meemalee

I've just been in Japan for a fortnight and I really didn't want to leave. But when I was on the plane back to Blighty, I decided to count my blessings, one of which is a little Vietnamese cafe near my office called City Caphe . Open only at lunchtimes, I've got through many a long morning at my desk by day-dreaming about City Caphe's food. The day-dreaming continues as I wait in their queue which stretches out the door - it's a dratted constant, but it's worth standing there, even in the rain. Sometimes I press my nose against the window, Charlie Bucket-like, to stare at the gorgeous steaming dishes that others are already enjoying. The queue continues to wind inside, but rather charmingly, they have a selection of books for the hungry punters to pass the time. I'm not a bread person, but even I adore City Caphe's banh mi, and their summer rolls are the best I've had ( apart from my own ) - packed with prawns and herbs, though there's a tofu ve...

I've never been a fan of spring rolls. I'm fairly sure this is as a result of early exposure at school dinners to a comestible dubbed a pancake roll - a huge, solid, brown rectangle dripping with grease and flabby beansprouts. But summer rolls are an entirely different matter. Fresh, light, stuffed with herbs and lettuce and other stuff so deliciously good for you that it's practically a salad, without the hair-shirt. A traditional Vietnamese snack, summer rolls aka gỏi cuốn need at least one specialist ingredient (the rice paper wrappers), but it's worth schlepping out and stocking up. Classic fillings are thin rice noodles, lettuce, pork and prawns. You can leave out the pork to make it meat-free or substitute fried tofu. I like to use diced roast pork belly (ok, so the claim to health food becomes wobbly here) or sometimes chunks of roast duck. You could use leftovers from a roast. Lettuce-wise, you want to use butter, Boston or Bibb - the round, velvety type - as...

Saturday evening, I'm at a family wedding, full of cake and gazing happily at the flickering tealights dotted around on my table. My 10 year old niece comes up to me and opens her hand and says, "What are these, Daw Daw ?" Her palm is full of star anise taken from the table centrepieces. I say to her, "Smell one" and she does, and she says it smells spicy and faintly sweet. I then take one pod and wave it through a flame and say, "Smell it again", and her eyes light up and she says it smells wonderful. I tell her that it's a spice used in Asian cookery and she runs off to gather more, and then insists I give them all the same treatment. As I singe the anise pods one by one, she gets one of the wedding favours, a gauzy reticule full of sugared almonds, up-ends the sweets inside, and replaces them with the charred anise. She then reties the satin ribbon carefully and sniffs the newly-stuffed little pouch appreciatively. That scent of charred star ani...