Polenta with parmesan and poached farm eggs

A girl has to eat, and when a girl has to eat, a girl has to eat well. A fellow girlie friend happened to have the day off from work, and so I had to think of somewhere nice for our girlie lunch. I cranked through the inner recesses of the restaurant database in my brain. Hmm, perhaps something a little bit upmarket. Yes, a Michelin-starred restaurant would be a nice touch. After all good food is what one would expect a girl to eat. Mayfair came to mind, perhaps somewhere near the Elemis spa in case we feel like a bit of pampering afterwards. Aah, what about Angela Hartnett’s recently crowned one-star Michelin restaurant Murano I thought? One-star Michelin, Mayfair, and with Angela Hartnett, one of the most successful female chefs in the country at the helm, it seemed only just to support her restaurant as a nod to girl power.

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Yesterday was a day filled with potatoes and pancakes, a day that I am going to call ‘P’ day. The day started with my cooking course which is proving to be really enjoyable. My lecturer is great. He’s jolly and jovial with a cheesy sense of humour, and I like cheesy. He will probably always be guaranteed a laugh from me with his jokes, even if he doesn’t get one from any one else for I am obviously easily amused. At one point our discussions turned to a potato ricer. It’s what you mash potatoes with and it’s akin to a large garlic crusher. You operate it by putting a cooked potato inside its head and pressing down on one of its arms to produce the mash. You release the arm, and then continue on with the next potato and so on. Describing it as ‘arm pressing’ exercise, he livened up the proceedings with a reference to a phraseology that he and his colleagues use to use when he was a junior chef: “hickory dickory dock, I must increase the size of my arm muscle!” See, he’s funny.

Crispy, fluffy potato croquettes

The highlight ingredient of the day was the humble potato, hence the reason for our discussions on the potato ricer. In the hot, steamy kitchen, we baked, boiled, mashed and piped potatoes, to then turn out potato concoctions of all sorts: duchesse (piped mash potato spirals); marquise (piped mash potato with tomato concassé on top); macaire (mashed potato scones/patties) and potato croquettes with Japanese breadcrumbs. Piping takes patience and skill, and I do not profess to have much of the former.

Banana, ice-cream & maple syrup pancake

Still, my potatoes turned out to be really yummy. And in the evening, in honour of Shrove Tuesday, my friends and I capped the day off with pancakes topped with whatever our ‘hearts’ desired. My heart desired banana, vanilla ice-cream, and Canadian maple syrup, and lots and lots of it. Make no mistake, it was a lot. So potatoes and pancakes came to make ‘P’ day. ‘P’ for piggy.


Westminster Kingsway College:
Web: http://www.westking.ac.uk

Another Related Story

I recently enrolled in a professional cookery course, the NVQ Level 1 at Westminster Kingsway College. This particular course is a one day a week course over 30 weeks. I have no desire to be a professional chef for the hours are too gruelling. I know as I had first hand experience of this growing up in my family’s Chinese restaurant. But I love food, and I want to further pursue my passion for it which is why I have decided to do this course.

Day one was highly anticipated and hugely enjoyable. We had a short day and there was no cooking involved. That will come on day two. Day one was introductions (everyone is lovely) and vegetable theory (potatoes are tubers, courgettes are fruit, etc). Excitedly, I was the only one in my class that recognised salsify which I attribute to watching Jun Tanaka on Market Kitchen.

The library at Westminster Kingsway College contains an amazingly extensive collection of cookbooks and food reference materials. Some of these are antique cookbooks and date back to the turn of the century which is unsurprising given that the cooking school at the college is about 100 years old. I cannot wait to explore the library further when I have more time to slowly meander and lose myself in the wonders of the knowledge that lie within those books.

Tomorrow we will cover potatoes, but the best bit will be the tasting. Yum.

Westminster Kingsway College:
Web: http://www.westking.ac.uk

Goi, Vietnamese prawn salad at Viet Noodle Bar

I was running late. Worse yet, I was running late to meet my friend, J, who never ran late. If anything, she usually ran early. Having worked with her before, I knew her time keeping skills well, and punctuality was one of her core virtues. Personality-wise, as a cute version of Speedy Gonzales in a size four outfit, she used to zip around the office with the gusto of an Olympic ice speed skater. Highly energetic, she was so quick at what she did that I was never able to keep up.

The sweet irony is that I am generally, (occasionally?), reasonably, on time. In fact, more ironic was that I always seemed to be on time for those friends who run late for me. Take last week for example when I was due to meet a certain friend for a bite. For some perplexing reason there were no delays on Transport for London and I managed to arrive early. The friend then called me 10 minutes after we were due to meet to tell me he’d forgotten the time and he was only just leaving home. An hour and two glasses of champagne on an empty stomach later, I was surprised that I managed to still hold a conversation.

So feeling rather guilty when I finally showed up, I could do little more than apologise profusely. Being mid-week with certain work pressures in the office to uphold, it was just as well that we were having lunch at Viet Noodle Bar, where the service, like J, was lightning quick.

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The grey-leg partridge at Boundary

The month of January is already over. Jeez how time flies… Christmas only felt like yesterday. But January has proved rather memorable. Some events of note took place, probably the most notable being the inauguration of President Obama (yes, Obama’s in the house!), and also the not-too-minor matter of a certain restaurant opening in Shoreditch.

Ok, on a relative scale, the latter, a restaurant opening, does not quite compare to the former, a presidential inauguration, but in the context of the London restaurant scene and my much-nurtured belly, it’s rather big news. See, it’s the new restaurant from Sir Terence Conran; the patriarch of fine design, architect, writer, and restaurateur; the man who in 2005 was named by CatererSearch, the website of the industry magazine, and Caterer and Hotelkeeper as the most influential restaurateur in the UK. The Sir Terence Conran who is much revered as the pioneer of redefining the way in which the British public dine out. Big news indeed for it’s the first restaurant he’s opened since he sold his restaurant group to D&D London in 2006.

(Continue reading her story…)