Sauce #57 | Antiques Horror Show

Braised Courgettes with White Beans, Chard & Smoked Anchovies

We’ve had less eventful weekends.

On Saturday morning I talked Rosie into letting me go to the Ripley Salvage Fair with a very clear, theoretically efficient mission that involved buying one or two specific items. These sorts of affairs can be quite overwhelming and it is easy to get distracted by all the shiny objects, so it is essential to turn up with a clear purpose, to focus on the job in hand.

Naturally, I found myself distracted fairly quickly. The first item I bought was an antique chauffeur’s badge, dated New Hampshire 1917, which I thought would make an excellent golf ball marker. This was not on the list (five quid though - a good find if this is anything to go by.)

The next thing I purchased was a vintage French seed rack that I thought would make an excellent wine rack for the Clock Barn. This was also Not On The List.

I did eventually find a few of the required items, and set off back for home, pleased with my endeavours. We were due to have lunch with friends near the kids’ school, which is also not all that far from the Clock Barn. I remembered that I had some mackerel curing that had probably seen enough of its cure. I told Rosie I was just going to pop by to give this mackerel a soak in fresh water and pop it in the fridge to dry before smoking it in a day or so.

“I’ll meet you at the Roberts”, I said.

This didn’t go down all that well. Arriving in two cars was, admittedly, unnecessary. I said I’d be as quick as I could and come home first. The clock struck midday. The mackerel were taken out of their salt and sugar cure, which was by now a liquid brine, and transferred to a container of fresh water for a cleanse. A desalination. I thought it best to give them a good half hour to remove any excess brackishness. With half an hour to kill I thought about various changes I might make to the room, thought about where I might put this new seed rack, thought about opening a beer.

Then I glanced at my phone and saw a flurry of missed calls from Rosie, followed by a text message which revealed that Thom had fallen off his bike, was pretty battered, bruised and bloody, and that they were going to the minor injuries unit in Ripon. In something of a panic I dropped what I was doing, by which I mean I very quickly got the mackerel out of the bath and into the fridge, and hightailed it to Ripon, giving, I fear, the finger to an elderly woman who didn’t let me through on a tight bit of road when it was very much my right of way. Not my proudest moment but in these episodes of high stress forgivable I would hope.

Arriving at A&E, I was shocked to find that rather than having exaggerated, Rosie had undersold the extent of Thom‘s injuries. He was covered - as was the chair he was sitting on - in blood, his body bruised and grazed and raw. The poor boy was as pale as a battery hen.

Nora, much like her father, had half an eye on the time and was wondering if we would make it to lunch at her friends’ house. There was no need for us all to hang about so the girls set off for lunch while Thom and I readied ourselves for a long wait which mercifully never transpired.

It might, in fact, be said that we were in and out all too quickly, his wounds only cursorily cleaned and dressed, the X-ray carried out in haste. This revealed a fracture on both bones and we still await confirmation as to when he’ll get an actual cast put on it. It’s unseemly to brag about one’s children but I’m very proud of how stoical he’s being, though as concerned as everyone else about the state of the NHS.

At least there was a good lunch after all this drama. The kids ate hotdogs and flopped in front of something ghastly on YouTube. We were treated to some staggeringly good lamb ribs, and then barbecued rump steaks rested in Café de Paris butter. Top drawer kit all round. You know it’s a good lunch when you leave at half six and that still feels far too early, though I suspect the injured soldier was ready for home.

By Sunday night (my brother-in-law Jono had produced a very fine lunch on Sunday to a somewhat jaded family of diners) we wanted something light-ish and reliable and nourishing, which the following certainly was.