Men in the kitchen

Why is there surprise in some quarters when a man says he does the cooking at home?

We are now a long way from the days when cooking at home was deemed women's work but unless the man in question is a chef, we women don't spend much time swapping recipes with blokes. A pity. From television celebrity chefs to food writers and foragers and espousers of home cooking, men are telling it like it is. Easy.

They might be the weekly cook or the weekend cook, or the special-occasion cook, but today's men are making curries, baking cakes and whizzing up a spot of haute cuisine without drama or angst.

The path that leads to culinary successes has many twists, and three Christchurch men share theirs.

Ewan Sargent discovered the joy of cooking when he was fresh from university and fed- up with fry-ups.

Everyone needs something to make in the kitchen that you hope will dazzle others and can be safely delivered time after time.

Often it arrives in your what-you-can-cook lineup by accident. You realise one day it's there and it's yours after all the failures, wins and personal tweaks.

Mine is aoili. I've played around with this fantastic sauce for years and I think I've got it close to perfect - for me, anyway.

You get this pungent garlic flavour, a tang of the vinegar, a little pop from the mustard seeds and wrapped in a glorious velvety unctuousness.

My perfect "complements" would be a well-seared, well- peppered medium rare steak and a big bowl of hot, salty deep-fried shoestrings. Dobbed on a recent stir-fry of brussels sprout halves (with garlic, oyster sauce, chilli), it was stunning, even overshadowing the steak.

Technique is everything in bringing it to life. Take short cuts and it will die on you. There's nothing more deflating than a split, runny aoili staring up from the bowl. This is a hand-whisk job and if you have done it right, your arm should ache a little at the end.

The first priority is making sure the egg's fresh. The second is getting the emulsion going. Oil is beaten into the egg yolk and, done right, the sauce should get thicker and thicker as more oil is added. But the egg can only stand so much oil at a time and at the start that's the tiniest amount. There's an old tip with aoili that the first oil in is mere drips from fork tines dipped in the oil.

Finally, it needs to stand for a while to let the ingredients get to know each other and the garlic to take charge.

Awesome aoili

Enough for two. Double or triple ingredients for more people.

1 fresh free-range egg yolk

2 garlic cloves

1 tsp white-wine vinegar

100ml olive oil

1 tsp wholeseed mustard

Salt and pepper to season

Step one (a): If you aren't a committed garlic fan, stop right here and go and make a cheese sauce.

Step one (b): Whisk the egg yolk with a pinch of salt, then start to add the oil a drop at a time. Add more as the opaque emulsion begins and it should get thicker and thicker.

Add vinegar halfway through beating the oil.

Mince the garlic cloves, then mash on a hard surface with the flat of a kitchen knife blade to get it into a milky paste. A few lumps are OK. Whisk into the aoili.

Whisk in the wholeseed mustard.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

Pop in the fridge and wait for at least an hour.

Dan McBeth developed his cooking skills after discovering foreign fare.

Cooking took off for me when the new breed of chefs like Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay came in. Their focus was on flavour and ingredients rather than technique and method and they made cooking seem like something everyone could enjoy.

A few visits to Spain in my early 20s and a few years working at an Italian restaurant sealed the deal.

I am a big fan of cooking soups, stews, broths and casseroles - anything that take a long time.

They allow you to take a cheap or unpopular cut of meat, and build something with a great depth of flavour.

I do an awesome braised oxtail with spicy Asian broth - star anise, orange with a chilli bite.

Tandoori logburner chicken

6 chicken drumsticks

Salt

1/2 lemon, juiced

1 tsp coriander seeds

1 tsp cumin seeds

1/4 tsp smoked paprika

1/4 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder, or less if less heat required

Handful fresh coriander, finely chopped

2 medium garlic cloves, peeled and crushed

2.5cm nob of ginger, peeled and finely chopped

1 1/2 cups natural yoghurt (acidophilus)

1 Tbsp edible red food colouring or natural equivalent - cochineal

Coriander, lemon slices to garnish

3 metal skewers, long enough to be suspended across the chamber of a logburner.

2 spare skewers to lift

Make small slashes along the drumsticks, season, place in a large, sealable plastic bag and pour lemon juice over.

Place seeds in a small pan over a medium heat, with no oil, to dry fry. Keep an eye on the pan to ensure the seeds don't burn. This should take about 3-4 minutes. You will know they are ready, when you can smell their aromas. Grind in a pestle and mortar.

Combine all the spices, garlic, ginger, coriander, yoghurt and food colouring in a bowl and mix to create the marinade, then pour into the bag over the chicken, seal, put inside another bag and toss to ensure the marinade coats all the chicken. Leave in the fridge for at least 4 hours, preferably overnight.

To cook, prepare a hot fire in your logburner, with lots of small pieces of non-treated hardwood, rather than large logs. While the fire is heating up, skewer the chicken lengthwise, 2 per skewer. Once the logburner has reached a high heat and there are no flames, push the embers to the back and lay down a piece of foil to catch any juices, then rest the skewers across the width of the chamber (use the spare skewers to lift them into place.) Shut the door and sit back.

The chicken will take about 25-30 minutes to cook through and the skewers will need rotating twice The easy way is to lift them out, rest on a roasting dish, turn the roasting dish 180 degrees and put them back in.

Serve hot with lemon slices, coriander and perhaps a little left-over yoghurt to take the heat off.

Kevin O'Hanlon rounds off hunting and fishing expeditions by turning his catch into fine food.

There is something exceptional about Kevin O'Hanlon's ability to catch fish.

In fact, his uncanny ability to drop a line, get a bite and land a fish has earned him the moniker of Fish Whisperer among family and friends.

At 37, O'Hanlon has almost 30 fishing years behind him, thanks largely to a father who taught his boys how to bait a hook, tie flies and, most importantly, go home with something for dinner.

The student has long since outstripped the teacher, but the knowledge shared by his dad has laid the seeds of his current lifestyle.

He has become a deft hand in the kitchen, a learning curve inspired by his desire to be able to hunt and gather and then eat his quarry.

At all times of the year, there is something he can catch, be it whitebait, ducks, rabbits, salmon, trout, crayfish and occasionally quail and pheasant. Is there anything he could catch that wouldn't make it onto his plate? "Kina - it just isn't my thing.

"When I'm on dinner duty, I might cook a duck in Guinness in the slow cooker. Otherwise it's usually a fish dish. And I do a really good pizza with salami and mozzarella.

"When I was really young, not even a teenager, I used to come home with a trout, gut it then fry it on a pan and then serve it covered in tomato sauce of all things. I think about it now and cringe.

"Two foods I think were made for each other are lemon juice and fish. I eat fish without lemon juice, of course, but would never choose to. It always feels as if something is missing. It's like eating a sausage without tomato sauce.

"Whenever I watch Hell's Kitchen, I always wish I could try one of the halibut or scallop dishes, because the diners usually rave about them. I'd just like to see if they are that much better than anything I have had.

Kevin's hot smoked trout

Once you have caught your trout, fillet it, leaving the skin on, but taking the scales off. Make a mixture of equal measures of brown sugar and sea salt and rub generous amounts into the fish. Leave to cure for at least an hour, but preferably overnight.

The bigger the fish, the longer it needs to cure. Rinse off the excess mixture, and pat dry with a paper towel. Sprinkle a small handful of manuka sawdust in the bottom of a smoker. This process involves a bit of trial and error, because too much will make the fish bitter.

Place the fish on the rack skin side down. For heat use methylated spirits. (I half fill my meths dish, because too much, and the fish overcooks). Place the top of the smoker on.

If the fish is undercooked, just add a little more meths and cook longer. The thinner the fillets, the less the cooking time. A standard 3lb to 4lb (1.4kg to 1.8kg) trout takes about 15 minutes.

Smoked trout pate

500g hot smoked trout, bones removed

250g sour cream

50ml lime juice

25g green peppercorns

25g freshly chopped coriander, salt to taste.

Place all the ingredients in a food processor and process until you get a smooth paste. Serve as a dip or spread on crostini.

- © Fairfax NZ News