pan; line base and side with baking paper. Cover base with potato. Spread vegetable mixture evenly over potato. Combine egg and half the cheese; season. Pour egg mixture over the vegetables. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Cover tightly with foil. Fold a 60cm (24in) length of foil to make a narrow sling; place under the pan. This allows for easy removal from the pressure cooker. 

Place a trivet n base of the pressure cooker and add 1 cup (250ml) water. Place cake pan, with foil sling, on trivet over the water; secure pressure cooker likd. Bring cooker to low pressure. Reduce heat to stabilise pressure; cook for 45 minutes or until just set. Release pressure using the quick release method. Alternatively if using an electric pressure cooking, your cooker will stabilise itself.

Preheat over grill (broiler) to high. Transfer tortilla, top-side up, onto a greased over tray. Cook under the grill for 5 minutes or until cheese is golden

Weekly meals

Saturday- Apple Pie and Cream

Sunday - Chorizo and sun dried tomato tortilla

Monday - Japanese chicken curry with rice

Tuesday - Salmon teriyaki stir fry

Wednesday - Spanish tuna pasta bake

Thursday - Honey chicken with rice and broccolini

Friday - Burritos (out for dinner)

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page.