26 FEBRUARY 1994, Page 50

AS WE have started Lent, most of the saints get

short shrift unless they are terri- bly important, but I have a childhoods interest in St Walburga, whose feast is on 25 February (or 26 in leap year. Why?). She is an English saint but was directed by St Boniface to convert the Germans, together with her brothers SS Willibald and Wini- bald — what wonderful names for future parents to use. They founded monasteries; she became the Abbess of Heidenheim and her body rests in Eichstadt, where a mirac- ulous oil exudes from her sepulchre. When I was small I used to have terrible earaches before the advent of penicillin, so the nuns at my convent used to bind tiny bottles of this oil over my ear. It worked; I never reached mastoid state and, touch wood, have never had any trouble since.

To another preventative for many things: garlic. I was given a present by my neigh-

bour, Caroline Spencer: a jar of prepared garlic cloves in olive oil, an incredibly use- ful gift as you can use them for anything you are cooking, from stews and roasts to salads and crostini. Put a quantity of whole garlic bulbs on a baking tray in a very low oven, say Gas 230F, 116C, and bake for 1-1'/2 hours. Let them cool, then peel each clove. Place them in jars and cover with good olive oil. The oil becomes impregnated with the garlic and can be used to give fla-vour. Just top up the jar with more olive oil.

To continue with this magic bulb, let us indulge in that magnificent dish, chicken cooked on a nest of up to 2 lbs of garlic, if you can face peeling that amount. This may alarm some people but after the cooking the strength of the garlic has evaporated and the cloves taste sweetly delicious. Even if you don't eat them they will impart aroma to the chicken. This dish is all the better for using the young garlic which should appear in a month or so, but we now get such good garlic in the market-place you can cook it any time.

Poulet beamais

From 40 cloves to 2 lbs of garlic 1 chicken —4 lbs

1 lemon

salt and pepper 4 sprigs tarragon 1 oz butter 1 tablespoon olive oil 1 tablespoon cognac 4 tablespoons dry white vermouth

This is adapted from Frances Bissell who uses 40 garlic cloves. Peel the cloves (this is facilitated by cutting the root end off first and/or covering in boiling water for '/2 minute). Squeeze the lemon juice over the chicken and rub it well in; put the halves into the cavity with the tarragon. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper. Heat the butter and oil in a casserole to fit the chicken, and brown the bird all over. Pour on the cognac, light it, swivelling the dish until the flames die. Remove the bird, put all the garlic on the bottom of the dish and return the chicken to sit on this garlic nest. Dribble the vermouth over the whole. Cover the casserole and cook in a preheat- ed oven at Gas 5, 375F, 190C for an hour, remove the lid, baste the breast and cook for a further 15-20 minutes to produce a nice browned skin. Your kitchen will abound with fragrance and delight. Have some new potatoes and little peas with this feast, or a good tomato salad wouldn't go amiss.

I have received a curious but very charm- ing tabloid-shaped document: My Father's Cookbook, privately published, it seems, by Gilbey and Schmid, priced at £10. It can be obtained by telephoning 071-262 6133, or writing to 136 Gloucester Terrace, London W2 6HR. It is a collection of receipts of Lisa Gilbey's father, Giles M. Gilbey, who lived in Barbados, France, Italy and Ameri- ca. Nice simple dishes with many a useful hint on wines and the preparation of food. A few misty photographs illustrate the book and the whole thing is written in the daughter's script. I think this iced tomato cream could be a very nice first course.

Iced tomato cream Sauté 1 chopped onion in 1 oz of butter until soft. Add 6 tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped (or a 14-oz tin of chopped ones), 1 tablespoon of tomato purée, 1 tea- spoon of sugar, 1 teaspoon chopped basil, '/2 teaspoon oregano, I/2 teaspoon Worces- tershire sauce, V2 teaspoon salt. Simmer, covered, for 10 minutes. Cool and purée 30 a blender. Add 4 fluid oz chicken stock, 6 oz double cream, 2 oz sour cream, and lemon juice to taste. Blend well and adjust seasoning. Freeze for Ph hours. Garnish with parsley and thin slices of lemon. Serves 4.

Jennifer Paterson