Читать книгу Enjoy: New veg with dash - Nadine Abensur - Страница 10

Below are some notes on ingredients which may be less familiar, or where I want to recommend that you use a particular type, or where there are differences between the UK and Australia.

Argan Oil

Argan oil is unique to Morocco. It has a slightly nutty flavour and comes from the argan tree, which yields a small fruit a little like an olive. When I was last in England, I was impressed to find it in Sainsbury’s.

Cassia Bark

Cassia bark (see photo) is from the cassia tree, a member of the Cinnamomum family, and has an intense aroma of cinnamon. The reddish-brown bark comes in large, wide curls and can be ground to a deep-red powder, slightly sweet, with bitter notes. I use my big, heavy pestle and mortar to grind it and release the essential oils, which are warming and energising and said to induce euphoria. I also find that dry-roasting, as with other spices, releases additional flavour.

Cassia bark is one of the five ingredients of Chinese five-spice powder, the others being cloves, fennel seeds, star anise and Sichuan pepper.

Add it to pilafs, salad dressings and, of course, to curries.

Fresh Turmeric

Fresh turmeric is most unusual in appearance, like a finger with five little appendages hanging down from it. It is the root of a plant, Curcuma longa, that resembles ornamental gingers, with flowers that can vary in colour from brightest red to palest lilac. Asian supermarkets are a good source of the fresh root and it is definitely worth seeking out in preference to the powdered alternative.

Galangal

Galangal is a hard rhizome with pink shoots, not dissimilar in appearance to ginger, though it tastes very little like it – despite the often-seen suggestion to substitute ginger for it in its absence. It is much harder, much hotter and a little bitter. Keep it in the fridge, submerged in a bowl of water. It is an essential ingredient in Thai curries.

Kaffir Limes

A weird thing, the kaffir lime, all gnarled and convoluted peel, yielding little juice but an incredible flavour. The peel is thinly pared or zested to use in curries. The leaves, which are easier to buy, also carry the distinctive aroma and are usually cut into thin strips from either side of the fibrous spine.

Lemons

I use organic lemons when I can, though I found out recently that organic ones are not necessarily unwaxed. Now I buy unwaxed lemons when I particularly need to use the zest.

Lemongrass

This is a perennial grass native to South Asia and widely used in its cooking. Like other lemon-scented ingredients, it lends itself extremely well to both sweet and savoury uses. It is better known for its role in savoury things, but left to infuse in custards it imparts a delicious and delicate afternote. Use only the white, bulbous part, discarding the green part and the tough, outer leaves. When using lemongrass in salads, always slice it as thinly as possible with the sharpest knife you have. Otherwise, split the stem down the middle and bash with the back of a knife to release the fragrant, lemony perfume. I recommend that you freeze any lemongrass sticks you are not using straight away, the green part removed, in sealed plastic bags. Use them, bashed to release their perfume, the next time you make a Thai-inspired curry.

Lemon Myrtle

From trees that grow up to 6 metres high, glossy, dark-green lemon myrtle leaves can be used fresh in curries or dried and pounded to a powder. They have fresh, lemony, eucalyptus notes and some varieties also have a pronounced aniseed flavour. On my visit to Brookfarm (see below) I discovered another of lemon myrtle’s properties: it keeps the dreaded mozzies away. You’ll be pleased to know that you can now buy the powdered form in the UK from Harvey Nichols stores, or you can order it via the internet on www.herbies.com.au

Macadamia Oil

Brookfarm’s organic macadamia oil is the pride and joy of the Byronshire. It is an extremely fine thing, and when you speak to Martin and Pam Brook you can see why: their palpable passion and their search for perfection; the obvious pride in their superior nut, which is kept disease free through the use of copper; the way in which they have succeeded in reducing to almost zero the ravages caused by rats – not through trapping but by the introduction, Harry Potter style, of owls. And the way that, by encouraging the proliferation of the rainforest that surrounds the trees, they are able to keep pest control to a minimum. They grow 4,500 trees on 90 acres of prime, lipstick-red volcanic soil.

Brookfarm macadamia oil has found a special spot in my kitchen. It is a monounsaturated oil with more health claims than olive oil, a higher heating point and a milder, less pervasive flavour. Making the most of an indigenous product that lends itself to organic production seems such an obvious step that I don’t see why Australia and macadamia oil should be any less intimately associated than Italy and olive oil, nor any less respected. And in my book, it certainly beats the horribly pervasive use of (genetically modified) canola (rapeseed) oil.

However, that is only part of the story. Martin and Pam were among the first to see beyond the apparently intractable nut – its shell requires a special vice-like nut cracker – and spent two years developing their range of fine oils, mueslis and spiced nuts. These are now exported world wide, with particular success in the UK, where the lemon-myrtle-infused macadamia oil was a gold-medal winner at the 2004 Great Taste Awards. It is a delicate oil that no kitchen should be without.

Potatoes

For potato salads and braises, I use the smallest, waxiest, yellow-fleshed new potatoes I can find, so that they maintain their shape even when very tender. In Australia Kipfler potatoes – finger-sized, knobbly ones with rich, sweet flesh – work well but there are others the further south you go (for example, in Victoria and Tasmania) that are as good as any of the fabulous French potatoes such as La Ratte.

Shallots (Golden Shallots)

For reasons I haven’t delved into, what the French call echalotes, the English call shallots and the Australians call golden shallots. To complicate matters further, spring onions are known in Australia as shallots.

Shiitake Mushrooms

Always a great fan, I seem to have used shiitake mushrooms more than ever before in this book. It’s their silky, velvety texture that I find so appealing, plus their ability to soak up both Asian and Western flavours, especially red wine and brandy. Fresh shiitake are now easy to find in supermarkets but the dried version makes a suitable alternative. If using dried mushrooms, soak them in boiling water for about 20 minutes before use.

Star Anise

A flowering bush with pretty white petals and yellow stamens, this is quite possibly the most beautiful of all spices. Star anise is the dark reddish-brown, eight-pointed pod with glossy seeds – the glossier the seeds, the fresher the spice. It has sweet, pungent, liquorice notes. Common in the cooking of Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia, it hails originally from South China. It can be added to pilafs, is surprisingly good in creamy sauces and fantastic in soups and dressings. It can be ground to a powder, which I then put through a sieve to remove the debris.

Tamarind

The long, brown pods of a tropical tree, this is a major source of sourness in Asian and Middle Eastern cooking. Packs of pressed pods, which need soaking and straining, are a common way to use tamarind. However, they are messy and laborious, so I always buy the ready-made tamarind paste.

Wattle Seeds

Despite the fact that wattle seeds are not yet grown on a commercial scale, they are already exported to America, the UK and other countries. Roasting and grinding the seeds brings out the flavour, which many compare to coffee. Use them in pastries, breads and ice cream. The acacia trees they come from flourish in the arid conditions of large parts of Australia and this has made them an invaluable aid in developing countries with impoverished soil.

Worcestershire Sauce and Fish Sauce

I thought long and hard about whether to include these in my recipes and finally succumbed a couple of times. They are, of course, not vegetarian and they can be replaced with a vegetarian alternative or light soy sauce without detrimental effect.