Food

Baking a cake rn btw. 3 tiered vanilla sponge with meringue buttercream. i'm not a natural baker. it's for my sons first birthday tomorrow :/ If it goes wrong I might be divorced.

Not exactly highbrow food but it is Yorkshire Pudding Day tomorrow.

The Morrisons Yorkshire Pudding Pizzas...

Would N'duja and prawns go well together?

Hell yeah!

Thought so. Will report back...

Made a fucking spectacular ragu this weekend, with fresh pasta.

Make a mirepoix of carrot, onion, celery and garlic. Heat in a heavy pot w/salt, pepper and bay.
Add smoked lardons from a butcher (big, fat cubes of pig) sweat for 10 mins. Remove.
Add aged beef bones and marrow bones turn the heat up and cook hard for 5 mins. Add beef and pork mince 60:40 ratio. Cook for 5 mins. Add veg and bacon. Add red wine (enough-plenty), chicken stock, a teaspoon of purée and some pasata (300-500ml). Stick in the oven for quite a while.

On the first day I finished the sauce with some whole milk served with thin pasta as above and on the second day I added a confit egg yolk served with handcut thick pasta

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we tried a new thai place in soho called Kiln. perfectly serviceable tapas-y deal (thaipas? i hope someone is writing these down) doing all manner of regional wotnots with nary a prawn cracker, green curry or a pad thai for miles. Sadly the evening was kinda fucked by a trio of corpulent, loud, obnoxious northerners talking loudly about their second homes, bitching about the portions and being unbelievably rude to the waitress "where's our sodding food? we've been here ages!" - they'd been there as long as we had - about 15 minutes. all of which visibly upset the poor kid. anyway we slipped said waitress an extra tenner and told her we thought they were horrible cunts as well.

this is why we have angus fucking steakhouses.

I love kiln. I just like watching them cook on the bowls of fire.

Did you have the lamb skewers?

They’ve got a really nice wine list as well.

Also those guys sounds like utter belms

I added a confit egg yolk served with handcut thick pasta

Just run that bit by me again?

didn't get to see the kitchen action as we were plonked at the other end of the bar. worrying lack of thai folk behind the pass.

highlight for us was a stir fried greens pot that included butt loads of kale, which ordinarily i can't fucking stand.

going to the football tomorrow at wembley, 12.30 kick off, and the need to be there an hour or so beforehand, means I'm looking for a place that does a good breakfast/brunch, hopefully aligned with decent coffee willesden green/kilburn sides.
Any suggestions?

I confit egg yolks and added these on top - thought it was like a steak tartare kind of thing. Worked quite nicely but v rich.

And rather than doing thinner spaghetti I cut the noodles by hand so they were thicker -

How do you confit an egg yolk?

Duh! You cook it in it's own fat, innit!?!

Oh, wait...

Separate egg yolk from whites
Place in zip lock bag
Cover in oil
Place in sous vide

I'm definitely doing this come asparagus season.

I’m off to Japan in Monday for a two week tour. Going to Fukuoka, Osaka, Tokyo, Kanazawa, Kawasaki and Nagoya.
Any recommendations?

I've got many things but one of my fave places was called Tonsui in Shimokitazawa in Tokyo. Husband and wife team for 30 years, tiny, and their speciality is Tonkatsu. Get a normal, and then a cheese hire-katsu which is hire-katsu with cheese between the pork and breading

Tokyo
Harajaku Gyoza Ro (must do)
Ichiran Shinjuku
Kappou Nakajima (go for set lunch)
Uobei motor sushi
Isetan Food hall (must see)
Savoy pizza
Midori Sushi Meguro (great value)
Nakeme Noteppen (gotta do)
Fish market - but I would really bother with trying to get into the Tuna auction

Osaka
Hanamaruken Ramen
There's also some excellent kitchen shops that I can't recall the name of, whole streets of them

@Bainbridge Have coffee/clothes/other reccos if you're in the market for those ;)

https://twitter.com/chrissyteigen/status/966048368903540736

Even famous people have those Ottolenghi recipe struggles

Hi home cooking professionals

I got given a sous-vide thing, and I have no idea what to do with it. I understand I need a vacuum sealer to use it properly. Is there such a thing as reusable plastic bags for a vacuum sealer? Seems pretty wasteful otherwise. What sealer are people using?
Also what should I be cooking in it, apart from steak?

Thanks for any tips

You can put stuff in a zip lock bag and suck out the air with a straw/force it out by dunking it in water. Aldi also have vacuum sealers at the moment I think.

Mostly benefits meat, but you can do veggies and stuff. I'd be keen to try eggs.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2013/10/sous-vide-101-all-about-eggs.html

http://www.seriouseats.com/sous-vide-101

Some of the high end vacuum sealers have zip locked bags with a valve built in. You seal the bag, attach a tube from the vacuum sealer and suck the air out.

They are more expensive and you need to buy their own brand bags though.

Anova were advertising this https://www.johnlewis.com/stasher-silicone-multi-purpose-kitchen-storage-bag-clear/p3244597 a reusable silicone bag.

You can use food bags but I found it was a bit of a hassle getting the air out so they'd float around and not always seal. I went with a cheapo vacuum sealer https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B075GVHJW4/ you can get a big roll where you seal both ends so you can fit them to the necessary size https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vacuum-Food-Sealer-Rolls-SousVideTools/dp/B00C9CS28O

Serious Eats has some good sous vide stuff http://www.seriouseats.com/2016/01/first-thing-to-cook-with-sous-vide-immersion-circulator-essential-recipes.html

Should have got herself down to Persepolis in Peckham