The Clarified Self
  • Blog
  • About
  • Recipes
  • On the Road
  • Contact

Hotel Gourmet: Hitchin, Day Five

5/5/2015

2 Comments

 
Picture
I received my fifth treatment at the Taymount Clinic and my gut felt good. Lunch had already turned into a culinary adventure (in a good way) and I was eager to continue eating well, for the benefit of my microbes, of course. This meant seeking diversity of colors and flavors, eating some of my vegetables raw, and including some high-quality animal protein.

I often hear culinary herbs spoken of as if they are something altogether different from vegetables--as if we need a sanctioned reason to use them. Tonight, basil was not held to a different standard. While it may be chock-full of plant medicine, it's also just an edible plant. I'm a real rebel.

Picture
Like I mentioned in my day five health update, I tried something new for lunch today. A fish vendor was selling a few mollusk-looking things of which I had never heard. A brimming pot of cockles (no longer brimming, at right), cost me £2 and was quite delicious. Come to find out, cockles are a type of clam not native to my part of the world. I was reasonably sure of this when I committed to eating them, but was glad to firm up my suspicion with an internet search. I passed on the malt vinegar (with gluten), but a squirt of lemon juice added some zest in its stead.

Picture
Being an avid apple lover, I am always thrilled to see them for sale when I travel. While a few varieties remain ubiquitous, regional climates and palates tend to favor different types.

The Cox's Orange Pippin is considered one of the premier dessert apples of England--a standard by which all others are judged. Having experienced my first of these fine fruits a couple of days ago, I am inclined to agree. Cox are particularly challenging to grow stateside, but I will continue my efforts. On this day, I enjoyed one from the market.

This is what I ate for dinner:

Steamed Globe Artichoke with Clarified Butter
  • Steam an artichoke in an inch of water until soft.
  • Serve with clarified butter and good salt.
Find an artichoke
Cook until soft
Serve with butter

Chicory and Basil Salad
  • Chop chicory, basil and carrot and add to bowl.
  • Add olives, olive oil, salt, olive brine (only if high-quality) and some white pepper.
Rinse and chop
Season and enjoy

Wilted Greens tossed in an Anchovy Mustard Sauce
  • Chop greens and onion and add to pot with a little water.
  • Cook with lid on until greens are wilted, then drain water.
  • Add anchovy, white pepper, and mustard powder (or mustard).
  • Chop/mash anchovies and spices into a paste, then toss into the greens.
Brassica-type leaves
Chop and wilt
My spices
Just starting to chop...
...to more of a paste
Toss and serve

Grass-Fed Ribeye Steak with Clarified Butter
  • Melt butter.
  • Cook steak on low heat to avoid smoke and mayhem.
Melt fat
Cook slowly
Enjoy

British pastures must be places of abundant corn, because that was the fattiest supposedly grass-fed steak I have ever eaten. In reality, this steak probably came from a grain-finished cow that grew up on grass and pasture but then lived out its final weeks eating a diet optimized to make it fat. Sadly, this practice of grain-finishing compromises the animal's health and skews the ratio of its stored fats toward those that are less optimal for human health. At home, we eat 100% grass-fed and grass-finished beef that spent its whole life on pasture--that's the kind of meat that tastes like magic and feels like medicine. Out here in the suburban jungle, far from my chest freezer of Alderspring beef, I do the best I can.

Thanks for sticking with me!

In good health,
Ethan
2 Comments
Eva
5/4/2015 11:55:44 pm

Seems as if this is working out at least as well as you'd hoped, maybe better! I'm curious to know where the anchovies are from. Morocco? That's the only source out here that I can usually find, just wondering if the UK is the same! Carry On & Keep Healing! :-)

Reply
Ethan link
5/5/2015 03:27:56 am

The Brits are apparently a little less stringent with their labeling requirements. "From fish caught in the South West Atlantic"

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    August 2016
    May 2016
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014

    Author

    I'm Ethan, a guy whose life used to be controlled by ulcerative colitis. As I systematically tested diets, treatments, and all types of health advice to heal my colon, I learned a lot about my own biology and also how to cook without compromise. I'm here to share the best (and sometimes worst) of that journey with you.

    Categories

    All
    Acorns
    Apple
    Basics
    Beef
    Big Ideas
    Book Review
    Braising
    Brisket
    Broccoli
    Butter
    Carrot
    Cauliflower
    Chickens
    Clarified Butter
    Coffee
    Cranberry
    Epigenetics
    Fennel
    FMT
    Folate
    Foraging
    Ghee
    Ginger
    Grass-fed
    Leek
    My Story
    Olive Oil
    One-pan Meal
    Paleo
    Pineapple
    Pork
    Pumpkin
    Quince
    Recipe
    Roast
    SCD
    SCD Legal
    Seafood
    Slow-cooker
    Soup
    Stalking The Wild Asparagus
    Sumac
    Taymount Clinic
    Travel Tips
    Turmeric
    Ulcerative Colitis
    Urban Survival

    RSS Feed

Food for thought.  Food for medicine.  Food for dinner.
  • Blog
  • About
  • Recipes
  • On the Road
  • Contact