Alex Mackay - The Magic Fridge: Amazing sauces, butters, bases and preserves that will transform your everyday cooking

Dedicated with infinite love to my god-daughter Casey and my sons Jake and James. You three are the magic in my life. Thanks to Jess for bringing our boys into the world and to Caseys mum Linda and grandparents Ron and Sally Clarke for asking me to be Caseys godfather.

CONTENTS

Welcome to the Magic Fridge

Open the door to incredible possibilities and enormous fun. Ill show you how to save time on your everyday cooking by stocking your fridge occasionally. Being prepared makes cooking more enjoyable and inspiration more available. Your Magic Fridge will go beyond tasty recipes; in combination with my kitchen tips and tricks, it can transform the way you cook and eat.

The idea behind this book was sparked at my old cookery school, Le Baou dInfer, in Provence. It started with a fridge: the one behind my demonstration area that I filled with fiercely flavoured ratatouille and bright green basil pistou, deeply savoury chicken broth, spicy chilli relish, pots of luxurious almond cream and tart lemon curd preparations I could use to build a simple meal or turn a nice dish into a delicious one. The fridge became like a person to me: a partner who always had what I needed when I needed it most. The stocks, sauces, butters, bases and preserves were always there, ready to help me conjure up the most fantastic meals and puddings.

To eat well every day, you need to plan and prepare. In this book Ive combined the restaurant tricks I learnt as a chef in everything from Michelin-starred kitchens to tiny cafs, with the practical realities Ive picked up from twenty years of teaching home cooks and cooking for my family. In any restaurant, of any size, the most important thing is to be prepared for service. Being prepared makes it possible to serve beautiful food, and its the same at home: while you juggle your jobs and families, your service is your mealtime. Its also the best opportunity to spend time together, in the kitchen and at the table.

No matter how many times youre told this, its not easy to just throw a meal together unless youre a chef or have ready access to expensive ingredients and tons of time. But if you fill your Magic Fridge (and Fantastic Freezer) with my simple prepare-ahead recipes and use my kitchen tricks, youll have the starting point for an amazing array of stews, sauces, soups, bakes, pastas, pies, pizzas and puddings, even meatballs without meat, upside-down tarts and an almost instant crme brle.

Ive chosen twenty savoury and sweet base recipes, from baked beans to chocolate mousse, that are tasty, useful and varied. Ive kept a careful eye on preparations that can keep for a long time. Some will be ready for you in the fridge, others in the freezer. Youll need to be careful about what you store your base recipes in and how you store them; Ill talk about this in more detail as well as in the individual recipes.

These base recipes are, in essence, convenience food. They are a way of making fast food personal, so instead of buying a jar of sauce or a pizza base, Ill show you how to make a lovely version of it yourself. Itll taste better and youll know exactly whats in it. Good taste, goodness and a part of you.

Your Magic Fridge gives you a head start: it enables you to cook fresh food because you spend time when you have it, in order to save time in the kitchen when you need it. Youll enjoy the wholesome satisfaction of making food yourself and the naughty satisfaction you get from cheating with food you prepared earlier.

Preserve food. Create time. Enjoy cooking more. Eat better. Magic.

THE MAGIC FRIDGE USERS GUIDE

The tips that follow will make the difference between cooking being fun or not. They make the process more pleasurable, so whatever happens, your food will taste better because you feel better.

Before you start

Organisation leads to enjoyment. Have a place for everything: this is the single most important thing I can tell you. Not being able to find what you need, when you need it, is a massive cause of frustration and the catalyst for most things that go wrong while you cook.

Start with a clear worktop. If you start in a mess, youll cook in a mess and finish in a mess. If you give yourself clutter-free space, cooking becomes easier, quicker and more fun.

Read the recipe all the way through before you start.

Work from a tray. Get all the ingredients for your recipe measured and on this tray before you start cooking. Line your ingredients up in the order in which you will use them. Once youve used them, stack any dirty containers back on the tray so that you dont make a mess on your worktop.

Anything that I suggest to prepare by specifying it in the ingredient list, you should do before you start with the method. With vegetables like onions and carrots I will tell you the size to chop them to, and the weight because the size of vegetables varies hugely, and this affects their cooking time and the taste of your food.

When you preheat your oven, put the racks in the right place first while they are cold rather than hot.

Use an electronic timer always, for everything, for any length of time. It takes pressure off you to remember, taking an important concern out of your mind so you can enjoy the next job more.

Rearrange your kitchen if you have to, but work next to your cooker so you can see whats happening on the heat in a glance.

If you are serving hot food, itll always be better on hot plates heat them in your oven or microwave.

Always have a full kettle just off the boil. Its a lot quicker than boiling water on your cooker, and youll be surprised at how often you need it.

If you dont have a dishwasher or microwave, please try and find space for both they make life in a domestic kitchen so much easier.

Ive cooked and written most of these recipes to serve two people because it was the easiest number to multiply to four, six or eight or divide to one. Ive used measuring spoons wherever possible for the same reason. On the whole my portions are on the large side. If you scale the recipes up or down, take into account the size of saucepans and frying pans as more or less food will need different-sized equipment. In many cases, you can cook the recipes in larger quantities, to give yourself a portable lunch or meal the next day. I worked hard to make as many desserts as possible for two people because I think two is an often-neglected number when it comes to sweet things.