Ginger Tablet

Greengage and Damson Jam

The damsons were the size of rotund grapes. So small, they certainly didn't look like plums. And when you bit into them, there was a pucker and a wince. Their bright yellow flesh sour and bitter.

Contrary to the signals your brain was firing, the atomic pulp of the greengages was nothing but sweetness. Already jammy before it went in the pot. 

There is nothing to making these jams. I bought approximately a pound and a half (600 g) of each kind and stood at the counter, slowly pitting them. First the damsons went in the copper pot with a tiny bit of water and a good amount of sugar. As the juices released and the fruit started to bubble slowly, more sugar was added to taste. Judged by dipping a small parade of teaspoons in the hot syrup until the sweetness balanced out the tart bitterness of the fruit. After adding almost as much sugar as fruit, I let the jam simmer until it clung  to the spoon, no longer threatening to slip off.

Old jars were sterilised in boiling water and lined up on a clean tea towel and I decanted the royal purple jam, trying to be careful, trying not to spill, almost succeeding. The colour is surprising. With their yellow interiors you never suspect that the resulting  jam will be such a uniform and profound hue.

Lids go on, and the jars are turned upside down to create a seal. 

And then the procedure repeats for the greengages, but as they are already quite sweet, just a fraction of the sugar is required. Sugar is surreptitiously bulky and adding less gives a smalled yield and a runnier texture. Once again it cooks slowly until the plums lose their shape and become a puddle of thick, sticky liquid. Once again, the hot green jam is carefully spooned into jars.

Despite these rituals, I have no faith in my processes. So I make a small amount and keep it all in the fridge.

It doesn't matter. Jam is an embellishment. There is none of the pressure of dinner, the expectations of a cake. If, somehow, it doesn't work, no one will notice. It won't be missed. If it does, it's an unexpected joy. A tiny gift.

Samphire and Crab Linguine

We've spent the last two weekends running away, first to the east coast and then to the west, staying just one night each time, getting covered in sand and midgie bites and learning the peculiarities of our new tent. These were not culinary journeys, although there were some delicious moments. Like the roasted sausage and pepper sandwiches I made over the campfire with the help of my trusty stick. See the raw materials below:

Waking up far earlier than necessary the next morning, I went for a walk through my hangover and down the length of the estuary on the way to the beach. The tide was low, the river just skimming over the sand and trickling down to the sea, leaving a vast, flat, sandy moonscape stretched out until the grasses and dunes in the distance. It's the expanse behind the sausages in the picture above. You can't tell that the sea lies beyond, but it does, the brave among us swam in it later on. In the estuary, though, was the second delicious treat. The sole vegetation; colonies of micro cacti, hundreds of small samphire plants breaking up the endless sand. I grabbed a few sprigs on my way back to the tents. 

Samphire is often called sea asparagus, and I suppose that's apt in some ways. It's long and green, for example. But I belong to the tiny minority that finds asparagus terribly dull. So boring. It tastes like stringy grass unless it is thoroughly roasted with strong aromatics. Now and then I'll buy some out of an obscure sense of duty and add them to a risotto or pasta, but it's just wasted on me.

And that's absolutely fine as no one ever forces me to eat asparagus anymore. But I resent the association with samphire. They do not taste the same. First of all, samphire absorbs all of the salt in its environment, making it an already seasoned vegetable. A truly rare beast. As the levels of salinity are just shy of aggressive, you don't need very much in any dish. Also, it's a member of the succulent family. It's closer to aloe than asparagus. So it has a pleasantly satisfying cruchy/snapping/jelly texture.  And its flavour, underneath the saltiness, is subtly floral and alien, almost peppery. It's a green curiosity. Something that would be difficult to grow bored of and it makes asparagus seem pretty darn plain.

Samphire grows in exactly the kind of environment in which I found it; river beds near the sea. The best way to collect is by cutting a few sprigs off and leaving the base intact. You can eat it raw, or lightly cooked alongside of fish and seafood. It would probably be nice with eggs or in a seaweed salad as well. I can't imagine it would hold up to long cooking times, but perhaps I'm underestimating it. We had it first panfried with butter, a fat piece of salmon on top and mashed potatoes underneath. Next I made this pasta and it was delicious. How could roasted tomatoes, cream and crab not be? If you haven't been to the seaside recently, you could easily make it without the samphire. You could even throw some asparagus in if it was in season and you were a pedestrian sicko.

Roasted Tomato, Samphire and Crab Linguine

Given the amounts, this probably should feed 3-4, but we are greedy and it just fed two of us. 

Ingredients

• 1 kilo cherry tomatoes 
• garlic
• a handful of crab meat (I used a tin and it was just fine)
• another handful of chopped samphire (well rinsed)
• olive oil, salt and pepper
•  cream
• chopped parsley
• something spicy: pepper sauce, chili flakes
• linguine, enough for 2-3 people

Method

1.  Dump the cherry tomatoes on a roasting pan with olive oil, salt and pepper and roast on a high heat, as high as your oven will go, for about 20 minutes.
2. Once they are juicy and broken and just a little bit black, remove them from the oven and start boiling the water for your pasta. Cook the pasta following your normal procedures and rituals.
3. Dump the tomatoes in a pan with the garlic. Then add the crab meat and the samphire.
4. Pour in some cream. As much as you can get away with. Ok, not so much that it will dull the acidity of the tomatoes, but enough that it feels like a small luxury.
5. Add your spicy poison of choice and the parsley, toss with the drained pasta.

Preserved Quince

I think you should try to smell a quince today.

If you haven't grown up with this fruit, its perfume is unusual but still somehow familiar; it's the missing fruit smell from your vast register. They smell ancient and warm and spiced with a clear citrus spike. I suggest them as an antidote to rain that has been falling angrily for hours and will most likely persist for the rest of the day, week, month.

Of course, you can smell quince all you want, but I don't think you should take a bite.* You can't eat them raw because bad things will happen to you. Witness:

•  Adam took a bite and got banished from Eden and had to wear clothes.
• J almost ate one of the ones pictured above while I was out at the pub. He would also have been banished and subjected to my fierce and angry wrath: quince aren't easy to find in Glasgow and these Spanish babies were not cheap. Fortunately J felt a sense of foreboding and decided not to proceed with his snack and domestic harmony reigned.
• I took a wee nibble as I was cutting them up. It wasn't actually that bad, but you know when you eat a persimmon that's not ripe and your whole mouth feels like it's full of aggressive cotton balls and you want to scrape all of the skin out of your oral cavity as soon as possible? Well there was a soupcon of that, so I would imagine a bigger bite would not be pleasant.

But as soon as you cook them, they soften, banish the bitterness and release only their sweetly complex flavour. And most fantastically of all, they turn from boring white into amazing pink, coral and red. Look:

This is my pot of poaching quince right after they've all been sliced and added to the sugar syrup (I dissolved about 2 cups of sugar in two cups of water).

And this is what they looked like after about 45 minutes. How magical is that? What other fruit performs such alchemical wonders all on its own while you sit read celebrity gossip online?

After the fruit was cooked, I scooped it into two clean, boiled jars and stuck them in the fridge (preserves make me nervous, so I make very small batches and keep them cold).

I cracked open one of these jars the other night to accompany some organic crowdie (a soft cheese made in the Highlands) and a few very crisp oatcakes. Quince has quite a bit of naturally occuring pectin so that makes the soft fruit pieces more like jellied sweets than syrupy preserves. There's a grittiness to the flesh, a bit like a pear, that gives the pink segments a sturdy texture and substance next to the soft folds of cheese. And the flavour: so perfumed and layered, redolent of dozens of aromatics, even though nothing but sugar was added. Your mouth fills with a taste that was hinted at when you first smelled the fruit. It's a miraculous payoff for such a simple bit of work.

* Certain varieties of quince can be eaten raw, particularly those grown in the Middle East. If you're unsure, cook the sucker.

The Blood and Vegetables Commandments

Well, I lied. I said I would post every day for two weeks and then I really didn't. My reasons were complicated. First of all the executive committee of Ginger Tablet took one look at me and decided I needed to get out of the house more. They prescribed a weekend of parties, field trips and excessive drinking. I complied. Once I had met their requirements and demonstrated correct dancing techniques to artist populations in Glasgow and Dundee, I returned home to commence the blog once more.

That's when an important component in my computer decided to die. More specifically, the "power tip" for my ancient Dell. I had to order a new one and wait patiently for it to arrive, consoling myself in the cool glow of J's deluxe and powerful Mac.

Plus, after I gave blood last Thursday I died a slow and miserable death and that really got in the way of my life goals. Oh boy, am I joking. I don't mean to proselytize like a rabid new convert, but giving blood is exactly like what they say on the guilt-tripping commercials: easy+fast+painless+feel good smugness+COOKIE. Honestly. I know the trust is broken, but I'm not lying now. A few years back, some "doctor", some pimple on the ass of the otherwise majestic city of Montreal, misdiagnosed me with cancer. During that time I had a lot of blood taken for tests. Other than the thought of dying and having my lymph nodes constantly probed (they reside in delicate places), extruding blood was the thing I hated most. I was pretty worried it was going to feel the same, but it actually hurt less. And even though they were taking far more, it only took about 10 minutes. I've also fainted around needles twice in the past, but I didn't even feel funny standing up after the bloodletting. Plus, not only did I get a cookie, it was a Tunnock's tea cake! I'm doing this again, as soon as possible.

I know a lot of people have very genuine reasons for not doing this, but if you're not among them, just do it. Sermon over.

Another one beginning:

I strongly suggest that you make some mushroom pate (and that you forgive my lack of accents). Are you tired of your normal sandwich fillings? Is that acrid store-bought hummus making you sad? Is that unsettling flop of luncheon meat turning your stomach? Mushroom pate, my friends, that is the answer.

Admittedly, this doesn't sound like a sexy proposal. It sounds a little vegan in fact. A little like a "substitute" for something that actually tastes nice. But I'm pretty sure I had a dream about this spread last night, and I couldn't wait to unsnap the lid of my lunch box today.

Happiness can be yours. Just buy some regular mushrooms. That's what I did; one of the massive supermarkets was selling a 2lbs box of mushrooms for 1.50 and I couldn't pass up that bargain. So to deal with this very large quantity, I cut up an onion and some garlic and added a bit more butter than I normally would into a pot (a couple of tablespoons). I sauteed them and then began slicing my mushrooms and throwing them in there, too. At first I wasn't going to add the lot, but the smell of them cooking weakened my will. I sliced all of them and sent J out for a bottle of white wine. While he was gone, I added some rosemary and thyme, and just kept on stirring them now and again. At this point they were dark and slippy and small and amazingly delicious. Especially with a bit of salt thrown in. When the wine arrived, one glug was added and after a couple of minutes the heat was turned off. I made one piece of toast. I put half of the mushrooms and the crumbled piece of toast into the blender. Blitzing occurred, my love was instant.

With a texture like raw silk and a flavour that seemed impossibly deep given the basic ingredients, I only managed to dislodge the spoon from my hand with the thought that the pate would (crazy as it seemed) be better tomorrow after a night in the fridge. AND IT WAS. The method I used was a simple one, but you can added in loads of other things like shallots, different booze, cheeses like parmesan, cream and maybe mascarpone, different herbs; your choice. You could make it properly vegan and use olive oil instead of butter. This is also perfect for sensitive geniuses who want a vegetarian spread but find beans difficult.

With the rest of the lovely mushrooms we made a risotto. That was easy too as the mushrooms had already been cooked and flavoured. I just put in a bit of oil, added the rice and a dribble of wine. Then the stock, stock, stock and it was done and it was perfect.

To review, that was two delicious things made from one pot of sauteed mushrooms. It makes me think that sauteed mushrooms could in fact be a staple of the kitchen that I should always have on hand. Not only so I can eat pate for the rest of my days, but also for their skills with eggs, dark meat and pasta. Buying two pounds at once is starting to seem like a paltry amount. But then again, I've just roasted seven peppers and baked a couple dozen banana muffins. As I've been temporarily taken over by a squirrel preparing for winter, my voluminous leanings should perhaps be avoided.

A Darling Zucchini

I had never seen round zucchinis before this year. They're called Eight Ball Zucchini Squash in North America. I'm not sure what they call them in the UK. Maybe Round Courgettes.

These sweet and spotted little orbs produce all kinds of strange feelings in my heart; I suddenly have the urge to make stuffed zucchini. That has never, ever, ever happened to me before.

You can use these in exactly the same way as their oblong cousins, although apparently their flesh is slightly denser, so slightly better for frying. This one was sliced and roasted with tiny tomatoes, peppers, garlic and thyme and then piled onto a baked potato already blanketed with a thick layer of cheese.