Marinades,Seasoning

Jamaica Observer Eating Well: Marinades & Seasoning

Marinades, seasoning ingredients and flavour enhancers that are made beforehand – say every week or every three days – are handy helpers for the gourmet on the run. You dash home from a meeting and have just enough time to do a quick stir fry for the family or to grill a couple of steaks for yourself and your companion before you are off again to another meeting or a night on the town.

At the top of the list is garlic in oil. Minced garlic in oil to cover it in a jar in a refrigerator does three things: it saves time, it saves your fingers (no more garlic on your fingers when you close the deal with that all-important client!) and it flavours your food beautifully. Add it to the pan before you cook, add it near the end of cooking if you want to keep some of that robust garlic flavour; put it on French bread before you crisp it in the oven, add it to oil and vinegar for a quick salad dressing. Olive oil gives great flavour but any oil will do. Garlic butter made beforehand and rolled in wax paper and sliced when needed is a variation on the theme. Keep this in the freezer for slicing with a hot knife.

Ginger in lime juice is good on fish and good on chicken too. Peel the ginger and grate it. Put it in a bottle and cover the ginger with strained lime juice. Add a pinch of salt to help preserve it. This also goes well in your drink; adds a certain something to the lowly glass of lemonade, does wonders for a fruit punch or any other concoction you want to try.

Having beurre manie (flour kneaded with butter) on hand is almost as good as having money in the bank. When the sauce should be slightly thickened at the last moment beurre manie is what you need. Knead equal amounts of butter and flour into a smooth paste and keep it in a tightly covered jar in the refrigerator for a few days. Use about a tablespoon of the mixture at a time… you can add more if you want it but adding too much at first may spoil your sauce. Stir it into the sauce bit by bit a few minutes before serving: just allow enough time to simmer so that the flour will be cooked.

Last but not least, sherry peppers. It is the final touch to a memorable bowl of stew or soup or omelette. It had its beginnings in the 19^th century when it was called pepper wine by the Royal Navy who used it to disguise the abominable taste of their shipboard rations. Today, discriminating cooks use it as all-purpose seasoning or to enhance flavours. You can buy a bottle at the supermarket but there is nothing like making your own. Use scotch bonnet pepper from your very own garden or bird pepper, the hottest of them all. Simply steep the hot peppers (be sure to wash and dry them first) in a sauce bottle with an appropriate drip/pour spout in a medium dry sherry. You may also add a few herbs or spices if you like: a sprig of thyme, a few pimento seeds or a stick of cinnamon. Leave it to mature a couple of weeks before you start to use it.