Early Autumn is one of my favourite culinary times of the year, root vegetables are becoming abundant, it is the season for game, hearty stews and fiery curries and it is when soups really come into their own. As the expected cold spell descends from the Artic just in time for Bonfire Night I thought I would pass one of our family favourite recipes. There is nothing as comforting after walking on the beach or kicking up some leaves up in the park with the children as a nice bowl of soup.

We love creamy chowder, spicy sweet potato with cumin and chilli but in my house the girls love roasted red pepper best. This is a really easy, comforting recipe that freezes exceeding well so could be made in advance, it is a fantastic thick tasty potage full of sweet, smoky flavours and great served in a mug as you stand to watch the fireworks. Passed through a sieve it can be dressed up as a lovely lunchtime treat or simple supper dish. So for the perfect fifth of November feast make sure you have some crisp-skinned jacket potatoes freshly baked in the oven, a plate full of toffee apples for the children and a big, big pan of this delicious soup.

Roasted Red Pepper Soup            serves 4 to 6

2 large deep Red Peppers, halved & de-seeded.

1 large Onion, peeled and sliced

3 cloves of Garlic, peeled.

2 sticks of Celery, washed and thinly sliced

1 large Carrot, peeled and thinly sliced

2 x 400 gr tins of chopped Tomatoes

1/2 litre of Vegetable Stock

100 ml quality Olive Oil

50 gr Tomato Purée

1 heaped teaspoon dried Basil

1 teaspoon Smoked Paprika

Juice of one fresh Lemon

A generous pinch of dried Chilli flakes

Sea Salt and freshly ground Black Pepper

Pre-heat your oven to 200 C /  360 F / Gas Mark 4. Place the pepper halves and garlic cloves on to a baking tray and drizzle with a little of the olive oil. Bake at the top of your oven for thirty minutes until the vegetables are roasted and nicely caramelised. In the meantime, heat the remaining oil in a large heavy-bottomed pan, over a medium heat, and sauté the chopped up onion, carrot and celery for about ten minutes until soft.

In a second pan heat up the vegetable stock and add the tomato purée and the chilli flakes. Whisk and then add to the onions, celery and carrots. Peel any very dark, burnt spots from the peppers and add them, the garlic and remaining ingredients to the stock and vegetables. Bring the soup to a low boil, turn down the heat and simmer for twenty to twenty-five minutes.

Remove from heat and allow to completely cool then using a hand blender or food processor blitz the until the soup is smooth. You can pass the soup through a sieve if you want a more refined dinner party finish. To serve, reheat and season with salt, pepper and lemon to taste.

Barbecue Diplomacy and the Most Important BBQ That Never Was – A Recipe for Walter Jetton’s BBQ Sauce

The culinary aware reader will know we are in the middle of National BBQ Week, you knew that didn’t you? I learnt that there is a National Hotdog Council over in America yesterday, so it really is never too late to learn and with that in mind I thought I would write a little about Lyndon B. Johnson. By nineteen sixty-three Lyndon B. Johnson had risen above the hurly-burly politics of the Lone star state to be vice president of the United States in the administration of the meteoric John F Kennedy. In a government of outstanding personalities including the president’s charismatic brother the attorney general, secretary of defense Robert McNamara and secretary of state Dean Rusk many saw Johnson’s role as mere window dressing. Yet this homely former school teacher established himself with quiet determination and pioneered what became known as barbecue diplomacy. As people relaxed due to the informal atmosphere of a barbecue around a pit or grill it was often easier for LBJ to talk business than in the rigid formal settings of a state banquette. My apologies as this is definitely an apolitical blog we need to talk more about the barbecue and not the man.

At his home on the banks of the Perdernale river, LBJ hosted an array of important barbecues for VIP dignitaries and most of these were catered for by Walter Jettson. He ran a local, well for Texas, catering company in Fort Worth and prepared the food at the LBJ ranch. On November 23, 1963 the staff of the ranch and Jettson were preparing for the biggest event of their lives the president was to visit and eat smoked ribs and brisket. As we all know he was never to make it. LBJ was sworn in as the thirty-sixth president of the United States on board Air force One carrying the body of President Kennedy back to Washington. Jettson was to become the President’s Pitmaster * and LBJ even flew him around the country to cater at political rallies. On the back of his celebrity, Jetton published a barbecue cookbook, which is unfortunately out of print but available on Amazon and other retailers.

Jetton catered for the first barbecue at the White House and continued to do so during LBJ’s term in office. When he decided not to stand for re-election LBJ hosted one last farewell barbecue on the White House lawns for over two hundred friends and supporters. The Texas style ribs must have been quite special as the Swiss-born, formally trained, White House head chef Henry Haller, wrote in his The White House Family Cookbook, ” He did a terrific job and I was most impressed with the results. His barbecue sauce avoided all of the common flaws (over sweetening, overcooking, excessive thinning) and by serving the sauce separately, he also avoided drying out the meat. ”

*Pit Master : An experienced barbecue cook, a skilled craftsman, who watches over the pit and can tell by sight, sound, smell, and touch, if it is running too hot or too cold, when it needs fuel, when to add wood, when to add sauce, and when the meat is ready.

For more information on Barbecuing visit www.joyofgrilling.com/glossary/

Here is my only slightly amended version of Walter Jetton’s recipe. As the full recipe is of authentic American origin it is measured in cups. A cup is between 200 and 250ml, providing one standard cup is used the proportions will work.

Walter Jettons’s BBQ Sauce

1 1/2 cups Water

1 cup Ketchup

1/2 cup Cider Vinegar

3 Stalks Celery, washed and chopped

1/4 cup Butter

1/4 cup Worcestershire Sauce

1/2 cup Onion, peeled and finely chopped

3 Bay Leaves

1 Large Clove Garlic, peeled and minced

½ tablespoon Sugar

1 teaspoon Chilli Powder

1 teaspoon Smoked Paprika

1/8 teaspoon Sea Salt

pinch of freshly ground Black Pepper

Mix all ingredients together. Place in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and bring to a boil and simmer for ½ an hour. Remove from heat and strain.

Walter Jetton’s LBJ Barbecue Cookbook– By the Caterer to the LBJ Ranch, Written with Arthur Whitman, 1965, Pocket Books.

A quick look at the weather forecast confirms that I have not mistaken a rise in the UESW Index*, if as expected we do have a mini heat wave then it is time to brush off the barbecue and go get out the gas fired grill. Speed to your shed or garage and send the spiders spinning and check the charcoal. I get excited about barbecuing pretty much anything but today is all about the burger. The burger has become a much-maligned meal when it has the true potential for mouth-watering, meaty magnificence. Our supermarket freezers are stuffed with mechanically extracted, pulverised, ground and additive enhanced excuses and many of the massive chain restaurants serve products that are little better. If you intend to barbecue ( or grill if you must ) please, please, please have a go at making some yourself.

At the heart of every burger is the meat to fat ratio, when selecting your cuts of meat to mince, you ideally want to achieve around 85% lean meat. The fat is very important to your finished burger, much of the flavour comes from the fat during cooking and is responsible for the correct mouthfeel of the finished product. The fat moistens the burger as it cooks but much of the fat will drain off onto your barbecue. If you cook too close to the coals this is when you get flaring as the fat ignites. Less than 15% fat and your burger will be dry, much more and your burger will shrink drastically during cooking. The finished burger will only be, a not unhealthy 5% fat so fear not if you are trying to diet, it is better for you than you think, positively rocking paleo speaking. You can ask your butcher for advice on which cuts to use but a fifty/ fifty split of ground chuck and ground sirloin will achieve outstanding results.

If you ask you butcher for advice he can help you with the next stage and mince your beef for you. You want to get a coarse grind. Too fine and the mixture is sloppy and the end result can be like rubber. You want to avoid working the meat as much as possible, your butcher will grind the beef in an industrial mincer which will process the beef quicker than a small handheld mincer. Many commercial burgers included numerous other ingredients but I like to keep it simple with just sea salt and plenty of freshly ground black pepper. If you do want to add other ingredients, an onion is just about acceptable, dice them very, very finely. Anything over the finest dice and the added ingredients will not cook and the minced beef will not hold together leaving you with burger pieces on the grill.

If your butcher prepares your mince for you, chill it for a couple of hours before you prepare the actual burgers. Keeping your seasoned burger mince cold by placing it in a bowl, in another bowl packed with ice, will result in a much better burger and help ensure a safe hygienic production. You could purchase a burger press if you are going to barbecue every weekend but it is just as easy to shape a medium sized handful into a ball then lightly pat it flat. Run some cold water over your hands to keep them cool before you shape your burgers and try to work them as gently and as little as possible. Over handling bruises the meat and will result in a tough, dry burger. Cover a tray with cling film and place the completed burgers onto the film. Cover with more cling film and store in the refrigerator until cooking time

Fire up your clean barbecue and get the coals nice and hot so the grill heats up. Give the grill a good going over with a wire brush then very carefully give the bars a quick wipe of oil. The safest method is to sprinkle some vegetable oil on a thick fold of kitchen paper. Using barbecue tongues wipe the oiled paper over the grill to wipe off any remaining burnt fragments and charcoal dust. Once the barbecue is ready we can cook.

Brush the chilled burgers with a little olive oil to help prevent sticking and place on the grill. Quickly press down with your thumb in the centre of each burger to leave a slight indentation, as the meat cooks and the proteins contract and pull together this will stop the burger looking like a rugby ball, or for you Americans one shaped just like your footballs. Aim to leave around a third of your grill empty. You might think this is an underemployment of your glowing coals but if you do get flare ups you will have space to move your burgers and prevent them from burning. After three minutes give the burgers a ninety-degree turn ( that’s one quarter-turn ). If you think your burger is cooking too fast and it will burn just raise the grill one notch from the coals. Turning the burger will give the criss-cross appearance of char marks on your burger that will demonstrate your professional cooking skills. Do not be tempted to squash the burger with your spatula as this squeezes out the tasty melted fat leaving a dry burger.

After another two minutes, your burger is should be ready to flip, the edges will be browning and you might see pinkish pearls of moisture on the burger surface. As you develop your barbecue grilling skills you will learn the cooking times of different meats and cuts. You really only ever have to turn the burger over once let it cook for three more minutes and you can then check if it is ready. The cooking time is directly proportional to the thickness of your burger when it is ready any escaping juices will be clear and the internal temperature if you check it with a thermometer should be over 80C / 180F.

Place the cooked burgers on a warm plate, cover with foil and place to the side of the barbecue to keep warm and let them rest for a few minutes. Brush the cut sides of your burger rolls with a little melted butter and toast them over the coals. The rest is up to you, personally, I favour sliced pickles, crisp lettuce, and really ripe tomatoes and maybe a slice of Monterey Jack Cheese. Enjoy.

* Unexpected Early Short Wearing – the major exponent is my friend Steven but he is South African and cannot help it.