THE SUNDAY COOK
The Sunday Telegraph
Sunday 27 January 2019
well to the surface. Coarsely grate the cheeses.
Mix the cornflour or potato flour with about 50ml of the wine until smoothly blended. Add the grated cheeses to the pot, pour in the remaining wine and add the cornflour or potato flour mixture.
Place the pot over a low heat and stir frequently with a wooden spoon until the cheeses melt. As soon as they do, stir constantly, adding the nutmeg and a little pepper, to taste. As the fondue comes to the boil, add the kirsch, if using, and make sure your guests are seated and ready.
To serve, place the pot on a fondue burner or portable spirit burner in the middle of the table. The fondue burner must be set to low and have an adjustable heat setting, so that the temperature of the fondue can be controlled.
Using long forks, each guest spears one piece of bread at a time with the fork and dips and turns it in the fondue before eating.
Sunday 27 January 2019
Sunday 27 January 2019
Sunday 27 January 2019
Julius Roberts prepares to tend to his goats, main and right; the smallholding, above right; lurcher Loki playing with a pig, left; one of Roberts’s dishes, top right
proceeded to lick Roberts’s hands and face in appreciation. “Although previously shy and wild, from that moment she became tame. She understood that I was there to help her.
He finds the gap between spring and summer is blissful. And at this time of year he misses the herb garden most: “Broadleaf plantain, yarrow, nasturtiums, oregano, thyme – all of these are important for the animals to eat, too.”
Right now, Roberts’s cupboards are well-stocked with his homemade pickles and preserves: from elderberry capers, fermented chilli and kombucha to quince and fig leaf vodka. Today is a momentous day, since we also sample the first of his home-cured and smoked bacon, from pigs kept for an unusual two and a half years (commercial pigs are usually kept for only six to eight months), their diet supplemented with marrows, windfall fruit and acorns.
We take our time over the bacon, and knowing where it has come from, and what a life the pigs led, it proves to be the most flavoursome rasher I have ever tasted. “It’s about eating quality meat, rarely and respectfully, perhaps for two or three meals a week,” says Roberts.
“Veganism is a powerful movement, and I love people for doing it, but it can be combative towards meat-eaters,” he says. “It’s subjective but if done well, I believe that eating meat can be right. For example, we need animals to create fertility in the soil. Taking my pigs to the abattoir was difficult. But they lived an incredible life, outdoors underneath oak trees, with their own stream to drink from. You see it in the meat: it’s an insanely dark, rich colour.”
Of course, not all of us have the resources to rear our own pigs, but for Roberts, awareness of where food comes from, bridging the disconnect between farming and food, is key. Keeping chickens or simply growing a few herbs is a good place to start, he suggests and using what you have to hand in the kitchen playfully, rather than buying food for specific recipes. “I’m brimming with excitement for 2019. Hatching a new flock of chickens (and building a fox-proof coop), desperately awaiting the birth of my next generation of lambs and kids, looking forward to growing some new varieties of fruit and veg and sampling the first of my Mangalitza prosciutto.”
With his first book in the offing, I suspect you’ll be hearing more from Julius Roberts soon.
‘It’s about eating quality meat, rarely and respectfully, for two or three meals a week’