Dear LPG,

As the days in England begin to remind us what winter weather is all about it felt good to be working on my attempt at a dish from a climate which is thought of as warm and, having read this recipe from ingredients to method well in advance I was confident that I was prepared to produce a good plate of food.

I have to report that my plan was to get a tagine to make the final picture look more authentic, but when I looked on line and learned that a cheap one would cost me upwards of £15.00, I decided that, for a one off dish, the Dutch pot would have to do.    So, with its wobbly domed base and flat top as opposed to the flat bottomed and funnelled lid of the traditional cooking vessel, my attempt to pay homage to this dish was somewhat flawed before I started.

The recipe was just a matter of making a weird sort of spicy tea, browning the meat and putting everything in the pot really, and even I could not get that wrong.  The honey and apricots made for a really interesting taste and I have to say that this was my most successful attempt at anything to date.  I even think that my fellow diners were quite impressed, and although my finished dish was a bit runnier than the authentic version, and the lack of a ‘Tagine’ forced my picture to look not quite the same as the one I was aiming for, if you can accept that it is in a different pot it does not look too bad.

For my next trick I would like to transport LPG readers to Finland, although perhaps this is not one for the diabetics amongst us.  I have decided to try my hand at a little Scandinavian baking as I attempt to produce one or two successful representations of Korvapuusti as we celebrate Finland’s Independence on December 6^th. 

CB, Lewisham.

CB offers some variations on a baking theme for next month’s challenge…

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