Summer's over

Coming downstairs, early yesterday morning, for the first time in months there was a chill to the air, and I was prompted to close the doors into the courtyard, which have been standing open since June. It rained last night, leaving pools of water on the entrance walkway, and a freshness which, although envigorating, speaks more of early autumn than of the depths of summer. The sun is warm, but no longer baking.

It's been blissful. Endless days ...weeks...of unbroken sunshine...a rhythm of siestas, and candlelit dinners, al fresco and late...early mornings working in the garden, the lawns washed with clear, strong  sun, and again in the evening, as the shadows lengthen and the sprinklers drench everything with hundreds of gallons of water. Individual days dissolved into a lazy refrain of sleeping, and working, and eating, and sleeping....waking, occasionally to wonder whether it was six in the morning or six in the evening, and it being not particularly important, in either event.

We have a last burst of summer social activity - three dinner parties and two different sets of houseguests, all to host within the next week - and can then subside, I hope, into a gloriously mellow autumn.

Tonight's dinner:

Parma Ham and Melon (the melons smell so irresistible at the moment, that I have an immediate menu-readjustment as soon as I get near them!)

Pork loin, pot roast with vinegar & peppercorns, in a cream sauce; braised mushrooms.

Plum and almond tart.

Striped Pasta

My starter offering in this year's Masterchef weekend - which was about a month ago...but which hasn't been blogged before now due to general levels of inertia as the result of stultifying heat over the past few weeks!

Striped pasta is an idea which came (for me, at any rate) from the Simili Sisters, a couple of leathery old bats from Bologna, whose lives are devoted to pasta and to sharing their devotion with the rest of the World. Their aesthetic sense looks to have stuck somewhere around 1967, and their version of striped pasta is a 'cheerful' evocation of the flag of Italy, with stripes of green, orange (ish), and white (ish); I decided to adopt their method, but took a more post-modern approach, and went instead for good old Black and White. Once you know how to achieve the various different colours available in fresh pasta, then the World is your oyster. For obvious reasons, there's little point in using the sheets of pasta for anything which involves them being cut into narrow strips (fettucine, or smaller) or where the pasta disappears under a blanket of sauce (lasagne, for instance). For large 'stuffed' (tortelloni, agnolotti, ravioli) or for dishes where the pasta is cooked and served as large squares (which seems to have as many different names as there are regions across the whole of Italy), then this works perfectly. For masterchef, I made large triangular ravioli, with a stuffing of salmon and tarragon, and served them with melted butter and a sprinkling of bottarga.

Ingredients: 'White' Pasta: 1 cup 00 flour, 1 cup semola flour, 3 medium eggs, 1 tsp salt, 1 generous tsp olive oil; 'Black' Pasta: 1 cup 00 flour, 1 cup semola flour, 3 medium eggs, 1 tsp salt, 1 generous tsp olive oil, 1 sachet squid ink.(This will make a much larger quantity of pasta dough than you will probably require in one go....but the remainder keeps in the fridge for up to a week, if not longer, and can be used up at will over that period)

Method:

1. Make the 'white' pasta, by combining all ingredients in the food processor and working it for the thirty seconds it takes to consolidate into a ball; knead the dough briefly on the work surface, and then put in the fridge for about an hour.

2. Ditto with the black pasta ingredients.  

3. For generous servings for three people, use only half of the white pasta dough, and a quarter of the black pasta dough.

4. As per normal practice, roll each of the two doughs ten times at the broadest setting on your pasta machine, then put each one through the machine decreasing the settings as you go, until you have reached the mid-setting on the machine (different machines vary on the number of different thickness-settings they have....my machine in Italy has nine, and the one in London has seven). For me, this means rolling the dough until setting number four. You will probably need to divide the dough as you proceed in order to keep the lengths manageable for putting through the roller.

5. Once both doughs are rolled to mid-thickness, lay the strip(s) of white pasta on a floured surface or flat cloth. Cut the black strip of dough into thin strips (either by hand or using the fettucine cutter on the pasta machine), and then carefully lay the black strips, spaced evenly apart, on top of the white pasta. Using a rolling pin, once the strips are in place, gently press down along the length of the strip and pass the rolling pin lightly, a couple of times, over the dough, to ensure that the black and white doughs are properly attached to each other.

6. Pass the amalgamated pasta through the roller on the machine, and continue as normal, decreasing the thickness with each roll, until the pasta has gone thriugh the thinnest setting.

And that's it. Therafter, use as you would any other pasta. The theatrical effect is excellent - and even the italians are impressed!

Brioche for Breakfast

Most recipes I've come across for baking brioche appear to ignore the fact that the reader of the recipe does actually have a life to lead, and the complicated cascade of risings, and warm restings, and cold restings, and punchings-down, and more of the same, repeated in a complicated and practically alchemical choreography is entirely inconsistent with a normal routine of eating, sleeping, and generally getting on with the day. I usually want brioche warm and  baked freshly for breakfast, and to be able to produce it without having had to get up at 4.30 in the morning to do so! This version, adapted from Michel Roux, is a godsend. He appears to have stripped away  many of the various stages which he - clearly correctly - considers unnecessary, and the remaining slimmed-down process is entirely practical and user-friendly...and consistent with only being ejected from bed along with 'Thought for the Day' (as who isn't...? If you're still lingering between the sheets at that point, TFTD is enough to make anybody take flight) and still having brioche on the table for 9.00!

This quantity is sufficient for six individual brioches, as well as a medium brioche loaf. Start the day before, with steps 1 through 7; then the final rising and baking can be done just in time for breakfast, next day.

Ingredients: 500g flour (I use Italian 00 Gran Tenero, which has only little gluten; the more glutenous your flour, the chewier and less cake-like your finished brioche will be - a question of personal preference); 2 tsp salt; 15g fresh yeast; 3 fl oz milk; 6 medium eggs; 350g butter; 30g sugar; egg glaze (1 egg, beaten with 1 tbs milk)

Method:

1. Heat the milk to blood temperature, place in a small bowl, and crumble the yeast into it , to 'prove'.

2. Combine flour and salt in a mixing bowl (make sure the two are well mixed, and the salt dispersed throughout the flour - the yeast will react badly if it comes into contact with 'undiluted' salt in any significant quantity. Make a well in the centre of the flour, and into this pour the yeast-milk mixture, first stirred with a fork. Flick flour lightly over the liquid and leave aside for fifteen or twenty minutes.

3. Add all of the eggs to the bowl, and then mix the contents of the bowl to make a homogeneous mass (I do this with the mixer paddle) and then knead for ten minutes or so, using the dough hook). Roux says you can also do this by hand, using a wooden spoon, but that it will take twice as long. Haven't tried, can't comment - but it sounds tiring!

4. During the ten-minute kneading, place the butter and sugar together in another bowl, and leave to soften at room temperature.

5. Towards the end of ten minutes, whisk the butter and sugar together with a hand-beater, and add this gradually to the dough being kneaded. Once the butter-sugar mixture has all been amalgamated, continue to knead for another five minutes or so.

6. At this point, cover the bowl with a damp cloth, and put in a warm place - I use a cold oven, in the bottom of which is a roasting pan full of boiling water - to rise, and leave for two hours or so. The dough will rise quite dramatically during this period.

7. Once risen, transfer the dough (or, in fact, the consistency is really more like a batter, at this stage) into a bowl which has room enough for the mixture to double in size, then cover the bowl with cling film and put into the fridge. (The process of transferring acts as 'punching down', and I have to do it anyway, as my mixer bowl is too large to go easily into the fridge). Leave in the fridge for at least eight hours, and up to twenty four hours.

8. Take the dough from the fridge. It will by now be quite firm, and can be placed on a floured surface for shaping. With this quantity, I can make six individual brioches, and the remaining dough goes into a medium sized loaf tin. Brush the centre of the surface of the brioches with egg glaze, then leave to rise, uncovered, in a warm place, until doubled in size - this takes about half an hour.

9. Once risen, brush again with egg glaze and then bake in an oven pre-heated to 220 degrees C. The  smaller brioches will be read after about fifteen minutes, and the larger one might take another ten minutes after that.

Chicken Liver Risotto

Rich and unctuous, with a satisfyingly complex mix of flavours. This comes from the Harry's Bar recipe book - a widely unknown treasure trove (perhaps unwisely 'introduced' by Michael Winner, in its most recent incarnation), which for the past few years has been an entirely reliable resource in my kitchen.
We had this as our 'primi' last night, as we dined by candlelight in the courtyard, while the glorious sound washed over us of the Kreutzer Sonata being expertly played next door in the garden of the Teatro Lux. Perfection!

For two:

Ingredients: risotto al bianco for two (2/3 cup of carnaroli rice; quarter of a medium onion; butter; oil; glass of white wine; approx 500 ml stock - something light; I used the broth leftover from poaching a chicken the day before; half a cup of grated parmesan): 125g chicken livers; butter; oil; half a cup of dark stock (mine was a combination of stock from pheasant and rabbit carcasses); half a cup of Marsala (or substitute medium sherry); 1 tbs plain flour; 1 tsp dried thyme; 1 tbs freshly chopped parsley; seasoning.

Method:

1. Make the risotto in the normal way: sautée finely chopped onion in half oz butter plus 2 tbs oil; add the rice, and stir; add the wine, and reduce; gradually add the stock, to cook the risotto over 20-25 minutes; when the rice is cooked, turn off the heat and stir in another half oz butter and all the parmesan; add seasoning, to taste.

2. Meanwhile: sautée the livers briefly in 2 tbs oil, then add the marsala and flambé the whole thing;  remove the livers to a small bowl, and add the dark stock to the pan juices; in a simmertopf, melt 1 oz butter, then stir in the flour, to make a roux; into this stir the pan juices and stock, along with the thyme; stir constantly for a few minutes, while the sauce thickens to a velvety texture; cut the livers into small pieces, then add these to the sauce, and keep warm while finishing preparation of the risotto. Check and adjust seasoning as necessary.

3. Plate the risotto (heated plates!), and divide the chicken liver sauce over the plated risotto. Garnish with parsley.

Luxuriate!

Old Bricks...

are  the theme of the moment. I've spent two mornings this week - from seven to nine, since it is too hot now to do anything later in the day than that - clearing out the weeds from what we poetically call the 'rhyll', which runs along two sides of the North Lawn, before it disappears into the confusion of undergrowth beneath the pine trees. In fact, it's a brick-lined channel, almost a foot deep, and half as wide, which starts out at the huge old well in the NW corner of the garden, and then runs gently downhill for its entire course. We think it was probably intended to replenish the level in the well beside the house, as necessary, from the water supply in the older and larger well - which is so plentiful that it appears in its own right on some old maps of Pisa, and which hardly shows any drop in level even at the end of a long, hot, rainless summer, when we've daily been throwing hundreds of gallons of water from it over all parts of the garden. The system was probably multi-functional, since there are slots in the rhyll, in places, for little sluice gates - which suggest that it was used also as a watering system, during the period when the garden here was still monastery farmland. I suppose it could be seventeeth century - going by the date of the house and of the smaller well - although I doubt that style of brickwork changed much over many hundreds of years, so it's quite hard to date with any accuracy. The Technical Dept is keen to use it in anger as some kind of water feature (we've tested it, and it holds water perfectly efficiently), and I can see it could be quite dramatic if we filled it with water and had half a dozen small fountains placed periodically along its length. Watch this space...

And the other bricks are the ones I've been dealing with as part of the process of reclaiming our cantina, which the previous generation of neighbours 'borrowed' (without asking) about a dozen years ago from our predecessor here, and which - since the current neighbours appear somewhat shamefacedly to have abandoned - we have decided to re-annexe. Having identified where (logic suggested)  the old doorway must have been, from the back of the laundry room, conveniently positioned between the boiler and the autoclave, I set to, with great enthusiasm and a large hammer, about a week ago - and was encouraged almost immediately to discover the vertical edge of an old doorway, which meant I was exactly on-track. It was only with the gradual discovery that the wall I was removing was not the sort of neat bricklaying of the late twentieth century, however, but that it also included large (and I mean 'large') chunks of dressed stone, that I realised that the infill I was removing was from several hundred years earlier than I'd thought. And then, I discovered the start of a graceful arch at the top of my vertical door edge - and immediately recognised it as part of the run of arches which are so perfectly preserved further along in the house, incorporated into the dining-room wall. And which also

appear as a second run of arches on the floor above, where three of them can be seen, forming part of the back wall to the courtyard terrace. The arches are part of the original thirteenth century church, which were incorporated into the structure of this house after the fire in 1650, when this section of the church wasn't re-built but was instead re-cycled to make a farmhouse for the factor of the monastery farm. The same explanation lies behind the ruined and truncated vaulted ceilings which now form alcoves in the courtyard - but which must once have been side-chapels in the church - and the great arched doorway which can be seen partly in the courtyard and partly in the dining room - with the top half concealed behind the plaster in the bedroom above - and which must originally have given access to the church interior, via the Martyrs' Chapel, which is still on the other side of the dining-room wall.

I imagine that before the fire, the arches were part of a two-storey loggia, or open corridor, which looked over the south side of the church, and probably, during the time when Thomas Aquinas would have been here, gave access to monks' cells and administrative offices where we now have the kitchen and salone. What a relief that I didn't start wielding my hammer six inches further to the right!

Tonight's Dinner:

Courgettes stuffed with tomato, garlic and mozzarella.

Tuscan Sausages, with braised lettuce.

Peach Tart - made with white peaches from the tree which Sarah gave us from Wisley.

This year's tea pavilion at The Serpentine Gallery

 

...is a triumph! All the more surprising given my degree of underwhelmedness on reading the reviews of it several weeks ago when the design was first unveiled in the National Press - by Sou Fujimoto, it seemed a pale imitation of the last japanese design, from several years ago, and the accompanying blurb about Fujimoto's thoughts on good design had me reaching for the 'delete' button on the computer keyboard, even before the end of the second paragraph. So, it was with no high expectation that I suggested we go and take a look at it, when an airing in the Park seemed a good idea, once summer had unexpectedly hit SW7 this afternoon, and bright sunshine and clear, blue skies beckoned. And, in fact, the place is a complete pleasure!

Like the unplanned result of the lid having been left off the biggest and best box of meccano in the World,  it rises ziggurat-like, with layer upon layer of spindly white framework, inviting exploration. Which is what people were doing, climbing up the outside and perching in the afternoon sun. And inside, it was the same, too - to the side of a central atrium,  plexi-glass levels rose above us and people, having clambered up, looked down and around, as though sitting in mid-air...with the view through the walls of the lawns and the Park beyond, and of trees swaying dramatically in the summer breeze. "This", said the Technical Department (happiness etched on his face) "is what it looks like when you've got the top-of-the-range version....the one that you always lust after, but in fact you've always had to make do with the intermediate model instead, because the best-of-the-best is always out of reach, and the shop only uses it as a way of getting punters in who'll end up (regretfully) settling for something less. This is the acme!"

And so, we celebrated. With tea. Provided by Fortnums, in a natty little carry-all. And acccompanied with sandwiches (egg, salmon, cucumber, and tongue) as well as scones, with cream and strawberry jam, and sacher-torte, and raspberry macaroons, and pistaccio macaroons....and all in all, it was perfect. 

Buy now, while stocks last!

Tonight's dinner (once we've recovered from tea):

Omelette Arnold Bennet.

Lamb Cutlets (in celebration of a few days in London); petits pois with pancetta

Marsala posset, over prunes poached in cinnamon and red wine.

In Rome...

for a few days of cultural R&R. We're staying in a rooftop apartment in one of the narrrow cobbled streets just to the west of the Imperial Forums, with a view from one window across the ruins of the forums of Nerva and Vespasian, and from the next window over the forum of Augustus and across to the magnificent profile of the Wedding Cake - dramatically illuminated at night - and the rear of Santa Maria in Aracoeli alongside the campanile and profile of the Palazzo Senatorio on the Capitoline. The stairs to the apartment are something of a challenge (I make it 62 going up, and 56 going down - go figure), but are worth it for the light and the view once at the top.

Tuesday's highlight was the Titian exhibition at The Quirinale, much of which was simply glorious....his John the Baptist, the early Madonnas, the Farnese portraits - splendid! Some of the later stuff suggests the start of the decline into chocolate-box messiness that characterised most italian art in the seventeenth century, although Titian's penultimate self-portrait is still wonderful. My choice for pocketing would probably have been the Farnese Danae, where the expression on the face of the subsidiary cupid is masterful in every way.

Thereafter, a look at the Palazzo Corsini - which has adequate ceilings and a terrible collection of pictures (save one excellent Caravaggio, and a goodish portrait of Queen Christina....TD also pointed out a couple of things by Teniers, which I suppose are good of their kind, but they don't do it for me) - via a flypast at Santa Maria in Trastevere, where the mosiacs are impressive, although clearly heavily restored. It's striking how many tourists in Rome appear to succumb to (presumably) long-suppressed childhood influences, and become clumsily translated into semi-pilgrims - awkward genuflections and bending of the knee popping up all over the place, which don't sit well with backpacks, water bottles and sneakers. Many of them also have a rabbit-in-the-headlights expression at the same time, as though themselves slightly startled to find that they're doing it...

Yesterday, to the Pantheon in the morning, before a memorable visit to the Domus Romane, in the cellars beneath the Palazzo Valentini. Although we'd been warned that the former would be crawling with tourists (which it was...absolutely heaving), it didn't seem to matter, as the scale of the place is such that the ants massing beneath the dome are merely that....ants! Technical Dept was in awe at the technical aspects of the construction, and it was easy to transform the t-shirt clad crowd of tourists into the same figures but with tricorn hats and knee-breeches who would have been equally thronging the place three hundred years ago - which makes them distinctly  more acceptable. The Domus Romane was a theatrical triumph! Looking through glass floors suspended several metres above the floors of the original roman house, we were subjected to a mesmerising son-et-lumiere, which elevated what is, after all, only another excavated roman house to something quite spectacular. Some of the 'son' was a bit crass, but the fact that it was in Italian helped...and it couldn't anyway detract from the overall impression of the place. The visit ended with a detailed presentation of Trajan's Column, before we were led down a subtaerranean corridor to a barred gate, and there before us, about ten feet away, was the base of the column itself.

Restaurants have been mostly unmemorable...although lunch yesterday at the Enoteca Corsi in Via del Gesu was good, and worth repeating: honest food, a good ambience, and excellent service. Unlike most other Roman restaurants, which come across as transient and baldly commercial enterprises, the Enoteca Corsi presents as a true family business, with years of experience behind it, and the promise (hopefully) of much more to come.

Just off to the Villa Farnesina, before we have to head to Termini, for the afternoon train back to Pisa.