Cooking The Books

Butifarra amb Mongetes

Now you can make the butifarra it's time for a recipe that uses them. Sausages have an affinity with beans - think Toulouse in a cassoulet, chorizo with chickpeas or even a tin of Heinz all day breakfast (maybe) - and this dish follows in that tradition.  One minor difference with butifarra amb mongetes though is the sausages aren't cooked in the beans and the beans are fried, something I've never before seen as an end to boiled beans. 

Mongetes are a Catalan white bean, I have seen haricot mentioned on the packaging along with the Catalunyan name but they're a lot larger than haricot I've seen over here.  The most famed mongetes are grown in volcanic soils but in the absence of the expensive delicacies I've turned to cannellini beans, whose appearance is similar to the mongetes I've seen in Carrefour.  Some recipes for butifarra amb mongetes do use braised beans but it was the fried finish, mentioned in Catalan Cuisine, that caught my eye. There was no recipe but frying beans in olive oil until golden is pretty self explanatory - no? 

The answer was yes.  After boiling the beans I left them overnight to cool which also dried them up.  In the oil the outside crisped up nicely leaving a slight crunch before buttery soft middle, a crushed clove of garlic imparted a subtle flavouring.  The sausages were tasty too, nicely flavoured with pepper and hints of the cinnamon rounding it off, but a change of dinner plans meant I half cooked the sausages then stopped for an hour and then overdid them a bit when finishing off but that's my own stupid fault.  This is a reasonably dry dish so feel free to moisten up with aioli or garlic mayonnaise.

Butifarra amb Mongetes

serves 4

250gr of dried cannellini beans

8 butifarra, or other meaty and peppery sausage (I'm thinking a proper Cumberland)

1 onion

1 carrot

2 sticks of celery

10 peppercorns

3 bay leaves

2 cloves of garlic

Method

Soak the beans overnight.

Bring the beans to the boil in clean water and boil rapidly for 10 minutes.

Drain and discard the water then bring to the boil with more water, the onion, carrot, celery, bay and peppercorns.  Turn down the heat to a very gentle simmer and give them 60-90 mins until tender.  I try to disturb them as little as possible so the skins don't come up.  Drain and leave to cool.

Fry or grill the sausages and whilst they're cooking heat some olive oil (extra virgin is wasted when cooking) and chuck in the two cloves of garlic, skinned and smashed.  Give these 30 seconds to flavour the oil then add the beans and fry over a medium heat until nicely golden, this will take a few minutes.  Season the beans well with salt.

Serve the butifarra with the mongetes and, if you want, the aioli or garlic mayonnaise.

X-Burger House, Kilburn

The first thing one notices about X-Burger House, the new Brazilian burger house in Kilburn, is that it is in the middle of nowhere.  Well to those that live in Kilburn or Willesden (or wherever it is to the south of these) it won't be but if like me you've come from the West End you're talking 7 stops on the Jubilee line and a 10 odd minute walk from the tube station.  A veritable marathon.  I've just changed team at work though and a long goodbye lunch was on the cards so I grabbed a couple of colleagues and set about the journey. 

Once you've made the trip it's a pretty nice place, decked in clean lined modern furniture and light and airy from the large south facing windows.  The kitchen is open and a till area deals out takeaways to what amounted to 4-5 people in the hour we were there.

The X in X burger is short for Xis, or Cheese, and every burger here has the magic ingredient.  On top of this we're treated to various toppings from the usual bacon and fried egg to the less usual chicken hearts, peas and sweetcorn - which I'm guessing show off the Brazilian heritage.  Sides again run from the usual chips and onion rings to the less usual polenta chips and chicken hearts.  It is cheap dining, with burgers running from £4.50 to £7 something, sides about £2 a glass of coke a quid.  The menu also had some steak sandwiches and hot dogs but I didn't get to try those. 

I decided to eat the bacon X (cheese) burger and went for the 7" - over 5" - option.  I wasn't sure if the " was a dodgy shorthand for oz or if the burger would be 7" tall, out the two I was guessing 7oz but it may have meant 7" diameter as this was the widest burger I've ever seen.  With such width, 7oz of meat or not, it has got to be a thin burger and my guess would be around the centimetre mark, it definitely looked like it had been made fresh though, the rough edges a tell tale sign of something hand shaped or squashed flat on the griddle. 

We weren't asked how we wanted our burgers cooked and mine arrived moist with the slightest hint of pink. With such thin burgers it's going to be hard to have them much less done if you want a decent amount of charring though, which is pretty important for flavour and definitely wasn't lacking.  Unfortunately the burger seemed to carry on cooking at the table and whilst the first half was pretty moist it got a bit dry towards the end.  From the toppings bacon was streaky and salty and and in decent quantity and cheese of the thin sliced real variety, sliced tomato added to the moisture. 

All in all it was a decent burger, although I would've preferred it less cooked through.

Sides were pretty damn good.  Homemade chips were crisp on the outside and fluffy inside, quite roast potato like in flavour.  Onion rings had a great crunch but maybe lacked a bit in onion.  Polenta chips were a revelation, perfect chip shape with crisp exteriors that gave way to buttery soft polenta - get in there quick though as by the end the last couple had lost their crunch due to the steaming middle.  One criticism of all three would be the portions were a bit small (we only ate two polenta chips before I took that photo), this criticism certainly couldn't be levelled at the chicken hearts with onion though which - at less than £4 - was absolutely huge, literally hundreds of the things griddled till brown and with a hint of thyme - absolutely gorgeous.

Whilst it may not be the best burger in London X-House Burger is a cut above the average burger bar and definitely superior to the average Kilburn offering.  The Brazilian influence makes for a really interesting menu, with great sides, and I may even return to see what peas and sweetcorn are like on a burger.  I'll even go so far as to add it to my list of reasons to go to Kilburn which now contains - The Luminaire, The Tricycle Theatre, Angeles and X-Burger House.

Butifarra

One of the defining factors of a British banger is the filler.  With few exceptions (the Cumberland being one) our sausage recipes incorporate some rusk which soaks up the fat and produces the lovely, softer bite of a decent local sausage.  Sure it was taken to extremes in days of want (the war springs to mind) and still is by peddlers of the low grade pink paste tubes but a reasonable quantity is a must in most recipes.

The same can't be said abroad were the pure meat sausage rules the roost.  This leads to a much firmer sausage which isn't better, just different.  With no rusk to soak up the fat these sausages are frequently pricked to stop them exploding whilst being cooked but I hate to see good fat go down the drain and I think with careful control of heat, and a bit of luck, you can get away without doing this.

Recently in Catalunya I had many a butifarra, the local snag (which in most cases the driving force in the flavour is black pepper), but whilst they came with chips or simply on the side of a rotisserie chicken I couldn't find the dish of Butifarra amb Mongetes (with white beans) and so I vowed to make it at home.  As butifarra are near as damn it impossible to buy over here this meant finding a recipe and dusting off the sausage stuffer.  I'm glad I did as I'd forgot how good fun sausage making is, not to mention the pleasure of the results.

 

As mentioned these butifarra have a predominant black pepper taste but there is also a hint of sweetness from the cinnamon and clove.  They're a nice simple sausage to make, so perfect for the beginner, and go well in a crusty baguette, with chips and a salad or with those white beans, something which will follow on the blog soon after I make it tonight.

With sausage making it's imperative that everything is very cold, this means meat and equipment.  As soon as things start heating up the fat melts and smears and the texture of the finished product goes down hill rapidly.  With this in mind meat, bowls, stuffer and mincer all spend some time in the fridge prior to starting out.

It is also imperative that there is enough fat on your meat, I've said 25% but I think that's a minimum, some people go higher.  For this rusk-free sausage (so nothing to soak the fat up) I think 25% is good though.  Some folk use belly for sausage making, and I have myself in the past, as the quantities of fat and lean can be good.  I think shoulder is a better texture though if you can find it fatty enough (you can always add back fat from loin chops) but belly would still turn out a decent butifarra.

Butifarra

Makes 8-10

900gr pork shoulder (25% fat) in 4cm cubes

15gr salt

3-4gr black peppercorns (1 - 1.5 ts)

Scant 1/4 ts ground cinnamon

1 clove

3 TB ice water

Natural hog casings

Method

The butifarra is a coarse ground sausage (aren't all the good ones?) so choose your biggest mincer attachment and give the well chilled meat a single grind into a chilled bowl.

Grind the black pepper, clove and cinnamon with a pestle and mortar, I find the addition of a bit of the salt helps, and once fine combine with the remaining salt and spread over the mince.  Add the 3 TB of ice water and mix to combine, I use a fork to save warming the mix up with my hands.  Once well mixed run the mince through the mincer a second time.

If you've never used natural skins before you need to soak them for a couple of hours to remove salt, you also want to run water through the inside a couple of times to clean.  Once prepared thread onto your sausage maker spout and stuff your sausages.

The butifarra I ate in Catalunya are larger than a British banger, more like 12cm (c. 110gr), so twist off bigger links.

Chill in the fridge for a day to dry, turning occasionally if - like me - there's nowhere near enough room in the fridge to hang them.

Veal Holstein

Restaurant reviews out the way I can now get back to my real passion, cooking, so carrying on the trend of recreating dishes from London's most blogged restaurants is the dish of veal holstein, this time from the almost cult Bob Bob Ricard.  I've not got around to eating there myself but of all the blog posts about it I've skimmed through the veal holstein really piqued my interest. 

Sticking things in breadcrumbs and frying rarely has a bad outcome and I could imagine the rich egg yolk and salty capers and anchovies combining to create something covering the whole flavour spectrum - assuming that spectrum is meat, crunch, fat and salt. 

I wasn't disappointed.

Veal Holstein

Per person

Veal escalope, 120gr (English rose - obviously)

1 egg

2 anchovies, sliced lengthways

2 ts salted capers, well rinsed

To coat

Plain flour seasoned well with salt and pepper, white pepper has a nicer fine texture

Egg

Fresh breadcrumbs, dried slightly in warm oven

Method

First off beat you escalopes a bit until they're very thin, they tend to shrink when frying so oversize is good.

Season some plain flour with salt and pepper and place on one plate, beat the egg in a bowl and place the breadcrumbs on another plate.

Flour, egg and crumb the veal then chill for 15 minutes to set the coating a bit.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan and add the capers, only enough to heat through rather than crisp up.

Heat 1cm oil in a frying pan over a medium hot heat then fry the veal for 3 minutes a side until golden.  Remove to rest on kitchen roll in a warm oven.

Fry the egg.

Place the veal on a plate, top with the egg, make a cross with the anchovy pieces and spoon the capers in butter over the top.

Serve with whatever you see fit.

Cerveceria Catalana, Barcelona

A quick glitch in the space time continuum here as I jump back to Barcelona for the last time.  Someone had recommended Txapela to me and I also wanted to try Cerveceria Catalana after reading about it on trip advisor. There was only one meal left though so the names went in hands behind my back (have to choose somehow) and the gf chose right, which turned out to be Txapela.  We were borderline busy time, at around 8.30pm, so rushed from the Metro to Txapela and luckily grabbed a table for 2.  The waitress acknowledged us then proceeded to ignore us for ten minutes so we got up and left.

Unluckily for us the walk to Txapela and back, along with 10 minutes of invisibility, had left Ceveceria Catalana absolutely heaving so our names were put on the list with a suggested wait of 30-40 minutes.  About 5 minutes later I went to ask the hostess if we could buy a glass of sangria and got the reply 'Come, I think I can squeeze you on a table now' and we were promptly whisked away to a lovely table for 2, completely jumping the queue.  Score!

Compared to Tapas24 this place is huge, with bars down each side as you walk in were folk noisily order the tapas from glass displays in front of them, the staff pouring cerveza after cerveza and handing them over diners to slake the thirsts of the masses waiting in the queue I just jumped.  The menu was more ordinary, which isn't a bad thing, covering all your standard tapas along with lots of grilled seafood and a large section of filled flautas, the thin baguettes that I had breakfasted on that morning in Matamala.

We ordered our first jar of sangria (a very reasonable €11 euro for a litre) and settled down to order and eat.  Grilled sepia were fantastic, a favourite of mine when in Spain and these were fine examples - charred and smoky whilst remaining juicy and tender.  The truita (tortilla in Spanish) was filled with melt in the mouth oily potato and onion and the middle was still runny.  Padron peppers, a huge portion compared to Tapas24, were good but didn't throw up any hotties.  Manchego was, for want of a better description, manchego like. Our first flauta was butifarra blanc, which was a shame as I'd ordered butifarra negra.  On the plus side I've never had the blanc before and it was tasty enough, in a haslet sort of way.  

By this point we were getting full enough but one dish on the menu had caught our eye and had to be ordered, flauta with foie gras and Roquefort (served hot).  When it turned up it wasn't foie gras, just normal pate (lost in translation?) that was warm to the point of nearing separation and topped with lumps of melted Roquefort.  As you can probably imagine it was a tad on the rich and full on side, the Roquefort somewhat overpowering.  As the gf said in a John Torrode accent 'We've got lovely crusty bread, smooth rich pate then - WHAM! - the Roquefort hits you like a train and overpowers them both'.  It was definitely an experience but I couldn't decide if it was a good or bad one.

All told this was another €20-€25 meal and train of Roquefort aside I really enjoyed Ceveceria Catalana and was glad that we had to leave Txapela, which whilst probably serving good food (it comes highly recommended) did feel like we were sat on Leicester Sq eating.  Ceveceria Catalana on the other hand felt more local, even though with so many reviews on trip advisor it must be frequented by lots of tourists too.