Podere Finerri

Serves 8

800g finely sliced fine fillet steak
400g rocket salad
200g shaved parmesan
1 lemon
salt
pepper
olive oil

Prepare 2-3 hours before serving.
Place the slices of beef on a large serving dish
Sprinkle with salt and pepper
Squeeze the juice of the lemon over the beef
Cover
Do not refrigerate

Just before serving cover the beef with fresh rocket salad and douse liberally with olive oil
Shave fresh parmesan over the beef and rocket.
Serve.

Here they are: purple, prickly, inviting, lots of them…time for experiments: fried artichokes, artichoke soup, pasta with artichokes, artichoke salad…yum!

Fried artichokes

Squeeze a lemon into a bowl of water, drop the rind into the bowl, and add a pinch of salt and a little bit of flour (not enough to make a paste). Peel away the tough outer leaves of the artichokes, trim the tops perpendicular to the length of the artichokes, and cut the artichokes into eighths. Do this quickly and get them into the lemon water asap as they begin oxidising and going brown in seconds. Soak them in the lemon water for an hour. Rinse them, wrap them in a tea towel and swing them around your head to dry them, sprinkle them with flour, pass them through the beaten egg. Fry them until crisp and golden in hot sunflower oil. Sprinkle with a little salt and eat while still super hot!

6 new family members: a speckled hen, 2 guinea fowls and three goslings (which at the moment are in a basket in front of the fire recovering from hypothermia, winter is back with a vengeance). Alice and Arwen have named them which means they are not destined for the pot. The guinea fowls on the other hand….

Still waiting for it,  in religious concentration we all pray the grey sky to dissolve into a warm blue to let our green fields to be shining and full of joy again

Last weekend brought snow to Finerri. We were outside building snowmen and having snowball fights. Sunday was still cold but on the melt. We needed a warm wholesome finish to the weekend. I had some rough beef off-cuts in the fridge and cubes of a venison stock in the freezer. I’d made the stock after de-boning a piece of venison left by Marco in November.

A stew was on the cards.

I took the last of the summer’s onions off the outside wall in the covered way, which although on the soft side, still had great flavour. I sliced them and browned them with some olive oil in this  great Fontignac cast iron casserole dish I have, added the beef, browned, then added 3 or 4 cubed  carrots 3 sticks of celery and a couple of potatoes. Braving the snow I went down and pulled a couple of leeks from the garden, sliced and added them. When the spuds started to stick I began adding the hot stock and when everything is covered close the lid, turn it right down and go and do something else for a couple of hours. The lid of the Fontignac drips the condensation back onto the stew so you don’t have to be continuously on standby to add more stock. The meat cooks ever so slowly and falls apart on your fork. I always add a little salt and pepper at the end, seeing what the result is before seasoning the stew. I served this with some organic semifine brown venere rice. Watch the rice. It takes about half an hour to cook. It is full, wholesome grain. It turns the water purple. You notice that the kids don’t ask for a sweet afterwards…

Last week our fantastic white rooster fought and died valiantly on the Finerri battlefield. The odds were hugely against him. Wily Mr. Fox waited till no one was around and then struck. In spilling his blood he saved the lives of his five wives. He who chose to die for love will be remembered.