wholefood kitchen

Coretta Van Wijk, at home in her wholefood kitchen, in the middle of cooking up a storm.

A Quinoa Salad with Blanched Broccoli, Toasted Pumpkin Seeds with Ume Vinegar, Maple and Shoyu and a Lemon and Brown Rice Vinegar Vinaigrette; Warm Okra, Potato, Tomato & Red Onion Salad; Organic Grilled Chicken Wings marinated in Garlic, Lemon Juice & Lemon Thyme.

A remarkable plate of colour, in the shape of an Ottolenghi salad.

A delightful, slow cooked lamb casserole prepared by virtuoso Ollie Heath.

I like this blog and the writer recently published a cookbook, see attached recipe sampler. Simple, beautiful pictures. It sometimes inspires me to make a new dish or use a new combination of ingredients.

http://www.101cookbooks.com/mt-static/images/food/Super_Natural_Every_Day.pdf

I just finished reading a book called ‘In Defense of Food’ by Michael Pollan, an incredible exposé on our relationship with food, and particularly the industry which has emerged to ‘support’ it. He cites the emergence of ‘Nutritionism’ as a defining factor. We no longer look at food as ‘food,’ but as a combination of its constituent parts. An exerpt from the book explains what this has led to: ‘The first thing to understand about nutritionism is that it is not the same thing as nutrition. As the ‘ism’ suggests, it is not a scientific subject, but an ideology. Ideologies are ways of organising large swaths of life and experience under a set of shared but unexamined assumptions. In the case of nutritionism, the widely shared but unexamined assumption is that the key to understanding food is indeed the nutrient. Put another way: Foods are essentially the sum of their nutrient parts. From this basic premise flow several others. Since nutrients, as compared with foods, are invisible and slightly mysterious, it falls to the scientists to explain the hidden reality of food to us. In form this is a quasireligious idea, suggesting the visible world is not the one that really matters, which implies the need for a priesthood. For to enter a world where your dietary salvation depends on unseen nutrients, you need plenty of expert help.’ Fascinating reading. There’s plenty of material available on Michael Pollan, who has produced plenty of books on the topic. Here’s a clip of a radio interview he made in support of ‘Food Rules.’

Tickets on sale now for Mouse & De Lotz’ Valentines Day Supper Club. £30 per head, BYO, although Alcohol will be sold on the night. Contact Victoria or Nadya at MdL to get hold of a place. They’ll go fast!

Valentine’s Supper Menu

Rhubarb vodka cocktail with ginger beer

Fennel and cider soup, parmesan crisp, walnut pesto

Sprouting broccoli with anchovy cream and soft-boiled egg
Seared venison fillet (or beetroot for veggies) on sourdough toast with buffalo curd, sango sprouts and horseradish

Caramel rice pudding with prunes

Espresso martini

I was flicking through the Yoga Cookbook and saw a recipe for a prune mousse…stewed prunes with yogourt and agar agar to thicken…hmmmm simple, interesting. For some reasons I prefer to keep yogourt savoury so I used a little tahini instead….added a pinch of cinnamon and fried bananas. Bananas keep appearing in the Growing Communities fruit bags. I don’t normally buy them because they are not really ….local nor seasonal to our climate. But Growing Communities have to respond to demand as well and people seem to want bananas…I fried them gently in coconut oil, on both sides, till golden. This changes the flavour, I can’t say exactly how but it works very well. Also, as they are a very sweet fruit, cooking them with a bit of fat make their sugar a little slower to absorb by the body. Plantain are similar to bananas and are eaten cooked. I was wondering what you think? Something interesting to research… 

The bananas work very well as a garnish for this prune mousse….I have put a picture of the agar-agar flakes in case you have forgotten what they look like. They are good for creating jelly like consistency. The basic ratio is 10 to 12 g per litre of liquid for a hard jelly. To get more of a mousse, you case use 6-8g per litre and add a spoon of arrow root diluted in cold water (about 5g per litre).

You add the flakes to a hot liquid (in this case prunes stewed in water which have been blended), stir a few minutes till the flakes are absorbed and pour in a dish. The jelly sets when it cools. If you use arrowroot to make the jelly creamier, add it diluted at the same time as the agar agar.

Also, another tip is to blend the jelly once set and then you get a very nice mousse effect. This is a good time to add the tahini or other seasonings (orange rind, vanilla etc). 

I tend to keep the agar agar jelly for the summer, using fresh apple or pear juice and adding berries. They look beautiful and are refreshing. But reading the macrobiotic guide conversations on FB, someone suggested that even in winter these jellies were a good dessert…somehow with dried fruits I thought it would be more wintery….Let me know if you want a more detailed recipe:-)

…Ian said (surprised ). I keep wanting to share my last minute meals, back from work at 7pm, on the table at 8pm including time to lie down and do some chi kung…

I know the weather is getting cold again and it is still time for stews and long cooking but I think somehow in this meal I paid brief respect to the potential of Spring a few months ahead of us as the dish I made seemed to have a lot of green. Cooking notes are below the picture.

1. I sautéed a small white of leek, added coarse bulghur (1 volume), salt and vegetable stock (1.5 volume), brought it to simmer, switched off the gas and left it covered whilst I prepared the rest of the meal.

2. I had some chicken defrosted (I buy whole chicken from the butcher on the Stoke Newington Farmers Market, cut it in pieces which I freeze) which I cut in strips and simmered very slowly in some more vegetable stock, skimmed and added the green of the leeks towards the end with a pinch of salt.

3. I sautéed some slices of jerusalem artichokes in sesame oil, covered and even added a small amount of water to ensure that they cooked well… which they need to, to be digestible…apparently Indians of North America cooked them for 48hrs in pits during which their flesh turns brown and jelly like and a sweet flavour develops – a sign that the hard to decompose ‘inulin’ has broken down… (Nourishing Traditions… again, Kevin and I seem to be lost in this amazing book at the moment).  I cooked my artichokes for a good 20mns, they were soft and sweet…

4. I made a side salad because I still had some lamb lettuce, simply sprinkled a pinch of salt, drizzled some walnut oil and massaged the leaves (method borrowed from Dragana Brown). Then drizzled a few drops of cider vinegar and mixed everything. This is my ‘how to dress a salad in less than 1mn’. Sometimes it’s great to spend time composing and testing a complex dressing, sometimes life is too short:-). But made time to grate some carrot because the meal was missing this colour to which I added a drop of ume vinegar (which is a quick way to add some salt and something a bit tangy) and a pinch of green nori flakes. And a small amount of raw food seems to work with animal food.

5. I added some parsley and chervil to the bulghur and mixed well, together with a small amount of butter. I placed the bulghur on the plate, placed some chicken pieces and green of leeks in the middle and drizzle some of the chicken cooking stock on the dish. Added the artichokes on the side. Bon appetit!

A delicious lunch prepared by Nat, comprising a Zuchini & Carrot Soup, followed by Homemade Hummus, Cooked Beetroot & Vegetable Salad with Alfalfa Sprouts and Wholegrain Toast, Sunflower & Sesame Seeds.