For the past several years, it has been my policy in restaurants to order in a semi-random manner, and to generally ensure that I include at least something that I haven't had before. This policy stands me in particularly good stead in my travels abroad, where menus are amongst the hardest things to decipher, being as they are a pure test of vocabulary without any context to help.
This policy, of course, drives my mother absolutely crazy. "How do you know you'll like whatever it is?" she asks. To this, I am quick to respond that, barring an incompetent chef (in which case all bets are off anyway), I can at least be assured that whatever I get will be at least edible. And while I run a certain risk, there is also the chance that I'll find a new favourite somewhere out there. Indeed, this has happened on more than one occasion - I wouldn't have ever tried calamari were it not for this policy.
However, the risk remains that I'll one day find myself presented with a meal that is just horrible. As has happened tonight. Jamie's book has reached a nadir, and it has done so just as I was rethinking my "fish as food nemesis" policy.
The problem, quite simply, was anchovies. The rest of the meal was a bit of a fiddle (seriously, who grates bread?), but looked like it might be quite the thing. And it was quick to cook, despite the fuss.
Oh, but the anchovies! It was immediate upon tasting, my revulsion. This was not a good meal I had cooked. And (horrors!), I had cooked enough for four nights. Oh dear.
I didn't finish, although I did get through most of the bowl. And, shocking as this will probably be to my father, I won't be forcing myself to eat up the rest of the meal. (I will take some consolation that Dad would never have cooked up such a thing, nor would he eat it - it being pasta - and so how he would act in the situation at hand is largely irrelevant, as he wouldn't ever face it.)
Anyway, that's an unassailable 4-1 against Jamie in his "Quick Pasta" chapter, levelling the rounds in our little game. I won't be having this again, even to finish it off.
Next week, a chance for Jamie to recover some pride, at least, with "Mini Shell Pasta with a Creamy Smoked Bacon and Pea Sauce". That should be good. Also, at the weekend I'll be trying my hand at his "One-Cup Pancakes, Tropical Yoghurt and Mango". Although the pancakes do seem awfully similar to the one-cup pancakes that I've known how to cook for many a year...
Also: anchovies? Blech!
2 comments:
Well done you for trying though: anchovies would have had me tearing the pages out in horror. I mean, what are they actually trying to be? Bleuch!
Thanks for that.
I was actually pondering this one overnight, and I don't think it's a total write-off. The fundamentals of the meal are actually sound, but it's just the anchovies that don't work.
So, I'm going to try a substitute. Where it says to use some of the oil from the anchovies, I will instead just use olive oil. And instead of the anchovies themselves, a handful of cherry tomatoes (added to the frying pan just before the pasta, so they don't burn). I shall report back on how that one goes at some later stage.
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