Perfect Persian

The first recipe cooked from my Persian cook book was chicken and orange stew. I found myself itching to fiddle with the ingredients - as always - but decided to cook it as suggested, then make changes next time. I think it only fair to give a recipe a fighting chance on its first outing. Hard as it was, I didn't even add cardamom or otherwise mess with the ‘plain boiled rice’ suggested to serve alongside.

Despite having few ingredients, the stew took a surprisingly long time to prepare. I was sorely grateful to the gent who quietly set to julienne-ing the orange peel and carrots whilst I got on with the rest: without him there would have been fluster and hunger. The orange peel is boiled and drained several times, presumably to remove some of the bitterness, but which creates a gorgeous marmalade fug in the kitchen: as Seville oranges are not in season, the book suggests to use sweet oranges and add lime juice to achieve the required sourness.

The outcome was a very delicately flavoured, thinly juiced stew. It wasn’t as sour as I expected (or hoped) so I am keen to try again with Seville oranges, as the recipe calls for, when the season arrives. The tangle of bright shredded orange peel and carrots was visually beautiful as well as adding the sweet/sour flavour, and the pistachio and almond nut garnish added a fantastic contrasting texture. In fact it seemed to crown the dish and make it doubly beautiful.

Although labour-intensive with some fiddly stages, the ingredients for the stew were not expensive or difficult to source. As such, I think it a perfect January weekend dish for when there is time to potter in the kitchen, and the bitter oranges are bountiful. I hope to find a few more treasures of this sort in the Persian book; dishes that have a sense of ceremony in the making, are a notch above average when cooking for friends, and yet not be elaborate to the point of onerous. Curious but, I sense, curiously addictive.

Two delicious things to do with a pheasant

A delightful visit to the coast brought magnificent eating gifts in the form of Mrs I's roast lamb, a visit to the Millstream (more of that, later), and a pheasant and home-grown butternut squash to bring back to the big smoke. A delicious, Sussex pheasant already plucked and prepared and be-headed. Phew. For some reason I never got round to the gruesome bit of being a country girl, so not having to prep the pheasant was a great relief.

Half of the butternut squash was put to service immediately. It was chopped in two, roasted until soft and roughly scooped / chopped on top of a very plain risotto, made only with white onion and vegetable stock. Sage leaves fried in butter went atop, and some greens alongside. I love some green. It was sweet, filling and heavenly.

A couple of days later, it was time for pheasant. I peeled and chunked the rest of the butternut squash, roasting it with red onion for about half an hour before popping the bird on top and giving it a thin blanket of streaky bacon. After 30 minutes the pheasant was still a little too pink, but another 5-10 minutes rendered it perfect. The gent brought a beautiful red wine along* using his ever-ready skills to match to the dish, and we used a dash to de-glaze the roasting pan and make some gravy. Sprouts are my absolute favourite so I am undoubtedly biased, but I think their bitterness goes amazingly well with the sweet squash and salty bacon (indeed, almost anything): a mid-week feast which ended in a hands-on, thigh-bone-sucking delight.

The gent and I had pretty much demolished the whole pheasant but still the carcass looked tempting, so a few days later the remaining handful of roast flesh was set aside, and the carcass was boiled into a dark stock. Onions, garlic and streaky bacon made the basis of a risotto and the pheasant stock silkily ladled in. Once cooked, a chunk of butter and the handful of leftover pheasant flesh was stirred through, and left for a couple of minutes off-heat. Meanwhile, some roasted chestnuts had been roughly chopped up and nubbled around in foaming butter to pour atop the mound of risotto. The gent came armed with gifts in either hand: a bottle of red he had been nurturing in his wine nursery** and a cheeky young savoy cabbage to steam and sit alongside the risotto. Parmesan was unanimously rejected as being completely wrong.

I actually think I enjoyed this meal more than the roast: using a proper stock makes such a different dish to using vegetable stock (Marigold powder being the staple chez Roy), the whole dish tastes just that bit richer and the rice is more unctuous and never claggy. I can never decide if the leftovers-meal is actually more delicious, or if the joy of using up scraps somehow heightens the eating pleasure? Frugality as salt? Either way, I always save a cup of rice or a few naked bones in the hopes of an unexpected delight the next day.

Well there are three recipes when I promised only two: that's the kind of good service you get round here. Have a nice day! Please tell your family and come again soon!



* el gent: it would be a complete delight if you could name it, for posterity... it was the easy-going fruity one which gave up its delights without a blush

** Casillero del Diablo -?