Kedgeree: not just for breakfast!

By chef Tony Carr

This dish began life as a British breakfast in colonial India. It's a tasty little dish, with a nice balance of spicy and smoky flavours. Whenever we put it on the menu it is hugely popular!

For the rice:

400g basmati rice

1tsp cumin seeds

400g smoked haddock, skinned and pin boned

400g salmon fillet poached in warm water with onion, leeks, carrot and thyme

4 hard boiled eggs

Cook rice in boiling water with cumin seeds until soft. Drain off in a colander and let dry.

For the sauce:

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

1 tsp ground turmeric

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp of curry powder

500ml double cream

2 white onions peeled and sliced

4 garlic cloves peeled and chopped or grated

1 ltr of fish stock

1 tbsp of tomato puree

2 inch piece of ginger finely chopped or grated

1/2 a block of butter

Sauté onions, garlic, ginger in half a block of butter. After 5 minutes when softened, but not coloured, add spices and tomato purée. After 3-4 mins while stirring, add the fish stock. Bring to the boil and reduce by half. Then add the double cream, season with salt and pepper, liquidize and pass through a sieve.

To bring the dish together:

Warm the sauce in a saucepan with the chopped smoked haddock and bring to the boil. Add the boiled eggs cut into quarters, then the rice.

Finally, add the poached flaked salmon bring back to the boil and check for seasoning. Spoon into suitable bowls. We serve our dish with one of Kirsty's lovely fresh free­–range eggs poached on the top.

In defence of Chardonnay

Here, Charles Steevenson of Charles Steevenson Wines Ltd, who supplies the Ring of Bells with wines, pulls no punches in the defence of the much-maligned Chardonnay grape.

 

ABC – have you heard these letters used when perusing a wine list and discussing a Chardonnay? ABC – it’s shorthand for ‘Anything But Chardonnay’!

Well, I say what a load of tosh! Chardonnay is the backbone of some of the most sublime

wines. One of the trio of classic grapes used in Champagne production; ‘The’ grape in White Burgundy. Yet how many times have I heard people claiming not to like Chardonnay and yet they love Chablis. And what is the grape of Chablis? It’s Chardonnay.

Chardonnay’s unfair reputation only developed when wines from the New World invaded our shelves, wines such as those of Australia, Chile, California and the like. Alas, these wines were often created from indifferent fruit that was, in turn, enhanced by oak integration. It is the often clumsy over-use of oak that became so dominant and unwelcome. The assumption to many is that Chardonnay is always naturally oaky and toasty – wrong!

This most classic and noble of all grapes is cultivated in all the wine growing regions around the globe. These regions, like the wines they yield, can be diverse and varied. While Chardonnay is one grape variety there are many different clones that have developed to suit the all important and very individual growing conditions. This, in turn, determines the size of yields, quality and, subsequently, the price. How very different are the styles of green-tight and highly acidic wines of say Chablis to an equivalent unwooded wine from Chile or South Africa.

While all white wines need to be punctuated by uplifting, balanced acidity, the real tangible difference will show itself in the texture, weight, structure and finishing persistence the wine can offer. Texture is often enhanced by the vigorous use of wood but this may well mask the real identity and subtlety of the wine. Also, the age of the vines will play an important part in not only the size of yields produced and concentration of the finished wines but, more importantly to the customer, affect the cost.

At the Ring of Bells there are three new key Chardonnay contenders to tempt you. Firstly, the Macon–Chardonnay, Talmard 2011, from the Maconnaise region of Southern Burgundy. Made in the village of Chardonnay, from the Chardonnay grape, rich honey/lemon, no wood, so rewarding and typical of the region.

Then there is the Rustenberg Chardonnay 2011 from one of the top estates in South Africa; both the bouquet and palate display intense vanilla/toasty wood notes with a hint of lime and crème brûlée on the finish.

Our third option, Domaine Grauzan Chardonnay 2012, Vin de Pays d’Oc. Made with fruit sourced from the very south of France, this wine is more reminiscent of a Maconnaise wine, slightly honeyed fruit with a pleasing citrus finish, bold in weight yet, again, with no intrusive oak influence.

Charles Steevenson Wines Ltd. The Wine Warehouse, 11 Plymouth Road Industrial Estate, Tavistock, Devon PL19 9QN Our warehouse shop in Tavistock is open: Monday to Friday, 9.00am – 5.30pm and Saturday, 9.00am – 1.00pm

www.steevensonwines.co.uk