Dudley - Land & Sea: Secrets to simple, sustainable, sensational food

ALEXANDRA DUDLEY

LAND & SEA

Secrets to simple, sustainable, sensational food

For my Oma and Opa pa.
Thinking of you always.

Contents

They say food is medicine. For me, I think its the cooking that is the medicine the peeling, chopping, rolling and stirring, the waiting while the dough rises, and everything in between. It is in these simple acts that I find peace of mind, and if I ever feel wobbly with life, spending time in the kitchen brings me back to my roots.

My mother always made sure that the kitchen was the heart of the home. The space was sacred, with conscious care taken over every detail from choosing the colour of the paint on the walls to deciding where the wooden spoons should be kept. The kitchen was where we spent most of our time, and I think thats true for most families. Its where youll find the blotchy childrens self-portraits pinned to the fridge, its where the smell of Sunday lunch comes from, its where we make the coffee and its where (generally) the dog sleeps.

I have had a fascination with the kitchen since I was a child from watching my mother and grandmother cook to learning to do things for myself. I can still remember, aged seven, going through about 16 eggs one early Mothering Sunday morning in an attempt to produce the perfect fried egg, while my sister eagerly waited by the toaster, ready for the call to action to push down the bread. My mother liked her toast piping hot with a generous amount of melted, slightly salted butter. Needless to say, I dont think either the egg or the toast were hot by the time it reached her but I think she enjoyed it all the same and since then I have learned to cook an excellent fried egg!

I enjoyed school, but as a hopeless daydreamer I preferred my ballet classes or Wednesday afternoons in the art room. The things I could do were sing, paint and bake. Little drawings and occasional sofa-staged performances were well received but nothing went down quite as well as edible goods. My Chocolate toffee crunch (see ), based on the much-loved Daim bar (a delicious combination of crunchy hazelnut-studded toffee coated in chocolate), is still today one of my signature Christmas gifts.

My inclination towards kitchen experiments drew me to investigating the methods of what I then called proper cooking. I ripped out recipes from Sunday papers and spent my weekend afternoons losing myself in my mothers cookbooks. These were the Mary Berry and Delia Smith days (good, good days), but my favourite book of all was one on French patisserie, which had a giant illustration of a croissant on the front. I couldnt understand a word of it but I would spend hours tracing the intricate pastry diagrams. The kitchen was my home, it was where I could shine and it was where I could make other people smile.

I wrote my first recipe book when I was 11, and many of those Sunday afternoon pastry tracings featured proudly in the neat(ish) cartoon-strip directions to Alexandras cookbook. It had four recipes. There was an English apple tart, heavily influenced by its French sister but made with English apples from the garden and blackberry jam instead of apricot after all, we were in England. Then came my chocolate toffee crunch, butterfly fairy cakes and peanut butter cookies.

Most of my childhood recipes were influenced by the cookbooks I loved at the time. Helen Drews My First Baking Book still has the best peanut butter cookie recipe I know. However, my rebellious streak outed itself early in the kitchen; hence my recipes always had a twist. Determined to make them my own, Id swap walnuts for hazelnuts, double the honey and leave out the salt, or use basil instead of mint. The aim was always to wow and create something unusual although fondly remembered failures include the lavender ice cream that made my mouth taste like soap for days, gooseberry custard which looked more like witches potion and countless batches of failed scones.

Thankfully I made my peace with each of these failed recipes and found my way with them, and even the ugly disasters make me smile. The failing didnt matter; it was just an excuse to try again. Over the years that itch to experiment continues to grow; the curiosity for new and varied ingredients is ever increasing, especially when I travel, and I hope I will always seek new recipes to adapt and adopt in my own little kitchen.

I think the best people are those that suffer from wanderlust. For me, the syndrome is left over from hearing stories of my mothers childhood in Africa, my grandfather sneaking back coconuts in his suitcase, and afternoons watching Disney films with my siblings. Daydreaming also had a lot to do with it. When my German grandmother, or Oma, visited she would tell us the greatest bedtime stories; our favourite was the magic carpet. Oma would let us choose where we wanted to go and wed all say, India! The story would then be about two little girls and one boy, a magic carpet and their journey through Mumbai. The funny thing is, my grandmother never went to India or any of the places we went to on the carpet, but these games fuelled my desire to see them in reality.

Although India is still on my list, since then Ive been lucky enough to visit many of the places we went to on the carpet. On every trip my main interest has been in the food the native produce, traditions, tips and tricks from the locals. I like to make friends wherever I go and, never having been afraid to talk to strangers, have met some of the most wonderful and inspiring people along the way. Always, we have connected over a love of food and, for the most part, a love of nature. Food and nature go hand in hand. The best food comes straight from the ground, tree and water, not from a can or packaging. The best meals are those made from these real ingredients, cooked fresh and that very often at least in my case have a little story behind them.

A sustainable rhythm of eating

I suppose the rhythm of my eating has been heavily influenced by my upbringing. I was lucky enough to be brought up on home-cooked food, and with a strong European heritage, the table was often scattered with various plates of fresh salads, cold cuts and leftovers. Still today I have a firm rule to never throw anything away. There is always something to be rehashed from leftovers and more often than not I will cook with those in mind. The cook once eat twice mentality is incredibly useful, especially when you live a busy, fast-paced life, which so many of us do.

During the week breakfasts are quick and easy yoghurt, fruit and oats are all regular contenders. Hot water and lemon followed by strong hot coffee or tea is compulsory, as is BBC Radio 4. Lunch is usually a mix of leftovers dressed up with something fresh and colourful. I am a regular packed-lunch eater and have been making them since I was an art student, partly because it saved money, but primarily because I found, and still find, that generally I enjoy them more than a soggy sandwich or barren salad.

Dinner is where things get a little more exciting, but as a general rule it will be something that takes under an hour to pull together. Despite weekday meals being a little less fancy than those that I prepare at the weekend, there is no compromise on flavour. Thursday nights dinner may be Rosemary bream with roasted romanesco, lemon and battered olives ( ) and some crusty sourdough. It may sound extravagant, but the truth is most of what we eat during the week is cooked and on the table in under 40 minutes.