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Sloe Gin

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This is my own adaptation of a recipe which works well for me. What you end up with is liqueur-like but not too cloyingly sweet. The flavour of the fruit should shine through and, perversely, is enhanced by the use of cheaper, less strongly-flavoured gin. Aldi, here we come …

Planning

serves: 1 (joke)
preparation time: 6 months
cooking time: n/a

Ingredients

  • sloes, washed and pricked with a fork.
  • sugar
  • gin (the cheaper the better)
  • almond essence

Method

Your bottles must be clean and dry to start with. Half-fill each bottle with pricked sloes (I prick them as I go and get my fingers in a terrible mess). Depending upon bottle size, add sugar as follows: 750ml bottle – 2oz, 1000ml bottle – 3 oz. (I know those proportions are not quite consistent but it seems ot work.) Top each bottle up with your cheap gin and stopper them.

Find somewhere cool to store the bottles. For the first week, agitate the bottles well daily by inverting them a few times. After the first week leave them well alone (as in, don’t drink them) for at least 3 months and preferably 6 months. Just try to forget them, though further occasional agitations would not go amiss.

After 3/6 months you should have a very appealing deep red liquid. Strain the gin into a single container so as to distribute the sweetness evenly. Using fresh, clean, sterilized bottles (preferably clear glass), bottle and cap the gin. Now drive yourself completely nuts by standing it and leaving it well alone for at least another month, preferably 3 months.

OK, have at it!


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Posted in Drinks Tagged with:

Dukkah

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One triggered by Paul and Liz’s trip to New Zealand in 2009. It made such an impression that Paul had to write about it so there’s clearly a need to make a note of it. The idea is to dip bread in olive oil, then into this Dukkah mixture.

This version comes from Claudia Roden’s, A New Book of Middle Eastern Food .

Planning

serves: An army
preparation time: 15 mins
cooking time: n/a

Ingredients

  • 500g sesame seeds
  • 250g coriander seeds
  • 125g hazelnuts
  • 125g ground cumin
  • Salt & pepper

Method

Dry roast the ingredients separately, so as not to overcook any). Pound them together until they are finely crushed but not pulverized to a powder. A short blast in an electric blender woudl seem to save a lot of effort. Too long will release oil from the seeds and nuts forming a paste which we don’t want.

Season with salt and pepper to taste.

This mixture can apparently be stored for many weeks in covered jars.


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Posted in Accompaniments Tagged with:

Tarragon Chicken

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A swift Internet investigation of either Tarragon Chicken or, in French, Poulet à l’Estragon reveals that there seems to be no standard way to prepare, or even to describe, such a dish. This idea for a roasted whole chicken version was given to me by a former colleague and it seems to work admirably.

The same friend also told me that a Gewurtztraminer wine makes an ideal accompaniment. Once again, he was absolutely right.

Planning

serves: 2/4
preparation time: 10 mins
cooking time: 1-1¼ hrs

Ingredients

  • 1 medium roasting Chicken
  • 1 pack fresh tarragon (20-25g)
  • 125g butter
  • 30g plain flour
  • 300ml water
  • Salt & pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas 6. Put a roasting pan, one that will hold the chicken comfortably, into the oven to heat, also.

Pick the best young leaves from the tips of the tarragon stalks and reserve them to add to the sauce when it’s made. Cram the remaining tarragon (whole, no need to chop) along with 100g of the butter into the cavity of the chicken.

When the roasting pan is hot, add the remaining 25g butter so that it melts then put the chicken into the pan. Season the skin of the chicken lightly with salt and pepper and return it to the oven to roast. While the chicken is roasting, chop the reserved tarragon leaves. Cooking time will naturally vary depending on chicken size but 50 minutes to one hour 10 minutes usually does it; check using the tried and trusted thigh-piercing technique and make sure the juices run clear.

Remove the chicken from the oven. The butter will have been well flavoured by the tarragon and most will have flowed from the body cavity into the pan. Tilt the chicken to encourage the remaining juices out, then keep it warm while you make the sauce.

Put the roasting pan with the tarragon-flavoured butter onto a gentle heat and stir in the flour. Cook the butter in the flour for a couple of minutes. Now you are essentially making a white sauce but with water. (I was tempted to use chicken stock once. Don’t – it’s better with water.) Add the water gradually, stirring between additions to avoid lumps. When all the water is added, increase the heat slightly and bring to simmering point. Simmer for a couple of minutes to cook out any raw flour taste. Season with salt, papper and the reserved, chopped tarragon.

Collect any juices running from the chicken while resting and when you carve it and stir them into the sauce.


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Posted in Poultry Tagged with:

Caponata

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This is a difficult-to-describe concoction: aubergines in a tomatoey, pickley kind of mixture – a sort of Italian slightly sour ratatouille. It makes a great addition to a series of dips for some pitta bread when nattering with friends and a few preprandial drinks.

Planning

serves: 4-6
preparation time: 20 mins
cooking time: 40 mins

Ingredients

  • 500g aubergine, peeled & diced (1cm)
  • 4 tbs olive oil
  • 100g celery, finely chopped
  • 50g onion, finely chopped
  • 3 tbs wine vinegar mixed with 2 tsp caster sugar
  • 400g tomatoes, chopped (or 1 can plum tomatoes, drained)
  • 2 tsp tomato purée
  • 6 green olives, pitted & slivered
  • 1 tbs capers
  • 3 anchovy fillets, pounded smooth
  • 1 tbs pine kernels
  • Salt & pepper

Method

If you feel the need, degorge the aubergine chunks in the traditional manner by sprinkling with salt and leaving to drain for 30 minutes. (Personally, I don’t find this necessary these days. I suspect the food engineers have been at the aubergines.)

Heat half the oil in a large, heavy frying pan. Add the celery and cook gently, stirring frequently, for 10 minutes to soften (without colouring at this stage). Stir in the onions and cook for another 8-10 minutes to soften and for everything to become lightly coloured. Transfer to a bowl with a slotted spoon.

Add the remaining olive oil, increase the heat and sauté the aubergine cubes, stirring and turning for about 8 minutes until they are lightly browned. You may need to add a little more olive oil. Return the onion and celery mixture to the pan and stir in the vinegar & sugar mixture, the tomatoes, tomato purée, green olive slivers, capers and anchovies. Season a little with salt and pepper being careful of the salt (due to the anchovies). Simmer uncovered, stirring frequently, for about 15 minutes.

Stir in the pine kernels and adjust the seasoning with salt, pepper and vinegar (there should be a slight but not overpowering sourness).

Leave to cool before refrigerating until needed.


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Posted in Starters Tagged with:

Roast Butternut Squash Risotto

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Butternut squash has become very popular, almost ubiquitous, and it’s an orange colour so it must be good for you. I think it is at its best roasted when the full flavour develops. As well as making a good accompaniment to a Sunday roast or, better still, a Sunday barbecued joint, roasted butternut squash shines very well in this risotto recipe.

Planning

serves: 4
preparation time: 15 mins
cooking time: 1 hr

Ingredients

  • 1 butternut squash
  • 1 tbs coriander seeds
  • 1 dried red chilli, seeds removed
  • Salt & pepper
  • olive oil
  • 100g butter
  • 1 large onion, finely chopped
  • 1 rib celery, finely chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
  • 1 wineglass dry white vermouth
  • 320g risotto rice
  • 75g Parmesan cheese, freshly grated
  • 1 ltr chicken stock, hot

Method

Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/gas mark 5. Cut the butternut squash in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds with a spoon. (If you can be bothered, pick the seeds out of the pith and reserve them for later. They can be roasted and added to the dish.) Cut the squash into 1cm slices. Don’t bother to skin the squash, the apparently waxy, hard skin gets softer with cooking.

Crumble the dried red chilli into a pestle and mortar with the coriander seeds and a pinch of salt and pepper. Grind all this together, mix with a tablespoon or so of olive oil and rub this all over the butternut squash slices. Put the squash in a roasting tray and cook in the oven for about 30 minutes. If you’ve reserved the squash seeds, stir them in to the roasting tray and roast for another 5 – 10 minutes, otherwise just leave the squash for the additional time. Remove the squash from the oven and allow it to cool enough to handle. It will have shrivelled a little and be quite soft now; chop it into chunks of about 1cm.

When you are ready, make the risotto. Get the stock hot in a separate pan ready to add to the risotto in batches. In your chosen risotto pan, melt half the butter over moderate heat. Reduce the heat to low, add the finely chopped onion, celery and garlic and fry gently for about 10 minutes to soften without colouring. Now add the rice; increase the heat slightly and, stirring constantly so as not to burn it, cook the rice for about 2 minutes when it should begin to look a little translucent. Add the vermouth and let the alcohol bubble off so the angels can have it. 🙂

Once the rice has absorbed the vermouth, you can start adding the stock, which should be very hot so as to keep the simmer going. Add the hot stock one ladle at a time. With the first ladelful only, add about half a teaspoon of salt. Adjust the heat so that the stock simmers and the rice does not cook too quickly. Stir the rice frequently to help release the starch and make the traditional creamy consistency of risotto. As each ladelful of stock is absorbed, add another and continue simmering and stirring. In this manner, it should take about 15 – 20 minutes to get all the stock incorporated.

Now stir in the diced, roasted butternut squash. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper now, remembering that the Parmesan cheese (added next) is salty so go easy. Add the parmesan cheese with the remaining half of the butter and stir again. Cover the pan with a lid and let it sit for two minutes; this reheats the squash but most importantly makes the risotto wondefully unctious. (Now there’s a posh word for some posh nosh.)

If you’ve roasted the squash seeds, sprinkle them on top. A few sage leaves quickly fried in butter wouldn’t go amiss, either.

This really just needs a good leafy salad, appropriately dressed, for accompaniment.


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Posted in Veggies Tagged with:

Hasenpfeffer

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The classic germanic hare stew taken from French Regional Cookery – Alsace , or so I thought. (Well, Alsace does suffer from a French/German identity crisis.) Before I’d cooked this, given my basic knowledge of German, I thought that the pfeffer part of the name might imply that it were a little peppery. It seems not, more’s the pity. Apparently, pfeffer also refers to thickening a dish with blood, just as in the very English jugged hare. Somewhat disappointingly, this might as well be called lièvre au vin or lièvre Bourguinon , for it closely resembles both. It does taste good, nonthemore for that.

Planning

serves: 6
preparation time: 3½ hrs
cooking time: 3 hrs

Ingredients

  • 225 g green bacon, diced
  • 1¾ kg hare, jointed, blood & liver reserved
  • salt & pepper
  • 1 tsp dried thyme
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 3 onions, sliced
  • 4 tbs olive oil
  • 2 tbs Marc d’Alsace or brandy
  • 50 g butter
  • 18 small onions, peeled
  • 18 button mushrooms, wiped
  • 1 clove garlic
  • 25 g plain flour
  • 350 ml red wine
  • 350 ml game or beef stock
  • bouquet garni
  • 5 tbs single cream
  • parsley sprigs for garnish

Method

Put the hare into a bowl and season with the salt, pepper and thyme. Add the bay leaf and one of the sliced onions. Combine the oil and Marc d’Alsace or brandy , and pour it over the hare. Turn the joints until well coated and set aside to marinate for 3 hrs.

Meanwhile, blanch the bacon in boiling water for a minute then drain and dry it. Melt half the butter in a frying pan and fry the bacon until golden. Remove the bacon with a slotted spoon and reserve. Now add the baby onions to the butter and fry for 5 minutes to clolour them slightly. Remove and reserve. Similarly, fry the mushrooms in the butter for 2 mins, remove and reserve.

Melt the remaining butter in the frying pan and add the last two sliced onions and crushed garlic. Fry for 4 – 5 mins until golden. Add the flour and fry gently until golden, stirring constantly.

Drain the hare, reserving the marinade, and pat the joints dry with kitchen paper. Add the hare to the roux and cook, stirring constantly, until browned. Pour over the red wine and stock and stir thoroughly before adding the bouquet garni. Bring to the boil, lower the heat and simmer gently for 1½ hours until tender.

Transfer the hare to a flameproof casserole and add the reserve bacon, baby onions and mushrooms. Now add the reserved marinade to the pan in which the hare was browned, stir well to deglaze and strain the contents into the casserole. Cover the casserole and cook in a preheated oven at 175°C, gas mark 4 for 1 hour. 10 mins before the end, chop the reserved liver, stir it into the casserole and continue cooking.

Remove the casserole from the oven and place it over moderate heat. Mix the reserved blood with the cream and stir it into the casserole. Cook gently for about 5 mins, stirring all the time and be careful not to let it boil or it will curdle!

Serve the hasenpfeffer garnished with parsley sprigs and accompanied by noodles.


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Posted in Game Tagged with:

Romesco de Peix

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Romesco is a traditional Catalan sauce made with pounded nuts and peppers. Here, a derivative of it is used to make a Catalan fish and shellfish stew. Firm fish, such as monkfish, works well in a stew but careful substitutions can be made. Similarly, the shellfish can vary between clams, mussels and prawns, depending upon availability. I’d use less fish stock for mussels or clams, which release their own liquid, than prawns, which do not.

Planning

serves: 4
preparation time: 15 mins
cooking time: 50 mins

Ingredients

  • 6 tbs olive oil
  • 1 large onion, preferably Spanish, roughly chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, finely sliced
  • 2 tbs rosemary, finely chopped
  • 3 bay leaves
  • 2 red peppers, quartered, seeded & thinly sliced
  • ½ tsp sweet smoked Spanish paprika (pimentón)
  • 400g tin plum tomatoes, drained & roughly chopped
  • 150ml white wine
  • 150ml (for clams/mussels, which release liquid) or 200ml (for prawns) fish stock
  • 1 tsp saffron threads, infused in 4 tbs boiling water
  • 150g whole blanched almonds, lightly toasted and ground
  • 650g monkfish fillets, cut into large chunks
  • 500g mussels/clams/raw prawns
  • Salt & pepper

Method

In a deep sauté pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion together with a pinch of salt and cook the onion, stirring occasionally, until golden and sweet (about 15-20 minutes). Then stir in the garlic, rosemary, bay leaves and red peppers. When the red pepper has softened for at least 10 minutes, stir in the paprika and tomatoes and simmer for another 10 minutes. Now add the wine and drive off the alcohol for a couple of minutes before adding the fish stock together with the saffron-infused water. Finally, thicken the base with the ground almonds and taste for seasoning. (You can complete this stage ahead of time.)

When almost ready to eat, reheat the base if necessary and add the fish and shellfish. Put a lid on and simmer until the fish is cooked through and (if appropriate) the shellfish have opened.

This goes well with new potatoes or a raw fennel salad.


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Posted in Starters Tagged with:

Fish Crumble

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Yes, I know this might sound strange to those accustomed to an apple crumble but trust me, this savoury crumble works well and has always proved immensely popular with those for whom we’ve cooked it.

The savoury cheese crumble mixture could, I imagine, be more traditionally replaced by a cheesy mashed potato topping, if you preferred, but then it would become a pretty standard fish pie that’d be rather missing the point, in my opinion.

Planning

serves: 4
preparation time: 20 mins
cooking time: 45 mins

Ingredients

  • 1½ lbs (~700 g) white fish (haddock, plaice; hake is excellent)
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 pt semi-skimmed milk
  • 4 oz prawns
  • 3 eggs, hard-boiled and sliced
  • 2 oz butter
  • 3½ oz plain flour
  • 2 oz Cheddar cheese, coarsely grated
  • pinch of grated nutmeg
  • Salt & pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas 4.

Add the bay leaf and white fish to the milk and bring it to simmering point. Poach the white fish very gently until barely cooked. Remove the fish and let it cool; leave the bay leaf in the milk cooling as well.

When the fish is cool, remove any skin and bones and flake it coarsely into a bowl. Add the prawns and the sliced hard-boiled eggs.

Make the crumble mixture. Rub or process together 2 oz of the plain flour and 1½ oz of the butter until you get the famed bread-crumb stage. Stir in the grated Cheddar and some salt and pepper. Set the mixture aside.

Make a thin white sauce with the poaching liquid. Strain the milk into a jug and sprinkle in the pinch of nutmeg. Melt the remaining ½ oz butter in a small saucepan over low heat. When the foam subsides, stir in the remaining ½ oz plain flour and cook gently, stirring frequently until the mixture is pale (2-3 minutes). Remove the pan from the heat and gradually add the reserved poaching milk, beating vigorously between additions to ensure a smooth consistency is achieved. Return the pan to the heat and bring it to a simmer, stirring constantly. Gently cook out the flour taste for a couple of minutes, then stir it gently into the fish, prawn and egg mixture.

Assemble the crumble. Tip the fish mixture into an appropriately sized dish. Cover it with the crumble mixture and bake it in the oven for 20-30 minutes until the top is golden brown.


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Posted in Fish Tagged with:

Celery and Stilton Soup

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This one’s entirely down to me. This is one of jolly old England’s classic combinations of flavours turned into a warming soup. These quantities make about a pint/550 ml so you can have either two steaming bowlfuls or four nicely pretentious coffee-cupfuls for a dinner party.

Planning

serves: 2 – 4
preparation time: 5 mins
cooking time: 50 mins

Ingredients

  • 30 g butter
  • 1 medium onion, roughly chopped
  • 3 large ribs celery, roughly chopped
  • 500 ml light chicken stock
  • 60 g blue Stilton cheese, crumbled
  • salt & pepper

Method

Melt the butter in a suitable saucepan over moderate heat and, when the foam subsides, sweat the onion in it for about 5 minutes without colouring. Add the chopped celery and sweat, stirring occasionally, for another 5 minutes also without colouring. Add the light chicken stock, increase the heat and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to simmering point and cook gently uncovered for 30 minutes. Liquidize the soup and return it to the saucepan.

Now it’s time to add the cheese. Since Stilton cheeses vary greatly both in strength and saltiness, I suggest that you treat the cheese as a seasoning and add it in stages to avoid over-doing it. Start with about a half (30 g). While gently reheating the soup, add the crumbled Stilton cheese stirring constantly so that it dissolves (this may take about 5 minutes). Taste the soup and try to balance the flavour of both the celery and the Stilton; neither should dominate. Add as much of the cheese as is necessary to achieve this balance.

Finally, adjust the seasoning to taste bearing in mind that you may not need any salt because of the salty Stilton.


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Posted in Soups Tagged with:

French Onion Soup

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This is my take on what is probably the ultimate winter-warmer classic. My variation is the stock. I always found beef stock such a fag to make and, frankly, it never seemed terribly successful (entirely down to me, of course). I do love eating duck and frequently made brown duck stock which I have found to be an excellent, suitably rich alternative which I commend to you.

Of course, since one can now buy very acceptable ready made stocks (for Heaven’s sake do NOT use cubes!), you could go ahead and use a good beef stock if you’d prefer a more original version of Soupe à l’Oignon Gratinée .

Planning

serves: 6
preparation time: 30 mins
cooking time: 2 hrs

Ingredients

  • 6 diagonal slices of baguette, 2.5 cms thick
  • olive oil
  • 4 cloves garlic, crushed
  • 750 g onions, halved & finely sliced
  • 50 g butter
  • 4 cloves garlic, crushed
  • ½ tsp granulated sugar
  • 1.2 ltr duck stock (or beef stock)
  • 275 ml dry white wine
  • 2 tbs brandy (optional)
  • salt & pepper
  • 200 g Gruyère cheese, grated

Method

First, make the croûtons. Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas 4. Drizzle about two tablespoons of olive oil on a baking sheet, add two crushed cloves of garlic and spread it around mixing the garlic into the oil (use your hands). Place the slices of baguette on the oiled sheet turning them over to lightly coat both sides. Bake them in the oven for 20-25 minutes until crisp and crunchy.

Place a 3.5 litre flameproof casserole on high heat and melt the butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil together. When hot, add the onions, 2 crushed cloves of garlic and the sugar, and fry turning everything occasionally until the onions begin to darken at the edges. (This should take 5 – 6 minures.) Reduce the heat to very low and continue cooking the onions very slowly for 30 minutes more. There should now be some nicely caramelized pan contents.

Pour in the stock and white wine, season, and increase the heat. While it is coming to the boil, stir with a wooden spoon scraping any caramelized residue from the pan bottom. Once at the boil, reduce the heat to very low again and leave it to cook very gently, uncovered, for about one hour. (All the above can be prepared in advance.)

When ready to serve, bring the soup back to simmering point and check for seasoning. Now is also the time to add the brandy if you wish.Serving this out of a tureen is apt to get very messy so I suggest you use individual soup bowls. Pre-heat the grill to high. Ladel the hot soup into the warmed soup bowls and top each with a croûton. Sprinkle the grated Gruyère over the croûtons and place the bowls under the grill until the cheese is golden and bubbling.

Warn your guests not to touch the bowls!


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Posted in Soups Tagged with: