Ember Yard - a set menu done right

Just the words "set menu" are enough to send chills up my spine. Too many meals where normally good restaurants send out lukewarm tomato soup or over-chilled pâté followed by woolly salmon or woody chicken, I suppose. But on Saturday we celebrated a friend's Big Birthday with a dinner at Ember Yard, which was so good I may have to change my mind about set menus. Or whinge twice as loud the next time I have one that doesn't match up...

I was having a lovely time, so I didn't get pictures of everything and the pictures I did get are not my finest work. And I didn't manage to taste everything; there was just so much!

I didn't get any pictures of the starters, I was too busy eating them. The grilled flatbread with honey, thyme and smoked butter was so warm and comfortingly pillowy I was tempted to curl up on it for a nap. Our lovely waitress informed me that the bread is baked daily for them, and then they grill and top it for each order. My lovely husband informed me that I need to up my flatbread game to compete.

The seafood and vegetable tapas came out next. As a person who sees little point in kohlrabi I was impressed by how delicious it was in the tomato salad.

Smoke flavours were quite prominent through the meal - so it's a good thing I like smoked food. The apple-smoked bream carpaccio had a lovely, delicate sweet-smoked flavour and slightly chewy texture. I can see shavings of bottarga in the picture, but I couldn't identify it as a flavour at the time.

 The arancini were apparently made of smoked ricotta, but the main flavour was the sweet piquillo pepper. They had the perfect soft but not mushy texture in the middle, surrounded by the crisp shell. My palate may have been dulled by too much (very good, no idea what it was) white wine, because I also couldn't taste any fennel in the aioli on top.

I adore a stuffed and fried courgette flower, and these were particularly good. Paul was less delighted with them because of the drizzle of honey, which he thinks doesn't go with cheese. He is wrong, it does, so remind me not to waste any of my precious jar of truffle honey on him.

This buttermilk fried squid with squid ink alioli was the best fried squid I have had in ages. Years probably. It set Paul reminiscing about the deeply crisp fried squid legs we used to get at Toriciya in Sydney, which have always been our benchmark. I don't know what the difference between aioli, as served with the arancini, and alioli, as here, is, but this was a beautifully black, salty, garlicky sauce.

The next wave of dishes were the meaty ones. Quite clever really; there was enough of the starters and cheaper bits for everyone to fill up on, and then slightly smaller portions of the more expensive meat dishes. At the same time it never felt remotely mean or stingy: there was plenty to go around, particularly since the birthday girl doesn't eat pork. I loved the ibérico pork fat chips - I didn't notice any chorizo ketchup (which sounds like an amazing idea and I must figure out how to make some) but they were topped with what amounted to crushed pork scratchings. Divine.

It's pretty common for some cuts of Ibérico pork to be served a bit pink, and it was the perfect treatment for the grilled presa (a cut from the shoulder at the head of the loin). The whipped jamón butter was divine with it - I couldn't help thinking how good it would be on toast, but better not think about how calorific it is.

Chargrilled beef underblade with cauliflower purée was similarly pink, delicious, and calorific. I can see dollops of jamón vinaigrette across the dish, but I don't remember tasting them. I think I'll have to go back and try it again.

The desserts came out in yet smaller portions, but again there was plenty to go around. If you were one of those people who likes their own plate of food you might have been a bit thrown, but generally it worked well with people passing the dishes around for a taste.

The strawberry sorbet that came with the lemon and buttermilk cake was absolutely sublime, but I didn't taste the cake itself. I had definitely passed the point where I could manage cake.

I loved the white chocolate mousse with pickled nectarines, but completely failed to get a picture of it, while somehow managing to record 16 minutes of video of the inside of my handbag. The chocolate and turrón cake was also a bit cake-y for me at that stage of the evening. Very chocolatey, with a texture similar to a good brownie.

My favourite dessert of the evening was the muscovado panna cotta with thyme shortbread and milk sorbet. A thinnish layer of the caramelly, brown sugar panna cotta, topped with just the right amount of crumbled shortbread and a beautifully light sorbet. The perfect way to end an extremely good meal, and definitely one to try to replicate myself.

There was, apparently, birthday cake to follow, but we had to scuttle for the last train home. And with the best will in the world I don't think I could have fit in another bite.

ETA I found out today that the head chef at Ember Yard is called Jacques Fourie. He is no relation, unto the third generation, so this is honestly as unbiased as a lot of lovely alcohol can make me.

Deep-fried chicken wings al ajillo - best wings ever

As much as I love a buffalo wing (and I really do), I may never eat another one. Not because of the clear health benefits of avoiding deepfried chicken in a sweet and salty sauce, dipped in blue cheese, sadly, but simply because I have found something even better.

These Andalucian treats feature in José Pizarro's new book, apparently, and if all the dishes in the book are as good as this, then I want it! This recipe was in the paper last weekend though - I do like this sort of teaser. Hard to buy a cookbook without them, I think.

Deep-frying in batches

The wings are simply fried (no flour, no batter, just straight in the oil), then they are drained on paper and drizzled with a sauce of garlic, chilli, pimenton and sherry vinegar and sprinkled with salt.

Possibly not very good for proper tapas-style eating (I couldn't possibly manage to look sophisticated and keep myself clean in a public place while eating these!) but as a totally delicious snack amongst close friends they are ideal. And very, very juicy. Salty, spicy, a little bit sour and a little bit smoky, they cry out for cold beer, or chilled sherry. I think the sauce would also be delicious on sauteed potatoes.

Best wings ever

As a bonus, the trimmed wingtips made a nice little pot of good chicken stock, to squirrel away in the freezer  for risottos.

Sort of Spanish Barbecued Chicken Stew.

Disaster has struck. My dishwasher is kaput. After bailing out 2 inches of mucky water at the bottom (which turns out to be about 8 litres, once it's in a bucket) and cleaning the filter etc my personal diagnosis is that the motor is fucked. They do have motors, right? I haven't been able to get anyone out to look at it yet, so I am back to washing up by hand.

It'll be a lot of one-pot meals and not a lot of elaborate cakes and so on until we can get it fixed.

I've posted before about sticking a pot on the fire. Not only do you get a one-pot meal (although the one pot takes quite a bit of washing), but there is something about the very fine, rapid bubble that means the sauce emulsifies to a rich, creamy texture with very little encouragement.

Browning the chicken thighs in the lovely chorizo oil

We started by browning chunks of chorizo in olive oil, then when they were well-browned and had given up some of their delicious red oil, we browned some bone-in, skin-in chicken thighs.

Once the skin on the thighs was really crisp and browned, in went sliced onions, garlic and peppers, a spoonful of sweet paprika and a hefty spoonful of pil pil seasoning, followed by a can of crushed tomatoes and some home-made chicken stock.

Beautifully browned chicken

Once everything was at a rollicking boil, in went some rice. We used arborio, but just because it was open - we were going for a fairly soupy consistency and didn't really need the particular starchy qualities of risotto rice. Then, when everything was very nearly perfectly cooked, we added some prawns, mussels and squid (i.e tub of seafood mix) and just let it finish in the heat.

In a perfect world, we would have finished this with a squeeze of lemon juice and a sprinkling of chopped parsley. We live in an imperfect world.

Splashes on the plate - further proof of the imperfection of the world

Partridge with garlic, sherry and saffron

This is pretty much a Spanish pollo al ajillo, chicken with garlic, done with partridge instead of chicken.

I browned the partridges (1 each) in olive oil in a Le Creuset dutch oven, and added a head of garlic, separated into cloves and peeled. When the garlic cloves and partridges were nicely golden, I added a good pinch of saffron threads (which a friend had kindly brought me from Spain a month or so ago) and a good slurp of dry sherry, seasoned with salt and pepper, put the lid on and put it in a 180C oven and left it alone until the birds were cooked through and the sherry had reduced to a rich and delicious sauce.

The vegetables were an exercise in clearing the fridge - leek, pointed cabbage and broccoli, sauteed with a little Spanish ham.

The partridge breasts came off a bit dry. I think I should have cooked it breast side down, to take advantage of more of the sherry juices. But aside from that the flavour was fantastic and it ended up being a very pretty and luxurious-tasting dish.

Torrijas - Spanish French Toast

I've been absolutely craving one of the dishes I tried in Spain last year. Torrijas. This Easter specialty is like boozy French toast and was absolutely delicious. You could have it as a dessert, but I made it for a leisurely brunch with many cups of coffee.

Torrijas (for 2)

2 eggs
1/4 cup sherry (I used a dry amontillado)
4 thick slices of good but stale bread
butter for frying
1/4 cup maple syrup
2 tbs more sherry
sprinkle ground cinnamon

Beat the eggs with the sherry. Dip 2 slices of the bread into the egg mixture on both sides.

Heat a frying pan and add a knob of butter. When the butter froths, add the first slices of bread and add the second slices to the egg mixture.

In an ovenproof baking dish, mix the maple syrup, extra sherry and cinnamon. Turn the oven on to 140C.

Now it is time to flip the first 2 pieces of toast in the pan, and flip the second 2 in the egg mixture.

Put the kettle on for the coffee.

Flip the first 2 pieces of toast into the dish of syrup and put it into the preheated oven.

Add an extra dab of butter to the frying pan if you think it needs it. Put the second 2 pieces of toast into the frying pan.

When those are done on both sides, get them onto your plates. Pull the warm, syrup-soaked ones out of the oven and put one of them on each plate too, and pour the rest of the warm, cinnamony, boozy syrup over them.

If you were serving this for dessert, some cream would be a good thing.

Yet more Spanish Food

We had to have a very much abbreviated siesta on the last afternoon. As well as doing the final dash to buy shoes and souvenirs, I had been promised seafood on the other side of the river in the Barrio de Triana (where apparently the Roman emperor Trajan was born).

I am quite a focussed shopper, so in not much time at all I had acquired an Indiana Jones hat from a famous equestrian shop for my husband, 2 pairs of wedge -heeled espadrilles and a pair of kitten -heeled sandals for me, as well as a handbag to match the kitten-heels and a couple of folding fans to use on the Tube in summer.

After a fairly long and not at all scenic walk, we were on the bridge to cross the river. A pause at a riverside bar to get a restoring beer, and then on to the 2 places that serve the best seafood around. At the first, we had a plate of chilled, steamed mussels and a lovely prawn salad. On Spanish menus they use different words for salads dressed with mayonnaise and salads dressed with oil and vinegar, so we knew that this was going to be a light, fresh, sharp salad.

Then on the other side of the plaza we went to a bar noted for their fried seafood. Tiny whole squid, none bigger than the first joint of my little finger, courgette fritters, more lovely cazon en adobo and some lovely merluza (hake) fillets fried and spread with a piquant salsa verde.

As well as seafood and Roman emperors, Triana is noted for flamenco. The real stuff, not shows put on by depressed Polish and Romanian girls for tourists. But since no one is likely to start dancing until after midnight, and we wanted to go out for a last breakfast before our taxi took us back to the station at 9, it didn't seem sensible. Next time!

More Spanish food

We knew the last day in Seville was going to be busy. So much more food to eat, so many shoes to buy. We walked to the Plaza de Espana - site of the 1929 Ibero -American Exposition. I'm afraid that it has to be said that it leaves the site of Brisbane's Expo '88 for dead.

Then a climb up the bell-tower of Seville's Cathedral. Used to be the minaret of a mosque and has a ramp instead of stairs because the Moorish prince who built it liked to ride his horse up, so I am told. The ramp makes for an easier climb, but descending in a half-crouch has led to very uncomfortable quadruceps. I like my ecclesiastical art and architecture a bit more austere and certainly less bloodthirsty. Do you actually need the severed trachea and vertebrae on your sculpture of John the Baptist's head? I think not, any more than we needed St Agatha holding her severed breast by the nipple in Segovia's alcazar chapel.

Clearly after that it was lunchtime. We made our penultimate visit to Bodega Santa Cruz Las Columnas - whose serviettes proudly proclaim "Especialidad en pringa tortillita de bacalao". Our light lunchtime snack consisted of berenjenas con miel (delicious slices of fried aubergine drizzled with honey), tiny clams in an oily, savoury sauce, rabbit cooked with garlic and sherry and a glass of gazpacho.

Spanish Food 4

The next stop was at Bar Europa - a spot that my friends had very fond memories of. It's a lovely space, tiled in blue and white which makes it very cool and relaxing. Unfortunately there seems to have been a less-than-successful change of management and the attitude from the spotty youth had my friend wild with rage. The things she'd been most keen to order were all unavailable, so we went with some different stuff.

The salad of soaked bacalao with romesco sauce wasn't very successful. The garnish of olive slices added nothing but an air of bad takeaway pizza, the fish was still very salty, the layer of lettuce didn't really work and the romesco needed a bit more of a vinegar punch. On the other hand, the scrambled eggs with wild garlic shoots were curdy, creamy and utterly delicious. I am delighted that my friend has actually pointed out a patch of wild garlic near my house, so I could go and forage.

After that, we needed to go somewhere where the food would be better and the service less rude. We fetched up at a bar just near the pink church (the Iglesia del Salvador) that my friends always go back to for the espinacas con garbanzos. Not only were they the best of the versions I tried (I think they had a bit of turmeric in as well as the other flavourings), the bartenders were very good-looking and charming. And when we asked for glasses of manzanilla, they offered a choice of 3 and looked terribly serious while we decided.

We finished the evening at another bar with a portion of torrijas. I'm told that we were lucky to get it, because a lot of places only serve it during Holy Week. The version we had was made with wine and eggs and then soaked in a spiced syrup and served at room temperature. The overall effect was like a boozy gulab jamun. Yum. It seems odd to me that something sweet, alcoholic and eggy would be a dominant feature of Holy Week - I guess Lent takes a back seat when something truly delicious is on offer.

Spanish Food 2

Life looks better after breakfast. Especially when breakfast consists of a lovely toasted roll, filled with good sliced serrano ham and drizzled with olive oil. And quite a lot of coffee.

I was a bit perplexed by the hams at first. They are everywhere, hanging from the roof - trotters intact - but they all had funny plastic cones hanging from the bottom of them.
And then I asked and was informed that it is a drip catcher because the fat melts in hot weather and trickles down. Sounds most unhygenic and I can't imagine that it would be allowed in Britain but no matter, the ham was delicious!

But even on a solid breakfast, after some hours of wandering around Seville, it hits beer o'clock and thoughts turn again to food. My friends really wanted to go to one bar (just off the Plaza Alfalfa) but it seemed to be closed. So we stood at the bar at another place and had a quick beer and I turned down the snails. I've had snails before - Burgundy-style, smothered in garlic and parsley butter - but these were a bit too anatomically exact. They still had horns. And faces. I couldn't do it. So we went on to another bar, which previously wasn't very good apparently, but is now under new management.

Well. The new management seem to be kicking goals. We had most delicious cazon en adobo - marinated fried fish, really beautiful tortillitas de camarones - shrimp fritters, a fantastic dish of pork in garlic and sherry and I was introduced to the healthy and charming idea of ordering a plate of tomatoes to accompany rich fried fish. Simply dressed at the table with a little salt and olive oil, it was lovely, and set us up nicely for the next meal!

Spanish Food

I'm 3 days into a 5 day Spanish holiday and I am running out of mental space to remember the food! Hopefully when I upload my photos I'll remember more.

Had 2 nights in Segovia, where the roasting of meat is more than a passion. There are regulatory bodies and everything. First night roast suckling pig, second night roast baby lamb. Both amazing! I never thought that lamb skin could crackle as much as pork skin. Succulent, tender, simply seasoned and served absolutely plain, but they do this ceremonial carving of the suckling pig, carrying it to the centre of the room and chopping it into pieces with the side of a bread and butter plate. We had a couple of tapas; tasty but not that special. This one was a chicken mayonnaise topped with cubes of ham, roasted peppers and lightly caramelised onions.
I am being guided by a hard-core foody with a love for Spain, so I am eating things I probably wouldn't have ordered for myself, but I am loving. The pickled fish sandwich for breakfast being a case in point. Boquerones - fat white fresh anchovies - marinated in oil, garlic and a mild vinegar, are a common tapas dish here. But they also stuff them into crusty white rolls and eat them at breakfast. Delicious!

We're in Seville now. We've had lovely fat mussels, pork loin cooked in whisky in a bread roll, lovely cheese, a sort of ham made from tuna, more lovely cheese and an extraordinary sauce/dip sort of condiment called salmorejo, topped with shaved bacalao. And that was just lunch...
The tuna "ham" is the rectangular bits inthe middle of the pic. Delicious, but disconcerting to the semi-veggie with us.