L'Angoletto Italian restuarant, Fitzrovia

I know this is not Glasgow (I will be doing more restaurant reviews very soon! And my thoughts on the List 09 guide!) but I wanted to blog about the food on my trip to London recently.

The hotel I stayed in had closed its restaurant, so I popped next door to a lovely little restaurant, L'Angoletto. I was ravenous and asked the waiter to bring me a plate of pasta - whatever was good. He brought a glass of red wine, and a tagliatelle dish with what tasted like an arrabiata sauce, but spiked with shards of Italian ham and meaty mushrooms. Absolutely bloody delicious.

Another easy-peasy midweek meal

I know it's the weekend, but this is the kind of meal I often produce when I'm pushed for time. It's adapted from a recipe of Nigella Lawson's - and it can be varied according to what you have in the house.

The basics you need are pasta (preferably penne, rigatoni, conchiglie, farfalle) as well as double cream and cheese. Yes, this isn't a meal for calorie-counters...

Boil the pasta in salted water; then pour your tub of cream into a separate pan, on a very low heat grate in some hard cheese (parmesan if you have it), then add in some cooked ham. Add some frozen peas to the cooking pasta for the last couple of minutes, and then drain and combine the contents of both pans!
Delicious. And you could substitute bacon for the ham, but fry it before adding to the creamy mixture. Cherry tomatoes would be a sweet addition too.

Week of making do

I've blogged before on the idea of credit crunch cooking, but this week really has taken the biscuit. Using the cupboard essentials, and buying only some ham, mince, cheese and the organic veg delivery, I've conjured up:

Rigatoni bolognaise
Macaroni cheese with leeks
Carrot and cumin soup
Penne with ham, peas and cheese sauce
Homemade beefburgers with chips
...and there will be a mushroom risotto using dried porcini.

I don't have a lot of cash this week, and I do have some salmon and prawns in the freezer that I'm keeping for the weekend! But it's interesting how soup and pasta suddenly become real peasant staples. I feel like I have eaten like a Gastro Queen all week, and yet, I'm totally skint. I get paid next Wednesday, so expect a restaurant review around then!