Lentils, pressure cooked.

I guess now is not a very good time to convince people that pressure cookers are perfectly safe, convenient little gizmos that don't explode. They really don't, you know, unless you make them. 

But I can see that the image problem is not likely to go away, so I suggest we call them express pots, like we do in Spanish. Olla Express, now, isn't that a gadget you'd be glad to use? Dear manufacturers and marketers, you are welcome to the idea. I am a pressure cooker evangelist and will be glad to have more converts to the cause.

So, anyway. The recipe. Lentils, cooked until just al dente, well dressed with a punchy dressing and a few crunchy things. It may be one of the perfect side dishes, and is one of my favourite things for lunch. You'll probably only find Puy or so called Puy lentils, but of course I would recommend Spanish pedrosillanas for this.

Here's what you do. You take your express pot (see what I just did there?) and put in a cup of lentils, a bay leaf or a good pinch of dried oregano, some salt, and perhaps a garlic clove or a shallot. Salt is controversial so you can do without and use it later, if you prefer.

Add water to cover by three centimetres/an inch. Lock the lid, bring up to pressure. When it's up, give it two minutes and turn off the hob. Now let it come down naturally for ten. Don't leave it longer or it will turn into lentil stew, which is fine but a different thing.

When you open it, drain the lentils but reserve the liquid, plus a couple of spoonfuls of lentils. 

Put these lentils in a pretty bowl or plate, and while they're warm, dress them. Olive oil and lemon for starters, and then any or all of these, well chopped: capers, shallots, dill pickles, parsley, almonds. You may want a touch of mustard, perhaps some sherry vinegar, probably some black pepper. See how you like it, and try it once again before you serve because they soak up the dressing a lot and you may want more oil or lemon or salt.

I love this with another salad of beets, or grated carrots. And boiled eggs and brown bread, or smoked mackerel, or these sausages. Anything, really.

Next day, a soup. I know you´ll think that that muddy looking liquid is ugly and useless, but trust me.

All you do is chop some celery, onion and carrot into little dice. If it makes you feel better by all means call it mirepoix. Sweat this in a little oil or butter or both, inside your express pot (ahem) and add the lentils and liquid, plus a cup or good stock, if you have it. If not, water with a bit of good stock powder will be fine, or just water, but the real chicken stock brings it up a few notches.

Bring up to pressure, give it three minutes. This is an understated soup, but very good. It has more heft than just vegetables, but is way gentler than all lentils. Put some lemon juice and some Sherry there, too, and perhaps a few fresh herbs to brighten the colour. It is just the thing for these spring days that are always colder than you hoped.

Let's give pressure cookers a good name, go on.

Summer salad

Just a salad. Words that strike dread into my heart. I've written about this before, but it bears repeating: if you have artistic tendencies, or think you may have, ask for help. Don't take it out on a pile of defenseless greens, and start flinging things at them until they are smothered in bits and bobs.

Yes, if salad is going to be the meal, it can't just be a sliced tomato.  I know it's too hot to cook actual food, and it makes sense to make the most of fresh summer produce and a couple of tins. Fine. But that doesn't mean it should have seventeen ingredients. It just looks messy and tastes messy, too.

Why don't you make two, or even three, salads instead? I looks beautiful, lavish, fills you up just looking at it, and takes a little more time to prepare, but much longer to eat.

A combination I like is a bowl of green lettuce and ruccola, perhaps. Tossed with this dressing, with perhaps a tiny bit of raw garlic and some chopped nuts.

In another bowl, tomatoes, just like that, with a drizzle of oil and some salt. If they´re good tomatoes, they need nothing more.

A third can have the heavy duty stuff: the boiled eggs, tuna, olives, asparagus, etc. Placed side by side, drizzled with a simple vinaigrette, or perhaps one that you have made creamy by adding some mayonaise.

Doesn´t that look pretty? Toast some bread, open some wine, enjoy the summer. And if you´re somewhere northern and blustery, have a hearty pudding afterwards. See the advantage where you can.

Sicilian orange and fennel salad

I'm having a slight case of blogger's block. I want to write about my trip to Sicily, but it's hard to know where to start. I´m still taking it all in, and somehow homesick. It sounds silly, since it´s not my home, but we were make  so welcome by Fabrizia that it felt like it.

I thought I would mention a few dishes, and maybe round it off with one of the recipes, but I couldn´t choose. We went through such a whole lot of stuff, from deceptively simple fried vinegary sardines to the baroque multilayered fantasy of cassata to potatoes in saffron that were just like the papas en amarillo I know from home. Every kind of food, in every note accross the scale. What would I write?

Then it occurred to me that a common theme in all those meals was the salad. There was always a salad of some sort, served on a moon shaped plate. We never had the same salad twice, I'm pretty sure,  but the point of them was always the same: to provide a  crunchy, fresh, almost discreet relief from the fireworks in the main, round, plates. Like the clowns in the circus,  coming between the high wire acts.

Of course these salads were all made from whatever there was in the kitchen garden. Right now, in early spring, that means fennel, frisée, wild radish greens, perhaps, and citrus: oranges, or some special salad lemons, or both.

Now, I live in Aberdeen, which puts me very, very far from that horticultural idyll. When I say "whatever I can find"  I don't mean whatever there is in the garden, but whatever they have in the supermarket. And let me tell you, that can often mean, "not much".

So when I made myself a salad of just oranges and fennel, with some some parsley leaves added for colour, I though, this is never going to cut it . But you know what? It was beautiful. Fresh, and sweet, and crunchy and yes, it took me straight away to Sicily. So if you'll forgive me resorting to the clichéd quote, it was a case of changing things so they would stay the same, and it worked.

I will be blogging more about our trip to the Anna Tasca Lanza cooking school, but also be sure to check out what Béa, Nicky and Oliver, Melissa, Keiko and Chika post. Prepare to swoon at the pictures, and to develop strong cravings for ricotta in all its forms.

Nostalgic Sicilian salad, for one

Half a fennel bulb
One orange
A few parsley leaves
Olive oil, salt, pepper

Shave or slice the fennel as thin as you can. Cut the orange over it, so not a drop of juice is lost. The shape doesn't really matter (to me, anyway , since I have the advantageof drawing my food). Leave the parsley leaves whole.
Now sprinkle with salt, drizzle with oil, crack a bit of black pepper and that's it.

Winter Caprese

I know, I know. Oximoron, right?

It´s just that after eating so much rich food every day I need a rest. The tons of smoked salmon and stuffed meat and roast potatoes and caramelized onions and the chocolate and polvorones, they´re great, but need some balance.

And since I found my favourite cherry tomatoes, pear cherry tomatoes from Pascual, in Murcia, practically given away at a Chinese grocer´s the other day, I simply had to do this.

It makes for a perfect dinner for two. A bag of fresh mozzarella, the tomatoes, sauteed, topped with either the last of some home made frozen pesto or a sprinkling of dry oregano.

Toast bread, or a few flour tortillas and you´re laughing.

Peanut slaw

Oh the joy of French onion soup. Not only the queen of soups, but probably top of my list of all time top ten grilled cheese greats, and high up there in any top ten list I ever make.
We had that on Thursday at the knife skills class, which was great, because I´ve always had some caramelization issues and I think now I know how to do it properly.
Also, I learnt this great tip: add vanilla right at the end of whatever you do with it because it tends to lose its perfume with long cooking. The reduced red wine sauce the chef made to prove this point was like hitting a brick wall of vanilla. Except, you know, nice.

All the stuff we did was classic bistro cooking and as such way beyond my usual scope, so instead I´ll link to this cabbage slaw, and just say I do it without the cilantro.
It´s a perfect thing to make when you´re distracted and kind of hungry but not really, because you had a heavy lunch, yet want some kind of a healthy yet not boring dinner. Or when you´re on a diet (but don´t go wild with the peanuts). Or when you want to serve vegetables but can´t be bothered to peel carrots or wash and dry lettuce. Or when cabbage is all you have, since it can last forever, unassumingly lurking in the fridge until called for.
So you see, most of the time, really.
It´s a good one for trying out new found knife skills, too, as chopping cabbage has to be one of the easiest, most rewarding chicken tasks. No matter how inept or slow you are, in no time you have a mound of crunchy leaves to be proud of.

Back in Spain, oh dear

Yes, we had withdrawal symptoms and really wanted to get back to our baby. But it was very hard to tear ourselves away from the coast yesterday, because as usually happens after a rainy weekend, the minute you pack your bags in the car, the sun shines merrily.
It was a very long drive, and we stopped in Elvas for lunch. J thought we might as well have the bacalhau dourada, and we did, and it was pretty good, considering we chose a nondescript touristy little bar in the square.
Elvas looked very beautiful but we couldn´t explore. That´s the problem with Madrid; it´s just too far from everything else.
J´s mother is coming for lunch, so cure the saudade I´ll make octopus salad to start with, and I´ll crush the meringues I bought in Evora to scatter over strawberries and cream.
As far as I can make out, the salada de polvo goes like this:

Octopus, boiled and cut thin (you can buy boiled octopus at the market here, so that´s easy)
Parsley, chopped
Onion, cut very thin and marinated in vinegar (?)
A generous dose of extra virgin olive oil

Just the thing with the so excellent bread we´ve also brought back from the Alentejo.

Salad or soup?

March was ablaze with sunshine; cotton jackets emerged from under heavy coats, cherry tomatoes covered the breakfast toast, creamy avocadoes turned up for almost every meal,
and it seemed that the jellied chicken stock would not go the way of onion soup but of asparagus risotto.
Except that now we´re firmly back in midwinter. With a fridge full of stuff bought with different weather in mind.
It seems too springy, despite everything, to make soup, and yet we can´t live on a few leaves and some silly white wine.
My favourite in between solution is lentil salad. Robust, yet sprightly enough.

All you need is lamb´s lettuce , topped with lentils that you´ve boiled yourself. THe reason for this is that the cooking liquid is full of flavour, and will help you to avoid dressing them with tons of oil. With a few spoonfuls of the liquid, a bit of oil, lots of lemon juice, some of the zest, and the garlic from boiling lentils squished in, you have a pretty wonderful combo.
If you have some bacon on hand, that can never hurt, and goat´s cheese is always good. A poached egg is heavenly. And for a gold medal, add a spoonful of onion jam.

I´m a huge fan of bottled beans, but lentils don´t seem to make it past the process so well, and they´re not such a bother to make, with the no soaking, no taking forever thing. So I definitely recommend making your own, specially if you can find the little black exquisite caviar lentils from León.

Sprouts

Here´s the banner I´ve made for Mary, aka Breadchick. It´s up just in time for the tentative beginning of spring. In Madrid chairs and tables are already beginning to sprout on sidewalks, and one can enjoy frothy little cañas in the sun.

Also, in a suitable springly mode , my friend Mariana, aka MariaGodzilla, gave me a bunch of mustard shoots (sprouts?) on Monday. They´re beatiful, grassy and fresh, with a hot mustardy aftertaste. They´re impossible to find around here, and these were home grown. The first I munched straight out, but after a while I decided to do them justice, with:

a salad- cherry tomatoes, perfect avocadoes, the mustard shoots, a few drops of olive oil, a slosh of sherry vinegar and salt.

and also, a sandwich- very dark rye bread, mashed avocado (they´re all over the place now, fresh from Granada), smoked salmon. Topped with a straggly mess of, yes, mustard shoots.

Lovely.

Rented house cookery: escalibada

"The kitchens of holiday houses (...) usually have a stony bleakness in common. However adequate the beds or satisfactory the view, the kitchen equipment will probably consist of a tin frying pan, a chipped enamel saucepan, one Pyrex casserole without a lid, and a rusty knife with a loose handle."
Elisabeth David, people. Marvel at this. She knew, to the letter, what would be the contents of the cupboard in our little cottage in Saaremaa, Estonia, in the summer of 2007. Pretty impressive. I love finding proof that some things never change.
Not that one really wants to cook in summer. At most, one will grill a few burgers, or make a batch of pancakes for a long lazy breakfast. The rest will go in sandwiches and ice cream, and happily so.
But when that´s not enough, here´s a summer staple that can be done in even the most basic rented kitchen, provided there´s an oven.
Escalibada is a salad of roasted peppers and aubergines, dressed with olive oil and vinegar, and chopped raw garlic. Some recipes also have tomatoes roasted alongside, and even the garlic and some onion, too. (I prefer this. Raw garlic and onion are sociopathic, in my opinion).
Here´s the recipe, with a suggested holiday timeline.
Start with 3 red peppers (bear in mind that in Spain peppers are very big, the size of an outstretched hand) 3 aubergines, 1 quartered onion, three whole garlic cloves.
In the morning, put everything in a 180ºC oven, unpeeled, whole, easy, while you prepare coffee. The vegetables will roast while you have breakfast and read the papers.
After 45 minutes or so, take them out, put them in a bowl, cover it with clingfilm, go and get dressed.
When you come back, they´ll have sweated a little and become cool enough to handle. Peel peppers and aubergines, deseed the peppers, and make your dressing. I like to squeeze out the garlic and make it into a paste that makes the basis of my vinaigrette.
If it´s not too hot, put it in the fridge, and go to the beach.
When you come back, you´ll have a beautiful, punchy salad. If you´ve picked up some fresh fish in the market on your way back, then of course you´re in business for grilled fish with escalibada, which is one of the best things possible. If not, it will still be great with tuna from a can, boiled eggs, a cheese sandwich, or even some pizza.
It lasts quite well for a few days, too, so you can make it as an investment or a just-in-case dish.
(And yes, I know, this is a very Mediterranean dish, and no, I didn´t make it in Estonia. I stuck to local cucumbers and apples and berries and mushrooms, no great hardship.)

Salpicón: seafood salad

Salpicón is one of the best things of the summer. It´s more of a bar food, of the sort that nestles in chilled trays on the bar. If you´re lucky, it will have whatever caught the cook´s fancy that morning at the market. If not, it´ll have been made on Monday with the sweepings of the fridge, and will have languished ever since. Caveat emptor.
In theory, salpicón is a vinaigrette made with three parts olive oil to one of sherry vinegar, and peppers, onions and parsley, chopped very small. Maybe tomato, too, and probably chopped egg ( I told you it was everywhere).
In practice, it´s more of a salad. The chopped vegetables make a substantial base note for a star ingredient, whichever it may be. The most typical is a mixture of seafood, prawns, mussels, octopus. Lobster, maybe, at the top end of the scale, surimi at the bottom. With potatoes, it becomes ensalada campera, or papas aliñás, and is one of the best possible potato salads, I think.
Fish roe is also a favourite, or beans, or salt cod. The variations are almost endless. Just walk into a bar, ask what aliño they have, and have a tapa sent round with your beer. It´s wonderful, and unique in the Spanish canon in its overall healthiness and lack of pig-parts.

Salpicón
Mince two shallots, finely dice one big red pepper, chop a good fistful of parsley leaves. The tomatoes don´t have to be as finely diced. Mix these with the 3/1 olive oil and sherry vinegar , and leave to mingle. Yes, the tomato will make a lot of liquid, but don´t we all love our pot likker?
Make a couple of boiled eggs using the 12 minute method. Thanks to everyone who left it in my comments box. I am a born-again boiled egg lover.
The seafood can be whatever you have on hand. Leftover crab, maybe, or a can of good tuna or sardines, or around 250 gr. steamed prawns. Whatever suits you best. I also love it over beans. In fact, I made salpicón to trick out this recipe from Mark Bittman´s 101 from last week´s NYT.
4 Open a can of white beans and combine with olive oil, salt, small or chopped shrimp, minced garlic and thyme leaves in a pan. Cook, stirring, until the shrimp are done; garnish with more olive oil.
I found it a bit bland, but left to cool, and then mixed with the salpicón and a couple of tomatoes, it was beyond delicious.
The only important rule you should never forget is to mix it a few hours ahead, and leave it in the fridge, well covered, so that flavours have time to mingle. And eat it in the day. It´s meant to be super-fresh and crunchy.

Home-made takeout event.

Lindy is hosting this event. I think that´s a great idea, because I´m quite fascinated by the whole wide spectrum of lunchboxes around the world.
I don´t pack lunches for myself, since I work from home, and mostly every day go to my mother´s for lunch. But since J has a long horribly trafficky conmute to Toledo, when he goes there I make him lunch to go.
In this way I assuage my guilt. Not that it´s my fault, but it feels very unfair that I take my lunch among the crazy babble of a family table, and then have coffee and a nap on a sofa, with a jack russell on my lap, and a labrador at my feet.
And since he always says that he lives in Madrid because of me, I do feel slightly bad. J´s fond dream would be to be the pharmacist in a small mountaintop village, and play mus every evening with the priest, the head of the Guardia Civil, and the mayor. Never mind that for that he´d have to move to the 1960´s, he sticks to his fantasy, and so I try to make up for it with lunchboxes.
Also because J, left to himself, would have fried eggs with chorizo at the university canteen every day, and that would never do.
The lunchbox itself is the Nomad model from Valira. It´s really great. It´s insulated, and holds two containers that close hermetically, so you don´t have to worry about sauce spilling everywhere. And there´s still room for a yogurt or some fruit, too.
It´s impossible to predict what will find its way to the lunchbox. Usually it´s whatever we had for dinner the day before, or else a sandwich. But I also like to have single portions of frozen dishes cooked at other times. Curry, or pisto, or noodles. They may not taste as good as they did the first time around, but I think they can stand up to the uni cafeteria food, any day.
I also always put in a salad in the small container. The dressing goes into a little plastic ziploc bag, so the greens don´t become soggy.
Unless it´s for J´s favourite salad. I make this one a lot, since it´s made from frozen green beans, and they´re a pretty handy thing to have around in case there´s nothing fresh in the fridge.

Green bean salad

Steam a handful of french beans.
Then mix a couple of spoonfuls of your favourite vinaigrette with a squirt of lemon juice and a teaspoonful of mayonaise. You might want to chop some shallot, too, but probably not. It´s only a lunchbox, after all.
Add some whole cherry tomatoes, and let the flavours meld. The vinegar will make the beans lose their bright green, but the taste will more than make up for it.

This brings the health quota of the lunchbox up so high, that you can even slip in a cookie. Go on.

More pesto tips and a recipe

Since writing the last post I´ve remembered another good tip

6-when the jar of pesto is on its last legs, use it to make salad dressing, so you don´t lose even a speck of precious sauce. Just put oil and vinegar and shake it well.

Browsing Apartment Therapy I´ve discovered this website, Specialty Bottle, which is the place to hunt for jars. They have every size imaginable. I want them all.

Freezing: yes, I freeze pesto, too. It´s perfect for bringing a little warmth to your winter. My method is to spoon just a little into my smallest plastic containers, and put them in the freezer overnight. Next day, when they´re hard, I snap them out and put all the different sized discs inside a ziploc bag. That way, they take up no room at all, and you have different serving portions at the ready. You can do this with ice cube trays, but it´s hard to prevent the whole freezer from smelling pesto-y for a long time. Not very good news for those gin and tonics.

And now for my all-time favourite cold pasta dish. I discovered this in the chiller cabinet of the long gone and much lamented Marks & Spencer on C/Serrano. You can see how old that drawing is, in that the label shows the salad to have cost 395 pesetas. Ah, what times...

It´s a very simple salad that consists mainly of pasta, penne rigate for choice, but orecchiette also ok, dressed with pesto and olive oil until slick. It is then combined with raw spinach, not much, it´s just for looks, really, and toasted pinenuts.
The trick is to toss it very well, so that lots of pine kernels end up inside the penne rigate. A few slivers of parmesan and you´re in business for a real crowd pleaser. I always make it for buffets, as it cosies up very well to all sorts of things, from other salads to cold meats or salmon.
You can also ring the changes by adding black olives, sauteed mushrooms, cherry tomatoes or mozzarella.

Peace, love and lentil salad

On Friday I had a 15:30 pm lunch date with two friends who also work in graphics. We were to eat sushi and talk shop. Perfect. But there I was, quite peckish at 1330, and the prospect of two more hungry hours to go.

I went to the kitchen, thinking maybe of eating some toast, or raw carrots, when I found a jar of lentejas al natural. More cautious rummaging around in the fridge revealed a celery stick. I thought I could do worse, even if the whole thing felt very much like a 1970s hippy-vegetarian conceit.

I feared with each mouthful I´d start to feel as if I´d knitted my own socks out of hemp, and my hair had grown a yard. But actually, I found the whole thing very elegant and spare, almost sophisticated, in fact.
I think we may be seeing a lot of this one, to bolster up sandwich dinners or meagre lunch boxes. It´s filling, but not overwhelming, and takes seconds to fix, which is good news when you´re snacking before what you know will be a good lunch later.

Elegant lentil salad

Lentils from a jar, drained
Celery, chopped very fine
Salt
Sherry vinegar, olive oil, plenty of pepper.
Chopped parsley goes very well with this too, as does lemon juice.

Verdi salad

The Music is back in my kitchen.

The radio cassette that had been there for four years, and previously six at my former studio, and before that an unspecified number of years in my room at my parents´house. I was attatched to it, but the cd broke, and then the tape deck, and for years I´ve had to rely on the whim of radio djs for my music.

I´m very lazy about home improvement, but finally I dragged myself to Fnac, and elbowing my way past the throngs of ipod and mini-camera buyers, managed to bring home a new radio cassette. I know it´s something of an anachronism, but it does read Mp3 files.

I couldn´t be happier. At last I can chop mushrooms in time to Elvis, stir soups with Eartha Kitt, and wait for stock to bubble away while Batisti throbs his heart out.

One of my favourite kitchen tasks, and one that lends itself to silly arm waving and keeping time to music, is drying salad leaves in the spinner. I loathe a limp, wet lettuce, and since I think a salad spinner is a lot of fun, I insist on keeping it always to hand.

I also like to keep my salad colour coded. Green or red, but not both, which clashes with the Spanish culture of "ensalada mixta". I do love to mix different greens, though, in what I like to call, in a very dorky homage, Verdi salad. It´s not an every day salad, but one worthy of your most honoured guests.

Lettuce, preferably trocadero, although normal is fine, lamb´s lettuce, maybe one of those dark "oak´s leaf", and possibly a few spinach leaves. Ruccola, depending on what it´s going on the side of. I´m not crazy about frisé, but feel free.
The pièce de résistance is an avocado, ripe and buttery, almost dissolving into the dressing and giving the thing an unctuous kick.

I wash, shred and mix the leaves well beforehand, with the music blaring, of course. Since it´s Verdi we´re with, let´s have the bit in La Traviata where Alfredo crashes the party. That´s always a show stopper.

By the time the guests have arrived, I´ll have some adequate background music for the first drinks.
Then, when everyone´s at the table, I slice the avocado, douse the whole with my favourite vinaigrette, mix thoroughly, serve, and prepare to receive the compliments like a proper prima donna.

Balsamic rage

Last week José asked for fried eggs with chanquetes in a very basic elemental place in Sevilla. The egg came dribbled all over with balsamic glaze.
J, a calm fellow, just shrugged and dunked his bread in the yolk.
I am all rage, and strong arms had to forcibly restrain me from throwing those eggs at the cook´s head. I´d ordered the rice, it wasn´t my problem, but really, in what stupid parallel universe does anyone think a fried egg is improved by a brown squiggle?

This has got to stop. I will now be beaten into submission by this stupid fad. I´ve had it.

Listen: balsamic vinegar is not a neutral ingredient. As well as acidity, it has a bunch of other flavours (wine vinegar, grape must, sulphites E22o, caramel colouring E150D, anyone?).
It should not be thrown about any old how. It can be a wonderful product, but it can also be pretty intrusive and pointless. If I had my way, I´d forbid the wanton use of this substance to all except
A. Italians. they invented the thing, they know what to do with it
B. good chefs. Ditto about knowing

I also think it´s fine to carry a small quantity for personal use at home.

Otherwise, people opperating bars or restaurants, de-glue your hand from the neck of that bottle with the Duke of Modena on it. Morever, don´t, I repeat, DO NOT, reduce it to a syrup and doodle on plates.
If you´re artistic, or think you may be, ask for help. There are other substances for you to try out, like charcoal and paper. Hopefully, you won´t expect us to eat those.

The worst thing is, we have excellent vinegars here. We should be selling them to the world, bottled prettily and labelled with the Countess of Chinchón, or whatever, and spending the hard cash on Ferraris. Instead, where are we? Buying stupid cheap balsamic from those clever fellows in Modena, who already have too many Ferraris anyway.

So listen, keep to Sherry vinegar. It´s the best we have to offer, and understandably, it´s the one best suited to traditional Spanish cuuisine. Anything else is pure daftness.
If you must waive your kids´ college education and spend millions on cute little bottles, then go for PX vinegar. It´s Made from Pedro Ximénez, a generous dessert wine made from raisins. It´s good, it´s pretty, it´s expensive, it´s sweet and heady and I daresay it may even reduce marvelously well. Just the thing for you arty types.

And now, enough ranting. I´ll give you my recipe for a killer vinaigrette, so we can all compare notes.
If anyone makes this with so much as a drop of balsamic, I´ll combust, die, become a ghost, and hide in your store cupboard, howling forever. Be warned.

Take an empty, clean jam jar. Put a heaped teaspoonful of Dijon mustard, and another one of honey. Mix well, maybe even put it a few seconds in the microwave. Add vinegar, the good stuff, from Jerez, to double the volume of mustard and honey. Add salt. Be generous. Now add olive oil, also the good stuff, to double the volume of vinegar.
Add a good pinch of cumin (this is optinal, but excellent if you´re serving your salad with cheese) and a couple of spoonfuls of water.
Screw the jar tight, and juggle it vigorously until it looks creamy and perfect.
This vinaigrette will keep for weeks in the fridge, and will truly make your salad preparations a thing of minutes.

A quick dinner for five

It´s not only I who am stressed and at my wit´s end with the heat of summer and the pressure of all the workload that has to be handed in before August.
My friends are all like that, too, or so it seems. We exchange a lot of emails that usually end with a hopeless "we really should get together sometime".
And then yesterday, magically, we decided to finally go ahead,and have dinner at my house. The decision was taken at 8, so there was just enough time to go to the market before they closed. I rushed out to buy ice , tonic and lemons, which would be needed no matter what, and ran over menu possibilities on the way there.
I´d have loved to try something new or spectacular, but there was really no time, so I opted for trusted warhorses ; focaccia, green beans in vinaigrette, and a pasta salad.
It´s a menu that can be done a few hours in advance. This time I didn´t have hours, but I did want half an hour´s quiet before they arrived, enough for a shower at least.
The first thing was to make the focaccia dough, and leave at least half an hour´s rising time. With the Thermomix that´s just a matter of pressing a few buttons.
While it rested, I boiled the beans, mixed the vinaigrette with some bottled mayo, sliced the tomatoes, and chopped the chalottes.
As the pasta boiled, I also found time to grate cucumbers and chop mint for a raita-ish dip with a bit of cumin and sesame thrown in.
Once all this was done, I put the focaccia in the oven and went off to breathe a little.
The dough didn´t rise as it should have. Maybe I didn´t leave it long enough, or maybe it was too hot in the kitchen. Probably the yeast was a bit old, having been in my freezer four months. So it was crusty and brittle, but tasted very good.
It was good to see everyone before we all disperse for the summer.
Btw, that drawing is nothing like us , of course, but the kitchen is very vaguely inspired on mine, which has red walls too.

Pasta salad
adapted from the Ballymaloe cookery course

250 gr. pasta in a smallish shape
2 big jars of beans, preferably dark, and if possible, two different kinds, for a prettier effect
200 gr. tuna in olive oil
Chopped parsley, and some other herbs if you like (chives are good)
Vinaigrette , as much as you like

Ideally, you should mix the vinaigrette some hours before, and leave the beans soaking in it. They will drink it up, and be very flavourful and very cold. When you add the hot pasta and toss them together, they both achieve the perfect temperature. Then all you do is throw in the chopped herbs and the tuna.
This can sit around for quite a while, but be sure to check for seasoning before you serve it. It seems to soak up vast amounts.