100 YEARS OLD AND STILL COOKING UP A TREAT...

FINALLY, after almost 35 years of harbouring a modicum of illfeeling, I have decided to forgive Bulgaria. I might, I suppose, have left my forgiveness a little longer so that Mrs May could include it in her Brexit negotiations but my recent pro-Bulgarian experience came as such a pleasant surprise that I felt impelled to forgive them immediately.

I last visited Bulgaria, you see, on some business so secret that I cannot breathe a word of it but my grudge was not a consequence of the business but of the food. I was staying in a decent enough hotel in the city of Plovdiv (which used to be called Philippopolis) and the trouble was that the hotel food was most unappetising.

Indeed, so desperate did I become that one of my secret coded messages back to England ended with the words, “food here terrible, please send chocolate”.

My low opinion of Bulgarian cuisine stayed with me until last week when I dropped in on a cookery demonstration at Borough Market hosted by the splendid people at Le Cordon Bleu cookery school. The chef for this occasion was a cheerful fellow called Emil Minev who is the culinary arts director at Le Cordon Bleu and who, remarkably enough, hails from Bulgaria.

After explaining that he was going to take us round Borough Market then instruct us in making a scrumptious sounding dessert before showing us how to cook a delicious hunk of Rhug Estate lamb, he took us all shopping.

I was shocked at his Bulgarity but I know that Rhug Estate lamb is the best known to mankind and the chef’s expertise in selecting mushroom species I had never heard of made me give him the benefit of the doubt.

So after a round of delectable mushroom picking, we were all sat down and told to pour a saucepan of heated whipping cream onto a bowl of white chocolate buttons and stir vigorously until they melted. After adding yogurt, we passed our bowls of slush to the chef who put them together in a bowl in the fridge.

Then he got us to hull some strawberries, which he adorned with some basil leaves and sealed into another bowl with copious cling film before placing it over a pan of boiling water. The juice from the strawberries would seep out, he explained, and half an hour later, it had done just that.

Meanwhile, he did some wondrous things with the lamb and cooked the mushrooms and other vegetables in lamb stock and lamb fat, both made from the trimmings, and moments later we were tucking into a deliciously tender hunk of lamb surrounded by meaty-tasting vegetables.

We rounded off the meal with a bowl of fresh strawberries sitting on a dollop of white chocolate, cream and yogurt ganache, surrounded by cold basil-infused strawberry soup. I have since recreated this at home and it was just as delicious as in Borough Market.

Bulgaria, you are forgiven. After 35 years, you have more than overcome your culinary inadequacies. You have my permission to send us your Cordon Bleu chefs whenever you like.