In the words of
Status Quo, “here we go, here we go, here we go again!” Yes
folks its here again - Christmas, it's the time of the year when
two matchsticks are required to hold open my eyes, as the
workload doubles and the thought of taking a little rest in the
afternoons is like finding a chicken with teeth. Its that time
of the year when, although it seemed as if it was only a few
weeks ago, I climb up into the loft at the restaurant to collect
the black bin bags that contain the Christmas decorations. Mrs
R. normally stands at the bottom of the open loft hatch to catch
the bags as they descend. She has remarked that over the years
I don't give her clear instructions when the bags are about to
drop down. Never mind it only happens once a year.
It's the time
again that bags and bags of brussel sprouts have to be prepared
and this is a job that Dan the commis chef loves doing - well I
think it is as I often hear him muttering as he stands at his
table surrounded by a mountain of sprouts. I once heard him
tell the other young chef that joined us in the summer, that
there were two things that he loved doing - one was mussels and
the other was, something, sprouts. I must confess that I did not
catch the other words that he also used to described them.
Looking back
over the year, its been a funny old year, and one that's seemed
to have flown by so quickly. I suppose as you get older time
seems to slip away faster then when you were younger; when a
summer’s day seemed to last forever. I remember many years ago
when, in the early 1980s I was in partnership with my good
friend the late John Brundle, Martin, the racing driver’s Dad -
those were the days when Martin was still in Formula Three. We
had an old saying in Kings Lynn: “if you sneezed at one end of
the High Street, it was reported by someone that you were dead
at the other end of the street”. News used to travel fast in
those days, and as the news of this unfortunate soul travelled
further afield so more juicer bits of information would be
added. Oh yes - poor old Sid, or was his name Fred, it was
rumoured he had met with his untimely death by many means. Some
reported that he had been run over by a car while other reports
came in that it was the four o’clock bus travelling at high
speed that rendered him to an early grave. The only good thing,
in a way, was that nobody actually knew who Sid or Fred was and
conversations like, “you must have known him, big chap, wears a
flat cap, walks with a limp, has a dog, lives over North Lynn”,
which of course would probably leave a lot for the imagination
to ponder on.
As many of you
are aware, when I opened Rushmore’s Restaurant I always said
that after cooking for over four decades this restaurant was to
be my swan song. As a young boy of sixteen I entered into a
love affair with food. This affair has been fuelled by my wish
to succeed and a great passion for what I was doing, and I
suppose in a way I have been successful and this has only been
achieved by my customers that I feel I have given pleasure to
over the many years by dining in my restaurants. Now I have
come to an age when Mrs R and I wish to slow down a tad or two
so after all these years of cooking day and night we decided to
put the restaurant up for sale, and to be up front and inform
customers of our intensions, so there you have it, as they say
straight from the horse’s mouth.
Like Sid or
Fred I sneeze - the latest news is that Gordon Ramsey is buying
the restaurant and is in contest with Gary Rhodes who has put a
bid in as well. It only comes down to which one will come up
with the money first. This was, of course, music to my ears
when I first heard it from a lady in the restaurant so when I
hear that Prince Charles or Lord Lucan is also interested in
buying the restaurant I will let you know. Life at Rushmore’s
will continue with the same passion as I have always installed
into my cooking, and I will probably be still moaning about the
heat in the kitchen in the summer of 2008.
As the 25th of
December draws closer a friend told me that her husband had
invited around ten of the family around for Christmas Day lunch
so with a look of fear on her face she asked if there were any
tips that I could give her to take some of the pressure off the
big day. One of the things that I thought might be of help was
for her to prepare and cook all the vegetables for the lunch the
day before. Once the vegetables had been cooked they can be
quickly cooled down by running cold water over them, then put
into containers and covered with cling film and placed in the
fridge. On Christmas Day all she had to do was to pop a few
pans of boiling, slightly salted water on the stove and pop the
already cooked vegetables in to reheat - job done!
The other day
when I saw my Grandson he came up to me and said “Granddad, do
you know that it won’t be long before a man dressed in a bright
red suit with a long white beard will arrive on a large sledge,
pulled by six reindeer? And do you know Granddad, he is going
to come down the chimney and leave me lots of presents?” I
smiled, and replied “yes I believe he may if you are a good
boy”, now who is putting that rumour around. . .
Merry Christmas
to you all.
Colin Rushmore
Mrs R. and all the staff at Rushmore’s
Spiced
Cranberries
With
fresh cranberries now readily for sale in the shops, how
about having a go
at making a fresh cranberry sauce this year? You will
require 1lb of fresh cranberries,
a qt oz of root ginger, whole cinnamon, and whole
allspice, also about 6 cloves,
half a pint of cider vinegar and 8oz of brown sugar.
Pop the washed cranberries into a saucepan with all the
spices that
have been tied in a muslin, pour over the cider vinegar
and bring to the boil.
Simmer the cranberries until soft and begin to pop,
after say 25 minutes
add the brown sugar and simmer for another 20 minutes,
remove the spices and pour the cranberry preserve into
warm jars,
serve with your Christmas turkey or cold meats.
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