Sophia and the Thai Cookbook

A few Saturdays ago Sophia, sitting at the kitchen table drinking morning tea, gestured at the cookbook shelf saying: “Mum, please put that Thai cookbook away. It reminds me of the lovely food that we had at the Chilli Pad in England last month...” And I said: “Well, why don't you have a look through it and see if there's anything you'd fancy making?”

“Is it that easy?” she asked. “Can we get the stuff here?” Sophia has never displayed culinary tendencies – or even interests – before, although left with detailed instructions, she has been known to produce a roast chicken in my absence.

Mili had given me the book, Stylish Thai in Minutes, several Christmases ago, and although I had flipped through it drooling slightly, I had never used it.

She took it down from the shelf and quickly established that we had 'the stuff' for Barbequed Prawns on Lemongrass, “If,” she continued “I can use a griddle and don't have to light the foukou.”

“Yes,” I said. “That is indeed possible.”

So we had prawns on lemongrass skewers (“I am never harvesting lemongrass again!” she harumphed, emerging from our clump with cuts to face and hands from the razor-edged blades) for brunch that day. A few days later, the boys being at school and Best Beloved at work, she produced fried meatballs with a tasty blend of fish sauce, coriander, onion and garlic in addition to minced beef (“These are just Thai keftedes!”) for our midmorning snack. And now that I have found Spring Roll wrappers, I'm sure we are on our way to something else.

“I'm not quite ready to start on the main courses yet,” she said. That's ok, Sophia. We're all enjoying the appetisers...

September Borscht

The first beets are ready in the garden and last night I cooked a goose that had plenty of leftovers. So what was for lunch today? Borscht.

I have loved borscht since I went to the Brezhnev-period Soviet Union on a school trip in 1981. It was a staple in the restaurants of all the hotels that we stayed – each recipe a little different, each one filling and warming and just wonderful.

When Leo was born, a lovely Ukrainian woman called Tania was doing my cleaning. She made me some wonderfully restorative borscht – and even better, taught me how to make my own. Except in the summer months, when beets cannot grow here, I make it throughout the year.

First I picked everything off the goose carcass, put the bones in a pan of water, and made some rich stock. Then I fried an onion and garlic in a spoonful of goosefat, added a couple of chopped beets, a chopped potato, a chopped red pepper, and a chopped carrot and let them all sweat a little. Three hundred or so millilitres of chopped tomato that I had frozen earlier this summer followed, along with the goose stock, the carcass pickings, and the finely chopped beet leaves. I simmered it for about twenty minutes, then served myself a big bowl complete with a spoonful of sour cream. Delightful. It could have used some dill, but I didn’t have any.

My children turned their noses up at it, silly darlings. So I enjoyed it all by myself.

Kids in the Kitchen

About six years ago I said to my children that if they wanted cakes or biscuits at home they had to make them themselves. Same for ice-cream (O, WitchyMummy!). This decree was partly in response to the phenomenal amount of money that I was spending out each week on sweet stuff, partly because I would feel a little queasy when I read the ingredients’ lists, and partly to encourage any creative baking genes that might be lurking in my off-springs’ DNA.

These days, Witchy Mummy is happy with her move. Although Alex and Sophia are not kitchen whizzes (we have a store of Sophia-in-the-kitchen tales, including the one where she roasted the chicken upside down and including the giblets – though not fortunately, in a plastic bag – “But I didn’t realise that I had to put my hand inside it!” – and the time that she baked the Dukissa instead of freezing it), Zenon and Leo are well on the way to so becoming. Monday is our baking day, and they are reasonably competent at pizza, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, Victoria sponge, and lemon drizzle cake. In the summer we get first class ice-cream – though I usually have more to do with that.

“Can I start making bread?” Zenon asked me the other day (music to my ears). “Then we don’t have to buy it any more. I could do white for us and brown for Alex. I just love kneading.”

They fight over who makes what each week and are happy to try new recipes and ideas. Clean-up still presents a few problems, but a few dirty dishes and some flour on the floor are a small price to pay for a selection of fresh goodies for the next few days.