Feasting with fabulous Floyd

Of all the celebrity chefs, Kith Floyd was my favourite. My life in cooking was inspired by Keith Floyd, Gary Rhodes and Rick Stein. This little story about Keith and some of his recipes sums him up exactly. This then, is the spanishchef tribute to a fabulous celebrity chef – Kieth Floyd. He will be missed by all good food lovers.

Clarissa Porter looks back at the life of a true Englishman who relished wit, good food and loyal company. From Bristol to rural Devon, to the countryside of Ireland and the world’s TV studios – Floyd was the quintessential cook for all taste-obsessed traditionalists.

Where to begin? I could write a book about my time with Keith Floyd. Back in the late- 1980s I was asked by a magazine, along with my photographer husband David, to ‘try out’ working with Keith Floyd. If successful there would be a weekly cookery spread with Keith. We had already ’tried out’ cooking with a pop star, a chat show host, and a chef from Buckingham Palace. The latter resulted in an injunction from the Palace stopping any publication of Her Majesty’s favourite recipes. A narrow escape; I was dreading endlessly piping mashed potato around the rather bland offerings from the ex-royal chef.

“Money’s no object,” said the editor, “it has to be the best you can make it.” Floyd was at the height of his success, but in the curious world of business one-upmanship, it was decreed he would come to us, rather than the other way around. So we hired a house on Blackheath with a spectacular kitchen, and Keith arrived in a limousine we’d sent to pick him up, hot, tired and a bit grumpy after a five-hour drive from Devon.

We were in awe of him, intimidated by his fame and volatile reputation. Keith cooked chicken with cider, and from Floyd on Fish, a trout baked in newspaper. Consternation! Keith insisted it be wrapped in The News of The World. We arranged for a motorbike messenger to collect a copy from the paper’s offices, and cooking began. It seemed to go well, if a bit awkwardly. Keith said: “Next time, my house! We could be a bloody good team.” The magazine liked the pictures of the food and Keith cooking, so we were hired for a year, driving backwards and forwards to Devon at least once a week, sometimes more.

For all you Floyd lovers out there, and indeed for all those of you who have never heard of Keith Floyds (RIP) Here are just a few of his famous recipes.

Trout baked in newspaper

Chicken roasted with garlic

If I ever feel the need to impress a dinner party with the minimum of effort, this is the recipe I choose. When this spectacular dish appeared in Floyd on France in 1987, it was greeted with gasps of surprise. So many cloves of garlic! Keith treated the garlic as a vegetable. “They are truly delicious,” he said, “just pick them up with your fingers and eat them whole!” Keith always insisted on a corn-fed free range chicken, years ahead of his time.

Serves 4
1 corn-fed chicken 1.75 kg (4 lb.)
salt and pepper
Juice of 1 lemon
1 kg (900 g) plump cloves of garlic, half of the quantity peeled
1 bay leaf
1 sprig of thyme
Olive oil
1 glass of dry white wine

Method:
Wipe the chicken then rub it all over inside and out with salt and pepper. Squeeze the lemon juice over the outside and into the cavity. Stuff the chicken using the 450 g (1 lb.) peeled garlic and the thyme and bay leaf. Quickly brown the chicken in a frying pan with some olive oil. Then put the bird in a roasting tin breast side down. Put in your oven preheated to 180°C (350°F, gas 4) and cook for about 30 minutes. Take the tin from the oven, turn the chicken onto its back, add the unpeeled garlic and a couple of tablespoons of olive oil. Baste the chicken and return to the oven and cook for another 1 – 1 1/2 hours, approximately. When the chicken is cooked, place on a warmed serving dish with the roasted garlic cloves. Add the glass of wine to the juices in the roasting tin and allow to bubble for a minute or two. Season with salt and pepper and drizzle over the dish. Keith served this with some fresh bread and nothing else, I like it with a simple green side salad.

Rabbit with Prunes

Keith’s fourth restaurant, ‘Floyd’s’ in Chandos Road Bristol, opened with the help of the ’500 Club’, 6 friends who all stumped up £500 to help Keith get back in business. Here he met David Pritchard a TV producer who asked Keith to do a 5 minute cooking slot on “RPM”, an arty early evening TV show. Feeding four people for a pound was the idea but Keith admitted he never costed it. He was paid £10 for this first appearance when he cooked this dish from Floyd in The Soup: rabbit with prunes.

Serves 4
1 rabbit, jointed into 6 pieces; wild rabbit preferably
50g (2 oz) butter
20 very small onions
100g (4 oz) smoked bacon, diced
Thyme, to season
300ml (1/2 pint) dry white wine
225g (1/2 lb.) soaked prunes
1 measure of brandy
Salt and pepper
1 heaped teaspoon strong mustard powder

Method:
Season the rabbit joints and quickly brown in melted butter in a frying pan. Then in the same butter brown the onions and diced bacon and put to one side. Sprinkle the mustard over the rabbit and put the joints, onions, bacon and thyme into a casserole dish and cover with the wine. Cook for about 1 hour at 180°C (350°F, gas 4). Then add the prunes and the brandy and cook for about a further 30 minutes. You can freeze this dish.

Trout in newspaper

This is the first recipe I cooked with Keith, from his book Floyd on Fish. Something of a novelty dish, but very tasty. Keith in his usual mischievous way thought you could embarrass or insult your friends by the choice of newspaper. In his book he says he would naturally use The Times, but when he saw me he insisted I send for a copy of The News of the World. What did he mean?

Per person
1 trout about 175g (6 oz), cleaned and gutted
2 sheets of newspaper
Bouquet of fresh herbs per fish
Slice of lemon per fish
Yoghurt sauce
For the yoghurt sauce
300ml (1/2pt) plain natural yoghurt
3 tbsp peeled and finely chopped cucumber
1 tablespoon chives, chopped
1/2 teaspoon of concentrated mint sauce
Juice of half a lemon
Salt and pepper

METHOD
First, make the sauce by mixing together all the ingredients and chilling in the fridge. Then stuff each fish with the herbs and a thin slice of lemon. Wrap an envelope of newspaper around the fish, tightly, and run under a cold tap till soaked through but intact. Place in an oven pre-heated to 180°C (350°F, gas 4) until the paper is completely dry. It should take about 7 or 8 minutes, and if you tap it should sound hollow. Remove from the oven — and carefully. It is hot, so cut open the envelope using scissors. Peel off the paper which should remove the skin at the same time. You may find it difficult to do this neatly. Practice makes perfect! Serve with yoghurt sauce. Will not freeze.

Oxtail with grapes

In Feast of Floyd under the heading ‘Eat More Meat’, Keith worried about the ‘brown rice conspiracy’ and the country turning to vegetarianism. He reckoned that the Government ought to make oxtail stew compulsory at Heathrow Airport, so that tourists could have at least one decent meal when they arrive! A dish that can, and indeed should, be made the day before. Oxtail is cheap and delicious but a little fatty. By making this a day early you can skim off the fat before you reheat and serve.

Serves 6
1.3kg (3Ib) oxtail, jointed
1 tbsp vegetable oil
25g (1oz) butter
1 large onion, diced
2 large carrots, finely diced
1 clove of garlic, chopped
1 large wine glass of sherry
1 tbsp of tomato purée
1 bay leaf
1 tsp chopped thyme
1 tbsp chopped parsley
Salt
Fresh ground black pepper
450g (1 Ib) seedless grapes

METHOD
Remove any excess fat from the oxtail and wash then dry. In a heavy pan, heat together the oil and butter, then brown the meat with the onion, carrots and garlic. Strain off any fat and then pour in the sherry and flame. Stir in the tomato purée and then add the herbs. Season to your taste with salt and pepper and add cold water to cover. Bring to the boil, cover with a lid and cook very slowly for two hours, or more. When the oxtail is cooked and tender, remove from the heat and cool. Skim off any fat from the surface and discard the bay leaf. When you are ready to serve, add the grapes and gently warm up the dish until the fruit softens, allow 10-15 minutes. You can freeze this dish before you add the grapes.

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