I think I should be with you

Back in 2014, Molly Wizenberg of Orangette fame published a blog post about lime curd. Although a tantalising prospect, it wasn't the curd that drew me in, nor the sugar cookies in the shape of Yorkshire terriers which acted as a grateful vessel for the smooth citrus spread; it was story that lay behind it. I won't repost it verbatim here, but when Molly was a teenager her mother used to make the lime curd in the recipe provided and visitors could spread it thickly on to accompanying sugar cookies. It's a totally innocuous tale (do people still say "cool story bro, needs more dragons"?), but the mental image of members of a book-club, huddled together and embellishing their pet-shaped biscuits is a very strong one for me.

Thanks to this story, I've had the fateful meeting of curd and biscuit lodged in my head virtually from the moment I finished reading the post. How could I take this concept and re-purpose it? I find myself in agreement with Molly's judgement that lime is "the superlative citrus", and therefore wanted to keep that part of the curd. Usually if I have limes in the flat, it's for one of two purposes; for garnishing a gin & tonic, or because I'm making Thai food. I use the latter purpose to adapt my recipe, but now I'm thinking; gin & tonic curd, would that work? I require answers.

Anyway, I tempered the sharp vitality of the limes with a dash of floral lemongrass, all to be spread over shortbread biscuits flavoured with the dry spice of ground ginger and the warmth of cardamom. I can promise you too that when I tried them together, I was emphatically not yearning for the potent scents of intoxication. The acuity of the lime is rounded out by the sweetness of the shortbread, and the slight fieriness ensures that this doesn't become overbearing. Admittedly, I'd never made or even eaten lime curd before, so this seemed a bit touch and go for a while but I was surprised by just how easy it was. I didn't even get impatient while grating the zest from the six limes, it's probably the closest I've ever been to being zen.

I mention all of this, because I probably would never have made lime curd without reading Molly's story; the simple act of contextualising and situating anchored it into the myriad recipes orbiting chaotically around my head. Though this aspect of food writing is crucial to me and countless other people who engage with the process, it is the part of the discipline that is the most widely mocked and even vilified among those who consume this media. I'd been aware of this long before I made my first post almost half a year ago, but it's on my mind now because of a tweet from Mindy Kaling which read:

"Why do all online recipes have endless pages of the chef's whole life story about the recipe and then on the 12th page is the actual recipe? I just want the recipe! I don't need the Modern Love essay on how you came up with it!"

Now, I'm totally reliant on you not thinking "she has a point" when you read the above; I'm gonna stop short of a deep deconstruction, but let's break this down just a little, should we? Firstly, I think it's so important to note that the vast majority of food writers/bloggers are not chefs. A chef is a professional cook, and while they obviously can write and blog too, the types of people you'll tend to find contributing online are home cooks who develop recipes outside of a controlled environment and therefore do tend to accrue stories regarding their provenance. They don't have a specific job description which orders them to transmit specific instructions to readers and nothing more.

It's not as if I don't get it; it is kind of hilarious to imagine the archetype of a food writer chronicling the lineage of a recipe which originated with their mother's friend's daughter's hairdresser's cousin's son's babysitter, but preserving this as a stereotype makes it that much harder for us to share our work. Sure, there can be a fair bit of pretension and elitism within the blogosphere, but that's a common denominator across the vast majority of modes of expression. Do I want to hear how so-and-so was deeply inspired by day-to-day life in their second home, a homespun villa among the vineyards and olive groves of Val di Chiana? Absolutely not. Does it get on my nerves that this experience is often written about as if it were somehow both aspirational and universal? Definitely. Do I believe that they have an inimical right to articulate that particular reality, no matter how obnoxious it comes across? Of course. I don't believe for one moment that food bloggers are largely defined by conspicuous consumption, but for where it does exist it is easily ignored.

I think the crux of this matter, however, is that we are essentially providing free content for readers to access. Some more well-established bloggers may be able to engage in revenue earning activities such as speaking events and publishing cookbooks, and so they should if they have the audience for it, but even then their blogs remain without cost to read. Doesn't it smack of entitlement to suggest we should refrain from writing to save the five to ten seconds that might have been spent scrolling past the prose and getting to the recipe? If it were somehow decreed that blog posts must be solely instructive rather than expressive, I would very quickly discontinue this blog. I've talked a lot about food always having a context (collective *ugh*) and having to suppress that would not be worth continuing on with this.

This post seems like it's been very negative so far. I lured you in with a charming story about shortbread dogs, delicious conserves and book club ladies from the 90's, before ladling on the frustration. I want to at least counterbalance this, so I've listed a few stories that are definitively stories that I like from food blogs below in addition to Molly's. I love the idea of an online blogosphere of compartmentalised micro-histories within which food has been the vehicle of anecdote. So, here are some of the stars which comprise that particular constellation:

• Deb Perelman's account of working in a local bakery in her younger years

• Luisa Weiss's visit to a Long Island nature reserve

• Jenny Rosenstrach prevaricating over what kind of tofu to make for dinner

• Sara Forte's coping mechanisms for the ongoing pandemic

What you'll notice about the stories above is that they'll range from idyllic childhood memories to the seemingly mundane aspects of day-to-day life. To me, this is all fascinating as it provides an insight into the individual forges of their cooking. With this in mind, it's difficult to see the maligning of such sincerity as being justified (sorry Mindy, I swear that I do usually enjoy your comedy). I'd really hate for us to get to situation where we know longer feel comfortable and safe enough to talk about our backgrounds, and how they evolve and influence as.

As a last note, I would be amiss to not mention how making curd was inspired by friend-of-the-blog Bee also making a delicious batch of curd (technically I didn't actually taste it because of the, uh, global pandemic, but I trust her enough to know that it was incredible). Also, I listened to a record by The Bangles when I started writing this last night that I'd bought back in November on a brunch trip with Bee and took almost half a year to play it. My title is taken from the song Be With You because it's truly sensational and why not give the post which was a partial excoriation a cutesy title? The curd and the shortbread just want to be together, and that's a story which will surely transcend the negativity! ... ugh OK.

Lime & Lemongrass Curd

Preparation time: 30 minutes

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Makes approximately 400 ml of curd

Ingredients

4 medium eggs, beaten

180g of caster sugar

6 limes, juiced squeezed and zest grated

1 1/2 tbsp lemongrass puree

100g of unsalted butter, cut into cubes

Method

Add to a medium sized saucepan the beaten eggs, caster sugar, lime zest and juice and the lemongrass puree. Turn the stove on to a low heat, and slowly warm the curd making sure to whisk frequently.

When the curd starts to thicken (which, for me, took about ten minutes of languid maintenance), continue to stir until it clings to the utensil when you remove it. Once it has thickened completely, take the saucepan off of the heat and gently stir the cubed butter in until totally combined.

Don't worry if your curd currently looks like pond detritus; the appearance will be transformed upon straining. At this point, check that the curd is cool enough to strain into a jar. Mixing in the butter should have brought the temperature down, but it's good to check.

Take a strainer, and press the curd through into a glass jar or any other appropriate receptacle. Store in the fridge and leave to set somewhat.

Ginger & Cardamom Shortbread

Preparation time: 50 minutes

Cooking time: 15-20 minutes

Makes 10-20 biscuits (I know this is woefully imprecise, but I just happened to start "experimenting" with different cookie cutters before counting how many biscuits I had - I think I had about 18 relatively large ones)

Ingredients

180g of plain white flour

130g of unsalted butter

60g of caster sugar

1 1/2 tsp of ground ginger

2 ground cardamom pod seeds

1/4 tsp of salt

Method

Add the butter and the sugar to a large mixing bowl and beat until smooth. It may be worth using a spatula to scrape down the sides of the bowl after you've done this.

Sift in the flour and add the cardamom, ginger and salt. Stir until it has all combined into a smooth dough. When you begin stirring, it will look as if it's not going to all adhere together, but do keep going! As the butter integrates with the mixture while being stirred, it will form itself into a coherent dough in no time.

Lightly flour a work surface and place your ball of dough down. Carefully take a rolling pin and roll it out to about a 1cm thickness. Don't worry about being too stringent with this; I think mine were a little thinner, but use it as an approximate guide.

When the dough has been rolled out, take a cookie cutter (of your choice) and cut out as many shapes in the dough as you can. With the dough that didn't get cut into a shape, combine it all together and knead it into a coherent ball. Roll this out again, and get as many shapes from it as you can. Repeat until you have used as much of your dough as possible.

Chill the dough in the fridge for 20 minutes, and pre-heat your oven to 190 C or 170 C if using a fan oven. Allowing the dough to refrigerate will ensure that the butter doesn't melt in the oven and cause the biscuits to spread out.

Once the biscuits have chilled, place in the oven for 15-20 minutes (err closer to 15, and leave them in for the extra 5 minutes if needed). Once they are done, allow them to cool on the baking tray for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.

Serve with the aforementioned lime & lemongrass curd on the side.

Notes & Adjustments

• The total amount of butter across both of recipes equals to 230g, and most UK supermarkets tend to sell blocks of 250g, so just one will be enough for both recipes and you'll have some leftover to spread on toast or melt over popcorn, if you should wish to do so. I think it's important here to use butter, rather than a baking spread. I am guilty of using the interchangeably because a block of the latter is about £1 cheaper, and usually this works perfectly well. However, here the buttery taste is a lot more integral so I strongly recommend using it. If you do want to save money though, the shortbread will still be good when made with a baking spread; I'm not so sure about the curd.

• Some of the ingredients here are interchangeable between the two recipes. Want to add a tsp of lime zest into your shortbread? Go ahead. If you want to add some ginger into your curd (I seriously considered this before opting for lemongrass) I would suggest using a tsp of finely chopped ginger, either instead of the lemongrass or with it.

• I used lemongrass puree in the curd because I couldn't get hold of the fresh variety. Seriously though, who is stockpiling lemongrass? Anyway, if you do have the fresh variety do use that because it is cheaper and the result be more floral. Bruise one stalk, slice it into four pieces and throw it into the mixture. Remove before straining. I also think throwing a couple of lime leaves into the curd might be interesting.

• If you want to be really fancy, when you come to eat these you could try serving them with a small bowl of toasted desiccated coconut on the side to sprinkle over the biscuits.

• Also, a disclaimer: you can make these separately; they are not reliant on one another.

• Another disclaimer: if you are reading this during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, do not invite your friends over to spread curd on top of shortbread. I know that the mental image of the book club is incredibly alluring, but you'll have to keep this pleasure to yourself for the moment OR perhaps share this recipe with ALL of your friends and host a virtual curd spreading party over Zoom.

I think that's all folks. I know I complained a lot, but I want to thank anyone who does read and encourage me to keep writing; it means a lot. I raise a shortbread liberally spread with curd to you.

Ashe x