I always like to keep a few staples in my fridge at home for occasions when friends drop by unannounced and you have to whip up a lovely meal from a sparsely stocked fridge.
Easter for me was going to be a quite holiday. I planned to spend most of it at the computer retouching images. Apart from the Easter bunny, I was expecting no other guests over the long weekend, and I even thought that he would give me a wide birth knowing my particular fondness for braised rabbit. So when a few friends turned up I was relieved to have some readymade items on standby that helped add a bit of oomph to our simple lunch.
I'd like to share three of these with you. They included a home-made vinaigrette, which is great for a variety of salads, including one of my favourites: watercress with walnuts and a few slices of fresh fig warmed under the grill; 2) a chermoula, which is an ideal marinade or delicious brushed over fish or chicken before going under the grill; and 3) a parsley, shallot and garlic butter, a versatile savoury butter which is classically served on top of a grilled steak, but can also happily be added to steamed vegetables.
Honey, mustard seed dressing
Chermoula
Place the herbs and spices into a food processor and blend until fine.
Slowly add the olive oil and then the lemon juice and reserved in the fridge until needed. Savoury butters are great. Very quick to make and can be kept in a roll in the freezer until needed. Simply cut a disc and place onto a piece of grilled steak or chicken before serving. The recipe below is a classic and especially good with meat.
Ingredients
Nestled amongst the second hand bookshops and cafes, in a section of High Street in Northcote that I heard someone affectionately refer to once as, "the Paris end" you will find The Estelle, Bar & Kitchen.
It is the first restaurant for the owners Scott and Ryan. Two chefs who survived the somewhat volatile world of the top European kitchens, now back in Australia, skilled up and ready to cook.
Scott worked at the two Michelin star rated The Square, and Ryan worked seasons at El Bulli and The Fat Duck. References most chefs would die for. Influences from both can be sampled nightly, with Scott and Ryan's combined styles showing touches from classical to the very modern. They don't disappoint.
From a photographer's perspective, shooting at The Estelle was a real contrast. The food is exciting and modern, both in its preparation and presentation. Then there is the graphic nature of the busy service, very European, in a kitchen that would have been state of the art during the Malcolm Fraser government.
As a diner you can simply leave the menu for to the chefs to decide; as most guests do. This is a part of what makes dinning at The Estelle exciting, the food is great and you never know what you are going to be served.
Would anyone care for a sardine fossil?
Barbecuing is one of my favorite pastimes. There is something wonderful about the alluring flavour of food that has been cooked over charcoal, or slowly smoked with hickory for a few hours until tender and rich with flavour.
I spent most of winter, 2011, in a plume of smoke. Working with my good friend and food writer, Bob Hart, on his new book Heat & Smoke, I would return home after a days shooting smelling like a large smokey rib. Our approach on this book was to keep the recipes, styling and the photography of the completed dishes simple. Hopefully illustrating to the reader the principles of what is a beautiful way to cook. Afterall, we are Australians, and should need no convincing.
As a photographer, my goal is to show my subject in its purest form with few distractions. I see this as my style. It may be a throw back from my cooking days, but for me the most flattering way to shoot food is as it is supposed to be eaten. In the production of Heat & Smoke there was no shenanigans or trickery. The food, cooked by Bob, came straight off the grill and was quickly photographed. A wonderful way to work…
The recipe below for Barbecued Chicken is typical of that found in Heat & Smoke, that is, quick, simple and very tasty. Perfect for a summer's evening.
Truth is that, apart from the pig, no animal is better suited to inspiring enlightenment and goodwill from your barbecue than the chicken.
It is a remarkable creature: built for roasting, cleverly designed to open out flat for grilling, suitably delicate for hot-smoking, divisible into splendid joints which satisfy very different requirements, and thoughtfully equipped with an orifice that accommodates a beer can. But more of that anon...
There are all sorts of ways of breathing extra life into a fit, healthy, free-range chook that, as illustrated by its athletic build, has lived a full, rewarding and active life. I am not, I confess, particularly impressed by organic chooks which have led, I suspect, rather sad little lives, and would have developed far more flavour had they been allowed out to scoff some free-range worms and neighbouring weeds through the fence. This, I need hardly point out, is purely a personal view.
Something that is beyond debate, however, is that a properly roasted free-range chook is just about the finest dish on the planet and one which, curiously, is more effortlessly executed on most barbecues than in an oven.
I like to roast a free-range chook - I like them around 2kg, or size 20 - in a Weber Q, which will cook one in no more than 75 minutes, and probably less.
The technique is simple: for a Q (and it works on a 120, a 220 or one of the brilliant 300s), place an oiled trivet down the centre of the grill over a double layer of foil of the same dimensions as the trivet. Remove the fat glands from just inside the cavity of the chook, rub the bird with EV olive oil and season well, inside and out.
Into the body cavity, place the remains of a lemon which you first squeeze over the bird, and a whisk made from a few good stems of parsley, a couple of bay leaves and a sprig or two of rosemary. And that's it.
When you oven-roast a bird, it's a good idea to turn it a quarter of a turn every 15 minutes or so. But in a barbecue, let nature take its course and leave the hood down and the bird undisturbed.
To ensure the bird does not roll around on the grill, I also use an adjustable roasting rack on top of the trivet (or, on a Weber kettle, a Big Green Egg or a larger gas barbecue such as a Weber Genesis, the rack without the trivet, but directly on top of a double strip of foil).
Your instant-read digital meat thermometer comes into play here: Lift the bird off the grill when the thickest part of the thigh registers an internal temperature of just above 70ºC and
Patiently waiting for his new restaurant, Terminus, to be completed in Flinders, Pierre Khodja quietly goes about the business of getting every detail ready for opening night, although at present you could not swing a cat in the dinning room without hitting a sparky or a carpenter.
I first photographed Pierre 10 years ago at his restaurant in Mornington. Even though we had never met, we shared a history. Both of us had spent time working for the same Michelin-starred chef, Bruno Loubet, in London.
Pierre was born in Algeria then moved to Marseille at the age of seven were he spent his childhood. His cooking career started in Paris and then he went on to London where he worked with chef Guy Mouillron at Ma Cuisine. From there, Pierre moved to the Roof Garden at the Royal Garden Hotel in Kensington, where he worked under chef Remy Frugere.
Pierre's star is on the rise in Australia. He was awarded one Chefʼs hat in The Age Good Food Guide at his previous restaurant Canvas and I have no doubt there will be more in the future. He has a masterful touch with spices, yet his food remains refined and elegant, all the hallmarks of the French dinning rooms he worked in.
The reason for my visit to Flinders was to get the photographic ball rolling for his new website. I can recommend the recipe for Saffron Chicken below it was delicious. One of the great perks of working with Pierre is that you are never sent home with an empty stomach.
Roasted chicken with preserved lemons, olives tagine
Ingredients Whole chicken approx 1.5kg 2 tbsp olive oil 2 preserved lemons 175g cracked green olives ½ bunch flat parsley, washed and chopped 1 tbsp Butter
Marinade 1 onion, grated 3 garlic cloves, crushed 25g fresh ginger, peeled and grated 1 small bunch, fresh coriander Pinch of saffron 1 lemon, juiced 3 tbsp olive oil Salt and pepper Method Mix together all ingredients for the marinade in a bowl. Rub all over the chicken, then allow to marinate in the fridge for a minimum of three hours. Heat olive oil with butter in a heavy casserole dish; add chicken and brown on all sides. Add the marinade and some warm water to cover the chicken. Bring to a simmer with a tightly fitting lid for 1 hour. Add the preserved lemon, olives and saffron. Cover with a lid and cook for 20 minutes and then add seasoning. Sprinkle fresh parsley and coriander and rest for 10 mins. Suggestion: Serve with steam potatoes or herb and an almond cous cous.