There’s only so many times a woman can hear her boyfriend say, “I’m going to make my own hot sauce” before she just gets on and does it herself. I mean, if he’s going to bang on about it all the time then I’m going to be thinking about it all the time and before I know it the mother of all cravings has crept up behind me and planted its claws right into my brain.

So I made the hot sauce while he helped by way of forming words with his mouth and speaking them at me from the sofa.

Basically the idea was that we would cook red peppers and scotch bonnet chillies in the BBQ to really get a smoke flavour going on in the sauce. That worked. The rest is tomatoes, garlic, onion and the usual saucy suspects: vinegar, sugar and salt. The red peppers I think add an essential sweetness, dodging the unpleasant saccharine gloop you get from too much regular sugar. Obviously it’s also fruity-hot; I put 3 scotch bonnets in there for goodness’ sake. De-seed or don’t it’s up to you.

We ate the sauce with jerk chicken and rice n peas. I made the boyfriend go and get it. Ha.

Smoked pepper and scotch bonnet hot sauce

550g tomatoes
6 scotch bonnet chillies
3 red peppers
1 large white onion
4 cloves garlic
250ml white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt

Heat your BBQ. Lightly oil the peppers. Crush a piece of foil with oil and place the scotch bonnets in it. Fold the foil into a parcel and use a skewer to make a few holes in it so the smoke can penetrate. Put the peppers and chilli
parcel on the BBQ once hot. Put the lid on the BBQ to keep the smoke in (open the top and bottom air vents). Turn the peppers every so often until soft and charred all over. Turn the chilli parcel once half way through cooking the peppers. Once cooked set both aside to cool.

Cut a cross in the base of each tomato then place them in a bowl. Cover with boiling water and leave for a few minutes until the skins loosen and can be peeled away easily. Dice the tomatoes and set aside.

In a saucepan fry the onion gently in a little oil until soft. Try not to colour the onion too much. Roughly chop the peppers, discarding the stalk, seeds and any charred pieces of skin and add to the pan with the chillies, garlic, vinegar, tomatoes, salt and sugar. Let the mixture simmer for about 30-45 minutes until the tomatoes have started to break down into a pulp. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve then blend it. Set aside to cool.

Last night, Anderson & Co. on Bellenden Road hosted the first Peckham Persian supper, cooked by shop keeper and food writer Sally Butcher of Persepolis. Sally’s book ‘Persia in Peckham’ is one of the few I regularly cook from as opposed to flick through so I was very keen to try a traditional Iranian meal cooked by the woman herself. This is likely to become a regular thing by the way; I’m not going to tell you about a one-off event that’s already happened, ‘ooh I had a brilliant time! You can’t go though’.

We started with a big ‘ol plate of herbs, walnuts, white cheese (like feta) and radishes. Herbs are very important at the beginning of a Persian meal we are told; coriander, parsley and mint are eaten in sprigs like salad leaves and have various effects on the body such as cleansing the liver and kidneys and stimulating the appetite for the meal ahead.

Next is warm taftoon bread (like a cross between pitta and naan), which we use to scoop up meze. The word meze is derived from the Persian word ‘mazeh’ meaning ‘taste’, apparently. Fact. We descend upon must-e-laboo, a refreshing, sweet and lurid pink combination of thick yoghurt and beetroot. Mirza ghassemi is an outrageously garlic-y mix of spiced aubergine, tomato and eggs. Our party all loves garlic, so we wolf it like gannets, a heavy vampire-repelling forcefield forming around the table. There are also excellent pickles including the famous Persian pickled cucumbers; sweet, sour, hot and perfectly crisp.

The main course was ab-gusht: shoulder of lamb slow cooked with dried limes and beans. Fat, wibbly hunks of tender lamb and potatoes covered in a fragrant broth. Real comfort on a somewhat chilly evening. Adass pulao was lentil rice with date fudge; the rice studded with lentils which stayed firm and provided a nice bite every now and then. The date fudge = my favourite part of the whole meal; chunks of a sweet, sticky paste to counteract the citrussy stew. We squabbled over the last pieces.

To finish, a stunning Persian rose water sorbet, mixed with small pieces of noodle, which sounds really weird but I promise works. The 1cm lengths of noodle are soft and just provide a pleasing texture. There were sinful Persian pastries too, tooth-destroying sweet, saturated with sticky syrup. Delicious. I forgot to take a picture of both of those though because it’s BYO booze and I drank too much.

All in all, a perfect evening was had by me, 3 mates and 1 boyfriend. Anderson & Co. is a great location, it feels really intimate despite seating about 30 (that’s a guess) and we got one of the best seats, right by the kitchen. The food was unusual, delicious, plentiful and served on great big sharing platters; my idea of heaven. Sally was a charming host as well as cook and she came round to explain each dish as it was served. I can’t wait to go back to the next one. Of course I recommend that you go too, so keep an eye on the news section of the Persepolis website for details.

Persian Pop-up at Anderson & Co.
Bellenden Road
SE15

Follow the website here for details of the next event. Anderson & Co. also host other evening meals, once a week I believe on a Wednesday. It’s a cafe/deli in the day time and is well worth checking out, as is this article.

Persepolis
28-30 Peckham High Street
London
SE15 5DT
0207 639 8007

If you pick up a copy of Red Magazine this month and turn to page 110 there’s an article where I talk about how bloody brilliant Persepolis is with lovely pictures of the shop.

I’m always thinking about the next thing I can sling on the BBQ. This weekend I fancied flavours of the Caribbean and my thoughts, naturally, turned to RUM. I used that as a boozy base for a marinade, then added a mixture of marmalade and honey, which caramelised on the grill and gave the stickiness I was after. Lime juice provided astringency, garlic and thyme fragrance and a scotch bonnet chilli, proper heat. A hint of allspice muddled nicely with the rum.

After playing around with a few variations, I’ve arrived at this recipe which makes a rather sexy pile of wings. The depth of a pirate-sized slug of Captain Morgan, sweet fruit, lip-tingling heat. Mmmm. Wings are excellent on the BBQ as they’re cheap, have a lot of surface area to hold marinade and they cook quickly, so you can get them nice and charred outside and juicy within.

I served this with a bowl of pineapple salsa, which compliments the booze, and a large kitchen roll. Sticky…

Sticky rum and scotch bonnet chicken wings (makes enough marinade for 10 wings)

10 chicken wings

2 tablespoons runny honey
2 tablespoons orange marmalade
A thumb sized piece of ginger, peeled and grated
50ml dark rum (I used Captain Morgan)
Zest and juice of 1 large lime plus 1 more for serving
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1 scotch bonnet, de-seeded and finely chopped
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
Salt

Mix all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl, stirring until well mixed and the marmalade is no longer lumpy. Pour about 3/4 of the marinade over the wings, mix to make sure they are well coated then cover and refrigerate overnight. During the day time, try and move the wings around in the marinade a few times if you can, it helps to get them nicely coated.

Preheat your BBQ and cook the wings, turning them often and brushing regularly with the remaining 1/4 of the marinade. Do this until all the marinade is gone, the wings are sticky, charred and cooked through.

View Peckham Food and Drink Map in a larger map

A reader e-mailed me recently to suggest I make a Google map showing the best food shops and restaurants around Peckham (thanks Alex). I thought it would be a nice way to follow on from this post and extend it to cafes, restaurants and boozers. I may branch it out further when I have time, into Nunhead and East Dulwich but for now I expect you locals to tell me about all those places I’ve missed. Don’t let me down now.

There’s a little linky underneath the map above to take you to a fancy big one. Ooooh.

I arrived at this recipe after a week of experimenting with lahmacun, or ‘Turkish pizza’. Lahmacun (pronounced lah-ma-jun) is a thin, flat disk of dough smeared with minced lamb (or beef), spices and aleppo pepper, cooked and then finished with a sprinkle of lemon juice and fresh herbs. I’ve made a few variations over the past 7 days and they’ve all been delish, particularly when scattered with chopped pickled cucumbers. As time went by though I found the recipe evolving into something a little more locally influenced.

As you all know, Persepolis is one of my favourite local food shops and I nip in at every opportunity. The shopkeeper, Sally has a recipe for ‘Persian Pizza’ in her cookbook, which bears many similarities to lahmacun but does away with dough faffing and uses ready bought bread instead. Feeling fatigued, I was having me some of that. I would just cook the lamb mixture before spreading it on the bread and cut about 2 hours off the prep time.

I ditched the aleppo pepper too for a jar of  ‘gongura red chilli pickle’; a highly addictive paste of sour gongura leaves, fierce hot chillies, garlic, tamarind and spices. For post-cooking pimpage, it had to be finely chopped Iranian cucumbers, which have a curious mix of musty/sharp/sweet flavours and are justifiably world famous. To finish, a swirl of cooling yoghurt and the essential fresh herbs.

The way to eat this is to roll it up, grasp it and show it who’s boss. My boyfriend was in raptures over it and I have to say I’m very pleased with the recipe; the bread works better than the dough ever did and the pickle adds an exotic tangy and hot flavour. Crisp bread, spiced meat, chopped pickles, cool yoghurt, fragrant herbs = contrast-tastic.  It’s packed with flavours of the Middle East and is therefore oh so very Peckham.

Peckham Pizza (makes 4)

4 naan breads
500g minced lamb
2 tablespoons gongura chilli pickle (or you could substitute chopped pickled chillies)
1 large onion, finely chopped
4 tomatoes
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander

Garnish
2 pickled cucumbers, finely chopped
Lemon wedges
Fresh herbs (I used parsley and coriander)

Soften the onion in a little oil then add the minced lamb. Stir it, breaking it up until it is all browned. Meanwhile, skin the tomatoes by covering them with boiling water and leaving a for a few minutes. Drain them then cover with cold water for a further minute. Rub the skins off, quarter them and remove the seeds. Blend to a paste in a blender or chop finely.

When the meat is browned, add the spices and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds or so. Add the chilli pickle and tomatoes and let cook for around 10 minutes on a medium heat, stirring occasionally. Check the seasoning and adjust to taste.

Preheat the oven to 180C. Spread the topping over each naan, making sure to really press it down and spread it right out to the edges. Cook for around 5 minutes, until the edges of the naan are nice and crisp. I find the best results come from cooking the pizza directly on the oven rack (i.e without a baking tray).

Artfully dollop on some yoghurt, scatter with fresh herbs and serve with wedges of lemon.

I was going to call these ‘Spiced Snail Buns’ but when I tweeted about it I had a load of replies from people who were, quite rightly, confused about the link between snails and buns. It’s the shape, people, the shape!

Anyway. I don’t cook a huge amount of sweet things (ice cream excepted) and puds are not my area of expertise by a long stretch. When I do venture into the World of  Wallace however, I like a savoury note, be it salt in caramel or in this case, spices in cake. I started out with a basic bun and showed it a bit of Peckham love by adding allspice, ground ginger and citrus zests in with the cinnamon, thinking along the lines of a Jamaica ginger cake.

I left them in the oven a few minutes too long but I’d just been dealing with a gas leak (my oven is electric for those detectives amongst you) so you’ll forgive me for feeling a little distracted. I had to use a fan heater to melt the butter for the buns for goodness’ sake. Now that’s dedication.

And come on, they do look like snails, right?

Spiced sticky buns

I started off with a Chelsea Bun recipe from the BBC website then added my own spices and citrus zests. I’ve tried them with the glaze and also with a very thin icing made of just icing sugar and water. I prefer the glaze.

500g strong white flour, plus extra for dusting
1 teaspoon salt
1 x 7g sachet fact-action dried yeast
300ml milk
40g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 egg
Vegetable oil, for greasing

For the filling

25g unsalted butter, melted
75g soft brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Zest of 1 lemon
Zest of 1 orange
100g currants

For the glaze

2 tbsp milk
2 tbsp caster sugar

Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl, then make a well in the middle and add the yeast from the sachet. Warm the milk and butter in a saucepan until the butter is melted and the mixture is tepid.

Add the milk and butter mix to the flour and stir until it comes together in a soft dough. Tip the dough out onto a generously floured work surface. Knead for five minutes, adding more flour if necessary, until the dough is smooth and elastic and no longer feels sticky. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, cover and leave until doubled in size. Knock the dough back then roll out on a lightly floured surface into a rectangle about 20 x 40 cams in size.

Brush with the melted butter, then sprinkle over the currants. Mix the ground spices with the sugar and sprinkle all over. Starting from the longest edge, roll the dough into a long cylinder. Cut 10-15 slices from it and place them on a greased baking tray, leaving a gap between each one. Let rise for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 190C. Bake for about 15 minutes, or until golden brown. For the glaze, heat the milk and sugar gently in a saucepan. Let simmer for a few minutes then remove from the heat.

Place the buns on a wire rack to cool. Brush over the glaze and let cool completely. Serve with a good spreading of butter, if you dare.

We’re two thirds into December and I’m feeling the need to vary my beer snacks. I turned to Peckham for inspiration.

Bright yellow patties stack up high in shop windows but most of them have been pre-made and frozen. They always look jaded and sad to me but I could see the potential so I had a bash myself. The primary stuffing is minced beef (fish and vegetable fillings are also common) wrapped in the easiest flaky crust, stained yellow with turmeric and curry powder.

Jamaican patties are a product of English colonialism and East Indian migration into the Caribbean: the former brought the idea of pastry while Indian slaves brought cumin. Both mix well with the Caribbean flavours: thyme, spring onion, scotch bonnet pepper and allspice.

The patties are highly savoury and perfect if you’re growing tired of snacking on mince pies, deep fried brown things and crisps, as I am. The way to eat a Jamaican patty is to pick it up and dunk it gleefully into your favourite hot sauce. Wash it down with a Red Stripe.

Jamaican Patties (makes 8-10)

For the crust

250g plain flour
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
125g fridge cold butter, cubed
5-6 tablespoons cold water
1 egg, beaten

For the filling (I have a bee in my bonnet about doing a slow-cooked goat filling next time).

250g minced beef
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 inch piece ginger, finely chopped
1 heaped teaspoon thyme leaves
5 spring onions, finely chopped
1/2 scotch bonnet chilli, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon allspice
1/2 tin chopped tomatoes

Preheat the oven to 170C

Heat 1 tablespoon vegetable or groundnut oil in a pan and add the ginger, garlic and chilli for 30 seconds. Add the beef and cook until brown. Add the spices and stir for 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes, spring onions and thyme and let simmer for 10 minutes or so, stirring every so often, until nearly all the liquid has evaporated.

While the beef is simmering, make the crust. Sift the flour, turmeric, curry powder and salt into a bowl. Add the cubes of butter and rub it in with your fingertips until the mix resembles fine crumbs. Add 5 tablespoons of cold water (add another if it’s too stiff) until you have a stiff dough then turn it out onto a lightly oiled surface and knead until smooth. Do not over work the dough, knead it just enough until it is smooth.

Grease two large baking trays. Roll out the dough until a few millimetres thick and use a saucer to cut circles from it – as many as you can. You can re-roll the trimmings to get more circles. Lay the circles on the baking tray (they will be too hard to move once filled) and brush the edges of each with the beaten egg. Dollop some of the filling in the centre of each then fold over to form a patty. Seal the edges by crimping with a fork.

Brush the patties all over with more beaten egg and bake for 20 minutes, or until golden brown. Serve with hot sauce and beer.

The crust recipe is adapted from the Waitrose website.