Posted on September 06, 2016 by Kate Halsall
Have you ever considered what makes food so good? Why is something your favourite food? Is it purely because of its taste? It can’t be just taste surely! Your food has to LOOK appealing, it has to smell NICE, it has to sound TASTY before you go near it.
Meals are so much more than just “tasting good”. They’re about the memories they conjure when you eat them, it’s about the texture (and it should be different textures) you notice when you eat them, it should be about the ingredients you use, how the food has been cooked in the first place, the portion size and also how the meal is presented. But when I say “presented”, I don’t mean Michelin-style presentation, it can be a bowl of vegetable splat (aka curry, chilli, stew etc) for all I care….for me personally, it’s about adding colour to your meals.
I had guests round for a meal on Friday night – do you ever panic when you have to cook a meal for other people? What if they don’t like it, what if it’s not ready on time, what if I cook it wrong, do I have enough plates and so on and so on…. I panic every time! So now I follow some simple rules when I’m doing any cooking for others:
- Don’t make it too complicated. I cook what I like, what I know how to cook, and use ingredients that are in season so that I know I can get hold of them.
- It needs to smell great. There’s nothing better than walking into someone’s house or a restaurant and you can smell the food. It’s about picking the best herbs and spices and knowing how to use them.
- Ensure there are different textures. It’s the variety of what we feel in our mouths (not just how it tastes) which gives food the excitement factor.
- It should be colourful. I remember working in a corporate environment and having meetings away from the office where the catered for lunch was largely a “brown buffet”. Bread in various guises, deep fried stuffs, pastries, cold meats and so on. It’s not inviting, it doesn’t get my tastebuds going, there’s nothing fresh or slightly healthy to make it appealing.
And to prove I stick to these rules, here’s what I cooked (some of it is in the picture above!
Starter:
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Cold Pea & Spinach Soup. It takes literally 5 minutes to prep and make, so can be done once you are ready for your starters. It’s bright green, fresh, healthy, light (almost palate cleansing) and not quite smooth (and it has a hint of chilli).
Main(s):
Jamie Oliver’s Italian Caponata – it’s been cooked almost like a stew so the aubergine melts in your mouth, there’s a hardness still in the olives, the tomatoes give it a great bright red colour which contrasts against the purple-black aubergine skin and greenness of the olives.
I served this with another of Hugh’s dishes – Lamb with Cauliflower & Chickpeas (I substituted the lamb for tofu but the other guests had the meat version). Not only a contrast in colours to the Caponata, but also the different textures of the meat and al-dente cauliflower and chickpeas. This dish also contains cumin and sesame seeds, where as the caponata has capers and oregano
Side:
Steamed dark green vegetables – broccoli, asparagus and green beans
Pudding:
Sugar free, vegan, homemade, coconut milk and vanilla seed panacotta with a mixed berry coulis (made with frozen berries and agave). White with specs of the black vanilla, jelly but creamy, contrasting with the colour of the berries.
SLURP!
Recipes:
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall “River Cottage Light & Easy”
More Reading:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/10604062/The-importance-of-texture-in-food.html