The Kitchen Diaries II. Nigel Slater

a couple of sweet oranges. It probably goes without saying that there is someone out there making it in minutes in the microwave (and surely missing the whole damn point).

      The method you choose will depend on how you like your marmalade. Don’t probe a marmalade fan on the subject of texture unless you are actually in need of a Mogadon. Some of us like ours soft and syrupy, others prefer a jam that will stand to attention on the spoon. I like my peel in thin, hair-like strips, while friends insist on juicy chunks. Then there are those who leave the fruit in whole slices or cut it into fat nuggets. In my experience the latter produces the marmalade most likely to fall off your toast while you are engrossed in Nancy Banks-Smith or the Today programme. Lastly, there’s the lot who insist on sieving their pith out altogether. And the lovely thing is that each and every one of us is right.

      I like my marmalade to shine in the morning sun. A bright, jewel-like mixture with thin strands of peel, quivering, but not so loosely set that it drips down the sleeves of my dressing gown. The point of this golden jam is its bittersweet quality. It’s a wake-up call in a jar. That is why we eat it first thing in the morning. The bitter oranges you need are available for a short season in January and February.

      I know I am stepping into deep water giving a marmalade recipe, which is partly why it has taken me twenty years to get round to offering you one, but marmalade recipes are very personal things and we marmalade makers are a proud bunch (which is possibly another reason why we give so much of it away). But here it is, a little pot or two of bright, shining happiness, full of bittersweet flavour and stinging thumbs.

      Seville orange marmalade

      I made two batches this year. One with organic fruit, the other not. The flavour of the organic one shone most brilliantly and took less time to reach setting point.

      Makes enough to fill about 5 or 6 jam jars.

      Seville oranges: 1.3kg

      lemons: 2

      golden granulated sugar: 2.6kg

      Using a small, particularly sharp kitchen knife, score four lines down each fruit from top to bottom, as if you were cutting it into quarters. Let the knife cut through the peel without piercing the fruit. Remove the peel, cut each quarter of peel into fine shreds (or thicker slices if you like a chunkier texture) and put into a large bowl. Squeeze in the juice from the peeled oranges and lemons with your hands, chop the pulp and add it, removing the pips. Add 2.5 litres of cold water. Tie the pips in a muslin bag and push into the peel and juice. Set aside in a cold place and leave overnight.

      The next day, tip the mixture into a large stainless steel or enamelled pan (or a preserving pan for those lucky enough to have one) and push the muslin bag down under the juice. Bring to the boil, then lower the heat so that the liquid continues to simmer merrily. It is ready when the peel is totally soft and translucent. This can take anything from forty minutes to a good hour and a half, depending purely on how thick you have cut your peel (this time, mine took forty-five minutes).

      Once the fruit is ready, lift out the muslin bag and leave it in a bowl until it is cool enough to handle. Add the sugar to the peel and juice and turn up the heat, bringing the marmalade to a rolling boil. Squeeze every last bit of juice from the reserved muslin bag into the pan. Skim off any froth that rises to the surface (if you don’t, your preserve will be cloudy). Leave at a fast boil for fifteen minutes. Remove a tablespoon of the preserve, put it on a plate and pop it into the fridge for a few minutes. If a thick skin forms on the surface of the refrigerated marmalade, then it is ready and you can switch the heat off. If the tester is still liquid, then let the marmalade boil for longer, testing every ten to fifteen minutes. Some mixtures can take up to fifty minutes to reach setting consistency. Ladle into sterilised pots and seal immediately.

      FEBRUARY 7

      Fish, some new thoughts

      I like February, with its grey-white skies and snowdrops. In the kitchen it is the time for long-cooked dishes of earth-coloured pulses, meat on its bones and home-made cakes. A month of beans, bones and baking. But it is also the month I go on holiday. Not towards warmth and bright sunshine, but places cold and icy, with crisp air that reminds you that you are alive.

      Little feels more right than eating fish within a few steps of the sea. A lunch in Oslo, now a favourite place to escape, of fish soup flavoured with basil, eaten within sight of seventy white masts in a harbour with water like a black mirror, feels about as right as any meal I have ever eaten. Even more so as I saw the fish arrive barely twenty minutes before.

      I have eaten nothing but fish for several days now – give or take the odd marzipan-filled, cardamom-scented maple syrup bun. The most curious was my lunch yesterday, of Arctic char served with chestnuts, bacon and apple purée. You feel it shouldn’t work, the flavours being more suited to pork or perhaps reindeer, but it does. A dish ordered partly out of novelty, partly out of disbelief. It’s clever, because the apples are cut into the tiniest imaginable dice and mixed with celery before being fried and served with the fish. It is a bit of a nancy presentation, but it leaves me inspired enough to have a go at home.

      I have always loved the colour grey. Peaceful, elegant, understated; the colour of stone, steel and soft, nurturing rain. The view from the window across the harbour has every shade, from driftwood to charcoal: the lagoon, the restaurant’s weathered cedar cladding, the moored boats, the trees on the opposite shore, all in delicate shades of calming grey.

      The monotones through the window aren’t altered by my plate of scallops, two if we are being precise, shallow fried, with a julienne of apple on top. Creamy, buttery cauliflower purée, black pepper and tiny bits of fried cauliflower complete the dish. It’s a study in cream and white on a white plate, eaten under a stainless sky. A scene of such subtlety it makes everything else look gaudy and crass. There is risotto too, a blissful combination of smoked cod and spinach. As soon as I am off the plane, back in my own kitchen, I will ape that restaurant’s sublime risotto.

      A risotto of smoked cod and spinach

      And I did …

      milk: 450ml

      smoked cod or haddock: 400g

      bay leaves: 2

      black peppercorns: 6

      hot stock: 450ml

      a small onion

      butter: 50g

      Arborio or other risotto rice: 250g

      a glass of white wine

      spinach leaves: 2 handfuls

      Pour the milk into a saucepan large enough to take the fish. Place the fish in the milk, add the bay leaves and peppercorns, then bring to the boil. As soon as the milk shows signs of foaming, lower the heat and simmer for ten minutes. Turn off the heat and leave the milk to infuse with the fish and aromatics. Heat the stock in a saucepan; it should simmer lightly whilst you are making the risotto.

      Peel and finely chop the onion, then fry gently in the butter in a broad, heavy-bottomed pan. When the onion is soft and translucent, and before it colours, add the rice and briefly stir it through the butter to coat the grains. Pour in the wine, let it evaporate, then add the stock a ladleful at a time, allowing each one to be soaked up by the rice before adding the next, stirring continually and keeping the heat moderate to low. Once the stock has been used up, change to the milk, strained of its peppercorns. By the time almost all the milk has been absorbed, the grains should be soft and plump yet with a firm bite to them. Season carefully. The total cooking time will probably be about twenty minutes, maybe a few minutes longer.

      Wash