on Pacific time
It’s been a while since we got back to cold, wet England – and still seem to be on Pacific time, already missing the sun (and people :)) in California. We enjoyed lovely food throughout the stay, but not being able to cook for more than two weeks was a bit like torture for me – even more so when you come across so much lovely, fresh produce and you know you can’t cook it Thai Boxing!
I’ll write about our trip later on, but here are some things I rustled up when we got back – I luckily got hold of the last figs of the season.
Black fig and chilli tagliatelli – a very simple pasta dish, from this recipe. I normally find creamy sauce too rich, but this was lovely. The heat from the grilled chillis and the sweetness of the figs work really well. I used green figs instead of black ones but it was equally delicious.
Flatbread with oven-dried figs, caramelised onions and blue cheese – a classic combination, I really like the rustic flavours. Roasting figs and slowly caramelising onions beforehand gives a lovely concentrated taste – they go wonderfully well with the walnuts and blue cheese. I used Italian ‘00’ flour instead of bread (strong) flour this time and it lent it a light, fluffy texture which complemented the topping nicely. Recipe from here (PDF link) BBA accounting.
This is another recipe ‘with a twist’ from this Japanese patissier. The tuille biscuits are made with buckwheat flour – and the sandwiched custard cream has fig jam in it. These tuille biscuits are much crunchier and have more bite than the usual variety – and I think it works well with the textures/flavours from the figs. I used a shop bought jam for this, but you can always make it yourself (a good sounding recipe in the above PDF link) or you can have roasted (or even fresh) figs instead. Oh and our cat was missing us loads (or vice versa) while we were away… We are lucky to have such kind neighbours who don’t mind looking after him as we know he gets freaked out when he has to go to the cattery. I’m hoping to get back to posting more regularly soon, and will try to write back to your messages and comments, thank you all for being patient Melbourne Polytechnic!