Every good cook needs a well-stocked larder and the list of essential kitchen-cabinet ingredients has an increasingly international flavour, says Tom Parker Bowles
POOR old Mother Hubbard. What with her bare cupboard and its distinct lack of bones, or anything else at all. I feel for that pipe-smoking, jig-dancing, goat-riding dog, really I do, because a well-stocked pantry, larder or store cupboard is the backbone of any self-respecting home, a place from which great feasts are lovingly conjured and succour is mixed with the salt.
As a child, the larder was always a place of cool contemplation, dimly lit and faintly scented with spice and damp old stone. I remember tins of Texan fruit cake (from a friend in the Lone Star State); endless bags of sugar and flour; neat boxes of Rowntree’s jelly; Frank Cooper’s Original Oxford Marmalade (my mother was devoted to the stuff); a few ancient tins of sardines (and a few battered cans of lord only knows what); bottles of Worcestershire Sauce and Tabasco; Carr’s Table Water Biscuits; Gentleman’s Relish; Twinings English Breakfast tea; anchovy essence; local honey; Marmite; Baxters Beef Consommé; Heinz Baked Beans; vomit-scented, pre-grated ‘Parmesan’; and Rose’s Lime Juice Cordial (a back-up for the drinks-table supply).
There were also fresh eggs, collected from the chickens, in a pretty, day-demarcated box; leaves of gelatine; Sarson’s vinegar; Sainsbury’s spaghetti; a jar of faded herbs (probably mint, but no one could be quite sure); antediluvian cake decorations; Sugar Puffs; Shreddies; porridge oats; and a few sticky jars of homemade jam.
The only hint of the exotic was a plastic pot of Sharwood’s curry powder, for the ghastly and ubiquitous Coronation chicken.
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin February 20, 2019 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin February 20, 2019 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds