Piers De Resistance

This is a little raviolo at ABC kitchen, NYC. Ricotta, egg yolk and spinach inside, on top of a pork ragu. The flavors were all a little non-descript an muddied actually, with the textures universally soft. Not such a winner, although the restaurant itself is nice, especially if you want to feel like Carrie Bradshaw.

And here more suitably rendered with fennel purée and braised shallots.

A leaning tower of pork belly. Oh the giddy heights.

I’m not even sure what’s in these. My housemates boyfriend made them. Lovely colours. It’s the little things…

A winning little salad here. Far from entirely original but oh well. It’s very self explanatory - in this instance it was cold rather than hot as it had to travel in my lunch box. It’d make a lovely warm starter though, perhaps slightly smaller than you see it here, with a poached egg and the anchovies and chilli finer and more incorporated into the dressing. Toasted, flaked almonds instead of seeds. Now we’re talking. With the seeds above here’ s a delicious little trick: Toast pumpkin and sunflower seeds over a medium until they’re popping, have some colour, and have released a little of their oil. When there still piping hot, get a good dash of light soya sauce into the pan, tossing the seeds constantly. The movement is really important as otherwise they can clump together with an uneven coating. What you end up with is pretty similar to dry roasted peanuts. I do batches at a time and sprinkle them on all sorts, but often crunch them down just as they are. 

These glistening little fellas are from France via Smithfield. Marky Market, quite possibly one of the best men in London delivered them to me along with 2 kilos of Old Spot Belly. He’s a great chap who goes to Billingsgate and Smithfield for you in the middle of the night, picks up the best kit he can find, then delivers it to you at your office the following day. Quite superb. The only too cook a duck breast is by starting skin side down in a cold, dry pan, on a medium heat. You’ll render the fat out slowly, and get a lovely crisp skin.

The cheapest Dover sole I’ve ever come across. Around four quid from Saino’s (!?). A slightly concerning price point - but I wasn’t able to work out what the catch was. A little bit of PSB there too and some potatoes with shaved wet garlic.

But the following day my Grandma announced that she was due to collect eight more little fellows from a local herd. What a reprieve, joy of joys. Here they are, making themselves at home in my Grandma’s barn. I have reserved a whole one for myself. I’d like to say bring on the slaughter, but they’re a little too cute.

This was billed by my Mum as the final leg from the final lamb that my Grandmother would ever rear. She’s 88 and has bottle-reared lambs every year for most of her life. On the devastating news that she had finally thrown in the towel, we savored this leg with due reverence.

The final slice of a pretty serious creme caramel made by dear mother. The recipe is from Gill Mellar’s mother and can be found by rooting around on Google in Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Guardian recipes. The reigning factor is the inclusion of Muscavado sugar in the custard - such stuff as dreams are made of.