Barbequed brochette of prawns, squid and courgette with sauce vierge

A stunning recipe from Bruce Poole's cookbook Bruce's Cookbook that shows barbeques don't have to be all about burgers and ribs.

Bruce's restaurant Chez Bruce in Wandsworth in south London, is a place where chefs - and food writers - like to go when they're off-duty. This is one of the simpler recipes in the book which by and large isn't one of those 'quick'n'easy' volumes but a serious collection of recipes for people who want to turn out Michelin-standard - but not fiddly - food. A must-buy for any cookbook collector.

Serves 4 as a main course or more in smaller form as part of a bigger barbecue offering

2 large courgettes, topped and tailed
salt
8 fresh baby squid, each one no longer than 10cm, cleaned by the fishmonger
12 large, raw prawns, thawed if frozen
1 lemon
For the sauce vierge
6 large ripe plum tomatoes, blanched and skinned
2 large shallots, peeled and finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, peeled and minced
salt and freshly ground black pepper
your best olive oil
1 small bunch of fresh basil, leaves picked and torn

Light the barbecue. Slice the courgettes lengthways on a mandolin into thin, 2mm-thick slices. Sprinkle with salt and leave to disgorge in a colander for half an hour or so.

To make the sauce vierge, separate the tomato flesh from the seeds and pulp and discard the latter. Cut the flesh into neat 1cm dice and combine with the shallots in a mixing bowl. Add the garlic and season with salt and pepper. Leave for 15 minutes to encourage the salt to get to work with the toms. Add a good slug of olive oil and the torn basil. Adjust the seasoning and reserve at room temperature.

Dry the courgettes on absorbent kitchen paper and roll them up into tight coils. Fold each squid in half. Thread the folded squid, the courgette coils and the prawns on to the skewers evenly. Don’t worry unduly if there is an uneven number of courgettes.

Season the brochettes with salt and pepper just prior to grilling. Place them without any oil on to the barbecue and cook until pleasantly charred all over – about 5 minutes in total. Transfer to a plate and sprinkle with olive oil and lemon juice. Serve with the sauce vierge and perhaps some couscous, or a cold rice or pasta salad.

What to drink: Plenty of possibilities - a crisp, elegant Sauvignon Blanc, an Albario or a dry Italian white like a Vermentino would all be good. Or - and I suspect Bruce might well go for this himself - a bone dry Alsace grand cru Riesling.

Bacon, Isle of Mull cheddar and Thornbridge beer bread rolls

I don't normally run commercial recipes but this comes from an enterprising new cookbook from a brewery I really like called Thornbridge with recipes from chef Richard Smith.

It's called Craft Union and includes a useful section on matching beer with food.

If you've never baked with beer before you'll be amazed how good the results are. You could, of course, substitute another pale ale for the Kipling.

Makes approx. 30 small rolls

Ingredients

Bread

500g granary flour

500g white bread flour

10g salt

50g fresh baker’s yeast

200ml Thornbridge Kipling beer (or other pale ale) plus a little for brushing

350ml water

140g smoked bacon, diced and cooked

100g Isle of Mull (or other) cheddar cheese, finely grated

Glaze

25ml Thornbridge Kipling beer (or other pale ale)

25g sugar

Method

For the bread

Mix both the flours and yeast in a bowl. Add the beer and water and bring together. Cover with a wet cloth and leave to prove somewhere warm until it doubles in size.

Cut the dough in half and roll it out into a rectangle 5mm thick. Add the cheese, bacon and salt and knead. Brush the rectangle with beer and roll up like a Swiss roll.

Cut the roll into portions 3cm thick and place them on greaseproof paper on a tray

Now prove again for about 30 minutes somewhere warm until they double in size.

Pre-heat the oven to 210°C.

When the bread has proved, put the tray into the oven and cook for roughly ten minutes or until golden brown (when tapped on the bottom the rolls should make a hollow sound)

Turn the rolls onto a wire rack until cool

For the glaze

Pour the remaining beer into a pan with the sugar. Warm until the sugar is dissolved then reduce it on a medium heat until a syrup is formed. Brush the glaze over the rolls.

Warm the bread in the oven for a couple of minutes before eating.

This recipe comes from Craft Union: Matching Beer with Food. You can buy the book from the Thornbridge shop for £14.95.

Sheekey's famous fish pie

Any of you who have been to J Sheekey's in the West End will probably have succumbed to their unbelievably good fish pie. Here's the recipe from their cookbook J Sheekey Fish.

"Some people add lobster, prawns or peas to their pie" says their chef Tim Hughes. "We prefer this purer version."

Serves 4

200g cod fillet (or another white chunky fish such as halibut or monkfish), skinned and cut into rough 3cm chunks
200g salmon fillet, skinned and cut into rough 3cm chunks
200g smoked haddock fillet, skinned and cut into rough 3cm chunks
Half a small bunch of flat leaf parsley, chopped

For the sauce

50g unsalted butter
50g plain flour
125ml white wine
500ml fish stock
90ml double cream
1 tablespoon English mustard
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
Half a teaspoon anchovy essence
Half a lemon, juiced
Salt and ground white pepper

For the topping

1kg floury potatoes, cooked and dry mashed (e.g. King Edwards)
50g unsalted butter
50ml milk
Salt and ground white pepper
20g fresh white breadcrumbs
10g freshly grated parmesan

To make the sauce, melt the butter in a heavy-bottomed saucepan over a low heat and gently stir in the flour. Gradually add the wine, stirring well. Slowly add the fish stock (a good-quality cube is fine) until you have a silky smooth sauce. Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 15 minutes. To finish, add the cream and briefly bring to the boil again. Stir in mustard, Worcestershire sauce, anchovy essence and lemon juice. (Add more mustard and Worcestershire sauce if you like it spicy.) Check seasoning.

Gently fold the fish and parsley into the hot sauce, and pour into a large pie dish, leaving a space of about 3cm from the top of the dish. Leave to cool, so the topping will sit on the sauce when piped.

Pre-heat the oven to 190°C/gas mark 5. Mix butter and milk into the mashed potato until soft enough to spread over the fish mixture. Season. Pipe or gently fork to cover the fish.

Bake the fish pie for 30 minutes. Sprinkle over the breadcrumbs and cheese, and bake for a further 10 minutes until golden.

What to drink: A perfect excuse to bring out a Chablis or other good white burgundy or other luscious, creamy cool-climate chardonnay.

J. Sheekey's Fish by Tim Hughes and Allan Jenkins is published by Preface Publishing at £25. Photograph © Howard Sooley.

Sherry Cobbler

Given the growing popularity of sherry cocktails and the fact that it's World Sherry Day this weekend here's a recipe for a sherry cobbler from Hawksmoor at Home (my son's restaurant, I have to confess).

Will and Huw write: "As the discerning drinker’s pre-air conditioning coolant of choice, this was, according to the New York weekly New World in 1840, ‘the greatest “liquorary” invention of the day’. Its popularity continued, leading Harry Johnson to observe in the 1888 edition of his Bartenders’ Manual, that it is ‘without doubt the most popular beverage in the country, with ladies as well as gentlemen’. A description in The Gentleman’s Magazine explains why: ‘[The cobbler is] a light vinous punch, exceedingly well iced, and grateful to the delicate æsophagus’ (William Burton, 1840.)

Sherry seems to have had a rather different image back then as it was deemed the perfect match for an evening of debauchery: ‘[at a San Franciscan saloon] we find the governor of the State seated by a table, surrounded by judges of the supreme and superior courts, sipping sherry cobblers, smoking segars [cigars], and reveling in all the delights of anticipated debauch’ (Dreadful California, Hinton Helper, 1855).

Early recipes call for it to be made with slices of orange. We think it makes for a more refreshing drink if lemon and lime are added as well.

For each person

2 slices each of lemon, lime and orange

100ml manzanilla sherry

50ml freshly squeezed lemon juice

25ml sugar syrup (gomme)

crushed ice

Dice one slice of each fruit into small pieces (about 3cm x 3cm) and put these at the bottom of a large glass tumbler

Add the sherry, lemon juice and sugar syrup, then fill the tumbler 3/4 of the way up with crushed ice. Churn the drink until well mixed and top with a little more crushed ice. Add a straw and garnish with the other slices of lemon, lime and orange.