Fields, Clapham Common

In the middle of Clapham Common, effectively my hometown, is a skatepark.  I don’t really know why, but there's always seemed to be something edgy about it, even gritty.  When I was a little boy it felt like a spot where the cool kids might hang out, somewhere I should avoid or else face the consequences.  Not threatening exactly, more somewhere that you needed some kind of unspoken, informal membership to participate in.  And I definitely didn’t have that.  

As a 30 year old man I now know better.  The five year old zipping along on his scooter amongst the bigger kids with their decks belies that old stereotype (look carefully, centre of the picture).  But it remains, for me at least, a spot that still has a certain childhood allure of the gritty, trendy hangout.

So when I head that Fields, a new café / restaurant, was opening up in the hut next door, I knew that I finally had my way in and could visit unquestioned.

Fields is the second spot opened up by the people behind M1LKin Balham.  We've been down to Balham on a Saturday or Sunday morning quite a bit recently and have been shocked by what we've seen outside M1LK.  It's crazy.  Proper block-long queues.  Fields doesn’t quite suffer the same problem – perhaps because there is little passing trade, it being in the middle of the Common rather than off the high street.  But it still gets busy.  I've visited twice now, once at midday and once at 10am, and both times been able to get a seat immediately.  But on both occasions I have seen queues forming.

It's definitely trendy chic.  You can just feel the various staff and punters itching to beard-up and hipster-out.  The water bottles are labelled government juice.  But unlike so many other places, here it works, here it seems natural even sensible to be a bit hipster.  And for all its gritty surroundings (if, it is these days even that gritty any more) inside it's welcoming, warm, homely (in an admittedly utilitarian way).

We settled in and ordered up.  First out was the coffee, a delicious dark roast with only a slight twang of acidity (I like my coffee to taste like coffee, not citrus fruits, thank you).  

Coffee is ordered in a slightly unconventional way – essentially you order on the basis of how much milk you like with your espresso – 2.5 oz (macchiato / flat white), 6 oz (cappuccino) or 7.5 oz (large cappu / latte).  It’s a quirky idea and I'm cool with that.  The coffee is amazing, so no complaints whatsoever.

On the alternative-to-coffee front, this is my one disappointment.  GrubsterGirl ordered the nettle presse thinking it might be homemade.  It wasn't, which was a shame, albeit a delicious one.  My note to the restaurant is provide some juices.  Seriously.  Everyone's doing it these days.  And I really, really like juice to go with a cooked breakfast.  

Food (which needs to be ordered at the kitchen counter) came out rapidly.  First up was homemade crumpets, hay smoked goats' curd and Wandsworth honey.  

This was a treat and a half.  GrubsterGirl has not stopped going on about them – and she is a fierce critic of brunchfoods.  They were spectacularly done.  Light, fluffy crumpets twinned with tangy curds and sweet honey.  Triumphant.

At the other end of the brunch spectrum was Fields' twist on that most classic of brunchfoods, the eggs benedict.  

In this case, the only thing left resembling the humble benedict was the poached egg.  And rightly so, because holy moly these guys know what they’re doing.  You've got homemade sourdough toast subbing out the plain English muffin, coal-grilled drycure bacon kicks bland ham in to touch and, unbelievably, the hollandaise sauce is infused with – wait for it – espresso.  Yes, this is one pimped eggs benedict.

The outcome?  Marvellous.  Fantastic.  Hands down triumph, I could eat down every morsel without pausing for breath and happily order up a second round if my arteries didn’t stop me.  This is, quite simply, a ten out of ten dish.

I supplemented it with smoked field mushrooms.

These were delicious.  As a note, they like smoked stuff at fields.  Everything is cooked over coals and the menu even tells you what they are smoking with each day – on our visit it was Suffolk birch wood.  This seems a good time to drop in their laudable efforts to support the local economy as well – where possible they try to bring stuff in from nearby, be that the honey made (is honey made?) in Wandsworth, the bacon sourced from the local butchers, or salmon from a smoker on Stoke Newington.  Locally sourced produce is not always easy to achieve in the metropolis, but at least they are making an effort.

Last out, a croquet madam.

I had to look up the difference between a croquet madam and a croquet monsieur.  Basically the madam is the same as the monsieur except with a poached egg on top.  Or, in Fields' case, a smoked egg yolk – a perfectly oozy beautifully orange sphere.  This too met the standards that the other food had reached, except perhaps for the pickles which were a touch flaccid.  

Would I go to Fields again?  I already have.  It's fantastic.  I sat out in the sun the second time (they have a big terrace which is heated in colder weather) and it was almost more glorious than the first time around.  I'd go every week if I could – and I probably could, it's nowhere near as expensive as I had expected or as its rivals seem to charge.  

 - GrubsterBoy - 

Courgette Carbonara

Courgettes were in season relatively recently, and GrubsterGirl's mummy grows them by the bucketload.  It's absolutely fantastic eating food that you've seen grown from seed in someone's garden – it's natural, fresh, exciting.  Really.

It's also free, and we tend to get rather a lot of it.  Not that there's anything wrong with that – I like lots of free food. 

This is a good way of eating them – and it's really bloody easy, so a good one to throw together after a long, dull day at work.

Ingredients:

x2 courgettes, decently sized  (turns out we didn’t get quite as many this year as we were anticipating...)
x4 rashers of back bacon
50 ml single cream
25g fresh parmesan (or a small handful, once grated, is probably an easier way to work this one out)
2 large eggs
Bunch of thyme
Black peppercorns 
Pasta (rigatoni for me, but penne would work just as well)

1. Top and tail and slice your courgettes (or zucchini if you're going to get all American on me) lengthways, then slice further into diagonal half-moons.  Keep'em nice and chunky – they should soften up when cooked.  Slice the bacon into chunky stips.  This is a chunky dish, so fear not. 

2. Separate the egg yolks from the whites.  Stick the whites in a bowl in the fridge to make meringues another day – you won’t be needing them here.  Add the parmesan cheese so that it looks a bit like a beard, to keep yourself entertained.

Labour the point unnecessarily.

Add the cream as well, and mix it all up into a nice creamy sauce. 

4. Get out your biggest frying pan, lug in some olive oil and fry the bacon until it's cooked and just starting to turn a little brown.  Turn the heat up all the way to the top and add the white wine - cooking it until it's reduced to a sticky residue.  Then throw your courgettes in there. 

Add the thyme.  Smash up the black pepper in a pestle and mortar and chuck that in too.  You want to add quite a bit of pepper – enough to give it a fiery kick.  I actually used long pepper, which is an ancient and extremely aromatic pepper, which you should track down if you can.  It has a sweet, musky perfume to the flavour that really adds something to the dish.

Long pepper comes in gucci little catkins, and I used a couple for this dish.  It was the first time I'd tried them out, so was a touch nervous, but you could go for a third if you wanted something with real punch.  Just be wary of drowing out the other flavours.

5. Get the pasta on now.  When it's done, the courgettes should be pretty soft.  If they look like they're getting soft too soon, you can always turn the heat right down – or even off – and reheat at the crucial moment. 

6. When the pasta's cooked, drain it and add it to the frying pan, reserving a mug-full of the cooking water if you can.  Work quickly now, and turn off the heat under the courgettes.  Toss the pasta into the courgettes so nicely combined and the pasta is covered in the cooking fats.  Then add the creamy sauce and a splash of the cooking water, and stir stir stir.  Don’t whatever you do, turn the heat back on – if you do you'll end up with scrambled egg pasta, which is not especially nice.  Add more of the cooking water if you think it needs it – it'll give it a smooth, shiny texture.

Serve immediately with grated parmesan (if you like).  Don’t muck about – this is not a dish that is improved by being tepid. 

 - GrubsterBoy -

Breads Etcetera

Saturday we knew would be a heavy evening.  So we knew that Saturday breakfast had to be equally tough to set us up for a long day and an even longer night.

 

This left us with only one option: Breads Etcetera, on Clapham High Street. 

 

It's a fun little concept.  Basically, it's all about the bread – and, boy, do they know how to bake it.  Literally tonnes of that stuff must pass through their ovens every week, as the cool kids of Clapham and its environs descend upon the place every weekend for brunch.  The guys who set it up started life as bakers – one of the owners popped in whilst we were there and we had a little chat – and has over 12 years' experience of baking.  Their range is incredible – from plain old sourdough (about which nothing is plain, this is some of the best I've had) to walnut and rosemary breads to dark, sticky Norwegian rye.

 

Each table comes adorned with its own Dualit toaster and they specialise in what they call 'DIY Toast.  The basic idea is you head up to the basket of bread, carve off great slaps of bread, and toast at your table.  It's those little thoughts and ideas that can make somewhere really different and interesting, something that Breads Etcetera can proudly boast to be. 

 

It's unlimited, so you can stuff yourself until you pop, which I basically did. 

 

GrubsterGirl wasted no time getting stuck in.

 

 

But if the bread is the star of the show, the supporting cast are pretty Oscar-worthy too.  All their supplies of meat and eggs and veggies taste and feel proper fresh, and high quality.  These are no frozen, 15% pork, budget bangers; these are proper, hearty Cumberland sausages, full of yum.

They also do an exciting array of breakfasts – not just full English brekkies, but carefully thought out and well executed dishes that are meals in their own right.

 

GrubsterGirl launched into the wild mushrooms, which basically is a mound of wild mushrooms on toast, accompanied with (in this instance) a sausage.  It's more normal sides are bacon, mackerel terrine or chicken liver pâté, the latter of which I have tried and (hot-damn!) it is good.  I know what you're thinking: chicken liver for breakfast?  Don't knock it 'til you tried it, folks, is all I'll say.

 

 

I went for the 'Cowboy Brekkie', with the charming slice of sourdough with a fried egg inside.  There's something wonderfully childish not just about the idea but about its execution.  It also came with a couple of rashers of bacon (what breakfast / brunch would be complete without it?) and homemade baked beans.  A word on the beans: they're incredible.  Rich, gooey, bloomin' spicy, and with at least a whole sausage diced up in there for good measure. 

 

 

What's more, even the walk-on parts fare well.  Proper juices and coffee that even an Italian barista could be proud of. 

 

 

All in all, a proper, filling brunch – and one of the best in Clapham, to boot.  Now for a lie down.  I'll leave you with a picture of the best egg holder I've ever seen. 

 

 

You'd need a lot of soldiers for that.

 

 - GrubsterBoy -

 

PS: This place is really the only restaurant that I can think of that genuinely suffers from multiple personality disorder.  No, seriously, it can’t seem to make its mind up – it seemed to start out as Breads Etcetera but now the menus are covered with references to 'The Ferm'.  In my view, 'Breads Etcetera' is a great name for a place that sells bread primarily and a lot of other stuff to fill you up kind of on the side.  Whereas 'The Ferm' means… well, not a lot to me, to be honest.  I've gone with Breads Etcetera as everyone seems to know it by that name. 

 

PPS: Sadly, Breads Etcetera has almost no online presence whatsoever, which doesn’t help one track it down.  Still, you can't really miss it once you get to Clapham High Street: just look for the place with a 20 minute queue coming out of it…  Still, totally worth it.

Smoked Fish, Potatoes and Bacon

Some years back I lived in Edinburgh, the Athens of the North, a fine epithet as epithets go, although you never hear people referring to Athens as the Edinburgh of the South.

There was, in the 'burgh, a pretty decent farmers market on Castle Terrace, sitting in the shadow of the Castle.  Not a bad place to be. 

Once, I stumbled upon hot smoked salmon being sold in bloody great big chunks.  I succumbed, and bought it, cooking it up that night with potatoes, smoky bacon, onions and tomatoes.  It was aces. 

I hadn’t seen smoked salmon being sold in big chunks like that for some time.  Until last night, in Sainsburys.  Even then it wasn't being sold hot smoked, but lightly oak smoked.  Nevertheless, I had to try to recreate the magic.  Adapting (slightly) a Nigel slater recipe I set about my task.

Ingredients:

Smoked streaky bacon
400g new potatoes
Half an onion (not actually called for in the recipe, but this was one of those buy-first-check-recipes-later kind of affairs, and it didn't seem to do any harm...)

x2 fillets of smoked fish (I used the smoked salmon, obviously, but any smoky fish would probably work)
300ml double cream
x2 bay leaves
x6 peppercorns

Cavolo nero (or any other accompaniment, but these worked especially well – the bitter, beefy, slightly metallic taste perfectly offsetting the richness of the fish sauce)

1. Chop them onions finely. Chop the bacon.  Nigel says postage stamp sized, which is a great unit of size that I am going to adopt generally.  Chop the tatties small.  I couldn’t be faffed to do Nigel's 'tiny chips', which was a big mistake – these took too long to cook, meaning the bacon was a touch overdone by the end.

2. Get the onions and bacon frying in the pan, softening the onions and browning the bacon ever-so-slightly.  It's going to get a lot more cooking, so don't crisp it up at this stage.  Do add a little oil – sure, the bacon will produce some, but you'll need extra for the tatties.  Once there, add said tatties and start frying, turning them every so often. 

3. Put the fish in a saucepan with the cream, bay leaves and peppercorns.  Six peppercorns.  Not five, not seven; six.  Also, bay leaves.  Courtesy of a neighbour's garden.  Oops.  Simmer for five minutes or so, then lid on, heat off, and leave to soak up the ambience whilst the tatties finish off.

4. Wash your greens.  Really.  I know it says you need to on the packet, and that you never do, but seriously: do it.  Mine had a flipping huge caterpillar in a cocoon in it that started crawling out to attack me when it was disturbed.  Remove the thick inner stalk (see below) and slice into thick ribbons.  Steam for one minute when the tatties are about done.  Add no butter or flavouring; the sauce will do all the magic.

(No steamer? No problem – just stick them in a sieve on top of a pan with an inch of boiling water in the bottom then stick the lid on.  That's what I did, and it worked a treat.)

5.  Assemble.  Tatties & bacon on plate, fish fillet on top, sauce over everything and greens on the side.  Wolf down. 

 - GrubsterBoy -

Bank Holiday Brunch: French Toast, Bacon and Maple Syrup

Bank holidays.  Love 'em.  Who doesn’t?

GrubsterGirl and I tend to try to manage at least one day of a weekend with just the two of us, holed up in the flat with papers, a jug of coffee and preferably something to eat.  This weekend has been a busy one, so thank goodness it was a three-day-er. 

To celebrate the extra day, this morning we got up bright and breezy to make my favourite brekkie: French toast, bacon and maple syrup.

It’s a strange combo, but far from an usual one.  In the States, they’d barely think twice about lathering salty, fatty, streaky bacon with lashings of syrup; in England we turn our nose up at the idea.  I remember the first time I tried it – in an underground, all-you-can-eat breakfast bar in New York.  At uni, up in Edinburgh, there was a great place called Favorit* that sold bacon rolls, coffee, Belgian beers, and, yes, French toast, bacon & maple syrup until 3.00 am, making it the perfect post-pub stomach filler.

The mix of salt and sweet is a fantastic one – and much more common that people think.  Salt and sweet popcorn?  Salt chocolate?  Salted caramel?  It’s everywhere.  And it’s great for breakfast – especially if you’re suffering a little from the night before.

Here’s how I do it:

Assemble your ingredients:

Loaf of white bread (In truth, I expect it’s fine with brown, or even granary.  I just like it done with white bread, a really cheapo tin loaf – although you want one as crusty as you can, otherwise it’s a bit of a nightmare to cut.  Like this one.)

x4 Eggs (Use free range, please. There should be four here, but I forgot one.)

Splash of milk

x10 rashers of smoked streaky bacon

Maple syrup

1. Get that bacon in the pan and start it frying.  Or stick it in the oven if (a) you remember to pre-heat it; and (b) you’re feeling healthy.  I did neither; I’m pretty disorganised and I kinda feel that, with this dish, if you’re cooking it then it’s a little late to be worrying about health concerns.

 

2. Carve your bread into nice thick slices.  You’re going to want the bread to soak up as much eggy-goodness as possible, so big chunks helps.  Thick, like the best part of an inch.  Slice diagonally to form triangles.  About one and a half slices per head.  Or two if you're a troffer. 

3. Turn the bacon. You want it nice and crispy, American style.  That’s why I’m stipulating streaky bacon, not back.  Sure, back bacon tastes better, but here you want the streaky stuff.  Some supermarkets do Americanstyle bacon which is really, really thin, a bit like pancetta, and about 50% fat.  Go for this for the truly authentic experience, it actually aint that bad.

4.  Crack your eggs in a bowl and whisk them up with a splash of milk.  A bit like making scrambled eggs, but without the pepper and cream.  So not that much like making scrambled eggs, but you know what I mean.  Some folks like to add cinnamon at this stage to make it even more all-American.  I didn’t, but I won’s judge you too much if you do**.  Once mixed, lob in some slices of bread, turning after a few minutes so that both sides have soaked up lots of egg-mix.

5.  Once all the bacon is crispy, remove from the pan and leave on a piece of kitchen towel to allow some of the fat to be soaked up.  If it don’t look like this, do it a bit longer.

 

6.  Wipe down the pan and throw in the eggy-bread.  Cook it for two to four minutes, then flip it.  If it shows any kind of resistance or stickiness to the pan when you’re flipping it, give it a bit longer – it aint done yet.  When you do flip it, check that the underside (ie. the bit that’s been a-cookin') is a lovely dappled brown.  If not, give it a bit longer.  It should look a bit like this.  

 

When both sides are cooked, stand them up on their sides to brown them.

7.  Remove from the pan.  Stack up, photograph, resist the urge to scoff them all, and Instagram that thing.

8.  Slice again into smaller triangles, arrange bacon, drown in maple syrup, serve with hot coffee and cold orange juice. 
 

MEGAYUMS.

Of course, if you're feeling super healthy (weirdo) but still want french toast (contradiction in terms) then why not try it as GG had a little while ago - forgoing the bacon and using summer fruits instead?

 - GrubsterBoy -

 

* I loved it as a student, but that was many years back now, and in any event our standards were probably more limited – I mean baked beans on toast was considered a delicacy if one sprinkled Worcestershire sauce over it.  One way or another, I notice the reviews online are now pretty poor.  So who knows.

** I will, actually.