Ginger Chicken with Almonds Recipe

What a blissful day yesterday! The garden team of Simon Johnson and Jeff Jones, and Beloved and I, traipsing round the garden of the new house talking about what sort of gardens to put in. In my old house in Westport, way back in a different life altogether, Simon and Piers gave me cutting gardens with iceberg roses and honeysuckle tumbling over pergolas, an orchard with peach, pear, apple, apricots and plums, a vegetable patch, a cherry walk, dividing the entire garden into 'rooms' with clipped holly hedges and low dry-stacked walls. It was beautiful, and easy to do on nearly three acres.

This time round we're on just under one acre, but I'm determined to do the same thing, on a smaller scale. Simon did look at me somewhat dubiously yesterday and asked who was going to look after the garden, and I will say back when I had those gardens I also seemed to have a lot more time, but he didn't know about the ace up my sleeve - Roger - who I found at a garden centre one day, who looked like a romantic poet from a bygone era and who seemed to know what he was talking about plantwise, so I offered him job as gardener. He still looks after my old gardens, and he promised me last week he'll come back and help with these, and I can't wait.

Simon and family stayed for dinner, plus us, Beloved's mum, Susan, and our friend Martha Stewart. The food ended up being pretty good, although the chicken could have been hotter (I always mess up heating times) but the piece de resistance was dessert. We started with a chilled cucumber and avocado soup, which was me using up a cucumber, greek yoghurt and dill salad I'd made a few days before and had TONS left over. I pureed it, together with a couple of avocados to thicken it, and added some milk. Served it with a spoonful of sour cream and snipped chives from the garden.

Next came the chicken with ginger and almonds which was incredibly tasty, but perhaps a little dry - I'm not very good with stir-fry things, and lastly the honey semifreddo and lemon and ginger tartlets. I sort of made up the tartlets. I adapted a recipe from the English cook Delia Smith, who I adore, and who tends to be completely idiot-proof, but it's hard for recipes to remain idiot proof when their makers forget to add crucial ingredients.

I swapped her pastry cases for a crust of crushed ginger snaps and butter, but I'd just put the tartlets in the oven, and turned around thinking, why is there an egg rolling around the counter top?

Ah yes. That would be the egg that was supposed to have been added to the lemon curd and creme fraiche filling. The egg that would have made it rise, instead of sinking pathetically as soon as they were out the oven.

So. more measures were needed. I then used my Mum's fool-proof lemon chiffon pie recipe, which is also impossible to get wrong. It involves mixing together one can of condensed milk, one small carton of heavy cream, and the juice of five lemons (I added the zest of a lemon too for a sharper, more lemony flavour). Are you sure you don't have to whisk it? I kept asking my Mum. No! She insisted. It thickens due to some chemical reaction. Truly, it's amazing! She said. You'll see.

I mixed it together, slopped it into the ginger cases (on top of the sunken lemon curd), put it in the fridge and waited for the magic to happen, that extraordinary chemical reaction to take place.

And waited...and waited. I kept prodding the lemon cream which was as sloppy two hours later as it was when I poured it in.

Drastic measures were then required. I poured the cream out, got out the electric whisk, and whisked it until it was thick and heavy and perfect. I then spooned it into the tartlets and scattered some candied ginger on the top, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best, and lo and behold, they were pretty damn good, if I do say so myself. Put it like this, even Martha didn't spot the series of culinary disasters that had befallen the poor lemon tartlets.

I also made a honey semifreddo which was Nigella Lawson's recipe. A semifreddo is a semi-frozen dessert, like ice-cream, but usually with the consistency of a frozen mousse, and much easier to make than ice-cream as there's no churning and no custard-making involved. I didn't bother adapting it at all, couldn't see what I could possibly do to make it any better, and it was AMAZING. As per Nigella's instructions, I drizzled it copiously with runny honey, threw on toasted pine nuts, and it was Impressive, delicious, rich as sin, and the perfect end to any dinner party.

There was one other dish I threw together for the eldest who keeps telling me she's vegetarian, although I know she can't resist a decent steak. It was gnocchi, on a bed of frozen spinach, with a horribly processed cheese sauce, topped with parmesan and panko breadcrumbs. The kind of thing that all children who subsist almost entirely on a diet of chicken nuggets and pizza, would adore. The kind of thing I would never, I mean never, serve at a dinner party.

Actually, that's not strictly true, but if I were to serve it for a dinner party I would have used fresh spinach flavoured with nutmeg, would have scattered dolcelatte in amongst the gnocchi, and would have made a bechamel sauce from scratch. Not thrown together store-cupboard heaven.

Let me be clear here. This was for the children. NOT FOR MARTHA STEWART.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, I wanted to shout, as I saw everyone, Martha included, spooning the pasta onto their plate. No-one commented. Unsurprisingly. Oh God. I have decided to wipe this dish from my memory.

The dish that shall not be discussed

I ate far too much, crawled into bed feeling rather like a small zeppelin, but here are instructions should you wish to do the same:

Ginger Chicken with Almonds Recipe (stolen lock stock and barrel from simplyrecipes.com - my new favourite website)

INGREDIENTS
4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (1 1/2 - 2 lbs. total)
2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger plus ¼ cup julienned fresh ginger
4 teaspoons grapeseed oil or other high flash point oil such as canola oil
2 teaspoons white-wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoond kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
4 large scallions (or 6 small), trimmed
1/2 cup mango chutney, large pieces chopped
1/4 cup chicken broth
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1/4 cup sliced almonds, toasted

METHOD
1 Slice chicken crosswise into ½-inch-thick pieces. Toss with ground coriander, grated ginger, 2 teaspoons oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper in a medium bowl. Marinate at room temperature 15 minutes.
2 Thinly slice white parts of scallions. Julienne green parts; set aside.
3 Stir together chutney, broth, and garlic in a small bowl.
4 Heat remaining 2 teaspoons oil in a 12-inch nonstick skillet (or wok) over medium-high heat. Add scallion whites and julienned ginger; stir-fry 30 seconds. Add chicken and stir-fry until thoroughly cooked, 4 to 6 minutes. Add scallion greens and chutney mixture; cook, stirring, 2 minutes. Transfer to shallow bowls with hot cooked rice (or without rice, for low-carb version). Sprinkle with toasted almond slices and serve.
Serves 4-6.