Cold Noodles with Sesame Sauce

Earlier in the summer I visited Murger HanHan on an invite from the PR company. Located in Mayfair down a back street, it's a real blink-and-you-miss it. Awful pop music was playing, and it was full of people slurping down on noodles. I think we chose a bit badly, actually; wide belt noodles with tomato, egg and garlic dipping sauce came in a vat of broth so huge we could have bathed in it, while the tomato and egg was comforting, it was also very sweet and devoid of garlic. Should have gone for the biang biang noodles. Impressively long noodle, though.

The pork murger, which is a flatbread cut open and stuffed with meat (the original burger, apparently) was quite bland, and very very fatty - though they do offer it on the menu with lean pork only. But there was seemingly no flavour to it other than the pork itself and a little salt. I get the feeling that this is super traditional, though having never been to Xi'an I can't confirm. The spicy beef murger with peppers and cumin is on the list for next time.

What we did love, though, was this cold steamed rice noodle with sesame sauce. Thick, chewy noodles were mixed up with slivered cucumber and beansprouts underneath, giving essential crunch to the slippery noodles, the creamy sauce being full of rich sesame flavour. They sent me the recipe, hurrah! So I set to making it myself.

I can't find rice noodles that are shaped like this - cut to a square shape, basically - they're all flat like pho or ho fun, or round like bun noodles, or too fine like vermicelli. I set about making my own, though to do this I trialled two methods; mung bean jelly noodles, and cold skin (liang pi) noodles.

More on the latter later, because mung bean jelly noodles were my favourite. The sauce could have clung to them a little better, I guess their surface is too smooth, but in terms of satisfaction of chew these guys really swing it.

For the noodles: 

100gr mung bean starch 
500gr water 
A pinch of salt 

Mix the starch well with half of the water in a large bowl, and add the salt. Bring the other half of the water to the boil and on a low heat, add the starch mixture bit by bit, mixing the solution until it is well combined, with a whisk. Cook on a low heat until the mixture becomes more transparent, then take off the heat, grease a tupperware box and pour into it. When cooled, place in the fridge until needed.

To use, slice thinly width ways and then slice again to the width of the noodle desired. For this I sliced into cube shape. 

Here is Murger HanHan's recipe for the sauce; it's practically verbatim except I've reduced the soy sauce down because it was plenty salty enough. This makes quite a bit - enough for 4 - 6 portions. 

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
7 tablespoons Chinese sesame paste (this is a darker colour to tahini, and tastes richer but you can use tahini at a push)
6 tablespoons of warm water
5 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons sesame oil
1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper (I used chilli oil here, and upped it to 1 tbsp)
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
1 cucumber, chopped to thin slice 
1 small bag beansprouts (I blanched mine because I don't love raw beansprouts)

In a large jar, combine all the ingredients except the cucumber and the beansprouts, and shake vigorously. Layer the beansprouts, cucumber and noodles, then drizzle the sauce over it and toss well. I added coriander, more chilli oil and some steamed choi sum to make it a full meal, and you could add chicken or crispy tofu too. It's a great lunch salad, but keep the sauce separate till you're ready to eat it. 

Steamed Aubergine Salad

I love aubergines - I love them deep fried, stewed, baked, stuffed, smoked, mashed. I love them curried, I love them in pasta, I love them moussaka'd. I even love them in salad which is what this recipe is for. 

This salad, with a combination of spicy, garlicky, savoury and sour is perfect spooned over rice or nests of rice noodles. It packs a punch - it's not a salad you can really eat on its own but it does make a light lunch or dinner. 

I especially like the ease of steaming aubergines and I use baby aubergines for this to aid cooking time; simply split into four at the stem (with the stem still holding them together), and 15 minutes is all you need to a quick dinner. 

You can also flame-char large aubergines on the gas hob or barbecue, or bake them until collapsed (prick the skin before baking) and scraping the insides out of the skins and having this as a smoky mashed salad; a Chinese babaganoush, if you will. 

Steamed Aubergine Salad

Serves 2 with other dishes, or 1 as a light dinner with rice / noodles

2 baby aubergines, split into four lengthways from the stem, stem still attached
2 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil
2 tsp Chinkiang black vinegar
A pinch of sugar
3 red birds eye chillis (fewer if you're chilli intolerant), minced
3 cloves of garlic, mashed
1 tbsp vegetable oil 
A small handful of coriander; stems roughly separated and chopped finely, leaves chopped roughly
1 tsp sesame seeds, toasted

Place the aubergines in a steamer and steam for 15 minutes. 

Meanwhile, prepare the dressing. Whisk together the light soy sauce, sugar, black vinegar, and sesame oil. 

Heat the vegetable oil in a small saucepan on a medium heat. Add the chilli, garlic and coriander stems. Cook on a medium heat for a minute, stirring and making sure the garlic doesn't burn. Remove from the heat and spoon into the dressing mixture. 

Remove the aubergines from the steamer - they should be collapsing a bit by now. Leave to cool for a few minutes, then cut the stem off and then the quarters in half again. Arrange on a plate and drizzle with the dressing. I quite like this salad warm but you can also now cling film and refridgerate in advance - bring back to room temperature to serve it. Garnish with sesame seeds and coriander before you serve it. 

Spinach & Chard Manti - Turkish Dumplings

I LOVE DUMPLINGS. I was helping a friend out with a pescatarian supperclub recently, and in doing so we made manti - a Turkish dumpling that's also found in Russia and Central Asia. The origins of the dumplings are uncertain, though it is believed that the recipe was carried from Central Asia through the Silk Road to Anatolia and China by Turkic peoples (thanks Wikipedia!). Essentially, they're dumplings made with an egg-enriched wheat dough, filled with a spiced meat mixture, and often served with yoghurt.

I tested the recipe first because I LOVE DUMPLINGS but also dumplings can be notoriously difficult to fold, and vegetarian fillings can sometimes be a touch on the bland side. We made this up completely as there weren't many of its vegetarian kind to be found on the internet and I'm not sure how traditional they are given our tweaks, but it has warming spices like cinnamon in them, mixed with the zest of lemon, the zip of parsley and a robust minerality of spinach and chard. Balanced on garlic yogurt, drizzled with chilli oil and dusted with sumac, these dumplings were swept off their plates hungrily. They're not too much of a pain to make, either, as long as you have a bit of patience.

The dough and garlic yoghurt is largely taken from this recipe, though we had a couple of tweaks - I'm not a massive fan of the flavour of dried mint, so I reduced it down. You need to roll the dough as thinly as you can, using a long, thin rolling pin and work to small parcels so that they're light and delicate rather than huge and stodgy. These are tips I picked up from Helen, so hat tip to her as well.

The folding of the dumplings is wonderfully simple - you take opposite corners and you pinch together to form a cross shape. This one was one of my first; you'll want to make them a little smaller. This recipe makes many many manti, but they're freezable and because they're baked first, they keep in the fridge a while. I have no idea why this is baked and then boiled, while most recipes straight-up boil but the baking means they do last longer - if you're going to eat them right away, you can go straight for the boil and miss out the baking stage. 

Spinach & Chard Manti

Serves LOADS

DOUGH:
300gr plain flour
A pinch of salt 
1 egg, beaten with 100ml water
2 tbsp olive oil

Sift the flour and salt into a bowl, then add the egg and the oil and bring together to form the dough. Knead for 6 minutes, until you get a smooth dough, and then cling film and leave to rest for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, make the filling. 

FILLING:
A bunch of spinach
A bunch of chard, leaves and stalks separated 
A bunch of flat leaf parsley
20 walnut halves
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 large pinches of salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp Palestinian za'tar (available at the Turkish Food Centre) 
Zest of 1 lemon
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp breadcrumbs

Blanch the spinach, refresh in iced water. Blanch the chard by adding the stalks 40 seconds before the leaves, as they take longer to cook. Refresh in iced water. Drain and squeeze the moisture out of both vegetables thoroughly, and place in a food processor. Add the walnuts, parsley, garlic, cinnamon, za'tar, lemon zest and olive oil and pulse until well pulsed. If it's looking too wet add the breadcrumbs - it should hold together well but not be sloppy. 

GARLIC YOGHURT: 
3 cloves of garlic, blanched in boiling water for 1 minute 
500ml yoghurt, at least 10% fat
1/2 tsp salt

Mince the garlic well with the salt and add to the yoghurt. Stir well. 

SPICED OIL: 
150ml olive oil
1 tsp pul biber (chilli flakes you can buy in the Turkish Food Centre) 
1 tsp urfa chilli flakes (again, buy in the Turkish Food Centre) - these are slightly darker, and milder and smokier than pul biber. You can use just pul biber if you wish.
1 tbsp hot pepper paste (biber sulcasi) - you can sub in half tomato paste half harissa paste if you like
1 tbsp sumac
1 tsp dried mint (kuru nane)

Heat the oil up in a small saucepan and add the hot pepper paste. Fry until fragrant, around 2 minutes, on a medium heat and then add the chilli, sumac and mint flakes. Simmer for around 3 or 4 minutes, then take off the heat. 

GARNISH: 
1 tbsp sumac
Chopped flat-leaf parsley

Line up a baking sheet or tray with greaseproof paper. Split the dough into 3, and re-wrap the other two. 

Working with one ball at a time, roll out as thinly as you can and then cut squares out of it - working to around an inch size. Maybe start slightly bigger until you have the hang of it. Use a pizza cutter to cut the dough as it's slightly easier. 

Add a teaspoon or less of filling to the centre of each square and bring the opposing ends up to join into a cross shape. Seal well and place on the baking tray. Repeat until the dough or the filling is gone or you're bored shitless. 

Preheat the over to 180 degrees and bake for 10 minutes, until slightly golden. Wait for them to cool if you're going to saving them for later - they last about 3 days in the fridge, or can be frozen - otherwise then simmer them in water for 8 minutes, before draining. 

To serve, add a generous amount of yoghurt to each dish. Place the manti on top of the yoghurt and drizzle with the spiced oil. Garnish with a hefty pinch of sumac and a sprinkling of parsley.  

Mushroom & Perilla Tagliatelle

Perilla is a brilliant herb. Incredibly beautiful, with purple undersides, it's a robust leaf and it has an incredible fragrance to it. A little anise, a hint of mint, slightly medicinal, it is used across Vietnamese, Korean and Japanese cooking. It is very similar to shiso - I would find it difficult to tell the difference in a flavour test. In London, you can buy huge bunches of the stuff cheaply at Longdan in Elephant and Castle - they also have other branches. You can buy shiso leaves at The Japan Centre, but here they're not cheap at all. I bought this particular bunch for the Bun Rieu, and I was left with a huge bunch of the rest. So what to do? 

Pasta. Obviously. 

This kind of pasta, called 'wafu', is based on Japanese fusion. It takes European ingredients and fusions it with Japanese flavours. Here, I used tagliatelle and a rich butter and miso sauce to dress the pasta in. Exotic mushrooms like shimeji and brown beech mushrooms are bolstered with oyster mushrooms too. I loved this; the butter gives it a luxurious richness, and when mixed with soy sauce and miso, it really adds a whole lot of umami to those mushrooms. Shredded perilla give it an extra citrus-like freshness. 

Mushroom & Perilla Tagliatelle

Serves 2

400gr dried tagliatelle
A handful of oyster mushrooms, washed and roughly chopped
A half handful each of shimeji & brown beech mushrooms, washed well
1 clove of garlic, minced
40gr butter
2 tbsp white miso 
2 tbsp light soy sauce
A rib or two of cavalo nero or spring greens, shredded finely
1 stalk of spring onion, greens finely sliced at an angle, whites saved for another
3 perilla leaves, shredded
1 tbsp vegetable oil

Put the pasta on to cook in heavily salted water. 

Melt the butter and mix in the white miso and soy sauce until completely incorporated In a cast iron pan, add the oil and heat on high until smoking. Add the oyster mushrooms and sear for a few moments before moving them around the pan. Add the clove of garlic and stir continuously so the garlic doesn't catch. Add the shimeji and brown beech mushrooms, cook for another minute, and then add the butter miso and soy mixture, taking it off the heat as you mix it in. 

For the final minute, add the cavalo nero to the pasta cooking water, then drain, reserving 4 tbsp of the cooking water. Add the tagliatelle to the mushroom mixture and mix well, with a little of the reserved cooking water. Serve, and garnish with the spring onion and perilla leaves. 

The Newman Arms, Fitzrovia

Around these parts, The Newman Arms used to be called ‘that pie pub’. I worked 10 minutes away from it for 6 years, and I went a few times – mainly in the depths of winter, to hunker down in the tiny little room upstairs with sticky tartan carpets and too-close-together tables. It smelled like cabbage and butter, and the only thing on the menu was – yep – pies. Most of them were the kind of pies that pie purists get their knickers in a right old twist about; you know the ones, they harp on endlessly about pies needing sides, and these! These! They shout, brandishing their pitchforks. These are CASSEROLES WITH LIDS! Snore. 

Those days are gone now, and so are their pies. The upstairs has been refurbished; nothing extensive, just pared back simplicity. The dining room is tiny, and the kitchen even more so which makes it all the more impressive for what comes out of it. It's still a pub downstairs, and on a Friday night you may have to jostle through a street-full, then a pub-full of drinkers to make your way up the rickety stairs. 

The Cornwall Project has taken the space over; they're also in residence at The Adam and Eve in Homerton, The Three Crowns in Stoke Newington, and The Duke of Edinburgh in Brixton. They like their pubs. The Project started five years ago with Matt Chatfield, a Cornishman who has worked closely with suppliers in Cornwall to bring London restaurants the finest produce, and has now branched out on his own.

From a short and changing menu, duck hearts with beetroot, blackberries and cobnuts is a great little starter; vivid on the plate, and the tender hearts sweetened with the fruit. It felt wonderfully autumnal, and the softer, squidgier textures were offset by the roasted, crunchy cobnuts. Some fine bread, loose-crumbed and sourdoughy, came with a generous pat of butter.

Mackerel with cucamelons - cucamelons! How cute are they? - and dill oil could have done with a heavier hand on the pickle flavour but otherwise the fish itself, served raw, was as fresh could be. Mackerel is an oily fish which has a tendency to go very fishy if it's been sitting around for a while, but there was absolutely no sign of that here. I am in love with cucamelons; grape-sized, cucumber flavoured and with a hint of citrus. 

I loved the aged rump cap beef tartare, properly beefy and chopped coarsely, so you could feel each little piece in your mouth. My poor companion, an avoider of the raw flesh, found that she really liked this one in small doses. Me? I piled that chargrilled toast up high, relishing the pickle and the smoked anchovy cream that dotted the tartare. 

An unexpected treat from the kitchen came in the form of lamb rump with an incredibly, impossibly crisp skin. God I love salty salty lamb fat. Pickled shiitake mushrooms made a change from the usual, a more interesting accompaniment to what can sometimes be a fairly standard meat-and-two-veg choice. 

The turbot though. Now this was pretty damn special. Pearly white flesh, on top of crushed potatoes, grilled yellow courgettes and purple micro-basil. Don't ask me what the sauce was - I have no idea and the menu missed this bit off - but my word this was good. Even though I know turbot is one of the most expensive fishes out there, at £25, it's the most expensive dish on the menu so it had a lot to live up to. Thankfully it did, and I was loathe to share it. 

It's very well I did, because otherwise I may have been denied the salt-baked celeriac with Tunworth cheese. It says a lot about a restaurant when out of 4 main courses you still fancy trying the vegetarian option (ok, maybe it says a lot about me), choosing over pork belly and beef shortrib. I have fond memories of salt-baked celeriac from The Ledbury; the salt-baking really intensifies the flavours, condenses the textures. Tunworth cheese is a runny, pungent one, adding some extra oompf. Pickled walnuts were a nice touch, and I especially liked the cubes of crisp, sharp apple; completely unexpected and it sounded bonkers on paper, but worked beautifully on the plate. 

I didn't take a picture of dessert. I completely forgot. I was having such a lovely time that once the dessert was set before us, we went at it and that was that. It happens a lot with me and desserts. The chocolate mousse was not, in fact, a mousse but was actually a baked fondant, those things with a liquid centre that Masterchef contestants seem to decide to make all the time despite its propensity to go completely wrong. This did not. The insides were molten, the outsides were cakey. It was light enough, topped with ice cream, for us to wipe the dish clean, and not so rich as to make us feel sick. 

As you can tell, I am a big fan of The Newman Arms in its new incarnation. We had a couple of dishes gifted to us (the beef tartare and the lamb) because Matt is just a bloody nice bloke but without it I can hand on heart say that I would feel the same way. These days finding a restaurant in the environs of Soho and Fitzrovia that is actually bookable, with brilliant food that won't bankrupt you is a rare find, and The Newman Arms is all three. 

Oh! There is ONE pie. It's on at lunchtime, when there is a ludicrously cheap 3 courses for £19 deal. I believe it might even have pastry sides to it, but don't hold me to that... 

The Newman Arms
23 Rathbone Street, 
London, W1T 1NG 

Miso Polenta Bowl

Sometimes, an idea can be so bonkers it might just work. It was a Saturday morning and I'd risen from my hovel a bit groggy and absolutely ravenous. There was nothing in the fridge; well, besides half a courgette, an avocado ready to turn and some leftover spring onion and ginger magic sauce that is literally the best thing ever if you can be bothered to chop three whole bunches of spring onion. A lone egg rolled around on the counter-top, bumping together with three pitiful cherry tomatoes. There was no way I could face going outside. What's a girl to do? Improvise.

The nice folk over at The Wasabi Company sent me some of their sauces to try, and I've been actively addicted to the Champonzu (red top) ever since. At £12.20 for a 300ml bottle, it's going to be an expensive addiction but you don't need much of it to bring out the five different Japanese citrus fruits. It has a very savoury base, with zesty orange and yuzu notes. I wanted this in my brunch. A ferret around the cupboard revealed the only carby base available to me was polenta. An idea was born.

Typically I'd look for cheese to enrich the polenta with and give it some flavour, but... no cheese. So instead, miso for a little umaminess to pep that polenta up. It worked an absolute treat, especially once you factor in the molten gold of that soft-boiled egg.

Miso Polenta Bowl

Serves 2

150gr instant polenta
2 heaped tsp light miso
A knob of butter
Half a courgette, sliced into thick matchsticks
Half an avocado, slivered at the last minute to prevent browning
A handful of cherry tomatoes, halved
2 soft boiled eggs, peeled
2 tbsp magic spring onion and ginger sauce
1 tbsp + 1 tsp champonzu (you could use a mixture of 60% light soy, 20% mirin, 10% sake and 10% lemon and lime juice at a real push...)
1 tbsp cooking oil
1 tsp chilli oil

Bring enough water to boil (as per the packet of polenta instructions) and whisk the polenta in. Add a lid half cocked and turn the heat low, and let it cook till you hear soft plop-plopping sounds. Then stir vigorously and place the lid on fully to cook for up to 10 minutes. Keep stirring so it doesn't stick to the bottom.

Meanwhile, heat the cooking oil in a non-stick pan on a medium heat. Fry the courgette sticks until they've softened, then add the cherry tomatoes and cook further until they're starting to collapse. Add the tsp of champonzu and remove from the heat.

Check on the polenta - add a large pinch of salt and keep stirring. It should be cooked at this point. Stir in the butter and miso until it has fully incorporated. Check the seasoning.

Assemble the bowls with half the polenta in each, then top with a halved soft boiled egg, the courgette and tomato mixture, the avocado, the spring onion and ginger sauce, and drizzle with chilli oil. Use the remaining tbsp of champonzu sauce to drizzle over the avocado in each.

(Got loads of miso leftover? Not sure what to do with the rest? My book, Chinatown Kitchen, has several recipes for it.)

Xi'an Impression, Holloway

I've long lamented that New York gets Xian Famous Foods and we don't. I crave those cold skin (liang pi) noodles, jelly-like in texture and served cool and refreshing, with a light kick from the sauce. The chang-an tofu is the stuff of dreams; slippery fresh tofu with a sweet, sour and spicy sauce on top. 

But, no need to lament now because Xi'an Impression has arrived and it is almost as good. I say almost because they don't have chang-an tofu. I was tipped off by this write-up on Fuchsia Dunlop's site, and I made arrangements immediately. Located directly opposite the Emirates stadium, I visited on a match day and the tiny restaurant seating 20 at most was full. They've obviously had the sense to capitalise on the volume of people passing by, and they also had heated dishes at the front of the room offering sweet and sour chicken with fried rice. There were plenty of people there having it, and I wondered if they weren't even a little bit curious as to what all these vibrant dishes were that everyone else was eating. 

Our waiter explained to us that all the noodles are hand-pulled, and they had a selection both dressed or in soup. These are biang biang noodles, so called because of the noise made when they are being made, by slapping the dough on the table. They were pretty fantastic - a great elasticky chew, and dressed with a fragrant, spicy oil rich with coriander seeds and anise, complete with a small mound of raw garlic to flavour but not overwhelm. They're mixed table-side, carefully turned over and over until the noodles are well dressed. A head of bak choi adds required vegetal crunch, but I wondered if a little more wouldn't go astray. Cabbage, perhaps, or a little coriander. 

"I call it a Chinese burger but it's really more of a kebab..." Our waiter insisted that we try both the spiced beef and the pork 'burgers'. Rou Jia Mo is the Chinese name for it, and they come simply as meat inside bread, no further embellishment. It's not just about the meat, the quality of the bread is important here and it was toasted until crisp, sturdy enough to withstand the rich juices from the beef. A great little snack for £3.80. 

The pork version was entirely different, being a little drier and resembling pulled pork. It was still packed full of flavour, though less heavy on the cumin and spice of the beef version. 

There they are. Liang pi noodles, so called 'cold skin'. God, I love them so. These are served cold and sliced thickly, alongside some spongy wheat gluten and julienned cucumber. Beansprouts nestled within the folds of the noodles. This was one of my favourite dishes there; the spice level was subtle, but it built up the further down the bowl we went. 

The fried dumplings, these with pork and seaweed, are typically left open ended, as is traditional for Xian-style dumplings. We had black vinegar, soy sauce and chilli oil to make up our own dipping sauce. I can't get enough of dumplings, so naturally, I loved these. 

I loved Xian Impression, and I could eat those cold skin noodles every day forever and not get bored of them. The menu is extensive, and includes many more noodle dishes, so plans are afoot to go back and try more already. The service is sweet - our man told us excitedly that someone from The Guardian had called to arrange a photo of their food, which can only mean one thing... He looked a bit scared when I told him to prepare for the rush. 

At £35 for two with service (no booze), it was really great value, meaning I can go as often as I like! Holloway, though. Holloway. 

Xian Impression
117 Benwell Street, N7 7BW
Tel: 0203 441 0191

Corn, Mushroom & Feta with Polenta

IT'S NOT ASIAN! Yup, sometimes I cook and it doesn't involve rice or noodles. It's strange and peculiar.

So polenta. Polenta is a thing I love, because it's sloppy like baby food and it's actually a requirement to cook it with enough butter and cheese so that it actually has some flavour. Alternatively, you can make an incredibly flavoursome topping (like lamb ragu...), so flavoursome that you need to cut a bit of the richness with the bland polenta itself. Since there's no lamb happening in this house this week - and maybe we should leave that for when the chill sets in - butter and cheese was the way forward.

I chose these vegetables for their combination of sweetness from the corn and tomatoes, with a little bitterness, from the cavolo nero. I bumped up the flavours a touch to really bring them out.

Corn, Mushroom & Feta with Polenta

Serves 2

150gr polenta
450gr vegetable stock (I used half a Knorr stock pot. They're actually pretty good.)
3 cloves of garlic, minced
50ml white wine
1 ear of fresh corn
3 large chestnut mushrooms, chopped into 6
5 large oyster mushrooms, roughly chopped
2 stalks of cavolo nero, stems removed and shredded
8 cherry tomatoes
1/2 tsp sherry vinegar
A pinch of sugar
A pinch of salt
Pepper
A knob of butter
70gr feta
A handful of parsley, minced
1 tbsp olive oil

Bring the stock to the boil and whisk in the polenta. Bring to a low simmer and stir every few minutes, scraping the bottom. Cook for 12 minutes - it should be a little runny. Stir in the butter and put the lid on, and leave while you prepare the rest.

Heat the olive in a frying pan on a medium heat, and add the garlic. Turn onto low and using a knife, cut the corn kernels directly into the pan carefully. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring every so often. Turn to medium and add the mushrooms. Cook for a minute or so, stirring, then add the white wine. Simmer until most of the wine has evaporated, then add the cavolo nero and cook for a further 3 minutes. Add the cherry tomatoes, the sugar, the salt and pepper. Place the lid on and cook on a low heat for 5 more minutes, stirring intermittently. Add the parsley, take off the heat and leave the lid on.

Dish out the polenta, then add the corn mixture on top. Garnish with crumbled feta.

(Got leftover ears of corn? There's a recipe for Miso-Buttered Corn in Chinatown Kitchen!)

Sesame Peanut Noodle Salad

Admittedly this would go well with a nice piece of barbecued chicken. Or the hoi sin and ginger ribs from Chinatown Kitchen. I am the worst vegan ever. BUT I still ate this all on its own and it's incredibly satisfying, due to the quantity of rich, creamy peanut butter. Mmm.

Because you want the garlic flavour without the harshness of raw garlic, there's an extra step here that requires a BIT of faff but also some lovely crunchy non-honky garlic pieces. If you don't care about your breath then just add it in raw. You can add whatever crunchy vegetables you have - sugarsnap peas, snow peas, cucumber, peppers - as long as you julienne them thinly. This noodle salad keeps incredibly well and travels very well too, so it's perfect for lunch boxes (careful of the honky garlic) or picnics. As I write this it's lashing it down. Hmm.

Sesame Peanut Noodle Salad

Serves 2

150gr dry weight wholewheat noodles
3 tbsp chunky peanut butter
1 tbsp tahini
Juice of 1 lime
1 tbsp light soy sauce
3 tbsp water
1 tbsp sesame oil
50ml vegetable oil
3 cloves of garlic, thinly and evenly sliced
1 carrot, julienne
2 Romaine lettuce leaves, sliced thinly
5 radishes, julienned
2 spring onions, greens only, julienned

In a small saucepan add the garlic in with the oil cold and heat it up gently, stirring all the while. When the garlic starts fizzing and starts turning the merest golden, take off the heat, as the garlic will continue to cook. When it becomes more golden drain the oil into a heatproof container and scatter the garlic chips on kitchen towel.

Cook the noodles as per the packet instructions, and then drain and run under cold water. Toss with 2 tbsp of the garlic oil.

Whisk together the peanut butter, tahini, water, light soy and sesame oil until it has combined. If it's too thick - it should look like emulsion paint (?!) - add a dribble of water and continue to whisk.

Add the vegetables to the noodles and add the sauce, tossing well. Garnish with the deep fried garlic chips. Serve cold.

Broccoli & Pea Salad

Some Americans have this thing where they use mayonnaise in their salad dressings, which has always struck me as a bit counter-intuitive. Salads, supposedly light and refreshing, bogged down by all that claggy egg and oil. Don't get me wrong - I love mayonnaise, but mainly for dipping chips in, or swiping freshly peeled prawns through. Not to dress my greens with.

I get the need for a creamier dressing, though. If this salad were to be dressed with an oil emulsion it just wouldn't be the same, it just wouldn't be as good. That's where yoghurt comes in - the thick, Greek-style stuff. Forget the 0% fat liquidy one - you need the creamy tang of the set yoghurt here.

This salad is perfect alongside something like a baked pastry; I ate this with a spinach and cheese borek, with a little watermelon and feta to go with it. I used freshly podded peas and I think frozen will do, but wait for them to thaw out rather than actually cooking them in boiling water. And a note on the broccoli. I went to LA recently for just a day for work, and they really do eat raw broccoli as a crudité. Nope. That raw fluffy floret top - no, not raw. If you can handle it, then sure, but I prefer mine lightly blanched.

Broccoli & Pea Salad

Serves 4 with sides

4 large broccoli florets, blanched in boiling water for 1 minute only and refreshed in iced water
500gr fresh peas in the pod, podded - or 200gr frozen peas, thawed at room temperature
1 pickled cucumber, drained and diced
Flat-leaf parsley chopped finely to make up 3 tbsp
200gr full fat Greek yoghurt
1 tbsp extra virgil olive oil
A large pinch of sea salt
1/2 a red onion, diced and soaked in the juice of a lemon for 20 minutes
1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
A hefty sprinkling of sumac

Chop the broccoli florets up roughly and add to the peas, alongside the pickled cucumber. Add the parsley in.

To make up the dressing, whisk together the olive oil with the salt and the yoghurt. Add the pomegranate molasses, and then stir the cucumber in. Drain and rinse the red onion and add to the dressing. Cover the vegetables in the dressing and toss well, then sprinkle with the sumac and allow to sit for 10 minutes while the flavours meld.

(Vegetarianism not your thing? I have a great recipe for braised broccoli, chicken and mushrooms in Chinatown Kitchen. Proper Cantonese homestyle comfort food. You can buy it here.)

Hot & Sour Soup - The Vegan Version

There is no doubt about it - hot and sour is a flavour combination that comes up quite often on this blog. I count 6 times; Hunan hot & sour soup, complete with noodles to make a one dish meal; Hot & Sour Aubergines with Tofu, one of the most successful recipes I've come up with, and deviating from the normal heat you get from the classic hot and sour - instead, fish sauce, birds eye chillis and lime juice flavour this one. Hot & Sour Mustard Green Soup is bulked out with a surf n' turf of pork ribs and fish balls; Hot & Sour Tofu, one of those dishes that might change your preconceptions about tofu; Hot & Sour Chicken Noodles, which almost graced the front cover of Chinatown Kitchen; and a Sichuan style of Hot & Sour Soup, way back in the mists of time when bad pictures were my game (arguably they still are...).

Why do I love it so much? It's hard to say, but as someone who is slightly addicted to both chilli and pickles, the clues are pretty strong. The heat in your classic takeaway-style hot and sour soup doesn't come from chillis, though. White pepper is what gives it that nose-clearing pep, though I usually add chilli too for good measure. With this vegan version you lose the silken strands of the egg-drop technique, a classic Chinese finisher for many soups. It's made by whisking egg up, bringing the soup to the boil and very gently drizzling the egg into the soup so that as soon as the egg hits the hot liquid, it cooks, forming wispy strands and that lovely, silken texture. However, what you do gain in losing the egg is a light, bright and refreshing broth packed full of interesting textures and a lot of goodness.

The key to making the soup pleasing to eat is to chop everything up similarly, so that you get the appropriate textures. Everything in this soup was julienned / matchsticked to get that effect.

Hot & Sour Soup - The Vegan Version

Serves 4 with sides (like these dumplings)

4 tofu bamboo sticks, rehydrated in hot water
4 large pieces of black fungus, rehydrated in hot water and julienned
4 inches of daikon / mooli, peeled and chopped into matchsticks
200gr firm tofu, cut into matchsticks
3 slices of ginger, peeled
4 cloves of garlic, peeled but left whole
2 large chestnut mushrooms, sliced thinly
4 large oyster mushrooms, also sliced thinly
3 spring onions, whites and greens separated - the whites can be left as is, the greens should be sliced into thin rings
1/2 a star anise
750ml vegetable stock
2 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tsp white pepper
3 tbsp Chinkiang black vinegar
1 tbsp cornflour, slaked with 2 tbsp water
1 red chilli, diced (optional)

Bring the stock to the boil and add the whites of the spring onions, the ginger, garlic and the star anise. Simmer for half an hour with the lid on, and then drain the stock into another pot.

Add the tofu, the bamboo sticks, the daikon, the chilli and the black fungus and simmer for 20 minutes. Then add the mushrooms and the white pepper and simmer for another 10. Add the cornflour solution and cook until slightly thickened. Take off the heat and add the soy sauce and black vinegar, and taste - add more vinegar or more white pepper as appropriate. Ladle out into bowls, and garnish with the greens of the spring onion.

Green potstickers

I love my friends so much that when one of them decides to go vegan, caffeine and sugar-free AND teetotal for a whole entire month in the name of charity, I'm still friends with them. Sigh. It's hard hanging out with these kind-hearted people. (If you donate £20 you can have a poem written for you with your choice of theme!) I remember how difficult veganism was, so I was only pleased to invite them round for lunch.

I almost always default to Asian food anyway but even more so with veganism, as that's where it feels most versatile without losing as much flavour. You won't get far with trying to replicate a bacon sandwich, but these potstickers, packed full of vegetables with no meat in sight are (almost) as satisfying. I will freely admit that I eat too much meat - I think we probably all do - so I'm making a more concerted effort to get more vegetables in there. It just needs a little imagination.

Green Potstickers

Makes around 30 

1 packet of white round dumpling skins (not wontons) - sometimes labelled gyoza, or make your own
1/2 a medium sized courgette, diced
3 sticks of celery, peeled and diced
100gr peas, freshly podded or thawed
1 inch of ginger, grated
3 cloves of garlic, minced finely
2 tbsp light soy sauce
120gr firm tofu, chopped finely
1 tbsp cooking oil
2 stalks of spring onion - whites minced and the greens finely sliced into rings
2 large shiitake mushrooms, rehydrated and minced

Dipping sauce:
Ginger, slivered
2 tbsp Chinkiang black vinegar
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp light soy


Heat 1 tbsp of cooking oil in a saucepan until it is shimmering. Add the garlic, ginger and celery and stir fry until softened. Add the courgette, tofu and soy sauce and cook on a medium heat, stirring constantly. Add the whites of the spring onion and cook for another 2 minutes. By this point the mixture should be quite dry, if not cook on a higher heat, still stirring.

Remove and leave to cool. Add the fresh or thawed peas and the greens of the spring onion. Add it to a blender or a food processor and pulse briefly until it has all been chopped finely.

Place a wrapper on the palm of your hand and add a teaspoon of the filling. Fold the dumpling, pleating as you go. (For step by step pictures, and a meatier filling my book, Chinatown Kitchen has it all.) Otherwise, here.

In a non-stick frying pan add the remaining 1 tbsp oil and heat on a medium heat until shimmering. Add the dumplings flat side down and fry for 3 - 4 minutes, checking that they're not burning. Add 50ml water and place the lid on so that they steam for 3 - 4 minutes. Remove the lid and, checking that the bottoms aren't burning, cook until the liquid has evaporated and you're left with a crisp bottom.

Mix the dipping sauce ingredients together and serve with the dumplings.

Hunanese Hot & Sour Soup

I have a real big soft spot for hot & sour soup. When I was a kid in Hong Kong my dad used to buy a particular brand that came in a foil pouch, which you could just stick in a pot of boiling water to heat up. It came out just as you and I know it; slightly gloopy from cornflour, with bits of mushroom and char siu, sometimes peas floating about in it. We always added more vinegar to pep it up. It really hit the spot.

All over Asia countries have their version of hot and sour soup. In Thailand, tom yum soup is a clear broth flavoured with lemongrass and lime leaves, sometimes with chicken (tom yum gai), sometimes with prawns (tom yum goong). I have a recipe in my book, Chinatown Kitchen which you can buy here, plug plug, for my ultimate tom yum made with a secret ingredient. The Filipinos also have their own version, as do the Vietnamese. 

Traditionally, the Chinese version of hot & sour soup originates from Beijing or Sichuan, and pigs blood is used to thicken the broth. What with it being rather difficult to find here, and perhaps not immediately appealing, instead most Chinese restaurants use cornflour to thicken it, giving it that characteristically gloopy appearance, or it is thickened egg-drop style - that is, whisked egg is stirred slowly into the soup and the strands are suspended within the broth. Contrary to popular belief, white pepper is used for the 'hot' aspect of the soup, not chillis. 

This Hunanese version is thickened by dried rice noodles cooked directly into the pot, so the excess starch thickens the soup. Chilli bean paste gives a richer, deeper hotness, though the white pepper also features. Pickled mustard greens give it that extra wallop of the sour balance. It's a great one-dish meal; after all the initial chopping it is quick to cook. Always add the black vinegar at the end, otherwise it loses its delicate flavour easily. You can add leftover roast meats like chicken or pork to this too, but it's just as filling in its vegetarian (and even vegan) state. 

Hunanese Hot & Sour Noodle Soup

Serves 4

1/2 block of firm tofu, chopped into cubes
1.5 litres of vegetable or chicken stock
4 shiitake mushrooms, soaked in hot water for 15 minutes, stems removed and slivered
2 pieces of woodear fungus, soaked in hot water for 10 minutes and shredded
A handful of sugarsnap peas, julienned
3 tbsp pickled mustard green, rinsed well in water
A bundle of enoki mushrooms, stems cut into three pieces
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 inch of ginger, peeled and minced
2 tbsp chilli bean paste
2 tbsp light soy sauce
4 tbsp Chinkiang black vinegar
1 tsp white pepper
1 spring onion, greens and whites separated, julienned
1 large red chilli, sliced into rings
250gr dried rice noodles - I used 8mm size
1 tbsp cooking oil

In a large saucepan, heat up the oil on a medium heat. Add the garlic and ginger and whites of the spring onions and stir-fry until fragrant. Add the chilli bean paste, stir well, then all the mustard greens, shiitake mushrooms and the woodear fungus. Add the chicken stock and simmer for 10 minutes. 

Add the soy sauce, then add the noodles. Stir well, making sure the noodles are covered with liquid. Cook according to the packet instructions - mine took about 10 minutes of simmering to become soft. Stir every couple of minutes. When the noodles are soft, add the tofu and simmer for another 3 minutes, then add the sugarsnap peas and enoki mushrooms and place a lid on top. Take off the heat and leave to stand for 5 minutes. 

Serve equally into 4 bowls and add the black vinegar and a hefty pinch of white pepper on top of each, with a little greens of the spring onion garnish. Finally, add a few chilli rings to each bowl. I usually bring the vinegar and some chilli oil to the table, in case people prefer to adjust their soups themselves.

How To Make A Bowl of Health

I don't know about you, but there were some pretty big indulgences this Christmas. Not content with just roasted goose, we also roasted a ham to go on the Christmas table. Boxing Day saw not only the ritualistic bubble & squeak breakfast, fried in goose fat, but also a buffet with lasagne, cottage pie and salt beef. How was I supposed to choose between that lot? I didn't. They all got equal stature on my plate. And if that wasn't enough, we roasted a rib of beef, with some of the most perfect roast potatoes I've achieved yet. There was fish pie, laden with cream and butter. The cheeseboard was not left unhassled. I waddled back home. 

That sort of thing doesn't come for free, though. Balance is key, and I had some repenting to do. I've been going in for one-bowl-wonders - what, in the US is often referred to as 'buddha bowls', though I'm not entirely sure why. I buy in a load of vegetables, and they can be marinated, roasted, steamed so that no one bowl ever needs to be the same.

- You need a carb or grain base if you're going to keep that hunger at bay. Brown rice has featured heavily, but I've also used glass noodles, quinoa, bulgur wheat, green lentils, or Israeli cous cous (the big sort). Step away from the pasta and the white rice. 

- Vegetables. A combination of steamed, roasted and raw. Use a mix of vegetables in both colour and texture. If you're going to be roasting them, cut up sturdy, fibrous vegetables smaller than vegetables that hold more water so that they cook more quickly. Peppers, courgettes, mushrooms, sweetcorn on the cob, sweet potato, butternut squash, broccoli, cauliflower and kale all benefit from being roasted. Green beans and carrots do well steamed. Cucumber, avocado and diced tomato can be left raw. Brussels sprouts can shredded raw and dressed with lemon juice and olive oil if you're not completely sick of them by now. 

- A sauce - them vegetables need jazzing up, after all. Lemon juice, tahini and garlic. Peanut butter, rice vinegar, soy sauce and sesame oil shaken together with enough water to loosen it. Miso, soy sauce, lemon and oil. Sherry vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, finely diced shallot. Garlic, lime juice, sugar, fish sauce and a little water to loosen. Whizzed up parsley, mint, anchovies and olive oil, with capers stirred through.

- You'll need some protein. Chickpeas, tofu, beans, houmous. Maybe some fish. Tinned fish also works. I laid off the steak and ham and pates for these bowls... 

- A topping to introduce some texture or an additional flavour. Toasted sesame seeds, toasted pumpkin seeds, chopped herbs, chopped up kimchi, a squirt of chilli sauce, that sort of thing.

Enjoy. Give it a week and you can get back to the burgers. 

Smacked Cucumber Salad, Turbo-Charged

A big part of my cooking life is the love of experimentation. I've fiddled and tweaked and added to already established recipes countless times because of curiosity, or carelessness in the shopping process, so that I've had to substitute something for whatever I forgot to buy. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes that additional ingredient lifts that dish from the norm to the outstanding (often, it's fresh herbs) but other times it just doesn't need anything else. It's perfect as it is. But you don't know until you try, and with Smacked Cucumbers I've tried many things. 

Stripped down to its basics, it consists of these main components: Salt, chilli oil, garlic, sugar and vinegar. Salty, sweet, sour and spicy, in a happy balance, soaking into the bland cooling cucumber. What if you were to take each of these flavour profiles to the extreme? 

I started off with making an infused garlic oil, made by frying garlic chips of uniform thickness as a base. This then became the chilli oil, and to it, I added some spices. Fennel seed and coriander seed for fragrance, and a star anise for depth. Palm sugar went in next, for the most caramel-rich of the sugars, and the salty aspect, with a little sweet for good measure, came in the form of soy sauce and white miso. Chilli was provided by Korean chilli flakes - mild, but vivid red. Sichuan peppercorns give tingle, and the punch was provided by finely minced fresh green jalapeno peppers. Sour? Sherry vinegar, Chinkiang black vinegar, and a squirt of lime. 

It works marvellously. With a simple crisp-skinned salmon fillet and some rice, the richness of the sauce takes centre stage. For something to accompany meat stews or stir-fries, the simpler option is probably best for some cooling relief - otherwise, this turbo-charged version is a winner. 

Smacked Cucumber Salad, Turbo Charged

Serves 4 as a side 

200ml vegetable oil
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced very thinly
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tbsp coriander seeds 
1/2 star anise
1 tsp Sichuan peppercorns
1 tbsp Korean chilli flakes
1 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tsp palm sugar
1 tbsp Chinkiang black vinegar
1 tbsp sherry vinegar
1 clove garlic
1 fresh green jalapeno, minced
2 long, slim cucumbers, washed and topped and tailed
1/2 tbsp toasted sesame oil
A few coriander leaves
Table salt

Place a clean tea over the cucumbers and smack lightly with a rolling pin, until squashed. Chop roughly and place in a colander - sprinkle with table salt and leave over the sink for the juices to leech out. 

Place the oil in a small saucepan with the garlic chips, cold. Place on a medium heat, and watch like a hawk. When the oil starts to bubble, swirl the garlic chips around to separate them. When they start to turn a light golden, take off the heat and carry on swirling - they will become browner in the oil. Do not let them go beyond a peanut brown, or they will become bitter. 

Drain the oil into a heat proof bowl, and place the chips on a piece of kitchen towel to soak up excess oil. 

Pour the oil back into the pan, and place back on a medium heat. Add the star anise, fennel seeds, sichuan peppercorns and the coriander seeds. Bubble for 30 seconds, then remove from the heat and add the chilli powder. Return to a low heat and stir continuously until the chilli powder darkens but does not burn. Remove from the heat and leave to cool. 

Remove the star anise, then add the sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, vinegars, and clove of garlic. Place in a small chopper or blender and process until smooth. Add the miso and process again. 

Rinse the cucumber well and pat dry. Place in a large bowl, and pour the dressing over. Toss well to ensure all the pieces are covered. Place the cucumber on a plate, and garnish with the minced jalapeno, garlic chips and the coriander leaves.