Queen Elizabeth II remembered. Salt, pepper and topical British food writing
ISSUE 7: September 9, 2022
Our world is living through particularly turbulent times. Around the world people are now mourning the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. After decades living a life full of service and quiet dignity, her death will be keenly felt in the UK and across the Commonwealth group of nations and beyond. She was a steadying presence in our lives, particularly across this unruly group of nations known as the United Kingdom. So whether you supported the Monarchy as an institution or offered it ambivalence Queen Elizabeth served with grace and dignity, for which I am grateful.
Across the world, people are sharing memories and thoughts on radio and TV shows, in newspapers and between family and friends.
The Lemon Grove seeks to entertain, inspire and share a little corner of the food world. So, bearing in mind our love of all things citrus, we share now stories of how the fruit crossed paths with the Queen on three occasions.
Rest in Peace, Ma’am. Thank you for your service, and condolences to your immediate family.
To celebrate her Platinum Jubilee earlier this year, the public was asked to create a pudding to mark the event. Earlier such competitions have given us the culinary staples, Victoria Sponge cake and Coronation Chicken. The winning recipe was named Lemon Swiss Roll and Amaretti Trifle and was created by Jemma Melvin, from Merseyside, England. Tabloid press reports suggest she was inspired by Queen’s reported love of Lemon Posset pudding, but I have no evidence that this really was a royal favourite. Find Jemma’s trifle recipe here.
The late Queen’s favourite cocktail is rumoured to be a Dubonnet and Gin mix, known as a Zaza when served over ice. There are many variations of this drink. Here is my favourite, which is based on Harry Craddock’s famous The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) recipe.
50 ml Dubonnet Rouge
50 ml gin (the Queen was rumoured to prefer Gordon’s London Dry)
1 half lemon/ orange wheel
1 twist lemon/orange peel, for garnish
Ice cubes
Mix gin, Dubonnet and the citrus wheel in a cocktail shaker.
Stir and strain into a white wine glass over ice.
Place lemon/ orange twist on the glass rim.
If this sounds a bit strong, top the glass with tonic, soda water, or even Champagne.
The drink is a French twist on a classic gin martini. Here, dry vermouth is switched out for Dubonnet Rouge, a fortified wine with quinine which offers a sharp and slightly sweet drink.
In 2021, Spanish officials revived a lost tradition of sending a crate of bitter oranges from the gardens of the Real Alcázar of Seville to the Queen’s kitchens at Buckingham Palace. Here they were boiled into marmalade. Click here to watch the Queen take tea and share marmalade sandwiches with Paddington Bear in a moving film made for her Platinum Jubilee earlier this year.
Watch the full film here.
THE MENU … FOOD, DRINK, INGREDIENTS, PLACES
My salt collection is growing. Crystallising. Grain by grain, my Salt Box (so named in honour of Nigella Lawson’s Liquorice Box) is gradually filling up. I have iodised salt, kosher, Sel Marin Noirmoutier (central-west coast France), spicy rose from Pakistan, black lava (Hawaii), crystal white (Himalayan) and Fleur de Sel (Camargue, southern France. And now I need to find space for Blackthorn (the tree from which sloe berries are gathered) salt. It’s one of the most exciting grains I have, and is now taking up space but probably not for long. Never let anyone tell you all salt tastes the same. It doesn’t.
Blackthorn Salt is based in Ayr on the southwest coast of Scotland and uses a tower of thick, hardwood sticks from the black tree, through which seawater dribbles and evaporates in the wind. Once the water has reached a salinity of 20% it’s filtered and pumped to the Pan House, where the liquid is slowly heated and the salt grains gather to create crystals. They taste of clean Scottish waters, wind and ever so slightly tannic form the blackthorn bark. Similar salt graduation towers have been used for centuries. Blackthorn’s master salter Gregorie Marshall visited working towers in Germany and Poland, seeking ideas and construction inspiration for his self-designed tower.
I met Gregorie this week at this Specialty & Fine Food Fair in London, where a model salting tower was attracting attention
Salt works are always special places. I’ve walked along jetties tickling my fingers in salt pans of the Camargue in southern France and Trapani, western Sicily. And I have been fortunate to visit working salt mines in Cheshire and Salzberg (translates to Salt Mountain) in western Austria. I still have see the Salt Valley of Añana, in the Basque Country of northern Spain. They look amazing - click here to see why I think so.
Through slow heating, Blackthorn’s crystals take on a fat, pyramid-shape and have a subtle flavour. I tasted some on a ripe cherry tomato and a nugget of watermelon. The salt offered minerally notes across my tongue and was much more appealing and complex than the sharp taste one-dimensional table salt offers.
Regular table salt is mostly (99%) sodium chloride. Blackthorn contains just 94% and is unbleached with a vague beige-tint (from the tannins). The remaining 6% includes magnesium, calcium, and some 65 trace minerals.
Click here for more on Gregorie and Blackthorn Salt.
READ, WATCH, LISTEN … SOME RECOMMENDATIONS
Two of the most interesting British food writers currently sharing thoughts are Ruby Tandoh and Jonathan Nunn. Many of you will be familiar with their work, exciting, challenging (to orthodoxy and complacency) and offer much-needed voices in the empty noise and clamour of TikTok and Instagrammers ‘recommending’ products without acknowledging it’s paid work.
Tandoh came to national attention in the 2013 edition of Great British Bake Off and has since taken to writing books, shifting from baking tips Crumb: The Baking Book (2014), to increasingly thoughtful essays in Eat Up: Food, Appetite and Eating What You Want (2018) and most recently Cook As You Are: Recipes for Real Life, Hungry Cooks and Messy Kitchens (2021, UK, 2022 US).
Nunn, a proud –Londoner is an accidental food writer attracting first attracting attention through Twitter with a now infamous/famous tweet …
‘the greatest moment in tv history was when jamie oliver showed children how mcnuggets are made and smugly said 'now who would still eat this?' and literally everyone put their hand up and he looked really sad’.
I subscribe to Nunn’s Substack newsletter Vittles and have pre-ordered his (as editor) book of essays, ‘London Feeds Itself’. The book contains: '25 essays about 25 different buildings, structures and public amenities in which London’s vernacular food culture can be found, seen through the eyes of writers, architects, journalists and politicians’.
Tandoh is not afraid to confront traditional, institutional food media. In a post-GBBO 2018 interview with Food & Wine magazine, she ‘realised that I was actually less interested in writing recipes, and more interested in the context that surrounded those recipes: the stuff that informs the ways we eat food, and the ways we pass on culinary traditions’.
Nunn walks London streets eating in places where we all eat – fish and chip shops, kebab outlets, back street restaurants serving local communities such as Caribbean, Chinese or Brazilian. In a recent interview with The Guardian newspaper, he said of his book: ‘Food is a really interesting portal into culture, and people, and parts of the city you might not normally engage with. And restaurants aren’t the only way to access that food culture. That’s what the book’s about’.
Other interesting London-based writers include Rebecca May Johnson (Small Fires, An Epic in the Kitchen 2022), Melissa Thompson, and the team at Eater.
Please suggest other writers that are exciting you in the comments box below.
STOP PRESS
Slow Food at Ludlow Food Festival, Shropshire
September 9 – 11, 2022
Set in the town’s castle grounds, Ludlow Food Festival is one of the UK’s most thoughtful and tasty food festivals. It’s on this weekend, and tickets are available online and at the gate. Sadly I won’t be there this year but if I were, I would head straight for the Slow Food UK stage and workshops.
Slow Food workshops (see here for the listing) include topics as varied as Spices, Walled Gardens, and Romanian Food, to name but three. There’s a FREE Slow Food Talks Tent hosted by Slow Food in the UK, with speakers such as Dan Saladino, Henrietta Green, Angus Birditt, Laura Price and Sue Chantler.
Click here for the festival website.
RECIPE OR INGREDIENT OF THE WEEK
FERMENTED KAMPOT PEPPERCORNS FROM CAMBODIA
Have your ever tried fermented fresh green Kampot peppercorns? They’re a pungent, fermented spice from Cambodia and those made by Kadode Kampot Pepper have just picked up this year’s Great Taste Supreme Champion run by the Guild of Fine Food.
The products are judged blind in a lengthy process organised by the Guild, with the best products awarded up to three stars. Remarks about this pepper submitted by the judges, who tasted over 14,000 products earlier this year, included: ‘an extremely interesting product with a delicate scent of salt on the nose’, and that they enjoyed the ‘soft crunch of the peppercorns and the layers of flavour that started salty, then fruity, then a kick of heat’.
Ground Kampot works well on fish dishes such as sautéed crab or grilled shrimp or mixed into a dipping sauce of fish sauce, lime juice, and sliced spring onion (scallions). For a sweeter match, crack the pepper over freshly cut fruit such as watermelon, dark chocolate, or a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Kadode’s peppercorns come from southwest Cambodia, in the shadows of the Phnom Voir mountain range in Kampot Province. Growers pick young peppercorns from the vine before they lacto-fermented – similar to yoghurt, kimchi or pickles – to produce a dark, juicy and almost snackable peppercorn. For the final production stage, the corns are preserved in Kampot fleur de sel. Tasting notes suggest heat, fruit, and citrus; they can be served whole or crushed, ground for pepper steak or mixed into the classic Roman dish of Cacio e Pepe.
To lift your dish with Cambodian flavours, try pairing the pepper with other spices such as turmeric, ginger, star anise, cardamom, tamarind or lemongrass.
For more information about this year’s Supreme Champion, please visit www.kadodepepper.co.uk.
Information on where to buy the Fermented Fresh Green Kampot Peppercorns and all other 2022 winners can be found here and at www.greattasteawards.co.uk.
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Bruce McMichael
Writer, Podcaster, Educator
Website: www.thelemongrove.net
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Disclosure: I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org