Closing Dinner

“For me, cooking and eating together is an important part of my identity and an extension of my practice. Relational aesthetics through nice times and tableware. This meal combines the comfort foods of childhood, with the collaborative process of making a queer home life in London. It is informed by my memories of growing up in Cape Town, as well my weekends spent with my partners in London.”
- Will Martin

Pickled Fish

This technique for pickling fish differs from that in northern Europe as we roll the sliced fish in seasoned flour to help remove moisture and then shallow fry until cooked through and golden. You cook the pickling liquid too, by sweating onions with ground cumin, coriander and turmeric, adding grated ginger and sliced garlic. Add a can of halved apricots with juice for sweetness, and finish it off with red wine vinegar and a bayleaf. Letting this simmer removes some of the acridity of the vinegar, and lets you adjust the seasoning with more salt, pepper or sugar. Cover the fried fish with the hot vinegar mixture and let cool before putting it in the fridge. This is best made 3 days ahead, but the night before is perfectly acceptable. For the Coming In closing dinner, I served a portion of fish with a halved apricot on thin slices of thickly buttered rye bread, but it would be equality delicious as a heaped portion in a bowl with some crusty white bread chunks on the side.

Cape Malay Chicken Curry

Our main had a similar flavour base to the pickled fish, with all that cumin, coriander and turmeric fried in onion, but differs in its use of whole woody spices. I like to season and brown the chicken first (skin on, bone in) so that the spices are essentially being toasted in chicken fat. I love the deep, rich flavour of this tomato based curry with its warm cinnamon sticks and aromatic cardamom pods. I leave the garlic cloves whole and treat them like a vegetable rather than slicing them up, and you could use ginger, but I don’t feel like you need it. Simmer it on a low heat for an hour or so till the chicken is falling off the bone. 

Everything was served in generous bowls at the table, with guests passing dishes and condiments to each other, sharing what combinations they liked best. The rice had been boiled with cardamom pods and caramelised onions, the carrots fried in browned butter, fresh orange juice and local honey. There was of course chutney on the table, as well as toasted almonds and chopped coriander leaves.

Apple and Damson Pie

When we went to pick up our veg boxes from Waltham Place Farm, we had the most brilliant (and filling) lunch at the restaurant. It culminated in a stewed damson a clotted cream dessert on a cinnamon tuile. When I discovered damsons in the veg box, I decided to use them for their tartness alongside the apples in my tart. Once again cardamom and cinnamon played a role, although this time a sweet one. Mixed along with the roughly chopped fruit, sugar and potato starch, they macerated while I made the short crust pastry. With no need to blind bake, the whole thing went into a spring form tin and into the oven for an hour. We added vanilla and more of the local honey to our whipping cream, served at the table, and garnished with a cape gooseberry or physalis. We ended the dinner with a rum and chai old fashioned and any remnants of cava left over from the welcome apricot bellinis.