Sausage ragu, strawberries, and digging myself out of a slump

Sharon’s post about suffering from ennui struck a bit of a cord with me, as I have definitely been suffering from a lockdown slump. While I’ve still been enjoying eating, the associated planning, prep and general organisation started to feel like a slog (I do have help from husband, but food is mainly my department – he does most of the cleaning).


So, what to do about this? First of all I made something that I just wanted to make: so many things I’ve cooked recently have been about what was available, what needed using up, etc. So, sausage ragu, featuring ingredients that were happily sitting in cupboards/freezers, and could have remained so for some time. The recipe, from blogger The Tiny Italian is here.

I was lucky that I actually had all the ingredients, including proper Italian style sausage, delivered by our local butcher Carl (Worgan’s Butchers if you want to look him up) – although the Italian sausages are generally made by one of his butchers, Nino the red-haired Sicilian.

I also had some special tomato passata, from the before times, and this seemed like a good moment to reach for it – and create a proper Elsewhere Kitchen moment. It came from Bottega Caruso, a wonderful Italian restaurant in Margate. It’s run by our friends Harry and Simona, who import tomato sauce – and other goodies – from Simona’s family home in Campania in southern Italy. There‘s a Guardian review of the restaurant which sums it up very well here.

Ragu!

The ragu was delicious. Good enough to cure many things, and it certainly kickstarted a way out of the slump.


Dessert was another Bottega Caruso thing: strawberries soaked in Strega. Strega, if you haven't come across it, is a luminous coloured, herbal flavoured liqueur, which comes from Benevento, the nearest town to the village Simona grew up in. If you drink it on its own, you would never believe it would go with strawberries, but trust me on this. The method is simplicity itself: chop strawberries, pour Strega over them, leave to soak for a few hours, and the Strega will gradually turn a pleasing pale red, and the strawberries plump up. You can strain them, in which case, drink the Strega alongside. Eat them on their own, or with anything that goes with strawberries.

Strawberries at the start of their soaking. I forgot to take an 'after' picture before I ate them.