Food – parsian news

Christmas is a time for traditions. If yours is a nativity pizza, who am I to judge? | Jay Rayner

We may want tradition to be mystical and ancient but in truth it’s exactly what we say it is – be that Baileys, beef rendang or turkey and all the trimmingsIn early November, the nice woman at the checkout of my local Sainsbury’s pointed out a nearby s…

We may want tradition to be mystical and ancient but in truth it’s exactly what we say it is – be that Baileys, beef rendang or turkey and all the trimmings

In early November, the nice woman at the checkout of my local Sainsbury’s pointed out a nearby stack of Baileys. “Just £10 a bottle,” she said, with a cheery wink. “Proper bargain.” I smiled thinly. She clearly had no idea what sort of a person I am. Baileys? In November? Don’t be so disgusting. Baileys is for Christmas. The annual bottle comes into my house on 20 December and not a day earlier. Because Christmas is a time for traditions, and the pre-Christmas bottle of Baileys is one of mine. I am stone-cold certain it is exactly what the Baby Jesus would have wanted. Why? Because I say so.

The word “tradition” is solid and reassuring; the things that word refers to are often rather less so. To mix our cultural references, the point is best made by Tevye in the opening song to Fiddler on the Roof. “You may ask, how did this tradition start?” he says, having introduced the audience to his fellow villagers. “I’ll tell you – I don’t know. But it’s a tradition.” Indeed it is.

Peas on toast trump smashed avocados as UK cost of living bites, says Waitrose

Britons return to comfort food like fish and chips, chicken kyiv and macaroni cheese as food prices rise at fastest rate since 1970sThe cost of living crisis has spurred a flight to comfort food, with Britons choosing shepherd’s pie, macaroni cheese an…

Britons return to comfort food like fish and chips, chicken kyiv and macaroni cheese as food prices rise at fastest rate since 1970s

The cost of living crisis has spurred a flight to comfort food, with Britons choosing shepherd’s pie, macaroni cheese and oven chips over more exotic dishes, while smashed avocados are being edged out by cheaper “peas on toast”.

After a year in which food prices climbed at the fastest rate since the 1970s, Waitrose said the financial pressure had altered buying habits and food choices. A third of adults surveyed for its annual food and drink report regularly consume old favourites, such as chicken kyiv.

How to cook sorpotel, or Goan hot-sour pork – recipe | Felicity Cloake’s Masterclass

This rich, Portuguese-Goan pork stew has a festive-looking, spicy-sour red sauce and is often served up at celebration meals, making it a spectacular alternative Christmas centrepieceWhile traditional British Christmas food is rich enough to send you t…

This rich, Portuguese-Goan pork stew has a festive-looking, spicy-sour red sauce and is often served up at celebration meals, making it a spectacular alternative Christmas centrepiece

While traditional British Christmas food is rich enough to send you to sleep, in Goa they prefer to celebrate in more lively style with a feast at which the centrepiece is often sorpotel – pork in a festive, red sauce that’s hot with chillies and sour with the region’s beloved coconut vinegar. It’s best made several days ahead – “This is a dish that requires time,” notes Mumbai-based caterer Pauline Dias – and is traditionally served with steamed rice cakes, but it’s also delicious with rice.

Prep 30 min
Cook 2¼ hr
Chill Overnight+
Serves 4

Minnows into seadogs: inside England’s new fishing apprenticeship

A recruiting crisis in the fishing industry has inspired a pioneering new initiative in south DevonAlfie Steer has chosen a different path to his friends. While they are studying for exams and filling out university application forms, the 17-year-old i…

A recruiting crisis in the fishing industry has inspired a pioneering new initiative in south Devon

Alfie Steer has chosen a different path to his friends. While they are studying for exams and filling out university application forms, the 17-year-old is setting his alarm for 2.50am and heading out to sea. By 5am, he is hauling crabs from the decks of his father, Alan’s, trawler.

“Yes it’s rough and wet – and rolly in winter – but I love it,” he says with a grin. “I’m the only one out of my friendship group who has a full-time job. That’s a good feeling. I get a wage, and it’s a job I might do for the rest of my life.”

Five of the best food books 2023

From life-changing recipes to a Caribbean journey: five mouthwatering favouritesThe Rice BookSri Owen, BloomsburyBorn in 1935, Sri Owen grew up among Indonesian rice fields and has spent much of her adult life in London. The Rice Book, first published …

From life-changing recipes to a Caribbean journey: five mouthwatering favourites

The Rice Book
Sri Owen, Bloomsbury
Born in 1935, Sri Owen grew up among Indonesian rice fields and has spent much of her adult life in London. The Rice Book, first published 30 years ago and reissued with a new foreword, is her masterpiece, a profound work based on years of travel with her husband, Roger, and their examination of rice’s cultural, historical, economic and culinary significance all over the world. It is an engrossing book. I felt like a rice ball bouncing through 80 pages of lively education before arriving, prepared, at the essential global recipes – donburi, nasi ulam, pilaf, paella and dolmas.

More Daily Veg
Joe Woodhouse, Kyle
Joe Woodhouse doesn’t peel vegetables. He also adds blue cheese to potato gratin and potato to focaccia, puts cream with cucumber, lentils in bolognese, celeriac in a puff-pastry, turns walnuts into magical sauce and makes pickling seem as everyday as washing up. After the success of his first book (Your Daily Veg), putting together a companion must have felt daunting. He did it though, offering another 85 satisfying and inventive recipes. I also appreciate the neat proportions and efficient layout of this book, neither of which inhibit the warm, unpeeled generosity of Joe and his cooking.

The sourfaux scandal: what is actually in your supermarket sourdough?

Lidl has been forced to rename a ‘sourdough’ that is made with baker’s yeast. Now the Real Bread Campaign is coming for other dupesName: The sourfaux scandal.Age: Fresh from the oven. Continue reading…

Lidl has been forced to rename a ‘sourdough’ that is made with baker’s yeast. Now the Real Bread Campaign is coming for other dupes

Name: The sourfaux scandal.

Age: Fresh from the oven.

Choc horror: will Wonka turn the tide on sickly movie chocolate?

Hollywood can’t help making onscreen chocolate look disgusting. But can Paul King’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory prequel raise the bar with a real-life chocolatier?Even before most of the world has seen it, we can all safely assume one thing: Wonk…

Hollywood can’t help making onscreen chocolate look disgusting. But can Paul King’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory prequel raise the bar with a real-life chocolatier?

Even before most of the world has seen it, we can all safely assume one thing: Wonka has done chocolate better than any film in the history of cinema. This is for two reasons. The first is that, as director Paul King recently revealed, everything in the movie that looks like it could be eaten could actually be eaten.

During the filming of Wonka, a chocolatier was on hand full-time to make sure that every fantastical confection was authentic, and told the Radio Times that “Everything consumed in the movie is properly edible and tasty, even the flowers and leaves.” Gabriella Cugno, the chocolatier in question, estimates that she had to make five different versions of every confection in the script, along with chocolate cups and saucers and several hundred of the film’s centrepiece hoverchocs.

Nigel Slater’s recipe for pork steaks with chestnuts, sauerkraut and apple

A juicy, flavoursome meaty dish with a sweet and sour twistSeason 2 x 150-200g pork steaks with a little salt. Slice a couple of small, sweet apples into thick segments and remove the cores. Finely chop 2 tsp of rosemary needles.Melt 30g of butter in a…

A juicy, flavoursome meaty dish with a sweet and sour twist

Season 2 x 150-200g pork steaks with a little salt. Slice a couple of small, sweet apples into thick segments and remove the cores. Finely chop 2 tsp of rosemary needles.

Melt 30g of butter in a shallow pan over a moderate heat, then add 1 tbsp of olive oil. As the butter starts to froth, add the pork steaks and cook for 5 or 6 minutes on each side until the fat is golden. Lift out and keep warm.

My advice about the stress zone that is toddler mealtimes: do your best and get by – everything else is just noise | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett

Any manual I wrote would have feeding tips certain to outrage the nutrition influencers of Instagram. I say, go with what worksWere I to pitch a cookbook, it would be this: healthy, easy toddler meals that take less than 20 minutes, for busy, tired par…

Any manual I wrote would have feeding tips certain to outrage the nutrition influencers of Instagram. I say, go with what works

Were I to pitch a cookbook, it would be this: healthy, easy toddler meals that take less than 20 minutes, for busy, tired parents who can’t be arsed. It wouldn’t be shiny or contain aspirational photographs of me, smiling with all my teeth as I one-handedly stir a laborious risotto while clutching a cherubic, catalogue-perfect baby, alongside scaremongery copy about baby food pouches. No, it would be written in bullet points of a paragraph or less, with no frills at all. The recipes would read like this:

Haddock risotto: 1) Boil egg. 2) Dot frozen haddock fillet with butter; microwave for 2½ mins. 3) Microwave 1/3 pack basmati rice for 1½ mins. 4) Microwave peas with water for 4 mins. 5) Make cheese sauce. 6) Mix it all together.

Riaz Phillips’ recipe for Guyanan pepperpot with green seasoning

An ancestral Guyanese stew often made at Christmas with a rich herb and spice mix for extra depthOne of the largest remaining populations of indigenous Amerindian tribes in the English-speaking Caribbean is found in Guyana, where the legacies of the Wa…

An ancestral Guyanese stew often made at Christmas with a rich herb and spice mix for extra depth

One of the largest remaining populations of indigenous Amerindian tribes in the English-speaking Caribbean is found in Guyana, where the legacies of the Warrau, Arawak and Carib can be seen to this day. Among the most famous of these is the cultivation and consumption of cassava root, after the Arawak developed a way to turn the prussic acid in cassava juice into a non-poisonous vinegar by cooking it. They called this cassareep and, together with local spices and pepper, it forms the basis of Guyanese pepperpot, a slow-cooked, jet-black stew that’s usually reserved for Christmas, when it’s traditionally paired with plait bread. It’s quite different from the pepperpot of other Caribbean islands, or even the African-American version, because the cassareep brings a deep, rich, slightly tangy sweetness to a gently peppery sauce that gets progressively thicker over time and that sticks to bread like metal to magnets. Traditionally, pepperpot was made with whatever meat the native peoples could catch, including deer, hogs and even wild rodents; today, though, unless you venture deep into the Guyanese interior, you’re more likely to find it made with more recognisable meats. There’s essentially no replacement for cassareep, so look for it in Caribbean and African food stores, or online. It can be an acquired taste, especially if it’s your first time; the more you use, the thicker and deeper browny-black the sauce will be.

These recipes are edited extracts from East Winds: Recipes, History and Tales from the Hidden Caribbean, by Riaz Phillips, published by DK at £25. To order a copy for £22, go to guardianbookshop.com