meemalee

Last year I somehow managed to wangle an invitation to the Waitrose Summer Party. All the greats in the food world were meant to be in attendance, but the main attraction for me were the hosts (and Waitrose ambassadors) - Delia Smith and Heston Blumenthal. I was hoping to meet Heston so I could give him a good poke , but I wanted to meet Delia purely to engineer a situation where I could get her to say the word "hummus". Because in case you didn't know already, the First Lady of Norwich has a tendency to pronounce it " Who-Moose ". To be fair, apparently that is the correct way to say hummus or houmous, but it still makes me snigger when I hear her say it - in the same childish way that it makes me smile when a non-French person calls Paris "Paree". Anyway, Heston and Delia didn't actually turn up, so I spent my time standing next to a very tall man who'd also been looking forward to meeting them. Wie schade. Anyway, hummus or who-moose is one...

Some people don't like century eggs. Those people are wrong . Whenever I visit Burma, I try to consume five times my bodyweight in food - that’s just the way I roll (sometimes literally, on the way back from Heathrow). Give me a break, I only make it out there every couple of years, so I need to make it last. This means I eat out (and in) about 12 times a day and succeed in putting on at least two dress sizes. I’m completely spoilt for choice when it comes to eating out - there are 135 ethnic groups in Burma each with varying cuisines. I’m a mixed bag myself - I worked out the other day that I’m 38% Shan, 32% Bamar, 13% Intha and 17% Chinese. I used a spreadsheet and everything. I guess it’s the Chinese in me that drives me to visit Shway Bè in Mandalay (that and the magnificent mascot - see above), for Shway Bè is ostensibly a Chinese restaurant, though most of the food has a Burmese twist. And when we’re there, we always order the roast duck (Shway Bè means ...

Lord knows that I'm not a vegetarian, though I'm not averse to the odd meat-free day. But when it comes to eating out, vegetarians generally get a pretty raw deal, with one to no options in most cases. This vexes me particularly as I'd been tasked with organised our works Christmas lunch, which turned into a New Year lunch, which turned into a Chinese New Year lunch, and two of our party are strict vegetarians (rather than wishy-washy "I am a veggie, though I do eat fish" types). For once I want us to go somewhere where they'll be able to choose anything off the menu rather than be stuck with the one pappy risotto. Vanilla Black seems an obvious candidate, but to be honest is too close to our office for comfort. In the end, someone suggests Zilli Green in the heart of Soho, a new vegetarian restaurant from Aldo Zilli (on the site of Signor Zilli), which is opening just this week. Perfect, I think and so I book. It's tipping it down when we get there, b...

So Sir Paul McCartney is exhorting us to have Meat-Free Mondays and for once I'm impressed. Don't get me wrong, I love the Beatles, but I've always thought Macca was a bit of a tool partly due to the McCartney/Lennon credits squabble and partly because a few years back, I went to see Theatre of the New Ear (amazing Coen Brothers / Charlie Kauffman play ) and, just before it started, Paul and then wife Heather Mills marched in front of the audience and stopped just so he could do a thumbs-up "Ayyyyy!" in the style of Arthur Fonzarelli . Heather looked really embarrassed and I actually felt sorry for her. Then they traipsed up the aisles to sit eight rows behind us. Heh. Anyway, I'm a rampant carnivore, but even I can see that it would be better for the planet's future to go meat-free where possible and everyone can do it at least one day a week. Therefore I present to you my favourite vegetarian Burmese dish - Egg Curry aka jet-u jhet (literally ...

"Marian" is the name of my favourite Indiana Jones character ( you already know of my Indy love ). It's also the name of one of my favourite fruits - the marian or marian plum, botanical name Bouea Burmanica , known as ma-yong or maa-prong in Thailand. Marians aren't lovely, luscious orbs of juicy sweetness however. Even when ripe, they're mouth-puckeringly sour and they're a vital component of one of the best Burmese salads ever . Unfortunately, as far as I know you can't get marian fruit in this country. Even in Burma, marians or mayun-thee is only available seasonally, and I always seem to manage to miss them whenever I get over there. However, there's always a substitute for an impossible ingredient and my mother discovered long ago that gooseberries make a respectable replacement. Since then, every June, I've bought up the very first "goosegogs" available ( thanks Tasty Tottenham ) to make this salad. Marian salad is eaten as a s...