IdleRich

IdleRich
No that one was very soft like.... I dunno butter with ammonia in it, it's wrapped in a kinda of cloth that I suppose you don't eat. Strange it tastes so chemically cos apparently literally the only ingredients are raw sheep milk and thistle. Although I do get something of that taste with roquefort sometimes.
 

catalog

Well-known member
Sounds pretty mental. During lockdown I have been eating a phenomenal amount of cheese, late night snack whilst curb is on. And I've got into blue cheese and brie again, to move out of the cheddar zone. Got some good chutneys for my birthday as well, which have been going down well.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
It's funny, since we've been here I've not been eating as much cheese as I used to. I kinda experimented a bit with the Portuguese ones but a lot of them are quite similar I find. I like Sao Jorge which is from the Azores (sort of like cheddar or comte maybe) but there are a lot of them that are basically the same thing - the ones with a rind that they slice through and serve in pieces at the start of every meal. It's nice enough and some are stronger or creamier or harder or whatever, but there isn't that much difference between them and I kinda got bored of buying a new cheese and getting it home and find it yet another take on that theme. But there are others which we manage to pick up every now and again.
Chutneys we love but they're not big on them here.... sometimes we order them or get them from Glood which is a kind of international shop with a couple of branches here. Yesterday we found a nice one in Auchan which was a kind of bitter pepper jam but the jar was tiny. Ate most of it as part of a late night snack this morning.

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The strong cheese is the messy looking one, the other cheese is fairly standard - maybe a bit creamier than most - the top thing is morcilla that girlfriend was adamant we could raw and the other meat is a black pig salami, that's really fucking good but expensive.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
So devilled half the kidneys.... pretty tasty though not the most aesthetically pleasing thing I've made (and midway through the kitchen looked like Patrick Bateman's living room).

From here

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To here

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Tomorrow gonna tweak it a little when I cook the other half... sear 'em a little longer before adding the sauce in short.
 

Leo

Well-known member
never been much of an organ fan (in the food, not musical, sense). what am I missing, aside from the unappetizing visuals?
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Just the taste... I mean liver is like meat but more meaty if that's possible... I don't think you're a big meat eater though so... maybe you don't have to rush to get into it. I love liver, kidneys (though lamb is less challenging than pig) but I'm not a huge fan of tongue say... I like a big ox-heart occasionally and tiny little chicken hearts at the other end of the scale. I guess lamb, chicken, pig, cow are all different in each organ though... the bigger animals tend to be stronger flavoured. I think you're supposed to leave cow liver to soak overnight in milk or something to soften the taste a little although I've never done that. Maybe if you wanted to start I'd recommend a veal liver or something in a restaurant and I reckon you'll dig it.
 

catalog

Well-known member
i've never been able to get on board with liver, kidneys and all that. it's the texture i think, they are too soft, like you are eating something raw almost. when i was a kid, we went to a family dinner at my uncle's house, and he pulled me aside at one point, and said, 'look, i've got these for you' and it was chicken kidneys, so i asked him about what they were etc, he said they were a treat for me, he really meant it, he was being nice, in his head. i could tell just from looking at them that they weren't what i wanted, that darkness and wetness yuck. i think i did everything i could to avoid eating them, then eventually agreed to try them, but i've steered well clear ever since
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Well the way I cooked these ones they weren't soft... might have been overdone to be honest. I've had udder once, that was a bit as you describe as you guess.... tripe I'm not a huge fan of either. Tongue seems a bit kinda undifferentiated to me, but then again when I've had horse it's quite similar so I don't think that's necessarily just down to the part of the animal.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Very random vegetables grilled on a skewer with salmon (peppers were planned but turned out they'd gone mouldy)

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DannyL

Wild Horses
St John restaurant in Smithfield might be the place to go if you're in London... or just read one of the guy's books https://stjohnrestaurant.com/
Can vouch for this. I had sweetbreads there once and it was one of the nicest things I've ever eaten.
My main memory of St Johns is a mates 40th where we ordered a suckling pig. Several of my mates started banging the table and chanting "EAT THE FACE!" at the birthday boy which may have disturbed some of the other diners.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
I was eliding the two - sweetbreads at St Johns, suckling pig at Bread & WIne. Only been to the former once, but the latter a bunch of times.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Risotto with peas, asparagus and mushrooms. Made a small portion (minus the mushrooms) for Rowan, who absolutely loved it whizzed up with a bit of milk.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Yesterday we cooked up a kind of bean chilli to have in a wrap... but we made way too much to wrap up so it ended up being a kind of bean stew on top of bread with some cream cheese and basil

BeanStew.jpg
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
We have a friend who drives every year from the Algarve where she lives to go and pick grapes in Bordeaux or somewhere. This year my girlfriend decided that, seeing as we (as everyone) has been financially hit by C19, she would accompany with her and see if she can earn some extra money. Not sure how much richer she will come back but I think the trip will be fun, turns out this girl has a van which is really more like a lorry with a bed for two in the back and built in kitchen etc So... they're gonna have a bit of adventure driving from Lisbon through Portugal, Spain and then France stopping when they like and meeting up with an old friend in France. I'll be staying to look after the cats.

So this girl has parked up a few miles down the road from us in a little park by the river. It's a cool place where girlfriend likes to go for a run and I like to wait for her with the spotting scope and watch birds. There are also a few stone grills that you can use for a bbq if you bring your own coal. So we went down to try them out for the first time today before they head off tomorrow.

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We were actually very lucky that there was another group just kinda finishing up first cos without their fire-lighters I don't think that we would have got started.

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Just simple burgers and these turkey and green pepper skewers they sell in Aldi. I love these skewers though, the white bits are in fact big chunks of fat which add a huge amount of flavour and moistness to what I've always thought of as a slightly dry and bland meat.

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Just really tasty with a few cold beers and a bit of wine.

Quite a nice and atmospheric place - by night as well as day.

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Then a little walk through the marhses to the hide from which you can watch birds by dead.

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A great evening and, is it wrong to say, I'm really looking forward to a bit of peace and quiet for the next few weeks...
 

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IdleRich

IdleRich
Today I cooked a load of peppers, tomatoes, onions, garlic etc really slowly for ages, then added some prawns and ate them in wraps. Could do it that way cos girlfriend is away, she prefers to have raw onions and peppers for the crispness, freshness and texture, but I prefer the deep flavour you get from just leaving everything bubbling away for hours on a low heat - as long as you have nothing else to do it's perfect.

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Bit blurred I'm afraid
Anyway, after I'd made two wraps it looked like this

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Foil to stop them falling apart and you can eat them in your hand - one of them I chucked our last bit of philadelphia cheese in one of them to see if it worked

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IdleRich

IdleRich
Anyone know what to do with prawn stock? I boiled up the heads and legs and stuff from the other day and sieved it and added some wine etc been sitting in my fridge for a few days now and I should do something with it... but what?
 
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