A casual lunch
Jun. 4th, 2013 09:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustI feel a bit self-conscious, posting on Tuesday evening about Friday lunch, especially when the specification was: a totally casual lunch. But there are things I want to record, so if it seems a bit precious, well, no doubt the next post will be more interesting.
It was A. who set out her terms: she was coming to Durham to visit the Passport Office and accepted an invitation to lunch on condition it was a totally casual lunch, and she could be home in time for an afternoon appointment. Very well: soup, bread, pâté and maybe a glass of wine, a little fruit - what could be more casual?
The soup was beetroot and rhubarb, from the Covent Garden Soup book, except that they specify vegetable stock, and since I'd roasted a chicken quite recently, I used chicken: next time, I tell myself, make the stock far enough in advance to cool it and skim the fat off - it was maybe not excessive, but identifiably there. Also, I might add a little fresh ginger to the mix...
The bread was an experiment. Up to a point, every loaf of bread is an experiment, since it's a living thing and I very the ingredients: but on this occasion the timing meant that I experimented with the process as well. I wanted fresh bread for lunch, and we were out the previous evening. So I started my loaf on Thursday afternoon, knocked it back and let it rise, put it in the tin and put the tin in the fridge before we went out. First thing on Friday morning I took it out of the fridge, remembered that I should have made a cut in the top and did that anyway, worried that it had developed a slightly leathery skin, and went swimming. When we returned, I baked it. This resulted in an impressively light, slightly chewy loaf (white flour, wholemeal, spelt and a handful of hazelnuts), and confirms my suspicion that I not only could but should make an effort not to rush my bread, let it rise longer.
I'm only human: I bought the pâté - one kind from the cheese stall, one from M & S. (I liked the one from the cheese stall better).
I had had in mind that there was a bottle of rosé left in the box of Corsican wine we had ordered from the Wine Society, and that it would be very pleasant with this rustic summer lunch. It was the palest of onion skin tawny colours, but that's how I like my rosé, so I thought nothing of it, and put it in the fridge. And I was right, it was fabulous, at once light and fresh and rich and characterful, balancing the sweetness and acidity of the soup, holding its own against the meatiness of the pâté. I knew that the Corsican half-dozen had been an extravagance (by our standards) but I went to look it up in the Society's list, anyway, because it had been worth a degree of extravagance, and had some difficulty finding it. Because it wasn't a rosé at all. I'm glad I didn't know that: it would never have occurred to me to serve white wine with that meal.
We also enjoyed a lovely gossip with A., who is very good at gossip. And were so busy talking that when she rushed off to keep her afternoon appointment,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
durham_rambler and I were left to eat the strawberries by ourselves.
It was A. who set out her terms: she was coming to Durham to visit the Passport Office and accepted an invitation to lunch on condition it was a totally casual lunch, and she could be home in time for an afternoon appointment. Very well: soup, bread, pâté and maybe a glass of wine, a little fruit - what could be more casual?
The soup was beetroot and rhubarb, from the Covent Garden Soup book, except that they specify vegetable stock, and since I'd roasted a chicken quite recently, I used chicken: next time, I tell myself, make the stock far enough in advance to cool it and skim the fat off - it was maybe not excessive, but identifiably there. Also, I might add a little fresh ginger to the mix...
The bread was an experiment. Up to a point, every loaf of bread is an experiment, since it's a living thing and I very the ingredients: but on this occasion the timing meant that I experimented with the process as well. I wanted fresh bread for lunch, and we were out the previous evening. So I started my loaf on Thursday afternoon, knocked it back and let it rise, put it in the tin and put the tin in the fridge before we went out. First thing on Friday morning I took it out of the fridge, remembered that I should have made a cut in the top and did that anyway, worried that it had developed a slightly leathery skin, and went swimming. When we returned, I baked it. This resulted in an impressively light, slightly chewy loaf (white flour, wholemeal, spelt and a handful of hazelnuts), and confirms my suspicion that I not only could but should make an effort not to rush my bread, let it rise longer.
I'm only human: I bought the pâté - one kind from the cheese stall, one from M & S. (I liked the one from the cheese stall better).
I had had in mind that there was a bottle of rosé left in the box of Corsican wine we had ordered from the Wine Society, and that it would be very pleasant with this rustic summer lunch. It was the palest of onion skin tawny colours, but that's how I like my rosé, so I thought nothing of it, and put it in the fridge. And I was right, it was fabulous, at once light and fresh and rich and characterful, balancing the sweetness and acidity of the soup, holding its own against the meatiness of the pâté. I knew that the Corsican half-dozen had been an extravagance (by our standards) but I went to look it up in the Society's list, anyway, because it had been worth a degree of extravagance, and had some difficulty finding it. Because it wasn't a rosé at all. I'm glad I didn't know that: it would never have occurred to me to serve white wine with that meal.
We also enjoyed a lovely gossip with A., who is very good at gossip. And were so busy talking that when she rushed off to keep her afternoon appointment,
durham_rambler and I were left to eat the strawberries by ourselves.
