Archant Life publishes a number
of city and county lifestyle titles and several French magazines. These
pieces are from their London magazines, Northwest and The Green.
Cooking
with kids
According to the TV chefs and lifestyle gurus, baking cookies
with our
children should be a weekly event. It’s a lovely notion – I sometimes
wonder if they’ve ever really tried it – but if, like me, you actually
have human children rather than adorable and photogenic moppets, here’s
the real story on baking cookies with kids…
Muffaletta
...But the best, the most filling and most wholly satisfying wet
sandwich
of all comes from Sicily via New Orleans. A monster with a towering
structure, a bewildering plethora of fillings and an unforgettably
robust flavour, the Muffaletta starts as a whole loaf, dressed with a
unique wet olive salad and then stops at every counter in the deli,
building to a kind of uber-Scooby-snack.
"Sugar
for my honey"
If cooking is not your thing I'd suggest a bottle of vintage Krug and a
takeaway pizza but if you are up for a bit of kitchen work, here's a
recipe for Valentine’s cupcakes - simple, quick to execute, a
guaranteed stunner and a memorable gift for a loved one of either sex.
Oh
deer
The term ‘venison’ (from same delightfully fleshly root as
‘venal’ and
‘venery’) originally meant the meat of any furred game but, by
Charles’s time it had clearly taken on the meaning we understand today.
Home Away From Home
Home Away From Home was a sadly short-lived magazine covering
'the world's most desirable property and lifestyle'. These pieces are
from a series on quality food.
Caviar
If we’re to believe the headlines, there will be weeping in the dining
rooms of the wealthy and mass suicides of hedonists this year as
caviar, the ultimate culinary signifier of wealth and taste, becomes as
illegal as drugs.
Grana
cheeses
For most of us Parmesan cheese arrived in the sixties along
with the mini skirt and free love - somewhere between Elizabeth David's
'Italian Cookery' and the surge of cheap package holiday travel that
gave us 'International Cuisine' and the dinner party 'spag bol'. It was
grim stuff, expensive, pre-grated, foul-smelling, and packed in a
cardboard shaker.
'Champagne'
rhubarb
Occasionally there's a quiet plopping sound like celery snapping. Neil
says it's the sound of the buds bursting but I can't help thinking of
the ghastly pods in 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'.