(Not up for the chitchat? Completely get it. Click the email title to go to a web-based version then jump straight to the recipe or Cultural Fun.
I wore my sunglasses yesterday for the first time this year which felt like a seasonal milestone. Although actually I could have got them out on Monday when my brother and I went for a walk round RSPB Fen Drayton Lakes and I came home feeling a bit pink-faced and squinty.
Strong recommend for the CornellLab’s Merlin Bird ID app which is basically Shazam for birdsong and came on very handy identifying all the creatures chirping around us.
I also went on my first Finsbury Park foraging expedition of the year, pricking my fingers whilst picking a couple of handfuls of gorse flowers. They have become a syrup (Mark Diacono has a good recipe although I like to put the flowers in hot syrup and let them steep overnight) which I am considering how to use. Cocktails? Kombucha? Poaching pears?
The elderflowers will be out in May or June. If you live near Finsbury Park and want to come foraging with me for them, let me know!
Recipe: Beetroot hot sauce
I had a batch of chillies and garlic cloves fermenting away but, once they were done, I I decided not to go down my standard hot sauce route. I have fond memories of a beetroot-based hot sauce from Danish distillers Empirical which is sadly no longer made so I decided to try and create and approximation of it’s smoky-sweet earthy tones.
This is the result. It’s delicious on all sorts of things but - I think - particularly good as a contrast to sharp creamy things: the feta cheese in the salad below or splashed on a yoghurt-y or smooth bean dip for contrast.
Half the batch of chillies became this and the other half transformed into something else that I’ll tell you about next week…
You’ll need a roughly 500ml jar for the initial ferment and these quantities make about 300ml of sauce (three of the little bottles from the picture). Double the chilli, add two more bulbs of garlic and use a bigger jar if you’d like to make next week’s sauce too.
For the ferment
200g red chillies
1 bulb garlic
5% brine
For the sauce
500g cooked, peeled beetroot (see notes)
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon shio koji (see notes)
Method
Prep the chillies and garlic. Remove the stems from the chillies and chop them into chunks. Maybe wear gloves if you have them? Or at least be careful not to touch your eyes afterwards. Separate and peel the garlic cloves.
Ferment the chillies and garlic. Put them in a scrupulously clean jar and make a 5% brine. 15g salt dissolved in 300ml water should be enough. Pour this over the chillies and add something to act as a pickle weight and keep everything submerged. If you don’t have glass or ceramic weights a sandwich bag filled with water (or brine) works well, as does half an onion. Seal the jar and leave to ferment, burping occasionally, until your desired level of funkiness has been reached. They can be ready in as little as a week but for me, this usually takes about a month.
Make the sauce. Remove your pickle weight and drain the chillies and garlic, reserving the brine. Put them in a blender with the beets, paprika, vinegar and shio koji. Add 100ml of the brine and blitz until completely smooth - about 10 minutes. Don’t breathe in too deeply whilst this is happening!
Taste and adjust. Add more brine and blend again if you would like a looser, more liquid consistency. Balance the flavours with more shio koji or salt and/or or more vinegar. Then return to the jar or divide between smaller bottles and keep in the fridge.
Notes (If Ifs And Ands Were Pots And Pans…)
For once there weren’t any beets in the veg bag so I just used a vacpac from Sainsburys. If you’re cooking your own I recommend the roasting method outlined in my Winter Pinks Salad recipe.
Shio koji is a Japanese fermented condiment made from rice and often used as seasoning or marinade. It’s salty and umami but sweet and floral too. You can get it in many Asian supermarkets or online. It was an ingredient in the Empirical sauce I was trying to create and I happened to have some after a recent browse around the Japan Centre. You could use a light miso and a pinch of sugar instead.
Keep any leftover brine, either for adding to stews as a fiery seasoning or to start your next batch of fermented chillies.
Recipe: Beetroot & feta salad with hot sauce dressing
Serves two as a side.
Ingredients
400g (approx) roasted, peeled beetroot (see note)
1 tablespoon beetroot hot sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon lemon juice or apple cider vinegar
pinch salt
50g feta
a few wild garlic leaves (or small bunch of your green herb of choice), finely sliced
handful mixed seeds (see note)
Method
Make the dressing. Put the hot sauce, oil, lemon juice/vinegar and salt in a bowl (the bowl you want to serve the salad in if you want to save on washing up or another large bowl if presentation is important) and whisk to combine. Taste and adjust with more of any ingredient if necessary.
Toss with the beetroot. Cut the beetroot into chunks, add it to the dressing and toss to coat everything evenly.
Finish and serve. Transfer the beetroot to a serving bowl (if it wasn’t there already) and crumble over the feta. Scatter on the wild garlic or herbs and sprinkle the seeds. Serve immediately.
Notes (If Ifs And Ands Were Pots And Pans…)
Again, I recommend this method of cooking the beetroot. If you can get it in the dressing whilst it’s warm it will soak up the flavours better.
If you can be bothered to toast the seeds they will be nicer and more interesting. But still good raw.
Cultural Fun
We went to see The Score at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. It was exciting to see Brian Cox as JS Bach, although I find it harder to suspend my disbelief with famous actors and it took me a while to stop thinking: “Logan Roy in a frock coat!” The supporting cast were very good, especially Stephen Hagan as Frederick II, the tyrannical king of Prussia who summons the composer to court.
Costume and set design were beautiful. I really enjoyed all the britches and embroidery and baroque curlicues. I wasn’t bored but I can’t, in all honesty, recommend the play. It took a while to get going and then didn’t quite seem sure what it was about.
Faith and creativity? Where artistic talent comes from and the limits of its power? Moral questions around patronage of the arts? Bach is religious, sure his genius comes from God and should be used only in praise of him. Frederick is an atheist, a music-lover but a soldier at heart. The set up is interesting and the central scene where the two men clash was powerfully done, but I was left feeling that there wasn’t really a thesis to engage with.
The title comes from The Great Gatsby: “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” Wynn-Williams casts Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg as the Tom and Daisy of tech and catalogues the messes they’ve made. From genocide in Myanmar to surveillance and oppression in China to sexual harassment in the Facebook office itself.
James and I really liked Black Bag, Stephen Soderberg’s stylish new espionage thriller. Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett are the spies at the centre of the caper, impeccably dressed and happily married. Or are they?
The action zips along, propelled by a (long-time Soderberg collaborator) David Holmes score. There’s plot and counterplot, mediations on marriage and fidelity and a great twist ending, all wrapped up in 94 minutes.
Bye! See you next week!
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Recipes look great - I love how the chilli flavour evolves with fermenting. Out of interest, any particular reason not to ferment the beetroot with the chillies?
Love the sunglasses!
Recipes look great - I love how the chilli flavour evolves with fermenting. Out of interest, any particular reason not to ferment the beetroot with the chillies?