Roast Chicken and Other Stories

INTRODUCTION

GOOD cooking, in the final analysis, depends on two things: common sense and good taste. It is also something that you naturally have to want to do well in the first place, as with any craft. It is a craft, after all, like anything that is produced with the hands and senses to put together an attractive and complete picture. By "picture," I do not mean "picturesque"; good food is to be eaten because it tastes good and smells enticing.

We are all drawn to the smell of fish and chips, fried onions, roast beef, Christmas lunch, pizza, fresh coffee, toast and bacon, and other sensory delights. Conversely, to my mind, there is nothing that heralds the bland "vegetable terrine," the "cold lobster mousse with star anise and vanilla," or the "little stew of seven different fish" that has been "scented" with Jura wine and "spiked" with tarragon. I feel uncomfortable with this sort of food and don't believe it to be, how shall we say, genuine.

I do not mean to berate the cook who wishes to make food complicated or multifaceted; I just think that some ideas are misguided. For instance, one perfect piece of turbot or halibut, grilled on the bone with hollandaise sauce must surely (ask yourself) be a perfect plate of food. What is the point of marrying a little piece of Mediterranean red mullet with a similar-sized piece of Scottish farmed salmon? They just don't belong together.

Food that tastes good lingers in the memory for all time: such things as good, homemade soups, my mother's meat and potato pie, Bury black puddings, a well-made bloody Mary, prosciutto and melon, native English oysters with Tabasco, hot salted ox tongue with coleslaw, a dozen snails at Chez L'Ami Louis in Paris, the apéritif maison at L'Oustau de Baumanière at Les Baux in Provence, and the home-made bresaola of Franco Taruschio at The Walnut Tree in Wales.

I have written this book, not because I am a chef, but because I like to cook and I enjoy eating good food. A novelist I know once said to me, on hearing that I had decided to embark on a cookbook, that cooks should cook and writers should write. Well, fair enough. (He is, actually, a very good cook.) I am not a professional writer, nor am I good at writing recipes on a regular basis. This is particularly so when I have to think about listing the ingredients in the right order for each recipe, or giving metric and imperial measurements, or stating exact oven temperatures and precise timings. I have had to learn to do that, and it has been interesting and beneficial to be so restricted.

Deep down in the mind of a good cook are endless recipes. It is a matter of knowing what goes with what; knowing when to stop and where to start, and with what ingredients. Thinking how a dish is going to taste, before you start to cook it, may seem an obvious instruction, but it is not necessarily common practice. It is important to cook in the right frame of mind (we are not talking everyday chores here) and to do things in the right order. Ergo: feel hungry; go out shopping (with pen and paper and money). See good things, buy them. Write down further items that will accompany previous purchases. Buy wine to go with food. Come home. Have a glass of wine. Cook the food and eat with more of the wine. More importantly, do make sure that the food you have bought is the sort that you like to eat and know how to cook. It is also a question of sympathy between the cook and the cooked-for; is there a worryingly large proportion of people, I wonder, who cook to impress rather than to please?

It's really a question of confidence. It is far better to cook food for your friends that you enjoy eating yourself. Familiar dishes are comforting; carefully prepared and simple dishes are an asset to a good lunch or dinner party. The food should not dominate the proceedings. Rather, it should enhance and enliven the occasion. There is nothing more tedious than an evening spent discussing every dish eaten in minute detail. "Oh Daphne, how did you manage to insert those carrots in your hollowed-out zucchini?" What's wrong with egg salad or leeks vinaigrette? Or a simple rabbit stew, or some grilled lamb cutlets. And, of course, roast chicken.

The title of this book, Roast Chicken and Other Stories, was chosen simply because it had a friendly ring to it, and I hope that it sounds inviting and uncomplicated. I also happen to enjoy roasting a chicken almost more than anything. It is very satisfying to look upon a fine chicken turning crisp and golden as it cooks. Even the sound of it causes salivation, and the smell of it jolts the tummy into gear.

I would like to think that this collection of recipes will appeal to all who like to cook; those who gain immense pleasure from being in their kitchens with good produce around them purchased from favorite sources—markets, butchers and fishmongers, grocers and greengrocers, delicatessens and wine shops. I would also like to imagine that everybody could become a good cook and have a healthy interest in the bountiful ingredients that are available in such quantity on our doorsteps.

Good food relies on good ingredients, but it has always been my belief that a good cook can turn the proverbial sow's ear into a silk purse. It takes a little knowledge and expertise, but whereas an ignorant and uncaring chef can ruin the finest free-range chicken, a sympathetic and enthusiastic cook can work wonders, even with an old boiling fowl.

Finally, I would like to thank Jill Norman for asking me to do a book in the first place: Lindsey Bareham, without whose help the book could never have been written; and Flo Bayley for her exquisite illustrations.

Simon Hopkinson

ANCHOVY

The salted anchovy, in one form or another, has been with us for some time. The Romans used to salt all sorts of fish, and from them made their all-purpose sauce, liquamen. This fermented brew seems to have been used as a seasoning and added to almost everything. Today, the Thai people use anchovies to make a fermented fish sauce—nam pla—that similarly finds its way into pretty well all their dishes.

I have liked the anchovy (it's one of the herring family) ever since discovering a bit of one stuffed inside a green olive many years ago. I am particularly keen on very salty things and I can actually eat anchovies on their own. The best I have come across so far are filleted Spanish anchovies. These are fat and juicy, a lovely pinky-red color, and their flavor is remarkably fine. They are preserved in olive oil and come beautifully packaged in large, round, colorful cans.

In disagreement with most of my food friends, I find whole salted anchovies a little disappointing. They are excessively salty, even for me. Perhaps I have never had a good one. So, it is the fillets of this little fish that I am talking about.

The strangest thing about cooking with anchovies is that they are best by far when accompanying meaty things. With fish, they seem to cancel out the inherent flavors and on occasion can even cause you to think that you are eating a piece of stale fish (the only exception to this is Old-Fashioned Egg Sauce, see here, which makes a good accompaniment to white fish). Not so with meat, especially when used to flavor and season a roast—lamb in particular. Little pieces of anchovy inserted deep into the muscles of a leg of lamb, together with some garlic slivers, impart the most agreeable contrast of flavors. And, curiously enough for such an intensely fishy fish, it ceases to taste fishy when used in this way.

The anchovy's uses and appearances are truly legion. You will find it on pizzas, in Caesar salad and salade Niçoise (I happen to think that the one and only fish therein should be a generous helping of anchovies), and on a good egg salad, as well as stuffed into those lovely green olives. Some continental classics would not be the same without the anchovy. Take anchoiade. This Provençal staple combines garlic, olive oil, a little vinegar, and some pounded anchovies. It is then spread onto thick slices of toast, according to Elizabeth David. She goes on to say: "This is not so much an hors d'œuvre as the sort of thing to get ready quickly anytime you are hungry and want something to go with a glass of wine.…" What splendid advice.

Closely related to anchoiade, and from the same region, comes tapenade. Another paste, made this time from pounded black olives, olive oil, capers, garlic, a splash of Cognac, and anchovies. Also good on toast and intensely savory. The Italian salsa verde (green sauce) is one of the very nicest lotions and consists of large amounts of finely chopped parsley, mustard, capers, garlic, olive oil, and anchovies. This is most often served with poached or boiled dishes. In all these sauces, the anchovy usually provides all the salt that is necessary.

Compound butters, for anointing pieces of grilled meat and offal, are especially good when some chopped anchovy has been introduced. A mixture of rosemary, a little garlic, cayenne pepper, anchovy, and unsalted butter is extremely good over grilled veal kidneys. But the king of savory butters, in my book, is the one called Montpellier. It combines all the flavors and smells of a Provençal marketplace. So, rather than telling you about it, here is the recipe. This version comes from Jeremiah Tower's book New American Classics. It is a particularly good one.

ASPARAGUS

Every year around the middle of May, I catch "asparagus fever." Our British crop is about to shoot up from underground in all its glory. And it is glorious, with the finest flavor in the world. In my opinion, nothing can touch the taste of that purply-green English asparagus. In France and Germany, and particularly Alsace, they grow white asparagus that has been cultivated completely underground. The green color never gets a chance to develop due to the lack of sunlight. People rave about it, but I just can't agree.

Out of season, we are bombarded with imported asparagus from (mainly) California, Mexico, and New Zealand. The spears are invariably huge and have lost most of their flavor due to their long journey. This, of course, happens to any green vegetable, however fast it is transported to your local greengrocer. Asparagus, however, seems to suffer more than most. If you have ever had the great pleasure of cutting asparagus fresh from the ground, you will see quite clearly how quickly its sap runs out. Somebody I know, who was obsessed with fresh vegetables, carried out an experiment on his own garden crop of asparagus. He erected a small Primus stove at the end of his asparagus bed and had a pan of boiling water at the ready. Next, he hurriedly collected spear after spear of asparagus and hurled them into the boiling water. This idea puts "freshly cooked garden vegetables" into a different category, but it must have been fun, and the asparagus surely the best ever.

There is a tall, very silly pan called an "asparagus pot." It has a basket inside that is slightly smaller than the pot itself. The idea is that you put your bunch of asparagus into the basket, fill the pan with water to halfway up the asparagus spears, and put the lid on. When the water comes to the boil, it is supposed to boil the parts of the asparagus in the water and steam the tips. I think this is a lot of nonsense and a waste of money, as these pots are very expensive. All green vegetables require plenty of viciously boiling, well-salted water. The more boiling water you can have around a green vegetable, the greener the vegetable will stay. And its flavor will have been, as it were, sealed in.

BRAINS

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