"the sort of cooking that allows the cook, quite justifiably to feel rather pleased with themselves." Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
It's a pretty ordinary day weather-wise - almost winter temperatures in the middle of summer, clouds, short bursts of rain ... I started to go for a walk at one point but turned back when it started to sort of rain a very short distance from home. I have never done that before, and of course the rain - if you can call it that - stopped as soon I was back again. So I despise myself a little. But never mind, on the other hand I am on a roll as far as cleaning up, throwing out and making something from nothing goes in the kitchen. And on the left here is the kind of thing I am aiming for, for dinner.
The picture is Nagi Maehashi's Corn chowder with bacon but I'm not following recipes today - I'm winging it and so far in a whole day of cleaning up and throwing out, I'm feeling pretty good. I will come to dinner. But first - jam.
That not very enticing weather is actually perfect for my first success of the day - getting rid of the last plums by making a last batch of jam. And not only did I get rid of the plums, but I threw in a handful of prunes which have been languishing in my pantry plus the juice of some very sorry looking mandarins. They were indeed so sorry looking - a bit like this one - I thought that when I cut them open I would find a completely rotten inside. But no they were pretty much perfect, so I squeezed them and added the juice.
So now I have seven jars of this rather dark looking plum jam, courtesy of plums grown by my friend Monika, I've used up those prunes and those very unpleasant looking mandarins, that made me feel guilty every time I saw them, have gone to a better place.
I am now turning my attention to tonight's dinner of a corn chowder accompanied by some cheesey scones. Which will involve a whole series of near total death ingredients. No that sounds a bit drastic - past their best.
The corn part of the formula will be frozen corn kernels which have been in my freezer for some time now, and so they need using. They haven't gone off but are probably past their best, and ice crystals surround them, so I shall have to remove them from the freezer soon so that they have time to defrost.
Then there are carrots - which haven't actually gone off - but I have heaps of them because my lovely husband, on solo shopping expeditions, kept buying them because they were a bargain. There is one last capsicum that really should be used before it goes into serious decline, and tomatoes that are beginning to look a tiny bit squashy.
The three ingredients most near to death are ham, sweet potato and cabbage. Indeed the cabbage may well have actually died. I have a quarter of it left and it is pretty black. It looks a bit like this one I found on TikTok, but worse. So I shall cut away all of the outside beyond the black bits, and see if there is anything worth using left. I may sound a bit gung ho about what I do use, but really I am not. I'm pretty careful. But you should never give up on something that looks awful on the outside. Inside there may well be good things. And I really don't need a lot of cabbage. Just a bit to add flavour and variety.
The sweet potato is a leftover from my younger son's summer/winter holiday in the USA (December!). They cleaned out their vegetable supply before going and gave it all to me. I have one sweet potato left, which does indeed look somewhat mouldy at one end. and maybe a bit along the side as well. But again if I cut all that off I may find some perfectly OK sweet potato in the middle. If there's a lot that's good I may actually keep it to make some gnocchi on Tuesday. Not tomorrow - a fasting day.
The ham is somewhat ancient too, being the very last tiny bit of the Christmas ham. The outside glaze has hardened and it was burnt anyway and there's quite a lot of fat in this last corner piece. I will also cut away the outside edge, so there may not be much to use there. If there isn't I shall substitute some perfectly good salami.
And I almost forgot the celery. Celery takes a long time to go off. It might not be at its crunchiest and freshest best so perhaps not brilliant in a salad, but perfectly wonderful in a soup.
Fresh and perfectly fine additions to the soup will be potato, frozen peas and lots of parsley - I have an abundant parsley supply in my garden. The stock is from my freezer and currently thawing on the kitchen bench. The milk is some days past its use by date but still smelling perfectly fresh so will also go in, maybe with some leftover sour cream as well. And a touch of chilli from a jar.
I almost forgot the allium contribution. Will it be onion, spring onions or leeks? All in varying stages of freshness but not yet at crisis point. Leeks perhaps, because the spring onions might go into the scones. It depends on how far gone the spring onions are.
The scones. I must remember to keep some of that milk or sour cream for the scones. It should be buttermilk but milk or cream will do. I have a good recipe for savoury scones which came from delicious. (Zucchini and cheddar scones) a long time ago. I have used this recipe many, many times, but vary the vegetable being used according to what I have to hand. Today it might be asparagus. I think I have a couple of spears left although when I check them out I may find that they have disintegrated - so it will be the compost for them. If not, I'll chop them up and maybe combine with some celery - which will be the substitute vegetable if the asparagus is completely dead. I could use spring onions as well, but I have lots of chives outside in the garden and they are the recommended bit of allium.
I should also of course, keep any vegetable peelings and stalks for making stock - not the dead stuff on the outside I hasten to add. I haven't quite got to the point of keeping a supply of vegetable peels in the freezer ready to make stock. They mostly end up in the green bin ready to made into compost. However, I do keep chicken bones there. Which reminds me that I must also take out some Parmesan rinds to add to my soup for the umami touch. I do keep them in the fridge. If I'm honest I'm not sure I detect that umami hit, but then maybe it's discreet and undefinable, and I would notice it if it wasn't there. Like salt. I'll put some in though. I might even chop the soggy cheese bit when I'm done and put it back in.
I'm really quite looking forward to this cooking exercise. With soup you almost can't go wrong I find. I'm hoping it will look sumptuous like this corn chowder, from a website called Gastrono-me, but also homely and comforting. I feel I have been eating a lot of marginally experimental things of late, and a return to something comforting like soup on a miserable day is just what is needed. Amplified by the huge amount of satisfaction I shall get from using up all those dodgy vegetables. Even if I have to actually throw some of it out, it will be satisfying and end the guilt I feel every time that I look at them.
"Winging it with what's to hand can be so liberating - flinging in this or that with the joyful abandon that comes from not trying too hard and not expecting too much" Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
That quote comes from one of my very favourite cookbooks Love your Leftovers which I dip into all the time. Not so much for actual recipes although there are lots and lots of them, like this one for Potato peel soup, but for inspiration every time I have something that needs using, but for which I am stumped for ideas. He also inspires because he seems to have a suggestion for just about everything you might think of. Today I didn't really need his advice I have improvised soups from this and that for decades now, but I wanted to see the kind of things that he suggested and also to find those words of wisdom that I have scattered through this post.
This picture is right at the start of the book. After the title page, and I think it sums up the philosophy of the whole thing - that something so absolutely delicious and comforting, homely and yet sumptuous can be made from scraps of this and that.
"Next time you scrape leftover food into the bin, you’re going to hear Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall in your head, asking whether or not you could have transformed those scraggly bits into something delicious." Bournemouth Daily Echo
I'll let you know if our soup will reach that standard of deliciousness.
R - I forgot to submit a photo of something beginning with R from yesterday's walk - So here is a rose - at what I think is the perfect stage for a rose. Other things I saw - red, rust, rocks, ring, rope, rubbish and roots plus a few letter Rs.
YEARS GONE BY
February 16
2024 - Nothing
2023 - Nothing
2022 - Nothing
2019 - Nothing
2018 - My last Christmas book
2017 - Disappearing tea leaves
Looking forward to all these nearly gone off ingresients, especially The Allium!? Will report back tomorrow after trying it all in 10 minutes!