What are you cooking now?

[french frank]

Blue Stilton cheese and sunflower/svelte bread rolls. Lovely.

Coop's latest offering is a Brillat-Savarin (sounds like a good pedigree!). As it looked like a cross between a chaource and a camembert I didn't put it in the fridge yesterday. It was a bitty difficult to handle by lunchtime (or spoondle). Not sure - consistency by this time was a bit like clotted cream (though with a rind), very mild, creamy taste. Epoisses, please.

[Zucchini]

sunflower/svelte bread rolls. Lovely.

I'm sure they're lovely - slender, sophisticated and suave, no doubt.

[Nick Armstrong]

svelte

It is after all your middle name, Bbm... !

[Beef Oven!]

Blue Stilton cheese and sunflower/svelte bread rolls. Lovely.

How's that spelt?

[Beef Oven!]

... yes, cats don't seem to be up to speed with recent nomenclature changes - they still consider themselves as persians - siamese - burmese...

And according to the most popular baby names in the UK, should a Tom Cat be changed to an Ali Cat?

[Nick Armstrong]

And according to the most popular baby names in the UK, should a Tom Cat be changed to an Ali Cat?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

How's that spelt?

It's the Low Calorie option.

[vinteuil]

Coop's latest offering is a Brillat-Savarin (sounds like a good pedigree!). .

... you was taken in by the marketing.

The cheese was only invented in the 1930s; it is an 'industriel' cheese, affinage of only one or two weeks. How they were able to steal the name of the great Anthelme Brillat-Savarin I do not know. I think John Lanchester was appropriately sniffy about the brillat-savarin in The Debt to Pleasure.

[Anna]

The cheese was only invented in the 1930s; it is an 'industriel' cheese, affinage of only one or two weeks. How they were able to steal the name of the great Anthelme Brillat-Savarin I do not know. I think John Lanchester was appropriately sniffy about the brillat-savarin in The Debt to Pleasure.

This led me the other day to get my copy down from the shelf. He does remark, in the introduction, that the ownership of the Fromageries changed in the 1970s and the contemporary edition of the cheese is “disappointingly underpowered.”

On cheese in general he writes: Cheese is philosophically interesting as a food whose qualities depend on the action of bacteria – it is, as James Joyce remarked, ‘the corpse of milk’. Dead milk, live bacteria. A similar process of controlled spoilage is apparent in the process of hanging game, where some degree of rotting helps to make the meat tender and flavoursome. With meat and game the bacterial action is a desideratum rather than a necessity, which is what it is in the case of cheese – a point grasped even in Old Testament times, as Job reveals in his interrogation of the Lord: ‘Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese?’

I’ve now had opportunity of browsing a copy of Persiana, (vint’s new favourite cookbook) - I was glad she includes my recipe for lamb tagine with butternut squash! Lamb and sour cherries appeals http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandst...ayour-cookbook also the spiced veg soup, (other recipes are on her website and scattered over the Net)

[teamsaint]

Cauliflower cheese and chips. ( with Worcester sauce, natch).

small Belgian beer.

Bliss and Bax chamber music.

[french frank]

... you was taken in by the marketing.

The cheese was only invented in the 1930s; it is an 'industriel' cheese, affinage of only one or two weeks. How they were able to steal the name of the great Anthelme Brillat-Savarin I do not know. I think John Lanchester was appropriately sniffy about the brillat-savarin in The Debt to Pleasure.

I think my review was as sniffy as Lanchester's. I won't admit to being 'taken in', but I was curious (the pedigree comment was being ironic). Shan't bother again. Remember Lymeswold?


Duck confit. With roast beetroot.

[french frank]

Finally got round to tryimg the onion and tapenade pizza. I thought I invented the idea, but it seems I am the 268,001st person to think of it. Ne'er mind.

I used the Hugh FW bread dough recipe, made my own tapenade (in pestle & mortar) with black olives, capers and anchovy. I think Hugh's oven temperature could have been lowered a little, esp. if I'd softened the onion a bit first, rather than using it raw. But, it was a bit tasty!!! Peasant food.

[Barbirollians]

Finally got round to tryimg the onion and tapenade pizza. I thought I invented the idea, but it seems I am the 268,001st person to think of it. Ne'er mind.

I used the Hugh FW bread dough recipe, made my own tapenade (in pestle & mortar) with black olives, capers and anchovy. I think Hugh's oven temperature could have been lowered a little, esp. if I'd softened the onion a bit first, rather than using it raw. But, it was a bit tasty!!! Peasant food.

Looks good - a variation on pissaladiere . I imagine it would be good with the classic caramelised onions of that dish .

[french frank]

Looks good - a variation on pissaladiere . I imagine it would be good with the classic caramelised onions of that dish .

It is more of a pissaladière (no herbs to season, btw) - and I think the sautéing of the onions would 'caramelise' them a bit - not sure I fancy any sweetening. I was also struck by how easy - and good - the tapenade was. Absolutely no need for a food whizzer and it takes 5 minutes.

[Barbirollians]

No the caramelised onions in pissaladiere arise simply from long cooking not the use of sugar - well in my recipe anyway - perhaps very well cooked onions would be a better description.