Yes my brave internaughts, it's another daring combination of the English and French. A bit like that great 'British' engineer, Brunel, who had a French mother and English father - and look what an impact he made.

Today I cranked up my Anglo-French nonsense by making two absolutely classic dishes from different sides of the Channel-Manche, that old great Monday breakfast classic bubble and squeek, served with a simple navarin au fenouil.

Now I know that bubble and squeek is best made with cold roast potatoes but I didn't have any. So, and in order to make some regardless of the normal bubble and squeek rules, I fried some potatoes first, let them go cold and then made some really quite superb squeek with these. The navarin is an old housewife's standard from La France. It's normally a turnip based stew with lamb but the fennel variety is not unheard of over there and I had some fennel in which needed eating.

As a combination it was superb. The navarin was tender and not overly aniseed tasting and the bubble and squeek was crispy and delicious. Maybe we should all have a go at mixing up dishes from around the globe.

Chilli con carne with made with haggis for instance. Now there's a challenge.


Cake Blog

Rasperry Cream Turnover: Again from Sainsbury's. It's hard to go wrong with fruit, pastry and cream and this didn't disappoint.


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