Lucy Boyd - Kitchen Memories

Whisky, pig’s head and langoustine are the words that come to mind from this trip. My old friend Fergus Henderson met me at Glasgow airport with his driver, sent by our lovely hosts to pick him up as the guest of honour at their annual Eat Bute festival on the Isle of Bute. I hadn’t seen Fergus for a long time, so it was a complete delight to find him waiting for me in his bright blue suit as I came out of arrivals.

We have shared a love of good simple cooking since our childhood days when Fergus and Annabelle, his sister, would invite us to stay in their parents’ house in Wiltshire. Elizabeth, Fergus’s mother, is an amazing cook. I was always keen to be offered some of Annabelle’s packed lunch at school (I particularly remember a delicious meatloaf), but it was their garden full of radishes and crunchy lettuce, new potatoes, leeks and carrots that has really stuck in my memory. It was the way of the house to cook the freshly picked ingredients simply, with just a little butter and then some dill for the carrots, or the potatoes just scrubbed of their dirt and put in a pan and cooked with a knob of butter; the softest lettuces were given a mustard dressing, and the cucumber was deseeded, salted and coated with a Dijon emulsion; then radishes, pepper hot and crunchy with salt, boiled ham with curly parsley sauce, some celery poached in stock – everything super fresh, bold, very English and courageous.

Brian, Fergus and Annabelle’s father, is one of the most stylish men I have ever met – hugely generous, wonderful company and with a great appetite for life. It was Brian who took me to Harry’s Bar in Venice when I was seventeen to experience my first Negroni, when he came out to visit Fergus, studying in Florence at the time (eating tripe from the stall in the old money market in his lunch breaks). Brian and Elizabeth taught us the enjoyment you could get from a meal and its many different stages. It was civilised without being formal – delicious wines and beautiful ingredients cooked simply, Marc de Borgogne to finish, often music and dancing to end the night – heady days …

On the ferry over to the Isle of Bute, Fergus went off and bought a couple of drams of whisky to warm us up while we sat on the deck, our weekend getting closer in the distance across the water. It was a joyful journey, sharing a whisky on the ferry over to a beautiful Scottish island with my old friend.

A festive dinner in honour of Fergus was held that evening, with various courses cooked by Skye Gyngell, Jeremy Lee and Rory O’Connell. Then, the following day at the festival, Fergus was giving a demonstration on cooking a whole pig’s head (which he does with such charm and simple instruction), and everyone was diving in at the end to tear off a piece. Huge plates of local poached langoustines were had for lunch afterwards with chilled wine, and then dinner and energetic reels to finish off the night.

Langoustines have the most delicious sweet flesh – pale pink and more delicate than that of their larger cousin, the lobster. I will always order them if I see them on a menu, as they can be difficult to find fresh in the shops.

The best, juiciest and plumpest langoustines tend to come from Scotland, where the waters are cold enough for them to thrive. These beautiful creatures are fished in relatively small boats off the Scottish coast from sustainable stocks with well-managed quotas. I am mentioning this since I would hate for them to become unavailable other than frozen, which is not the idea at all.

Fresh langoustines need to be cooked when they are alive (although you can put them to sleep first by keeping them in the coldest part of the fridge, covered with ice and sheets of damp newspaper, for a couple of hours prior to cooking). My favourite way of cooking them is to plunge them into boiling water and then serve simply with a bowl of mayonnaise to dip into.

1 very fresh best-quality large egg yolk

200–250ml extra-virgin olive oil

2 lemons

24 fat live langoustines, kept in the bottom of the fridge, covered with some damp newspaper until you are ready to cook

100g purslane or lamb’s lettuce

1 handful of fresh sweet marjoram leaves and buds picked from their stems, washed and dried

salt and black pepper

To make the mayonnaise, put the egg yolk in a pestle and mortar ( see here) or mixer, then very slowly start adding the olive oil, drop by drop at first, stirring all the time until the mixture is thick, sticky and gloopy. (If it is thin and the oil has separated from the egg, it means it has split, in which case start again by putting another yolk into the bowl and then adding, drop by drop, the split mixture.) As the mixture starts to thicken, about 10 minutes, add a small squeeze of lemon juice to loosen it a bit, then continue to add the oil a little at a time, checking the mixture has not separated. When all the oil has been used, taste and add more lemon juice if required – the juice of a whole lemon should be enough. Season with salt and pepper and keep cool.

Plunge the langoustines into a pan of boiling, salted water and poach for 3 minutes, then remove, or drain, and leave to cool for a few minutes.

Put the purslane or lamb’s lettuce in a bowl and squeeze the juice of half a lemon over with a little extra-virgin olive oil and some salt and pepper.

Place each langoustine, belly-side up, on a chopping board. Using a sharp knife, slice the langoustine in half lengthways and remove the flesh. Distribute on the plates, gently scatter the dressed leaves here and there – but not too many as to overwhelm the flavour of the shellfish, then lightly spoon trailing pools of the mayonnaise over.

Very crudely chop the marjoram – just one or two chops will be fine – and scatter it over the top.

There are many more different varieties of spinach available in the supermarkets and greengrocers now than before but they never seem to name them – the packaging just simply states the generic name. I find this annoying, as I have to spend time describing the variety I am after, but I love all spinach, with its iron-y taste and melting softness when cooked.

There is one variety that I particularly enjoy – it arrives in spring and is mainly imported from France or Italy. Unlike the usual spinach you see in the shops whose stems have been cut individually, this variety is sold with the cluster of stems attached together at the base of the plant where it has been cut from the root. The stems are fairly short, only 5–6cm, and are pink below a canopy of deeply crinkled, dark and dense leaves. It is the more robust texture and flavour that I love, compared with the larger-leaved varieties. I have tried to discover the name but no one could help.

If you manage to find this variety, keep all the stems attached when braising in the olive oil, as they are full of flavour and look lively on the plate.

750g spinach, washed and tough stems removed

extra-virgin olive oil

salt and black pepper

To wash the spinach very thoroughly, plunge it into a sink of cold water several times as sand and grit can often cling to the leaves and stems.

Heat a good drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil in a pan over a medium to high heat. Drop the spinach leaves into the pan and toss in the oil with a pair of tongs. Season with salt and pepper and mix together. As soon as the spinach has collapsed and is soft and glossy, serve straight onto the plates.