Retro Food For Modern Times

26
Aug
2023

Riceycoco

categories: 1970's recipes, Good Housekeeping World Cookery, The Caribbean, World Cooking

Greetings friends and welcome to Jamaica! Today, on the back of my trip to tropical FNQ (Far North Queensland), I am featuring a recipe from the Caribbean. Riceycoco comes to us via the pages of Good Housekeeping’s World Cookery (1972). It also comes very high on the list of words I find pleasant to say! And that is all the justification I needed to make it!

Riceycoco, is as the name suggests, rice cooked in coconut milk. It is traditionally eaten for breakfast which reminded me of a Sri Lankan dish called Kiribath (milk rice). There the difference ends. Kiribath is eaten with chutneys and sambols as a savoury dish whereas Riceycoco is sweet. I am not fond of a sweet breakfast so I ate mine as a dessert, similar to a rice pudding. To amp up the tropical vibes, I added some mango to the mix.

Rice and coconut milk is a classic in many Asian countries and I enjoyed the twist of having a sweet version of something I am more familiar with as a savoury dish. It was also a nice reminder of the tropics now we are back in cold, grey Melbourne! Its also a very soothing comfort food – a little bit like being cocooned in a warm cuddlepillar!

Riceycoco – The Recipe & Notes

I used coconut milk from a can instead of fresh coconut milk.
I also swapped out the brown sugar for maple syrup.
I served some additional coconut milk on the side.
This would also be spectacular with a dollop of coconut yoghurt.

If you want to be reminded of the tropics, like a sweet breakfast or want the nursery comfort of a rice pudding why not give Riceycocoa try Even just so you get to say the name a few times!

Have a great week!

21
Aug
2023

N or M – Aperol Betty

categories: Aperol, Dining With The Dame, Drinks

Hello crime readers and food lovers. Or in this case, cocktail lovers because we are celebrating Agatha Christie’s wartime thriller N or M with an Aperol Betty. N or M has few references to food. I wonder if Agatha Christie did this intentionally as food was rationed during the war. Reading about lots of food may have led to readers becoming disgruntled with their Mock Crab and other wartime foods. I found my inspiration from one of the characters in the novel Betty Sprott, who despite only being a little girl is key to two pivotal parts of the novel!

N or M -The Plot

It is 1940 and Tommy and Tuppence Beresford are disheartened because no one wants them for war work. Tommy is then approached by Mr Grant, the head of the secret service to hunt out some fifth columnists. Tommy is sent on a top-secret mission to Leahampton, to search out two Nazi agents, a male and a female, known only by their code names, N and M. Imagine his surprise then on his arrival at the Sans Souci guesthouse to see Tuppence there!

We have quite the cast of shady characters including

A landlady who may or may not be Irish
A German refugee chemist
A female resident of the Sans Souci who is watching Tuppence very closely
A mysterious Polish woman hanging about the Sanc Souci
Little Betty kidnapped
The kidnapper killed by a crack shot from Mrs Sprott
Someone hitting Tommy over the head with a hammer
Someone holding Tommy captive in their basement

Luckily we have Tommy and Tuppence on hand to figure out who is N and M and save Britain from the evils of Nazism via enemies from within. .

This is a thrilling tale that I feel really captures what life might have been like in England during 1940. I really enjoyed the depiction of “ordinary” life at this time – the talk of the war, everyone having their own theories or having heard “on good authority” what was happening at the front. The setting for this tale of espionage is perfect and Tommy and Tuppence are as adorable as ever!

N or M – The Covers

There are some fabulous covers here, lots of French ones, a Danish one and one that I think might be from Hungary.

The Recipe – Aperol Betty

The Aperol Betty is a very simple but very tasty cocktail with a strong citrussy taste. It was even easier for me because I didn’t even have to bother to combine the grapefruit and orange juices in the recipe. We have a tangelo tree (tangelo = tangerine x grapefruit) in our garden which is currently laden! (Also look how pretty that bright orange looks on a grey Melbourne winter day!!!!

But anyway, when life gives you this many tangelos, you don’t go buying grapefruit or orange juice! I walked to the garden and chose some lovely fresh fruit for my drink!

Here’s the recipe with the OG ingredients!

Betty had changed her mind and demanded instead:

“Wead me story.”

Tuppence pulled out a rather tattered book from one end of the cupboard – to be interrupted by a squeal from Betty.

“No, no. Narsty…Bad…”

Agatha Christie – N or M

As an alternative, for anyone who does not drink, the close runner up for this was a Pasta all N or Ma. I didn’t make this because I am somewhat allergic to aubergines / eggplants but if you were having an N or M themed dinner, for me, the pasta would be a good choice!

What does Agatha Christie have in with Leonard Dawe?

First, I hear you ask, who is Leonard Dawe?

Well. he was a crossword compiler for the Daily Telegraph who was investigated by MI5 in 1944 because he published the names of several of the D-Day Landing sites in his crosswords.

A few years earlier, Agatha Christie got into trouble over the name of one of the characters in N or M. One of the residents at Sans Souci is Major Bletchley. In the 1940s, Bletchley Park was the place where code breakers ultimately cracked the German enigma machine. Of course, neither Dame Agatha nor Leonard Dawe were acting in an untoward manner but they were both investigated by MI5 for their unfortunate choices! (I really hope that after they questioned her, Dame Agatha then grilled MI5 on their techniques for her next novel)

Links to The Christieverse

There are a few references to the earlier Tommy and Tuppence novel, The Secret Adversary.

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in N or M

Whiskey
Tea
Bread and Cheese

As mentioned, last week, I am currently on holiday in beautiful Port Douglas. Part of my reading material for the trip is The Body In The Library which will be our September Dining with The Dame read. Marple fans, this one’s for you!

Have a great week!

13
Aug
2023

Mock Crab

categories: Eggs

Hello, retro food lovers and…war buffs? Today I am sharing a recipe for Mock Crab which was inspired by my reading of N or M by Agatha Christie. The real Dining with the Dame post will come next week but during my reading of this book, I became mildly obsessed with the food of wartime Britain. I found a fabulous blog called The 1940’s Experiment and decided to give one of the wartime recipes a whirl! I am also mildly obsessed with “mock” foods so I chose mock crab.

Umm…what? I hear you say. Mock crab looks like this! However, it looks to all the world that you have posted a photo of some scrambled eggs on toast. Did you mix your photos up? Might we finally be getting a post on the bacon and eggs that is mentioned in EVERY Agatha Christie novel but has yet to make an appearance in Dining with the Dame?

Well…no and no. This my friends is mock crab.

But also yes. Because this is scrambled eggs on toast. Albeit some mildly vinegary scrambled eggs on toast. This recipe perplexed me and I’ll tell you why as soon as I share the link. Here it is: Wartime Mock Crab.

Mock Me Not

So here is what I don’t understand about the mock crab. Cheesy scrambled eggs are delicious. And not just for breakfast. I would eat them at any time of day! Cheesy scrambled eggs with salad dressing and additional vinegar? Not so much. This, for me, was, unfortunately, something that was less than the sum of its parts. I’m also not quite sure why, particularly when you are on rations, you would add anything to cheesy scrambled eggs. My preference would have been to save the dressing and vinegar for something else (maybe a salad?) and to eat the eggs as scrambled eggs.

I can only surmise that the addition of the salad dressing and vinegar was to make it taste more crabby. If so, it didn’t work. No one in their right mind would mistake the taste of this for crab. And yet….there was something. Maybe the texture? Or possibly the power of suggestion…that made this somewhat reminiscent of crab.

Whilst I didn’t love the mock crab, it was nice to take a peek into war time cooking and imagine the gang at the Sans Souci (from N and M) tucking into a plate of of it for lunch.

Next weeks post will be on N or M, an Agatha Christie wartime thriller featuring Tommy and Tuppence. At least I hope it will be. I will be on holiday, soaking up some sun in the north of Australia so I will schedule it to run on Sunday. Fingers crossed it works!

Have a great week!

09
Aug
2023

Wine and Song Prune Canapés

categories: Canapes, Prunes

Hello retro food lovers and welcome to a surprise mid-week edition of Retro Food for Modern Times. Today we are taking a teeny little step back into the amazing book that is Kelly Brodsky’s Food For Lovers and making some canapes from her wine and song prunes. When we last spoke about them, it was in the context of breakfast but these little beauties are nothing if not versatile. My favourite food is finger food so I decided that I would turn these into a canapé based on the vintage hors d’oeuvre Devils on Horseback.

I have taken the key ingredients from Devils on Horseback and popped them on a round of grilled bread.

As a reminder, here is the recipe for the Wine and Song Prunes. These are the starting point for our canape’s.

Here’s the recipe…if you can even call something so simple that!

Print

Wine and Song Prune Canapés

Print Recipe

A delicious canapé for your next retro party. Or for eating all by yourself!

Author: Taryn Nicole

Ingredients

Wine and Song Prunes (as many prunes as canapés you are planning to make)
Rounds of chargrilled bread or bought crostini (as many rounds as canapés you are planning to make)
Proscuitto – (1/ 3 the number of slices as the number of canapes you are planning to make)
Goat’s cheese
Watercress – 1 bunch

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

Top your rounds of bread with a sprig or two of watercress, then 1/3 of a slice of proscuitto.
Top this with a piece of goat’s cheese and one of the prunes.
Enjoy!

I’ll get my timing back on track with an N and M adjacent post. The actual post for the Agatha Christie thriller will be posted the following week. It’s a quick read so there’s still plenty of time if you wish to read it. Have a great rest of the week!

25
Jul
2023

July 2003 – What’s In The Fridge?

categories: 20 Years Ago Today, Chocolate, Pizza, Steak

Hello, retro food lovers! Let’s take a trip back twenty years to July 2003. While where there, why not pick up the current copy of Delicious Magazine and try to make a meal with ingredients that we can find in our fridge. I set a rule for myself with this one that at least 2 ingredients for each meal had to come from my fridge. For the purposes of full disclosure, I have also listed items I have used from my freezer, pantry and those I bought for the recipes. Before we head to the recipes, let’s set the scene for what else was happening in July 2003!

Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl was #1 at the box office, followed by Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and Bad Boys II. Doesn’t sounds like I would have been going to the movies a lot in July 2003! Instead, I was likely staying at home reading the best-selling Da Vinci Code by Dance Brown and listening to Beyonce’s Crazy in Love. But enough about me, let’s get to our menu!

The Menu – July 2003

BROCCOLI, PANCETTA AND FETA PIZZA

There was a cheese fondue in the magazine which very nearly became the entree for our July 2003 menu but in the end I chose the pizza. The recipe comes from an advertisement for Ardmona Rich and Thick Chopped Tomatoes which was absolutely brilliant and why I decided to use this recipe over the fondue. The advertisements which ran for a number of years featured celebrities not known for their intelligence advertising pureed tomatoes! Rich and thick tomatoes from the rich and…you get it. The ad certainly caught my eye! Also, this was the only recipe in the magazine where I did not have to buy any ingredients, although I substituted a few:

Fridge ingredients

Broccolini (subbed for the broccoli in the recipe)
Proscuitto (subbed for the pancetta in the recipe)
Feta cheese

All of these were leftovers from other things I had made which would have otherwise likley gone to waste

Other ingredients

Puff Pastry – from the freezer
Tinned tomatoes – from the pantry

Broccoli and Pancetta Pizza Recipe

Beef Carpaccio with Parmesan, Horseradish and Raw Beetroot

This is a Jamie Oliver recipe that I made to use up some leftover beetroot. I generally hate beetroot but the fussiest eater in the world likes it so we had half a beetroot in the fridge left over from a roast dinner he had made. A lot of people, including me, give Jamie Oliver a hard time but seriously…this might be one of the best things I have eaten all year!!! It was perfectly pitched. Everything went together so well. It was an absolute dream of a dish! 10/10 Mr Oliver, this one was outstanding!

Fridge ingredients

Beetroot
Horseradish (originally from our garden)
Sour cream (instead of the creme fraiche in the recipe)
Parmesan cheese

Other ingredients

Thyme – from the garden
Lemon – from the garden
Olive oil, salt, pepper – from the pantry

Bought ingredients

1 steak – I was not going to buy a whole fillet for two people!
Rocket -(this cost all of 36 cents!)

Carpaccio recipe:

Chocolate Chestnut Log

On first reading, I thought this would be a cake. Instead, imagine a melt-in-the-mouth mousse with a swirl of chestnut surrounded by a swirl of chocolate chestnut. Delicious but very rich!!!! (Not thick though). If the carpaccio was something I would gladly eat every day, this is a dish I would save for special occasions.

Chocolate Chestnut Log Recipe:

Fridge ingredients

Butter
Egg

Other ingredients

Sugar – from the pantry
Brandy from the drinks cabinet
A can of chestnut puree which had been in the pantry for far too long!
Cocoa powder – from the pantry

Bought ingredients

Dark Chocolate

My Nigella Moment – Fillet of Beef Bourguignonne

For first-time readers, this refers to the moment at the end of Nigella Lawson’s cooking shows when she sneaks back to the fridge to have another bite of something delicious. In the context of these Twenty Years Ago posts, it is something contained in the magazine that does not fit with the overall menu theme but I’m sneaking it in either because I made it and it was really good, or I just didn’t have time to make it but it was one of the most appetising things in the mag!

I feel a bit sorry for the cheese fondue recipe in the July 2003 issue of Delicious Magazine. It got pipped at the post for the starter and again for the Nigella moment. Those of you who know me, and whose jaws are dropping that I didn’t pick the fondue (twice), take a look at this picture:

The perfectly cooked beef, the glossy sauce, the wine-soaked onions – this dish looks so beautiful and luxurious to me and something that I would definitely cook if I was having a group of people for dinner. Something this size though would feed us both for a week. I’m holding on to this recipe though! Next time we do magazines in my Foodies club, this is exactly where I am heading!!!!

Well, the July 2003 issue of Delicious proved to be an absolute treasure trove of recipes and definitely filled the brief of being able to base a meal, largely on ingredients that were in my fridge!