 ISSUE 32 2007 | COVER | 
“…the lunch on this occasion began with soles, sunk in a deep dish, over which the college cook had spread a ~ from A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf I don’t know about you, but I like reading about food. I read restaurant reviews as a hobby and then try to will myself into the scene. A fiction writer is also able to draw you into a book by urging you to use your senses, and, of all of them, it may be taste that exerts the most power over our imaginations. After all when we taste we use the other senses too. (Yes, even hearing—as in the case of bacon sizzling and corn popping) There are countless descriptions of mouth-watering meals in novels, so here to tantalize—and torture you— are 3 dishes lifted from the pages of literature, brought to steaming, fragrant life. Soles in Cream Ingredients: 2 x 275-350g/10-12oz Dover—or any other— soles, skinned Instructions: 1. Preheat the oven to 230C/450F/Gas 8. 2. Place the skinned Dover soles side by side, slightly overlapping if necessary, in a buttered shallow baking dish and sprinkle them with some salt, the cayenne pepper and ground mace. Pour the cream over the fish and bake for 10-12 minutes, by which time the fish should be cooked through and the cream reduced and thickened. 3. Carefully transfer the fish to warmed serving plates. Stir the lemon juice and parsley into the sauce and adjust the seasoning if necessary. Spoon the sauce over the fish and serve with some small, boiled new potatoes.Salad of French Beans “There's beds here, sir,' said Sam, addressing his master, 'everything clean and comfortable. Wery good little dinner, sir, they can get ready in half an hour--pair of fowls, sir, and a weal cutlet; French beans, 'taturs, tart, and tidiness.” ~From Chapter 51 of The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens Ingredients: Instructions 1. Put all ingredients except oil in a food processor and make a rough paste. Add olive oil and mix to make olive dressing.2. At this point the chopped parsley and basil can be added. Blanch beans in salted water for a few minutes so there is still some bite. Trim leeks and blanch for 5 minutes. 3. Cut in half lengthways, toss in a little olive oil and grill on a griddle pan until lines appear and they are just cooked. Cut into quarters. 4. Mix beans and leeks together and mix with tapenade to taste. Some shaved fennel may be added. Apple Tarts “’Oh!' said he directly, `there is nothing in the way of fruit half so good, and these are the finest-looking home-baked apples I ever saw in my life.'…The apples themselves are the very finest sort for baking, beyond a doubt…” ~from Chapter 27 of Emma by Jane Austen Ingredients: Pastry: 175g/6oz plain flour Filling: 900g/2 lb cooking apples For the Glaze: 4tbsp apricot jam 1. First make the pastry. Measure the flour into a large bowl, add the fats and rub in with the fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolk, stir into the flour mixture with a round-bladed knife, and bring the mixture to a dough, adding a little water if necessary. Knead the pastry very lightly, then wrap and chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes. 2. Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas6. 3. While the oven is preheating and the pastry resting, start to make the apple filling. Cut the cooking apples into quarters, remove core and chop the apple into chunks (no need to peel). Melt the butter in a large pan and then add the prepared apples and water. Cover and cook very gently for 10-15 minutes until the apples have become soft and mushy. 4. Rub the apple through a nylon sieve into a clean pan, add the apricot jam, sugar and grated lemon rind. Cook over a high heat for about 10-15 minutes, stirring constantly, until all the excess liquid has been evaporated and the apple mixture is thick. Allow to cool. 5. Roll out the pastry thinly on a lightly floured work surface and use to line a 20cm/8in loose-based fluted flan tin. Cover with greaseproof paper and fill with baking beans. Bake blind in the oven for about 1-15 minutes, then remove the paper and beans and bake for about another five minutes until the pastry at the base of the flan has dried out. 6. Spoon the cooled apple purée into the flan case and level the surface. Peel, quarter and core the eating apples, then slice them very thinly. Arrange in neat overlapping circles all over the apple purée, brush with the lemon juice and sprinkle with the caster sugar. Return the flan to the oven and bake for about a further 25 minutes or until the pastry and the edges of the apples are lightly browned. Allow to cool a little. 7. For the glaze, sieve the apricot jam into a small pan and heat gently until runny. Brush all over the top of the apples and pastry. Serve warm or cold.We Also Recommend:
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