SIMPLE FOODS FOR A SIMPLE LIFE

We have heard a lot of talk over the past few years about so called super foods. My grandma would have thought it all rubbish. Her motto was if God grows it, it must be good for you. She planned her meals with one eye on the cost of what went on the plate and the other eye on what was nourishing. If it also happened to taste good, well that was just a bonus.

Grandma didn’t go with various fads but she did have a huge variety of menus that dressed up the same food items in various disguises. I tend to follow a lot of my gran’s ideas when it comes to different versions of the same thing, take for example the simple egg.

An egg can be eaten in a different form every day of the week. As a non meat eater I eat a lot of eggs and never get tired of them. I try to exclusively use farm fresh eggs for meals, for baking I use anything but what goes on the plate has to taste good. An egg is an amazing thing, it can be soft-boiled, hard-boiled, fried, poached, scrambled, stirred through rice, made into an omelette, devilled and, in desserts, it can be used in whatever your imagination can dream up.

My particular favourite way to eat an egg is dry-fried, a piece of cheese melted on top and served between two halves of a toasted English muffin. I eat it slowly to get all the flavour and savour every crumb. The dark yellow yolk of a farm fresh egg is so full of richness that my mouth is watering at the thought of letting that goodness roll around my tongue so my taste buds do not miss one nuance of it’s depth of flavour.

Another food with so many uses is the humble potato. Whether baked, mashed or simply boiled it has so much good taste in it that it doesn’t need any dressing up except a little salt. Fries may not be a healthy option but the crispy coating with a soft interior is a delightful sin.

One of my favourite memories of being a teenager in England was walking home from a movie eating chips out of a newspaper wrapping. They would have salt and vinegar sprinkled over them and the taste of hot chips in the cold night air was absolutely wonderful. Nothing served on a fine china plate could ever taste as good. They were eaten with your fingers that would absorb the flavour and could be tasted long after the chips were gone. A vinegar flavoured kiss would round off a perfect night and the bus ride home was equal to any that Cinderella took in her glass coach.

The flavours of our youth linger long after the smell of vinegar has been scrubbed from our fingers. Ahh, the simple pleasures leave long memories.