Tag: Pies

‘Think of the Takeaway as your friend’

This was the advice of a friend on how to deal with being housebound while recovering from surgery.

It was good advice, and we started by ordering from our local restaurants.

 

Then some kind friends realised our predicament; they introduced us to Dishpatch, and we haven’t looked back.

 

Dishpatch is a service which offers menus from top restaurants, delivered to your door, and available nationwide in the UK.

Your order arrives on Friday, by courier, in an insulated box, and practically all packaging is recyclable. There’s a detailed list of contents, with step by step instructions on how to finish your meal at home.

Menus change frequently; typically there’s a starter and a main event with optional ‘add-ons’, which might be a pudding, or something for breakfast or afternoon tea.

Everything is carefully thought through to ensure you have all you need to complete your meal. You won’t go hungry. Some of the participating restaurants will provide their choices of wine or cocktails to get your dinner party started.

The advice for all perishables is to enjoy them during the course of a weekend, but with common sense you can extend any leftovers for a day or two.

 

The introduction was the gift of a feast from Angela Hartnett’s Café Murano.

 

First was a fluffy focaccia with antipasti, a pleasantly bitter, smoky aubergine dip, and pickled vegetables; then an outstanding starter, Broad Bean Pesto with pine nuts, peas, herbs and Parmesan.

It came with a whole Burrata cheese to serve on top (I don’t normally set homework, but if you haven’t tried Burrata, find some immediately to rectify your omission, or I will mark you down for carelessness).

There was a little tub of pangrattato too, crisp breadcrumbs to scatter on top, for crunch. Weeks later, we still had a few left in the fridge, they were a gift that kept on giving.

 

I feel I should apologise that the photos that follow are blurred and poorly lit. Or both, we were SERIOUSLY OVER-EXCITED!

 

Buratta, Pangrattato, Broad Bean pesto

 

Main course was the leg and breast of a plump chicken, anointed with spicy N’duja sausage, star anise, rosemary and cardamom.  There were roast new potatoes to serve alongside, with sweet cherry tomatoes and artichoke hearts.

 

Chicken, roast potatoes with artichokes & tomatoes

 

We finished with a sublime, intense chocolate ‘cake’, and a light pistachio cream.

 

Chocolate cake, pistachio cream

 

Emboldened by this success, we ordered my birthday treat from St John

 

I’m very fond of St John Restaurant. I know the white interior of the restaurant and the staff uniforms are reminiscent of an operating theatre, but it smells much more welcoming, and is infinitely more pleasurable.

Both the restaurant and the cookbooks have been a huge influence on chefs, particularly in Britain and the USA. They were the originators of ‘nose to tail eating’, a philosophy that respects the animals we eat by using every part.

Be reassured, any idea that you will leave the table up to your elbows in gore is misplaced.

It’s elegant, thoughtful and skilled cooking. By ordering from Dishpatch, you only have two jobs: to complete the process in your kitchen, and then polish off the results.

 

 

Chicken & ox tongue pie

 

 

A chicken & smoked ox tongue pie served two of us generously over two nights. It came with an enamelled pie dish, sufficient pastry for the top, and a length of marrow bone. The marrow enriches the gravy, while the bone serves as pie funnel.

(If you’re not a fan of tongue, the pieces are large enough to allow easy removal, once they’ve imparted their soothing smokiness to the pie).

 

 

Potted Pork with cornichons; tomato salad “model’s own”

 

 

As well as the pie, which we ate over two days, we ordered all the optional ‘add-ons’ to complete the treat: ‘anchovy gunge’ to nibble on, potted pork & cornichons to start.

There was ginger loaf, butterscotch sauce & clotted cream to follow.

There were Welsh rarebit and miniatures of Fernet Branca for the Morning After, and a chocolate brownie for tea. And an Eccles cake with Lancashire cheese. Just in case we got famished before dinner….

 

Our latest experiment? José Pizarro’s Paella Box.

 

You’ll find the full menu via the link below. The tapas provided were enough as dinner on Saturday, with some left over as a starter for the paella the following day. We chose the wild mushroom and artichoke paella, and were amazed by the intensity of flavour. The correct sized pan is included in the box, and can be re-used again if you’re tempted to reproduce the recipe yourself.

There was enough Alioli (garlic mayonnaise) for the Patatas Bravas as well as a transformative dollop to go on the paella.

 

Mushroom paella with artichokes; brown food, but in a good way.

 

If your tapas need deep frying, the instructions tell you roughly what size pan to use. There’s a tub of the right amount of rapeseed oil, and a little tin of Maldon salt, enough for a generous seasoning. There’s a chunk of sourdough bread in the box, for mopping.

Deep frying at home can be quite challenging, another time I (or, rather, The Carer) might try cooking the blue cheese croquetas in a hot oven, and using less oil for the Padron peppers.

The Basque cheesecake with lavender honey? We were speechless with admiration….

 

‘Beef and Liberty’ from Hawksmoor

 

Liberty? If only….

 

This was another gift, aimed more at the kitchen-weary carer, I suspect.

Hawksmoor is a restaurant group known for its beef; they offer their own service, delivering steaks, or in this case a Roast Beef dinner for two. The worry and stress of preparation has been lifted from your shoulders, just follow the instructions (intelligently!) and don’t get distracted!

The beef in question was a 35 day dry-aged rolled rump. Don’t be tempted to reduce the amount of salt they advise you to throw on it while searing before it goes into the oven – the end result won’t be over seasoned.

The rested beef didn’t throw out any blood or juice when carved. It was pink, moist and perfectly tender, with the aroma of well aged meat.

The meat cooked at 200° C, and conveniently everything else reheats at the same temperature, even the perfect (substantial!) Yorkshire puddings.

Everything on the plate tasted intensely of itself.

 

Roast beef with everything prepared and ready to finish in the oven

 

Potatoes were roasted in beef fat, with whole cloves of garlic that oozed mild sweetness when squeezed open.

Again, everything is included, the fat, the Maldon salt, even a piece of marrow bone to scrape into the gravy (don’t let it dissolve, just let it soften till the sauce ‘throbs’ on the heat). Chantenay carrots & buttered greens are provided, and a sticky toffee pudding.

We kept the cauliflower cheese to eat with the leftover beef the next day (it has no other part to play in a roast, in my opinion).

The meal reminded me very much of the fantastic restaurant ‘A.G.’ In Stockholm, where the steaks are generous, and you just want to keep eating everything. http://www.amaroandtwisted.com/2019/10/09/vegetarians-look-away-now/

 

Overview of Dishpatch

Dishpatch was founded in 2020 during the first lockdown. They work with London restaurants to create meal kits that can be posted anywhere in the UK. The restaurants do what they do best by preparing the food, while Dishpatch handles logistics, delivery and customer service.

Since starting, Dishpatch has delivered well over 75,000 boxes.

We’ve found their service excellent. On only one occasion we had a minor issue with a couple of products which we fed back to the support team at Dishpatch by email. They responded very quickly and professionally, with a partial refund as recompense, and a generous voucher to spend on a future order.

Prices are comparable with a local takeaway, ranging from around £25 for a one-course meal for two, to £70 for a complete dinner; if that sounds expensive, be reassured the contents of the latter will provide more than enough for a feast, or more likely two.

Our local restaurants do not include Mexican, Japanese or Korean among the options, to name just three of the cuisines in the Dishpatch portfolio.

 

https://www.dishpatch.co.uk/menu

 

Hawksmoor is not a participant in Dishpatch, you can find their menus on their website here: https://thehawksmoor.com/hawksmoor-at-home/

My round-up of 2018

2018 has been a year that required urgent distractions from the shambles that passed for political debate in Westminster.

Fortunately it’s been a good year for adventures: exhibitions, travel, theatre, food & drink. Here are just a few of my personal highlights:

 

Theatre – behind the scenes at The Bridge

In February I wrote about the extraordinary immersive experience of Julius Caesar at The Bridge:  https://wp.me/p7AW4i-af

Later in the year I attended a wine tasting in the foyer, with Trevor Gulliver of St John Restaurant who do the catering at The Bridge; to go with the wine they produced some simple snacks, including crispy pigskins….

 

St John chefs preparing bar snacks

 

To browse St John Wine, click here: https://stjohnrestaurant.com/collections/wines

Also my page “And to drink?” https://wp.me/P7AW4i-aV

 

After the tasting, a member of the theatre management team sat down to ask for feedback. She explained her job as running “everything on the other side of those doors – would you like to see?” Needing no second bidding, I followed her through the double doors to the stage manager’s control desk.

 

Between productions at The Bridge

 

They were taking out the set of Alan Bennett’s “Allelujah”, ready for the next production. It revealed the size of the space behind the scenes. I noticed that the seats were angled towards the stage, and asked if they swivel.

“Yes! Every seat turns”.

 

Two more stand-out productions in 2018

Girls & Boys with Carey Mulligan at the Royal Court. Outstanding performance of a coruscating play.

The Lehman Trilogy at the National Theatre, directed by Sam Mendes, with stunning performances from Simon Russell Beale, Ben Miles and Adam Godley as the Lehman brothers, and the many  other characters they encounter along the way.

 

 

London Film Festival

It’s always worth picking a film or two out of the programme, something that may not get a wider release. These two will probably turn up on Film 4.

Look out for “Nancy”, with an astonishing performance by Andrea Riseborough, and “Out of Blue”, a noir interpretation of Martin Amis’s novel “Night Train”, with James Caan in a role that reminded me of John Huston’s chilling performance in Chinatown.

 

 

American Utopia 

David Byrne’s American Utopia was a reinvention of the rock concert, so good I saw it twice. The stage set was a box formed of silver chain curtains. As the lights went up, Byrne was sitting at a table, addressing a human brain.

When the music started, the audience were on their feet, and stayed there. A dozen musicians and two dancers joined Byrne on stage, their instruments strapped to them, uninhibited by cables so they were free to move, sometimes individually, sometimes marching or swaying in unison, inhabiting the whole space.

The choreography was outstanding, at its centre the unlikely sight of a grey suited, white haired man in his sixties, dancing barefoot, sometimes playing guitar, sometimes flapping his arms and tripping across the stage.

The set list was a mix of Talking Heads’ greatest hits with newer material; it’s a true ensemble piece which ended with Angie Swan’s blistering guitar solo.

Eventim Apollo, Hammersmith in June. The 02 in October.

 

 

Roy Hargrove, the “trumpeter who gave jazz a jolt of youth”.

That’s how The New York Times described him; I first heard trumpeter Roy Hargrove on a Blue Note compilation in the 1990s. Impressed by the purity of his sound, I started to explore his music.

I saw him at work in a tiny upstairs rehearsal room in Tribeca, New York in 2010, and then later in concert at the Union Chapel in London.

 

Roy Hargrove at The Jazz Cafe, 2018

 

He played two dates in October at The Jazz Café in Camden, where he came on stage and started the set by saying “Let’s make some noise!” It was a night of joyous jazz.

The Jazz Café said “witness a true maverick up close and personal in our intimate surroundings for what will be his last shows for the foreseeable future”. I’m so glad I did.

On 2nd November news broke of Hargrove’s premature death, aged 49.

 

 

Amsterdam for Orange Day & High Society

I went to see an exhibition of full length portraits at The Rijksmuseum. The entrance involves negotiating a cycle lane that bisects the museum:

 

 

Once inside, I encountered Luisa Casati, a dangerous-looking woman who threw notorious parties in the Palazzo Venier, now the Guggenheim Museum in Venice.

 

The notorious Luisa Casati

 

Luisa Casati in real life

 

 

It was impossible to miss the fact that my visit happened to coincide with Orange Day, a national holiday in the Netherlands.

 

 

The day when a nation wears orange

 

Turner’s House re-opened

The artist J. M. W. Turner chose Twickenham to build a house of his own design in 1813. By this time he was achieving success in his career, and it was to be a refuge where he could escape the pressures of the art world in London, to fish in the Thames and entertain his friends. He lived there with William, his “Old Dad,” a retired barber and wig-maker, who looked after the house, and spent most of his time in the warmth of the kitchen.

 

Turner’s House, October 2018

 

It was partly William’s declining health that led Turner to sell the house in 1826, and after his time the house was altered significantly, and the surrounding green countryside became a suburb of substantial Edwardian villas.

In the Second World War the house served as a secret factory, manufacturing pilots’ gloves and goggles. After the war it was a private house, and the last owner bequeathed it to the Turner Trust, who opened it to the public for a brief period before restoration commenced in 2016; my overriding memory of a visit then is the smell of damp.

 

 

Turner’s House in November 2015, before restoration

 

The restoration involved returning the house to as close to its original condition as possible, including the demolition of the later first storey additions to the wings. This entailed removal of the white stucco, which exposed the original brickwork. The unexpected discovery of time-consuming “penny line pointing” led to the decision being taken to leave the house unrendered.

Inside the restoration has created an intimate impression of the house as it would have looked in Turner’s lifetime.

 

The House

 

Twickenham High Street is a mostly banal collection of charity shops, coffee shops and estate agents. Look a little deeper and you’ll find evidence of its rich history, and gems of 18th century architecture. Most notable is Marble Hill, a Palladian villa on the riverside, built for George II’s mistress Henrietta Howard. It was used as a location for the recent ITV adaptation of Vanity Fair.

 

 

Picking up an English Longbow

While my enthusiasm for archery started on the field of Agincourt, I wasn’t expecting to pick up an English longbow any time soon. This year in Norfolk I tried a more traditional style bow, and it just felt right. To cut a long story short, I had an opportunity to acquire an English longbow in the summer, made by a bowyer who retired a few years ago, and literally “they don’t make them like that anymore”.

A few months on, I’m achieving some success (at sixty yards, I’m confident I could down a French knight or two….)

 

 

Pie of the year

And finally, the Pie of the Year award, 2018, goes to….

Rochelle Canteen at The ICA

 

 

Guinea fowl, bacon and wild garlic; buttered potatoes, Hispi cabbage, and a glass of Bourgogne Passetoutgrains on the side.

 

Rochelle Canteen at The ICA

The Mall, St. James’s, London SW1Y 5AH

http://www.arnoldandhenderson.com/rochelle-ica/

 

 

Happy New Year!

Of Pigeons, Pies, and Flakey Flossy’s Pastry

 

Clay Pigeon Practice

Arriving in the countryside the day before the pheasant shoot, I was invited to try my hand at shooting clay pigeons; terracotta discs which are released from machines to mimic the speed and trajectory of birds in flight.

It started well. The barrels on a modern shotgun are “over and under”, and there’s a single trigger which you pull twice to fire. I found it difficult to see if I’d hit the clay, only to be told I needn’t have fired a second shot; my first round clipped the clay, but the second smashed it.

 

Over-and-Under. Two hits

 

My experience of instinctive archery may have helped me to relax at first, but then I tensed up and began to overthink.

The posture in the photo is a bit of a clue; leaning back nervously from this loud, dangerous and unfamiliar piece of kit.

They tell you to resist the temptation to turn towards your mates to celebrate a hit. Break the gun open as soon as you’ve fired, making it clear it’s not loaded. The spent cartridges pop out, and you quickly learn how to avoid them hitting you in the face. (They’re hot!)

I also tried firing a restored 19th century English gentleman’s fowling piece, with side-by-side barrels, two hammers and two triggers. Despite its slender appearance, it was like shooting a musket: a loud thud, a flash, a puff of smoke and the sulphurous reek of black powder.

(I missed. With both barrels).

 

 

 

Vintage side-by-side. Two misses

 

 

As for shooting pheasants? Yes, I had a go the following day.

Reader, I missed (again).

 

 

No birds were harmed by this “gun”

 

 

A substantial Game Pie

My hosts for the weekend met and married in London, but Tim returned to live near the farm where he grew up, and fairly quickly “went native” (he’s the one who organises the shoot). His wife Kate was more ambivalent about country life, but came round to it eventually. She’s a wonderful cook, but also ambivalent about the annual challenge of dealing with a glut of game birds.

On the night of arrival (Friday) we met at a local pub and, suitably refreshed, went back to the house for “a simple supper”: potted pigeon, a game pie, a game terrine, salads, cheeses, pickles, chutneys….

There were five of us.

I wish I’d taken a picture of the pie, it was the perfect centrepiece – hand raised like a pork pie, and so packed with meat that Kate had to serve the sloe jelly separately, there was no room to pour it inside the crust. She said it was easy enough to make; she had just cooked all the game she had accumulated in the freezer, and combined it with pork shoulder.

The hot water crust is a pretty traditional recipe (Mary Berry or Delia Smith). Kate marinated her game in red wine, juniper and thyme overnight, seasoned her pork with more thyme, nutmeg, salt and pepper, and let that infuse overnight too. The jelly was made with game stock, redcurrant jelly and sloe gin.

 

Dealing with pheasants

After Saturday’s shoot, I was given a brace of birds to take home and deal with. Tim and Kate have so many in the course of the season that they advised skinning them,  rather than embark on the long and messy business of plucking, then to take off the breasts, and use the rest of the carcasses to make stock.

I hung them in a cool place for three days, then this video from the Shooting Times proved useful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbwSGPtLUxw

 

There are many recipes for cooking pheasant. I wrote this one down decades ago (two or three?) and can’t remember where I found it. Looking at it now, the cooking time and use of flour seem excessive, but my sister and my mother-in-law both swear by it as a dinner party stand-by, so I give it to you as written:

 

Pheasant Casserole (for 6) 

3 pheasants.

1½ oz butter, 1½ tbsps oil, 2 sliced onions.

3 oz flour. 1½ pints stock.

The juice and finely grated rind of two oranges.

2 heaped tbsps redcurrant jelly.

¼ pint of Port.

1 bay leaf, a sprig of parsley, salt and pepper.

Fry the pheasants in butter and oil until golden, and transfer to a casserole. Add the onions to the frying pan, and cook until soft. Stir in the flour and cook for 5 minutes. Gradually add the stock and bring to the boil, stirring all the time. Allow to thicken. Add the remaining ingredients, and pour the sauce over the pheasants. Cover and cook in the oven for 3 hours at 325° / Gas Mk 3.

 

 

Footnote – ‘Countryman’s Cooking’

First published in 1965, Countryman’s Cooking is a minor culinary classic. Written by the appropriately named W. M. W. Fowler, it provided practical advice for men, in a time before the expression “Political Correctness” had been coined, let alone “Gone Mad”.

 

Countryman’s Cooking

 

 

Fowler served as a Lancaster bomber pilot in WW2, and was shot down and captured by the Germans in 1941. His time as a Prisoner of War heightened his interest in food but “gave little scope for practice, except the stewing of the Kommandant’s cat with a black market onion!”

After the war he resumed life as a countryman in his native Cumbria, and set about learning to prepare and cook his food with masculine cunning.

His advice on preparing game is still invaluable, but for a pie, he says “the only snag to it is that you must have some pastry; and here, I fear, I cannot help you.” His solution was to bribe his “Glamorous Pastry-Maker, Flakey Flossy,” by plying her with gin.

 

“But don’t kiss her till she has carried out her duties; otherwise you will find the situation gets completely out of hand and you end up, hours later, with no gin, and no lid on your pie!”

 

 

The Shooting Party

 

On a chilly November morning, somewhere in the English countryside, we assembled in a farmyard for an early briefing before the day’s action.

The captain who was to be our commander stressed that our safety was his primary concern.

Later that morning I was sitting in a cramped trailer with twenty armed men and their equipment, dressed in brown and green. I felt as if we could have been bumping across country to board a DC47 transport plane which would deliver us to a drop zone in the Netherlands in 1944, or even bussed to the Western Front for the final Big Push of 1918.

Even the banter and vocabulary of my fellow passengers added to my sense of being among a cohesive unit of specialists, comrades ready to go into action for a common cause.

I was indeed. For the first time, I was going on a pheasant shoot; the briefing had been accompanied by tots of sloe gin. There’s a specialised vocabulary on a shoot: “drive, pegs, cover, flush”, and the shooters are known as “guns”. They were hoping the day would start with ducks, which would be leaving the pond first thing in the morning to feed.

“They don’t know the clocks have changed, so we’d better get moving”.

 

 

Eager to start: “the ducks won’t know the clocks have changed”

 

 

For the first drive of the day, I was allowed to stand with an experienced “gun” on his peg, his place in the shooting line. From there, I was told, I would get a better picture of what was going on. If I went with the beaters to flush the birds out of their cover, “you’ll hear World War 3 breaking out, but all you’ll see is trees and a few dogs.”

We could hear the shouts of the beaters as they worked their way from both ends of the wood at the edge of the field, and sure enough a few ducks took to the air, climbing and changing direction indecisively as the guns opened up. Then as the beaters converged on the centre of the wood, pheasants started to break cover. I was told they are lazy birds, preferring to run, and only fly as a last resort. There were shouts of “over!” letting the guns know from which direction the birds were flying, making for the cover of a nearby field of maize.

 

 

Taking up positions for a drive

 

For the second drive, I joined a group of beaters walking through a narrow strip of maize at the edge of a field.  This felt more like hunting; the beaters can’t see each other above the corn, and pheasants have a habit of waiting till you’re right up close before taking off in a panic. I felt vulnerable when the shooting started.

Then came elevenses, laid out on a drop-down shelf on the side of the trailer: mulled wine or lemonade, with sausage rolls, wedges of pork pie, and slices of buttered fruit cake with Wensleydale cheese. Participants take it in turns to cater for the shoot, and appetites are sharp.

 

“On the Peg”

 

One gun claimed he hadn’t brought enough cartridges. When the shoot captain ribbed him for “making any excuse for bad shooting”, he said another stratagem would be to bring plenty, but of the wrong size, then say ‘I’m goin’ ter struggle wi’ these….’”

Another drive, then it was back to the “Shoot Shack” for a hearty lunch of stew and dumplings, followed by apple crumble and custard.

 

 

“The Shoot Shack”

 

 

Musings from the field:

• Periods of waiting are interspersed with bursts of adrenaline, and the excitement as the birds break cover. Snap decisions are made, whether to take the shot, or leave it to your neighbour if he’s better placed.

• At one point I thought a gentle drizzle had started when I heard a patter on the ground, but quickly realised it was the sound of spent pellets falling around us.

 

 

Waiting in the field

 

 

• The shoot captain’s shout to a gun who was standing at the wrong peg: “Fookin’ move, Derek! Fookin’ move!”

 

• The trailer was ready to take us to the next drive, when someone noticed one of the beaters was missing: “where’s Alan?”

The shoot captain got on the walkie talkie: “Alan, where are yeh?”

“In the artichokes” came the reply.

“What yer doin’ there?”

“Lookin’ fer a duck.”

 

Great care is taken to retrieve all fallen birds, so that none are wasted; all the birds from this shoot are eaten. It’s not run commercially; it’s organised by a group of friends, and outsiders only attend by invitation.

 

 

“Should have worn more tweed”

 

 

As a town dweller, I want understand how food arrives on my table, and to take responsibility for where it has come from. I felt more comfortable taking home a brace of pheasant as “beater’s perks” than I would buying meat reared in a factory farm.

 

 

The beater’s perks

 

 

In my next post, “Of Pigeons, Pheasants, Pies and Flakey Flossy” – clay pigeons, a game pie, advice on how to deal with pheasants, and a recipe.

 

“The Shooting Party”

Set in 1913 on the verge of the First World War, “The Shooting Party” is a novel by Isobel Colegate, published in 1980. It was adapted for the screen in 1985, with a cast of British stars, headed by James Mason.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shooting_Party_(novel)

 

 

The Beaters’ Trailer

 

 

Lunch in the Shoot Shack

 

Featured

Portena: an Argentinian member of the Borough Market family

Federico Fugazza arrived in London from Argentina in 2002. His brother Franco was studying for a Master’s at the LSE; he quickly introduced Federico to Borough Market, his favourite place in London, for its food, its multicultural mix of people, and its socialising.

 

Choosing Empanadas at Portena

 

 

It was unique in London at that time, and Federico quickly realised that it was a special place, for its sense of friendship, and the sense of belonging to a community that welcomed him with open arms. It was like an easy adoption into a big family, and while the market has grown and developed, that community, that family, still exists today.

 

 

Stoney Street, Borough Market; the view from Portena

 

 

He quickly found a job with two brothers at their stall, Sardinia Organics (later to become Villanova Food) and with them learned “how to do everything” in a small company, the importance of people in how the market worked, and how to be himself in that environment.

He remembers 2004-5 as the boom years of Borough Market; the food scene in London was evolving fast, and by 2005 the leading supermarkets had started to sell similar products to the traders, sometimes at lower prices. Selling, by specialist knowledge of the products, and through personality, was more important than ever.

After working for other traders, Federico ran a stall at Borough for the Fresh Pasta Company at weekends. During the week he was working for a distributor of Argentinian food in London, and after a couple of years he wanted to express himself by representing his country in Borough Market itself. In 2007 he introduced a range of products under the name ‘Argentine Folklore’.

Federico used to sell 150 jars a day (each) of Chimichurri and Dulce de Leche off his trestle table “by talking all the time!” but he quickly realised that this on its own was not going to make a viable business.

 

With encouragement from his friends and neighbours in the market, he applied for a permanent pitch to sell typical products from Argentina: Chimichurri, dulce de leche, Alfajores cookies (filled with dulce de leche), the infusion Yema Mate, a sweet potato paste, and a quince paste.

 

 

 

Dulce de Leche

 

 

He wanted to create a concept for the business, and hit on serving Empanadas, a street snack that Argentinians probably eat “twice a week, they’re more popular than pizza”.

 

Empanadas are small savoury pasties, with fillings such as beef, spicy chicken, ham & cheese, caramelised onions & melted provolone cheese. Porteña also offers spinach & ricotta, chorizo, ‘humita‘ (sweetcorn) and ‘Caprese‘, with mozzarella, tomato & basil.

 

 

Empanadas lined up and ready “to go”

 

 

The Moors introduced Empanadas to the Spanish, who in turn took them to Argentina. On the day of the Declaration of Independence in 1810 they were eaten in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, so they are central to Argentina’s national identity.

 

 

It’s up to you, but my choice usually includes the Provolone with caramelised onions….
‘Portena’ – choosing her Empanadas

 

 

Borough Market was supportive as the business grew, and by 2013 it had moved from trading “under an umbrella” to a permanent shop on Stoney Street, with a seating area open into the evenings, the introduction of a steak sandwich, which was “easy to explain to the British public”, and Argentinian wine and beer. Everything was coming together nicely. 

 

 

Argentinians love their beef & beer

 

 

With more support from his friends in the market, in 2017 Federico took an opportunity to acquire premises on Southwark Bridge Road, from a friend who was ready to retire after thirty years in her restaurant. He called his friend Nico Modad, who had been head chef with Tapas Brindisa, and was now working in Cuba. He tempted Nico to return to London, and Chimichurris was born.

 

 

Federico Fugazza at Chimichurris

 

To be continued.

 

To visit Porteña, click here:

http://portena.co.uk/

 

Porteña, 7A Stoney Street, Borough Market, London SE1 9AA