Learning the game

I think I have talked before about how comfortable I mostly feel now in putting together a dish from scratch based on the years I've spent cooking and coming to understand flavours and techniques that while they may not produce cutting edge cuisine will get me through most meals whether for myself or for a hastily gathered group.

I'm not claiming for myself anything other than practice, but it feels great to take a basic bechamel and add a splash of tomato sugo, a generous pinch of herbed sea salt and an equally generous pinch of smoked paprika (one of my favourite flavourings), reduce it down to a stage where I can add a panful of lightly sauteed mixed mushrooms and simmer this down quickly to a creamy mixture that I can pour over a layer of slices of just cooked potato lining the bottom of a grapeseed oiled dish, top with another layer of potatoes sprinkled with grated parmesan, grill, and have a most satisfying wet autumn night's dinner. But to also recognise as I hoe into it that the next time presenting the dish with a side of chopped fresh herbs (parsley, thyme, marjoram and perhaps sage either solo or in combo) would take the dish just that step further. Would I go the extent of sliced kalamata olives along with the parmesan on top, absolutely, and I may even go so far as to slice up my home salted dried kalimata that have been marinating in olive oil and dried chili for a couple of years. But no more, I think. There's a fine balance to be found between the additions that enhance the basic dish and those that overwhelm its basics, in this case that combination of potatoes and mushrooms, and I think it's that balance that I get right more often than not these days (there still are disasters that are best composted).

As I think I have in my barbecued whole fish (snapper works well as does redfish). In the absence of lemon or dill one day I looked to the herbs in the garden for a tad of inspiration. What I came up with was first oiling, pepper and salting a sheet of aluminium foil, then laying on top of it a generous bunch of lemon verbena and sprigs of bay, putting the same mix inside the gutted belly of the fish, deep scoring the flesh of the fish three times, laying the fish on its side on the prepared sheet of aluminium foil, then covering the exposed side of the fish with more lemon verbena, bay, pepper, salt and oil, covering that with another sheet of foil, sealing the packet and barbecuing it at a high heat for around 10 to 15 minutes each side.