Mark
Mark Bradford was born in Australia in 1966 and has lived on a damp, cold island off the coast of France since 1970. Educated in the State School System (proudly), his teachers unanimously agreed he had raised indolence and mediocrity to world-class levels.
In sport, he excelled at outrunning the bigger kids to avoid a regular hiding. These traits have seen him through several aimless career changes and now, in his 50s, he finds himself wondering what he will do when he grows up.
But, he loves his family and he can cook a bit.
Follow him at www.bradfordfamilycookbook.uk
It's what the mackerel would have wanted!
This is a very basic recipe which you can play with by adding different flavourings if you like: garlic, spring onion, chilli, up to you
Any excuse to use nuoc cham and rare beef
Use any salad you like - we are weird in Europe in that we make a salad from veg and variations on lettuce and then add a few herbs whereas in other parts of the world herbs are the salad. Tabouleh in the Middle East for example isn't parsley in salad, it's parsley as salad.
Like porridge but nice!
When I had it in Hong Kong it seemed as though the rice had been broken up which made it smoother. I just use rice
Named after one of Meg's school friends, its a bit like coq au vin but tarragon gives it a lovely fresh lift
Do this in a heavy-bottomed casserole and if you can get chicken with skin on so you can roast it and get it lovely and crispy on the outside and gives the stock a lovely flavour. Whole legs are good but if you don't like bones then skin-on breasts are ok
What a Pulava!
This started as a conversation with Meg about rice (I know).
Wouldn't be a Bradford Christmas without this!
Remember, there's more to life that Cheddar!
Much more!
It's lots of butter and is the basis of any Cheese Sauce, Parsely Sauce, or . . . you get the idea
It's simple but you can cock it up if you try to rush it. But then it only takes a couple of minutes anyway so why mess around? this makes about half a pint but you just increase each of the ingredients in this proportion. the important bit s that you have equal amounts (weight) of butter and flour
"Pan" on anything pisses me off quite a lot: What else would you fry in? Bucket-fried? Even the colonel fries the chicken separately from the bucket he puts it in
Anyway, you can just cook the salmon in the pan on the hob (fry it) or start it in the pan and then put the pan in the oven (pan-roasted). Pan-roasted is fair enough I suppose
I'm not a great fan of Salmon but this recipe just works!
Like every fish recipe it's easy to lose your nerve and keep it in for too long. You'll learn how you like it after you've done it a couple of times but this really works
Ever wondered what tinned peas were for? Well, it's this
Use tinned marrowfats for this recipe. I've used sage because it goes better with the ham or bacon than mint would, but peas and mint go really well. In summer use frozen peas instead of tinned and leave the meat out, swap the sage for mint and you've got something beautiful