Things I like this week….
February 2, 2012
More good ideas from the Pure Style design files
Being a lover of all things Portuguese - and seeing that Remodelista has gone Iberian this week, I wanted to show you some inspirational and timeless interior detail from the land of grilled sardines and Pastel de natas;
Above, are Azulejos, tiles from Sintra Design used by hotelier Sean MacPherson in his NY kitchen (shown above courtesy of The Selby).
Baixa house looks like the place to stay if you want traditional with a modern update. There are twelve rather wonderful looking apartments in this recently refurbished apartment hotel in Lisbon’s historic district. ( See one of the kitchens , above, photo Fernado Guerra + Sérgio Guerra Fotografia de Arquitectura. and a patio, below, photo Ana Paula Carvalho ) .
Portuguese cotton blankets with wonderful earth coloured trimmings from Anichini.
Portuguese cotton blankets with wonderful earth coloured trimmings from Anichini
On the home front
February 1, 2012
Friends say they don’t know how I put up with a disrupting stream of photo shoots at home. I suppose, like anything it’s how you choose to look at it. For the most part, the family are cool about the shoots, plus they know that it means income. The childrens’ rooms and my husband’s study are off limits and so there’s enough private space. I’ve been a home worker for so long anyway and am used to combining an office with mashing the potatoes. In a way we’re living over the shop, or, as when I was a child, living over my father’s surgery. It is important though to be laid back enough to let strangers waft around the house shooting mail order catalogues, or Christmas cakes from the Great British Bake off. There’d be no point if I twitched every time a cup and saucer were moved.
Actually, quite a number of clients, photographers and stylists aren’t strangers at all but long lost faces from my magazine days. ‘Still hanging on in there, we rib each other’. I also meet new faces – and it’s a chance to chat and brainstorm. And when you know that it’s not your stuff but someone else’s monkey then even days of rooms piled high with boxes and camera equipment don’t raise the blood pressure. Apart from the odd set painter who doesn’t know how to control a paint brush, the most stressful thing is when a domestic drama is being played out behind a closed door. This generally involves two siblings warring over some item of clothing that one has pinched from the other without permission. “Be quiet we have a shoot “I hiss, and barr the way to the flouncy behaviour spreading further – more Miss Trunchbull than the smiley location house owner that the clients meet at the front door.
One rather wonderful advantage of the shoots is seeing all sorts of wallpapers, fabrics, paints and things, here in the flesh - window shopping chez nous. I am sighing over this beautiful yellow printed linen from Bennison Fabrics that is playing a leading role in a magazine story currently being photographed. I have managed to sneak a little sample to show you how rich and mustardy it is, and the perfect colour to go with something blue .
Even the shoot leftovers can be inspiring. My compost bin last week looked a picture, see below, with the floral remnants from a summer flower catalogue job. And, of course the house smelt rather lovely and garden borderish, too.
Golden shreds
January 24, 2012
Marmalade is on the agenda and at the second attempt I am lucky to bag Seville oranges from greengrocer Pretty Traditional in East Dulwich. This is Emma’s marmalade recipe from my book – Pure Style Recipes for Everyday:
1.5 kg Seville oranges, granulated sugar, water
Cover the oranges with water in a large, heavy based saucepan and simmer until soft, about 1-2 hours, depending on the toughness of the peel. Retaining the liquid, remove the oranges from the pan and cut into halves, scooping out the pips with a teaspoon. Return the pips to the pan and boil rapidly for 10 minutes. This extracts pectin to help the marmalade set. Strain the liquid into another bowl and discard the pips. Using scissors or a knife cut the peel into pieces – bigger ones if you like it chunky and vice versa for a finer texture. I like my slices to be about 1cm wide and 3cm long. That’s because I like a good proportion of chewy peel. Measure the strained liquid, adding 500g peel, 750g sugar to 450 ml liquid. If I’ve lost more liquid than normal, either because I’ve boiled everything too for too long or the oranges are not quite as juicy , then I will top up with some water.
Put the liquid, peel, and sugar into the saucepan and bring to the boil slowly , then boil rapidly until setting point is reached (when you get a wrinkly look on the surface of the mixture). Leave the hot marmalade to stand for 15 minutes. Sterilise approximately 8x250g jars (and lids if you want to use them) by washing them in hot soapy water and then drip- drying them on a rack in an overn preheated to 140C. Put the marmalade in jars, either cover with waxed discs and cellophane lids tied with string, or like me, simply screw on the lids.
ACTION: The low golden sunlight pours in through the windows and falls across the worktop burnishing the pile of oranges that seem to bask in its rays. The pan of simmering fruit soon imparts a rich aromatic smell which pervades the Sunday afternoon kitchen.
Cut into halves I scoop out the pips of the softened oranges. The chopping board is soon flooded with pith and juice which I tip back into the pan. Once the pips have done their pectin releasing act I strain the mixture through a sieve, removing the pips and pushing any orange mush that comes out with the pips too.
I chop the peel into quite chunky slices, because that’s the way I like my marmalade to be, and add it to the pan with sugar and boil the whole lot up for about 25 minutes or so. A key thing is to keep stirring with a wooden spoon so that nothing sticks on the bottom. Once the whole bubbling mass starts to go into the slow rolling boil motion like a kind of molten orange lava – then you’re on the way to the all important setting point. I test for the set by spooning a little of the marmalade onto to a frozen plate- if it wrinkles it’s ready
I hunt for more jars, washing out any that can be relieved of the dregs of some encrusted jam or pickle which I know no one in the household is going to venture into (Hmmm not very food saving, but I do swill out a nearly finished jar of tomato paste with water and add it all to the pasta sauce.)
The bitter sweet orange taste of marmalade makes it just as appealing with hard cheese and oatcakes for pudding as it is spread thickly with breakfast butter and toast .
PS The verdict from the 23yr old for this year’s batch: ‘It’s good mum ”
PPS Very belated thanks for all the wonderful responses I had to the Pure Style Competition. It was hard to choose from all the entries – but there were two very succinct examples that summed up Pure Style brilliantly. The winners have their books and I would love to write a post including the wining entries, together with some of the other inspiring responses- I hope I have all your permissions to do so!
Frost and lemons
January 16, 2012
Like Benedict “Holmes” Cumberbatch, I have also been playing sleuth in my Bajan Cumberbatch quest. I don’t wear a Spencer Hart suit or Dolce & Gabbana shirt but do have lots of change for parking meters. Hunting through fusty maps in Lambeth Archives I locate the road in Brixton where my Cumberbatch grandfather lodged in the early 1930s. Pulling into the kerb with the dog up front (Watson, No), I try to visualise Number 7, long demolished on a site that is now part of a bleak communal estate garden. Maybe the house was like its neighbour the Vicarage which is a shabby but handsome late Georgian building with sash windows and a panelled front door.The pavements have been relaid but underneath there will some infinitesimal trace, some cell, or atom of his footprint, his physical presence. My grandmother’s too, as they set out, a pair of 23 year old lovers, to play tennis on the courts at the end of the road. Now these are more grassed over bits of Council anonymity fringed with traffic , where the air ambulance landed once for a shooting at McDonalds.
The dog also appears lost in contemplation but her intense gaze really means ‘ Let me out I want to walk’.
More heating bills and all that , but there’s something so beautiful about a hoar frosted morning, where everything in the path of the freezing moisture is decorated and crystallised in white ice. The house is playing Locations today, and afterwards the 17 year old is making dinner with 10 schoolfriends. I have been elected assistant to the preparation of the lemon tart. See recipe below . Nigella’s Vietnamese chicken and mint salad, and Beef Satay with peanut sauce are turned out with aplomb and what is more, they do all the washing and clearing up. I must be doing something right.
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Lemon Tart
Pastry for 4-6 people
120g unsalted butter diced
75 g icing sugar, plus extra for dusting if you want
3 large egg yolks
250g plain flour
2 tablespoons water
lemon filling:
5 large eggs
150g caster sugar
90 ml lemon juice
2 tablespoons finely grated lemon zest
150 ml double cream
Make the sweet pastry:
Cream the butter and icing sugar . Beat in two of the egg yolks. Add the flour and with your finger tips rub the butter mixture together to make a crumbly texture. Add the water and press the mixture into a ball. Knead for about 30 seconds on a lightly floured surface. Wrap in foil or cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes
Make the lemon filling
Mix the eggs, sugar , lemon juice and zest. Add the cream and beat well and place the mixture in the fridge.
Roll out the pasty to about 3mm thick and place in a 24cm loose bottomed tart tin. Trim the edges. Prick the base with a fork and cool in the fridge for 30 minutes. Pre heat the oven to 160C. Bake the pastry blind for 10 minutes (line case with foil and weight with dried beans). Remove from oven and take out foil and beans. Bake the pastry for a further 20 mintues. Brush the inside with remaining egg yolk and return to the oven for a minute to seal the surface and stop it getting soggy when the filling is added
Turn the oven down to 140c
Warm the filling mixture in a saucepan, not too hot or it will scramble. Pour into the pasty case and bake for 25 minutes until just set. Cool and dredge if wanted with icing sugar.
Things I like this week….
January 12, 2012
More good ideas from the Pure Style design files
Stir a warming winter soup with this hand hewn oak soup ladle from Blodwen supplier of all things Welsh.
A perfect basket for a bicycle
Inspiration and great ideas for children at Olive loves Alfie
Foglinenwork makes dish cloths look like works of art
Looking for more natural looking fencing? Willow hurdles are great – I know because I have them in my garden to screen the compost bins.
James Ravilious is a photographer whose work opened my eyes to the beauty in the ordinary.
The orange season
January 11, 2012
The parrot wolfwhistles at no 63, dogs bark, and a cockerel crows. The Olhao alarm clocks are in good working order at the start of 2012. On the roof in the cool but not cold, an early pink morning sky is building to shades of blue. I’m joined by a plump pigeon with a tagged claw. It perches on the wall unconcerned. This is new – I see it has flown from my neighbour’s roof opposite where there’s a jumble of hand built wooden hutches on top of and in which there are another seven pigeons all looking as mollycoddled and content as my companion. I think I’ve told you before about the Olhaons passion, a strictly manly one, for homing pigeons. This rooftop pursuit is like the tool shed at the bottom of the garden where Englishmen often like to escape.
I’ve been away for four months, four quite dry ones judging by the water level in the metal cans in the quintal. The house though is full of winter humidity. In the kitchen salt has separated into mush and water, and to ward off the general bed dampness I sleep sandwiched between two hot water bottles.
Cavala (mackerel) rigid with freshness are 1.50 euros a kilo and I plan to stuff them with garlic and fry them in olive oil in the little ridged pan. This is quite a good alternative to cooking on the fire because you still get a nice crispy outside. It is so good too, to carry home bunches of just picked broccoli and oranges with green leaves and matt skins – signs that they’ve been nowhere near supermarket screening.
Olhaons fire up their lunch time barbeque using the street as an outdoor kitchen. As old as the sand flats or round about the art of barbequeing is all about calculating the perfect balance of charcoal, heat, and cooking time. No fancy instant flame gas powered wheeled models needed here.
The town is post New Year and lazy. Tables wait for business outside the seafront restaurants. From the scattering of tourists I am impressed by an athletic German pensioner couple swooping around on a tandem, and an elegant silverhaired biker straddling a Harley Davidson bike. The usual gangs of retired fisherman gather round bottles of Sagres, crab claws and dominoes. A scraggy dog or two in tow for the pickings.
I am hooked on DBC Pierre’s Lights out in Wonderland and the crazy antics of Gabriel Brockwell, who rants against modern times, and the decadence of capitalism. A manic read but in context as I think about the desolate recession hit new ‘Marina Village’ on the edge of town. The greedy over scaled vision of men with euros in their eyes, it has the looks and charm of a Sink Estate. Just what Olhao doesn’t need. The Council is myopic paying lip service to the preservation of the town’s historic buildings making the owners do a patch up job on broken down facades, yet giving the go ahead to bulldoze some of its best architectural heritage. For what?….. more soulless apartments. Please note! Olhao needs more rescuers of elegant high ceilinged rooms, quiet patios and rooftop terraces to keep its heart beating.(see example below) . To get the flavour stay in one of the restored properties belonging to White Terraces.
A fresh start
January 2, 2012
Hello 2012. It feels like this is going to be the year of ‘less is more ‘. I mean this in a very positive forward thinking Pure Style kind of way. It is a practical response to all the rather boring price hikes in everything from gas to council tax together with one’s income that doesn’t quite keep up. But a less is more philosophy is also the way I have done things for ever ( glasses of good white wine excepted ) just because it feels right. I hate waste, poor quality and having too much stuff . I’d rather have one good jumper, say, than 5 acrylic numbers from Primark.
So to start on the right note here’s my less is more recipe for apple crumble (the less factor relating to simple, good, inexpensive ingredients, and the more referring to the crumble’s deliciousness). I use apples that I have stored in the cellar from my September garden crop, the valliant 25% still standing bit of my old apple tree – but you can do something just as local by going to the farmer’s market. In Brixton we have been buying bags of scarlet stripedKent apples right up until Christmas.
Peel and slice 1kilo apples – cooking or eating varieties – and lay in a dish. Add the zest and juice of one lemon. Sprinkle with 75g of brown sugar. To make the crumble: mix 300g flour and 175 g brown sugar in a large bowl and then rub in 200g cubed butter until the mixture ressembles breadcrumbs. Spoon the crumble mixture over the apples and bake in a preheated oven at 180 C for 40 minutes until the crumble is lightly browned and the fruit mixture bubbling. Serve with cream, ice cream or creme fraiche.
PS the 2nd competition winner finally got in touch ( Twitter doesn’t always seem to work !). Your book is on its way.
Happy Pure Style Christmas
December 23, 2011
….. Happy Christmas everyone ! Jane x
Winners and winter veg
December 19, 2011
Well done – you two winners of the Pure Style book competition. One copy has been sent off but the other…. where are you, Joanna, winner number 2? I’ve sent you an email but maybe it’s gone into the junk- so please all competition entrants check the junk.
Must tell you about my glorious walk around the grounds of Lytes Cary in Somerset: the perfect old English manor house set amongst avenues of great lichen splodged trees, topiary and a watery ha ha. I threw sticks for the dog in fields with tussocky mounds of grass and peered through the weathered metal and stained glass panes of the rotund brick ice house. There’s productive rural stuff going on here, too in community allotments complete with shepherds hut on wheels, brimming leeks, floppy cabbages and this luxuriant patch of winter radiccio.
Bulbs and chestnut tart
December 13, 2011
The last bulb is planted – 150 over the week whenever I’ve needed to leave screen and do something physical. The dog is banned because she starts digging because I’m doing it. Yawning has the same effect. She watches accusingly from the kitchen window.
When much of my post is bills, and special offers for over 50s life insurance, a Walker Evans room and Gees Bend quilt in stamps and a handwritten envelope hold much more promise. And even more so when the electronic is replacing much of our physical correspondence.
‘Par Avion from the United States Postal Service’ still thrilling enough for me as I pull out the photocopied recipe for chestnut puree tart , plus carefully typed English translation, that my New Yorker friend has kept his promise to send me.
I make it on Saturday afternoon – one of those ever darkening December days which cry out for cooking, a flight to the sun or getting deep into a book. Clement Faugier chestnut puree is suggested but I have a stash of jars in the cellar from when my husband ran Sierra Rica, his Spanish chestnut business. A few years old but the paste is none the worse for running over its sell by date. I have always been the first to ignore such deadlines anyway- and use my nose . ‘Off ‘generally smells it.
Chestnut puree tart
4oz butter – plus 2 tbsp butter for mould
4 eggs separated
l vanilla pod
2 tbsp orange zest
16oz sweet chestnut puree
2 tbsp self raising flour (plus a little more to flour the tin)
pinch of sat
¼ cup crème fraiche
1 tbsp icing sugar for decoration.
Utensils:
9-10 inch latch tin or fluted flan tin with removable bottom.
Preheat the oven to 360F
Butter and flour the tin.
Split pod in two and remove the vanilla seeds with the tip of a knife.
Melt the butter in a saucepan on a low flame. Add the chestnut puree, egg yolks, vanilla seeds, flour, orange zest and mix well
Whip the egg whites with the salt until stiff. Gently fold in 1/3 of the egg white to the chestnut mixture. Add the rest of the egg whites and mix gently but well.
Pour the mixture into the mould and bake 40-45 minutes. Cool and take out of the mould.
Decorate the top with sieved icing sugar and serve with crème fraiche.
