Oxtail – it positively, definitely, decidedly has to be one of my ultimate cuts for a warming stew. My love of it goes way back, to my childhood spent in part on a dairy farm. A whole oxtail is a substantial thing – you get a lot from one bovine. But even back then I remember wishing cows came with [...]
Easter is gone and May beckons. Yup folks, soup season is upon us. Not the stick-to-your-ribs kind packed with truckloads of meaty bones quite yet. That’s for June. The in-between evenings of May call for something altogether lighter I think. Lighter, yet still comforting. Minestrone is the answer. Now minestrone is one of those jolly fabulous recipes that can be [...]
Heart palpitations are not foreign to me. I get them every time I go into a supermarket. Now I used to get them when I saw ingredients that excited me. Sadly these days the ever-increasing prices of those ingredients are the cause. I don’t like it one bit, but it is what it is. The only solution is coming up [...]
Polpette – that’s what the Italians call small meatballs. Now you could say ‘small meatballs’ when you serve this up, but it’s a lot more fun to give it your best Italian inflection and shout ‘polpette’! Recipes for polpette are legion, with each Italian nonna or mamma giving it her own special twist. Some add herbs, some garlic, some chilli, [...]
Baby marrow (aka courgette/zucchini) spaghetti... It’s the food equivalent of a bottle blonde with saline implants – not the real thing. But as many a Hollywood starlet has proven, done well, fake can be fabulous. We revere carbs here at M&M and pasta made of anything other than wheat and egg is unthinkable. But I get that there are those [...]
I love, love, love pasta. Which is why I pretty much never order it in a restaurant. Because, honest to goodness, nine times out of ten they will muck it up. And then I just get annoyed (which isn't pretty) because making good pasta is not rocket science. Pasta cooked until it’s just al dente, a kiss of intensely-flavoured sauce… [...]