Winter Skies, Kitchen Aglow

Many foodies and everyday cooks (those who only cook because one needs to eat) enjoy Nigella Lawson's approach to cooking. She is a great magpie, picking from many cuisines and adapting them to largely unfussy presentations for everyday cooking and great parties. I think that which makes her more successful than most tv cooks and chefs is that she has finely tuned her analytical abilities developed through her work as a literature and restaurant/food critic. As such, she is able to make any ingredient and, by extension, any dish approachable and appealing. Nigella Lawson is the "theme" for this month's Weekend Cookbook Challenge, hosted by Ani at Foodie Chickie.

La Lawson first came to my attention through her television show Nigella Bites. I hadn't heard of her before then, and I managed to catch her quite by accident when I was alone on a rainy night with nothing better to do. In fact, I was thinking of changing the channel, for preparing food was not my "thing" - my angelheart Eric was the cook in our family; I was the barman. Anyway, it didn't take long for me to get hooked. I got caught up in Nigella's energy, the way she talks directly to the camera, drawing her audience in, and by the swift and uncomplicated editing. Nigella Bites and all of Nigella's subsequent shows are contemporary and ride on La Lawson's sass, charm and heady, descriptive powers.

Okay, so it took me a few years to actually get around to trying any of her recipes, but Nigella planted the seed and many a mental note was taken - her encouragement and lack of airs made it all seem so easy. To Nigella, I am grateful for ingredients and foods that I now couldn't imagine my cooking and baking life without - principally sumac and vanilla extract.

Nigella Lawson's books capture her shows' same humour and vivacity, which are not easily translatable to text. What I also enjoy about the texts so much is her detailed explanations of combinations of ingredients, aromas and textures, clipped from other writers and from her own travels and experiences. That she has a great bibliography section at the back of each book is a wonderful bonus, a direction to further one's own culinary curiosities. From La Lawson's recommendations alone, I have found myself purchasing books by Claudia Roden, Beatrice Ojakangas, Elizabeth David, Simon Hopkinson, Patricia Wells and Nigel Slater.

The following recipe is taken from Nigella Lawson's first book, How to Eat: The Pleasures and Principles of Good Food, which I reviewed last year. And while she, too, has adapted this recipe (from Claudia Roden), I find it summarises her approach to food really well. La Lawson extracts all the goodness from every ingredient, and it is no different with the incorporation of chicken fat in this recipe, used to coat the pasta, best enjoyed hot. If you want a quick and tasty lunch, this is the way to go: chicken thighs instead of a roast chicken. The Venetian ghetto is conjured up with the pinenuts and sultanas, necessary ingredients for haroset.

Fettucine with Chicken from the Venetian Ghetto
(Adapted from Nigella Lawson's How to Eat: The Pleasures and Principles of Good Food)

2 large chicken thighs, bone in and skin on
extra virgin olive oil
salt
pepper
1/4 cup sultanas, soaked in warm water for 30 minutes
1/4 cup pine nuts, lightly toasted
fettucine, about 500g/1 lb
parsley

1) Cover the chicken thighs with olive oil, salt and pepper and start boiling a pot of water for the pasta.
2) Over a medium-high heat, pan-fry the chicken thighs - skin-side down first. It should take approximately 10-15 minutes for the thighs to be done, depending on their thickness.
3) When done, allow to become cool enough to handle. Ideally, this should be done about the time the pasta is ready to go into a pot of boiling, salted water.
4) Tear the chicken flesh from the bone either with your hands or two forks. Chop up the skin.
5) As the pasta nears completion, add the pinenuts and drained sultanas to the liquidised chicken fat and olive oil in the pan. Heat through over medium-low heat.
6) Drain pasta and immediately pour over the chicken fat, sultanas and pine nuts. Toss thoroughly.
7) Add the shredded chicken and sprinkle over with parsley.

This is incredibly comforting on a blowsy day like today. The inclusion of this recipe in Nigella Lawson's debut book is testament to her ability to create appealing and approachable food, showing off the best of each ingredient. The slickness of the oil-coated pasta is tempered by the sweet, juicy sultanas, the crunch of the toasted pinenuts and the freshness of the parsley. It took Nigella Lawson to teach me how so few ingredients are all it takes to make a good meal every day.

Labels: Chicken, Fettucine, Nigella Lawson, Weekend Cookbook Challenge