Bibury, Swans and Cotswold Dumplings

Arlington Row, 14^th c.

When I was researching where to go on my road trip in England, I fell truly madly deeply in love with images from the medieval village of Bibury. I read that William Morris (famous decorative artist of the 19^th century and prime mover in the Arts and Crafts movement) had said that the village was the most beautiful in England and worked to preserve its beauty.

Bibury

Bless him. He encouraged others in his Arts & Crafts circle to relocate to the Cotswolds and in so doing probably saved many villages from the ravages of progress and commerce.

Bibury

Bibury is no “Ye Olde” copy. It is the real deal. Built on a Roman village, its church has existed since 750AD and it thrived as a horseracing center and wool market in the 17^th century.

We arrived early Sunday night and it appeared most of the foreign interlopers had cleared out of town. It was still. The light shone all golden, reflected by the warm yellow Cotswold stone into the sweet air. I have to admit, I was too in love with this little town to take all the pictures I should have. The 14^th century Arlington Row (formerly a monastery’s wool store) is everything you think of when you imagine an ancient English village. Best of all there is nearly nothing to remind you of the world outside. No advertising, no garish signs… just inns and restaurants and tiny shops with subtle signage.

Swans glided languorously in the clear waters of the River Coln. Idyllic. Transporting. Watching them, I remembered reading years ago about the curious swan laws in Britain and the wonderfully drawn Swan Rolls (thank you, World of Interiors !). I looked it up to refresh my memory when I got back. Nearly all swans belong to the Monarch. Through some quirk of law, only the Queen and Charlotte Townsend, daughter of the deceased 9th viscount of Galway (one of the richest people in England), are allowed to own swans, the rest are licensed from the crown. Swan licenses are granted and regulated by the 1482 Act for Swans and enforced by the Monarch’s Swan Master. There is an incredible document called the Broadland Swan Roll from the late 15^th century that lists swans with brands on their beaks to distinguish them. There are 5 of them, each measuring 4 ½” by 13’. I had seen it years ago and had a heck of a time digging it up but… eureka it was found. Although there are others, this is the most famous. I wondered if this black beauty was listed somewhere.

We were thirsty after a trip from Oxford (my first driving in the UK for many a year was a tad stressful). Beside the swan’s river was a 17^th c. coaching inn, aptly named The Swan Hotel where we dropped by for some local cider.

We stayed at the magnificent 1633 manor, Bibury Court, a Jacobean mansion built by Thomas Sackville where the 6 acre grounds were lovely and dotted with local sheep (little lawnmowers as an English friend once described them), and the rooms superb (hello 4 posters and fine sheets) as was the divine breakfast. After dorm rooms at Oxford, Bibury Court was really luxurious and the perfect place to land on the first night of a journey. Although I had read about a few other lovely places in Bibery, when we drove through the enormous gates and down an elegant drive that turned to reveal the great house, we decided to look no farther. It was perfect!!

What should I share with you??? Trying to come up with traditional Cotswold cuisine was not so easy. There is the famous Plowman’s lunch of cheese, bread, butter and pickles… but that is best done there with the real local Ingredients. I had an amazing English breakfast of eggs, black pudding, sausage and bacon with tomatoes and mushrooms in Chipping Campden but that isn’t really a dish either. There are the puddings (the famous Pudding Club is in the Cotswolds), of course, but after Eton Mess, I thought something savory. After a little digging I came up with Cotswold Dumplings. Fried little cheese balls, they are often plopped on stews or served with a vegetable puree... tomato or such. The recipe is courtesy of Celtnet.

I know, I know, you’re going to be like me and say ‘ugh suet, gross’. No No NO!!!

I was so wrong. This grass-fed stuff is sweet and good. The dumplings are like airy donuts with a crunchy exterior, and remember, it was beef fat that made McDonald's fries so great!

I dipped them in quince jam but applesauce would also be great. Dr. Lostpast thought that they were best dunked in ketchup… and they were great that way. Bottom line… addictively delicious.

Cotswold Dumpling

½ cup *self-raising flour (140g) (*for substitution ½ c flour, ¾ t baking powder, pinch salt)

2 tablespoons grated *suet (60g) (vegetarians can use grated frozen butter)

1 tablespoon grated cheese (30 g) (I used Neal’s Yard Cheddar from a small English producer) I think it would be great with double the cheese.

Enough water to mix

Breadcrumbs from 3 slices of bread, toasted with salt and pepper and thyme to taste

fat for frying

salt and pepper to taste

Add the flour, suet and cheese to a bowl. Mix together then season with the salt and black pepper. Add enough water to form a slightly sticky dough. These are usually made into just over 2 tbsp sized balls - six or eight rounds. I made them into 10 tablespoon size balls, rolled them in water then in the breadcrumbs and repeated it. Fry in oil at 350º till puffed and golden.

*I got my suet from Grazin Angus Acres. Grass-fed makes all the difference in suet, it smells sweetly!

Stop over to my post on Cherry Pie at Blog Critics It made FOODBUZZ top 9 yesterday!!!

Although I would love to take the credit, the first 3 pictures are what made me want to go to Bibury, they were not taken by me but by wonderful photographers!!!

Dorothy L. Sayers, Oxford & Eton Mess

When I was a teenager I loved Dorothy Sayers detective, Lord Peter Wimsey. I derived a vicarious pleasure from his fictional lifestyle. At that age it was the bridge between the wholly imaginary fairytales of childhood and the delicious real and imagined pleasures of adulthood. Even the author basked in the glow of her character. Sayers’ biographer, Barbara Reynolds, quotes Sayers in How I Came to Invent the Character of Lord Peter Wimsey:

“Lord Peter's large income... I deliberately gave him... After all it cost me nothing and at the time I was particularly hard up and it gave me pleasure to spend his fortune for him. When I was dissatisfied with my single unfurnished room I took a luxurious flat for him in Piccadilly. When my cheap rug got a hole in it, I ordered him an Aubuson carpet. When I had no money to pay my bus fare I presented him with a Daimler double-six, upholstered in a style of sober magnificence, and when I felt dull I let him drive it. I can heartily recommend this inexpensive way of furnishing to all who are discontented with their incomes. It relieves the mind and does no harm to anybody.”

One would imagine the Wimsey family at a house like Longleat

Lord Peter was a man possessed of a spectacular level of refinement that reached its highest pitch in the 1928 short story The Bibulous Business of a Matter of Taste (Lord Peter : The Complete Lord Peter Wimsey Stories). This tale led me down the path to exploring wine and food more than any other I can think of. Although my mother and grandmother were good cooks that enjoyed entertaining well, I did not come from a background of rarified tastes and spectacular cellars. I had never cooked in my life. At 15 I was not allowed wine. This was my introduction. I aspired to this lifestyle.

The point of the story is that 2 men, claiming to be Wimsey, show up at an appointment to obtain a poison gas formula. There is a duel of the palate that ensues to discover who is the real Wimsey. “It is not a matter of common notoriety that Lord Peter has a palate for wine almost unequalled in Europe?”, says the Comte de Rueil who devises the contest, “The bet which you won from Mr Frederick Arbuthnot at the Egoists’Club when he challenged you to name the vintage years of seventeen wines blindfold, received its due prominence in the Evening Wire”.

The two men are given wines and asked to determine their appellation, name of the producer and vintage year whilst dining on oysters, consommé marmite, poulet and confitures

Chateau Yquem 1909

After reading the story (which I know now is silly fun and rather a send-up of the Wimsey character) I felt compelled to read up on the wines that were discussed (no easy feat then, I had to go to the library!!). I read about the Chablis Moutonne (1916), Chateau Yquem (1911), Chevalier-Montrachet (1911) and Napoleon brandy and then took to trying as many as I could when I was able. I must say I have had all of them now… not of the same extraordinary age, of course, but certainly I’ve tried some at 15-20 years old which is what these would have been in 1928—even sampled brandy which was over a 100 (and held a bottle of 1811 from Josephine’s cellar but sadly was not allowed to taste it -- drat).

Dorothy L. Sayers

Why all this about Sayers??? The author of this story, Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) is connected to Oxford, you see. She was born in Oxford and her father was the Chaplin of Christ Church and she went to Somerville College in 1912.

Roy Ridley

Lord Peter Wimsey (his appearance was based on Balliol’s Roy Ridley and Sayers felt he was a combination of Fred Astaire and Bertie Wooster) and his lady friend Harriet Vane were both at Oxford (Lord Peter at Balliol and Harriet at the fictional Shrewbury—based surely on Sayer’s Somerville which was the first college for women at Oxford).

Somerville College Library (Building 1903)

Balliol College (building 1868)

Balliol detail

Lord Peter first appeared in Whose Body (1923) and Vane showed up in Strong Poison on trial for murder (1930). Gaudy Night (1935), set in Oxford, has Harriet solving a mystery there with Lord Peter helping on the sidelines (and at last having his proposal of marriage accepted by Vane!).

Balliol Dining Hall exterior

Balliol Dining Hall 1877

Balliol Dining Hall today

Since I was attending the Oxford Food Symposium, I thought I’d share one of the dishes with you. It was an Eton Mess (Wimsey did attend Eton before Balliol~!). It is a splendid and simple dessert that was traditionally served at the cricket game between Eton and Winchester, Wikipedia tells me. It has had the name since the 19^th century and was originally made only with strawberries or bananas with ice cream or cream. The meringue was a later addition. The version we had was with mixed berries and an almond meringue. It was decadent in the extreme. Antony Worral Thompson’s recipe is simple and perfect

Eton Mess

• 1 box strawberries(or mixed berries)

• a dash of sugar

• a dash of port

• meringues, broken up**

• cream, softly whipped

Mash some of the strawberries with a little sugar and port, toss in the rest of the berries and fold in broken meringues and softly whipped cream.

**Meringues from Kala Englnd, BBC Food

• 2 egg whites, room temperature

• pinch of salt

• pinch of cream of tartar

• ½ cup natural golden caster sugar

• 2.5ml/½ tsp vanilla extract

• 1/3 cup hazelnuts, coarsely chopped

.

. Preheat the oven to 130C/250F/Gas½.

. Butter a baking sheet and dust with flour. In a large bowl, beat the egg whites with the salt until foamy. Add the cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks form.

. Beat in 1 tbsp sugar until the mixture holds long stiff peaks when the beater is lifted. Fold in the remaining sugar, hazelnuts and vanilla. Pipe or spread the meringue into 6 forms (circles, squares-whatever you prefer) onto a baking sheet and bake for approximately 1 hour, or until the meringues are firm to the touch.

Transfer the meringues to a rack and allow to cool

Eton Mess as served at Oxford Food Symposium

Deviled Chicken at Oxford

University College (Building dates from 1634)

As I spend my first hours in England, I am really channeling Constance Spry as I walk the hallowed streets of Oxford. University College, founded by King Alfred in AD 872, should qualify as hallowed.

It is England, with a noble, lavender scented beauty everywhere. If only stone could speak, what a tale it could tell!

In “Garden Notebook” in 1940, Constance Spry wrote “Perfection in living seems to me to consist not in the spending of large sums of money but in the exercise of a selective and discerning taste in the use of what we may possess, and flowers and plants can in their judicious use contribute in a high degree to the elegance and graciousness of life.”

I just love that sentiment, don’t you? It’s not about the money, but about using what is around us (and what we have) to fill our lives with graciousness (a word that is not used often enough these days). This is a sublime spirit to cultivate and you feel it everywhere here in the great wild gardens and time-softened stone architecture of Oxford.

My first snack was at The Grand Café on High Street. It proudly announces it was the first coffee house in England (the first coffee was drunk in England at Balliol College just a few years earlier) that uses house-made cage-free egg mayonnaise for its wonderful little sandwiches. All the sandwiches on the menu, like smoked salmon, cucumber and watercress reminded me of many of of Spry’s efforts in THE CONSTANCE SPRY COOKERY BOOK. Her savory Éclairs with Deviled Chicken, bacon and watercress are bite-sized lovelies that go down far too easily (I can attest to this because my household did a lot of sampling with these babies) not unlike the sandwiches at The Grand.

I did use a different recipe for the pate a choux than Spry used after the first batch came out a little flat. I went to Michael Ruhlman who has the same recipe I’ve used for years but with simple instructions (and even a video) as well as a love song to the pastry. They really are fabulous. This makes enough for a few leftovers that I stuffed with chocolate ice cream and topped with chocolate sauce and had instant profiteroles. You can make them and freeze them and then heat them up in minutes. I pop them in the toaster oven and they are good as new. That way they are always ready for a savory or sweet filling for last minute guests and quick desserts.

Devilled Chicken

2 poached chicken breasts (you could use the equivalent amount of left-over chicken)

2 T butter

Devil Sauce 2*** (around ½ of the recipe)

½ C cream (a little more if you like it moister)

1 T curry paste (powder?)

1 t. Dijon Mustard

2 t dry English mustard

seasoning (S&P)

Take chicken and chop into bite size pieces then toss with melted butter and run under broiler for a few minutes then toss with Devil sauce 2. Allow chicken to rest overnight. Combine other ingredients and heat gently and toss with chicken

Serve in choux puffs with chopped bacon and watercress.

Devil Sauce 2 ***

3 T worchestershire

2 T mushroom Ketchup (if you don’t have it… toss in a few mushrooms and a T of soy sauce with a pinch of allspice and mace)

1 T tarragon vinegar

1 T chopped onion

2-3 slices lemon

1 clove garlic

1 c strong stock

1 cup chopped tomatoes

1 bay leaf

Combine and simmer 10 minutes. Remove the lemon slices and the bay leaf and blend.

Choux paste

1/2 c water

4 T butter

½ c flour, sifted

2 eggs

½ t salt

Heat oven to 425º. Boil water and butter, add flour all at once and beat until smooth then allow to cool. Put into a bowl and using a standing or hand beater, add the eggs by degrees to the flour, waiting till one is incorporated before adding the next. The paste should be smooth and shiny.

Put on baking sheet either golf-ball size or pipe as éclair shapes (Savory éclairs were called Carolines during the Edwardian age). Then bake 10 minutes at 425º and lower heat to 350º and bake 20 more minutes or until golden. Remove from oven and pierce with knife to release steam.

Thanks to Gollum for hosting Foodie Friday!

Madeira & Madeira Cake

I know when I talk Madeira, I usually speak about cooking with it, not drinking it. That probably won’t change anytime soon since I am no great expert but thanks to Mannie Berk at The Rare Wine Company (who invited me) and to the people at IVBAM (Madeira’s institute for wine and crafts), I got to taste 40, count ‘em, 40 madeiras at the snazzy Astor Center at Astor Wine in NYC.

Let me tell you -- for the uninitiated, wine tasting is not for sissies. I still can’t bring myself to spit (that’s what the ominous black bucket on the right is for) but even with small sips… after that many wines I was exhausted. Probably concentrating that closely played a part as well. It was all for a good cause…this is one great wine, I know I’ve told you this before.

I tasted young, old, dry and sweet with the differing personalities of the 7 houses that make the wine on the Portuguese island of Madeira off the coast of Africa. The micro-climate and basaltic soil make for an ideal grape haven. There are many grapes used to make the different varieties of wine (Malvasia, Bual, Verdelho, Sercial & Tinta Negra being the best known) and these are planted strategically on the various parts of the island. Five centuries of experience have told them which location is best for which grape.

I got to speak with representatives of many of the 7 producers. I asked a representative from Henriques e Henriques about what they eat with Madeira and they said Bolo de Mel, a classic sweet cake that is much like gingerbread. It is made around Christmas and is meant to be eaten by hand (never to be cut with a knife). And they make a lot of it…enough to last all year long.

Since it is summer, I decided I would hold off on making this dark spicy recipe and instead make the English version of Madeira Cake that has been popular for a few hundred years.

Lighter and lemony, I found a spectacular recipe from Chef Michael Caines at the beautiful Gidleigh Park in Devon, England (a little more research for my England trip). He makes his mum’s recipe for the cake (that she found in an old Good Housekeeping book). It is a stunner, like a light pound cake soaked in madeira scented apricot and tangy lemon, oh my! Best of all I get to sneak a little Madeira into it (which is not traditional -- the English version, and Caines' version is wine-free) because of the beautiful apricot glaze that I found. Let me tell you it is great with the wine or with tea… a little Earl Gray, mmm. Heaven.

Lemon Madeira Cake based on Michael Caines’s Recipe

Serves 8

Zest and juice of a lemon

5 eggs *

350g caster sugar (1 ¾ C)

Pinch of salt

150ml double cream (5 oz)

275g plain flour (almost 2 c at 140g a cup)

5 g baking powder (1 t)

100g butter, melted (a little less than ½ c)

A little apricot glaze ****

100g icing sugar (7/8c)

A little extra butter and flour for the tin

Method

1 Preheat the oven to 160C/gas3 (320º). Grease a cake tin with butter and dust with flour (the recipe called for a 12”x 4”x3.5” pan but I made 2, one smaller one in a 6" x 5" decorative mold and the other in a 5" x 9" loaf pan). Put the lemon zest, eggs, sugar and salt into a mixer and whizz at top speed for about 10 minutes until the mixture thickens and turns a lovely pale yellow.

2 Fold in the cream. Sieve the flour and baking powder together and fold into the mixture, then add the melted butter, again folding it in carefully.

3 Spoon into the cake tin and put into the oven for 1 hour or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean (the smaller mold was 45 minutes).

4 Turn out and cool on a rack, but leave the oven on. When cold, brush the cake all over with apricot jam.

5 To make the glaze, put the icing sugar and lemon juice in a pan on the stove until the sugar melts and the mixture turns syrupy, then brush this all over the top and sides of the cake and return it to the oven for 30seconds.

*the eggs from Grazin Angus Acres in Union Square make everything the best color...they are so yellow~

****Apricot Glaze

As for the glaze, it comes from a century-old recipe from La Cuisine Française. The author, François Tanty, was trained under Careme, the most famous 19th century French Chef. Tanty then served as Chef de Cuisine to Emperor Napoleon III and Chef to the Czar of Russia; he also was proprietor of the Grand Hotel and the Restaurant Dussaux at St. Petersburg, and Purveyor to the French and Russian Armies says the indispensable resource, Feeding America . How’s that for a CV! This world-class toast and jam is about as good as it gets. If you don’t have apricots at hand, just use 2 parts apricot jam to one part Madeira. You will be astounded how good this is for breakfast or tea or an incredibly quick dessert for last minute guests.

I did a guest blog for the generous and amazing Lazaro. Do stop by and have a look. If you have never seen his blog, Lazaro Cooks scan back and enjoy!!!

Thanks to Gollum for hosting another Foodie Friday

My next post will come from England!!! Thanks to all of you who clicked on the ads!!!