For Christmas this past year, my sister gave me a book on Borough Markets. I flicked through it eagerly going first to the recipes and even made a couple of them. I didn’t realise that only a 6 months later I would actually be at Borough Markets sampling some of this very fine produce that I was reading about. Borough Markets are London’s oldest markets, incredibly since Roman times when they built the London Bridge, they have been at this location for 250 years and is a market steeped in history and pride of the storekeepers. Artisanal is a term that comes to mind when walking through these stalls (although I hope Artisanal is not a term that become abused as I suspect it might, look out for McDonald’s “Artisan burger” )

Fresh pasta made 15 hours ago

Various cheeses on offer

Mmmm sausages!

Various baked goods

The day after arriving, our first stop is here. We’re taken by my sister’s friend Candy who is an expat from America who has lived in London for 4 years. She shows us around Borough Markets, which are huge, much bigger than I ever envisaged. There are throngs of people everywhere. It seems that either half of London is on holiday or that the neighbouring offices house a great number of people that pour out into the markets every lunch time to wait in long queues to eat delicious home grown locally made produce.

Huge slabs of chocolate and truffles

Pick your own truffles

Nuts, dried fruit and chocolate coated goodies

Prices vary but on the whole they’re generally at a premium. Most of the providores are artisans proud of their produce and there are many samples proffered to the waiting public in an attempt to seduce.

Huge mounds of butter

Slices of cakes, eclairs and strudels

Delicious sounding jams

Along with picture perfect fruit and vegetables, there are vividly coloured flowers and a range of seafood, some of which I’ve never seen before like the long cylindrical clams.

Wild things!

Seafood on offer

Huge lobsters

Big crabs with fat claws

Impressive mushroom medley

Different kinds of tomatoes

How perfect do these tubs of redcurrants look?

Even French food gets a look in

“Harry Potter No. # 3 filmed here” You didn’t think I’d miss the chance for a Harry Potter moment?

There’s even a sign near the pub saying that a scene from Harry Potter was filmed here-one look at the pub and you can definitely see that it could have been.

Free range Basque Pig Salami

Enough of this browsing, we’re ready to eat and it seems so are most of the markets as the queues stretch out long for most of the hot food. We tried to get a table at Tapas Brindisa to no avail so we settle with one of their Chorizo rolls (a double with two sausages £4.75). I line up at another stand whose name escapes me, just look for the queue, and get a roll filled with Wild Boar sausage and a Devils on Horseback roll filled with cumberland sausages wrapped in bacon and prunes (both £4.00 for large £3 for small). The Wild Boar sausage was guaranteed at least 90% meat which is a refreshing change for English sausages from what we’ve seen on The F Word.

Brindisa’s stall-for those who can’t get a table at the restaurant, which is… everyone

Brindisa’s Chorizo roll (double sized) £4.75

The chorizo roll is small-ish although the double amount of chorizo is good for chorizo lovers like me. It’s a good sausage although I feel as though something is missing from the roll. My husband and Candy however are thoroughly impressed by it.

Devils on Horseback roll £ 4

The Devils on Horseback roll with cumberland sausage wrapped in bacon and prunes is very good and absolutely enormous filled with caramelised onions and salad. The roll however is very floury and we find ourselves leaving the roll behind and eating the filling.

Wild Boar sausage roll £4

The Wild Boar sausage on a roll, also filled with onions and salad is a strongly flavoured and very meaty as promised. Adding a cranberry sauce to it helps to sweeten it and ease off the intense edge off it.

We dust the flour off our face and hands, stomachs full of all sorts of exotic goodies.

Borough Markets

Southwark Street London SE1 1TL
In front of London Bridge subway station, use “Borough High Street” exit.
http://www.boroughmarket.org.uk/
Thursdays: 11am - 5pm
Fridays: 12pm - 6pm
Saturdays: 9am - 4pm

Its an rainy day during Sydney’s Winter that I decide that the Spaghetti Pie recipe will get an look in. There’s nothing better than being inside when its raining and it becomes a little more gratifying when there’s something delicious smelling in the oven.

Being particularly time poor that day, I short cut the meatballs by using Chevups skinless sausages which are low in fat and high in meat. I added some fresh breadcrumbs to them to fluffify and lighten them, some milk to bind and stirred in the broccoli and oddly enough, we have a new meatball favourite.

I also couldn’t get by without using my favorites tomato pasta bake sauce, Remano Creamy tomato and basil from shock horror, of all places, Aldi. Its creamy and very tomatoey and we make special trips to Aldi to stock up our cupboards with it. My husband and I are those oddball people that actually love cottage cheese. We could eat it by the tubful so I need no convincing to use it. In fact the texture, once cooked, is like using mince. And since I’m not a fan of mozzarella, I used regular tasty cheese, nothing fancy there. It wasn’t as crispy as the recipe suggests that it would be - perhaps the addition of the pasta sauce instead of regular tomato sauce did it but it was still very good and a favoured alternative to spaghetti and meatballs.

(Rainy Day) Spaghetti Pie from Deceptively Delicious

This is a perfect recipe for that leftover pasta you’ve got in the fridge from last night’s dinner

• Nonstick cooking spray
• 3 ozs/90g whole wheat spaghetti or angel hair pasta (or 1 cup cooked leftover pasta) I used fettucine
• 1/2 pound/250g lean ground turkey or sirloin (I used 200g chevups sausages and 50g fresh breadcrumbs)
• 1/2 cup broccoli puree
• 1 large egg white
• 2 tablespoons grated parmesan
• 2 cloves garlic chopped
• 2 cups bottled tomato sauce
• 1 cup lowfat cottage cheese
• 1/4 cup carrot puree
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/4 t pepper
• 1 cup shredded part skim mozzarella (I used regular tasty)

1. Preheat oven to 350F/180C. Coat a 9 inch pie plate with cooking spray

2. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil, add the pasta and cook until al dente. Drain in a colander (Skip this step if you have leftover pasta)

3. In a small bow, mix the ground turkey or sirloin with the broccoli puree, egg white, parmesan and garlic. Form the mixture into 1/2 inch balls

4. In a large bowl, stir the cooked pasta, tomato sauce, cottage cheese, carrot puree,, and salt and pepper. Spoon the mixture into the pie plate and smooth the top. Scatter meatballs on top and sprinkle with mozzarella. Bake, uncovered until the centre is firm and the cheese is bubble, 25 - 30 minutes.

Prep: 20 mins Total: 45 mins serves 8-10

By Jessica Seinfeld from Deceptively Delicious

For all of my semi high falutin’ tastes, I admit that one of my favourite meals, the one that has me fork and knife at the table ready, is the humble roast chicken. I have a visceral reaction whenever I see a gloriously bronzed bird at the table and along with bread baking, I believe there is no smell better than a roasting chicken. And because I can’t help but fiddle, I made a stuffing with apricot and onion, a slight twist on the traditional sage and onion.

An item that makes another appearance in the recipe is Duck Fat. I had a little left over from cooking a duck stashed in the deep freeze. I never used it as I only had left such a small amount. But luckily only a small amount is needed here. If you can’t be bothered, and the whole point is that this is an easy dinner where the oven does all the work, just use butter. And prepare to swoon, this method ensures that there’s no dry breast meat at all, just succulence and bliss.

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No, I’m sorry if I got you excited but these are different from French macarons.

I admit I’m ahead of time. I usually make these for Christmas presents but don’t think I would recommend that you make a Gateau Breton requiring 6 egg yolks and leave you stranded with 6 egg whites do you? Of course not Dear Reader. This is one of the standby recipes I use if I have a surplus of egg whites. However this only uses 3 of them, and if you are determinted to use all 6 egg whites, you’d do better making a pavlova (as long as they’re totally egg yolk free) but in this case I was using my sister’s kitchen and she doesn’t have a beater or mixer.

You can use milk or dark chocolate, I used white as I like the snow topped mountain look. And cachous are optional but obviously desirable, especially around Christmas time when things need a sparkle. I have to confess I went wild while in London at Tesco for their silver cachous. Priced at $6AUD at your local supermarket for 60grams, they were an incredible 9p-yes that’s right, a whole 20c for a 30g box of them. Which confirms what I’ve suspected for so long, that we’re completely rorted in Australia price wise. Which is of course why I bought 16 boxes of them

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I’ll caution you that I was going to do Olympic cupcakes. But that time it rolled around, the last thing I felt like doing was fashioning Olympic rings in the various colours out of chocolate. Let the athletes train for it, I’ll just stay on the lounge and watch. So these are my little shout out to the Olympics.

My mum rarely gives out recipes. For some mums, revealing their best recipe is akin to a magician revealing how they have done their tricks. They prefer to keep these close to the chest and leave a bit of mystery. It’s not restricted just to mums and I’ve seen it in people my age too. Not that I blame them, they’ve probably been asked to keep the valuable family recipes a secret, a physical or mental “vault” if you will.

It seems that everyone is dumpling mad lately and sometimes you just want to whip up a batch of soup with some greens and dumplings without having to leave the house. And at night temperatures in Sydney reaching -1 degrees (aren’t we supposed to be the sunburnt country?) the thought of going out some nights just pushes me towards the heater and the snug quilt. So for these nights, my mum has open up her recipe treasure trove and revealed her famous Wonton recipe (ok famous among her friends and family) which can also be adapted to make Siu Mai. These are excellent to freeze (use greaseproof paper between single layers) and popped into boiling water to cook.

The easiest part of this of course is making the filling. I buy the prawns shelled but whole so I blitz the prawns, rehydrated shiitake mushrooms and spring onions in the food processor to make a fine mince. After making the filling, that’s where the fun begins. You may want to enlist others into this part as it can take up to an hour to make the wontons or siu mai. The biggest mistake in the past I’ve found was overfilling the dumplings. Please resist all urge to overfill them, especially when you’re halfway through and realise that you’ve still got loads to make (making a giant one when you’re well and truly over it isn’t a great idea).

How many this makes exactly depends on the kind of dumplings you make. The plain soup dumpligns require less filling but the Siu Mai and Gow Gees require more. Also make sure the ingredients are minced well, the finer the mincing, the less likely that the skins will burst from “sharp” or large bits. And either cook them once they’re made or freeze them, if you pop these in the fridge as is, they skin will become moist and stick to the bottom and split when you try and prise them off. The only thing I can think to counter this is to flour the bottom of the tray that they sit on although I haven’t tried this.

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