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    Game pie with an excellent pastry and spiced, braised red cabbage

    11 January 2022 - By 

    Really excellent pie, cobbled together from fairly standard technique that I will relay here. Ideally the pastry is prepared before starting on the filling. Ingredients 1 x Roughly sliced onion 2 x cloves of smoked garlic, finely chopped 3 rashers of smoked bacon sliced into lardons (this may be too much smoke with the garlic) 3 parsnips, peeled and cut into cork sized pieces 3 carrots peeled and cut into thumbnail sized pieces 400g game  (of the fowl variety) cut into of whatever size you have or desire. around 250g of white wine around 250g of chicken stock 2 or…

  • Blog

    Sticky Ginger cake

    11 January 2022 - By 

    Come November and the winter urges set upon me, the cosy, warmly lit nights, the pumpkin pie, the mulled cider and the spiced cake.  I’d never made a ginger cake that quite satisfied this image of wintertime for me, so I set about finding the recipe that would be the standard bearer of the form going forward. The following are what I narrowed it down to: https://rainydaymum.co.uk/sticky-gingerbread-loaf-cake-recipe/ https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/spiced_gingerbread_45369 https://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/international/american-mexican-and-caribbean/dark-jamaican-gingerbread https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/7322/favorite-old-fashioned-gingerbread/ With some final parkin variations for future consideration: https://lostinfood.co.uk/parkin/ https://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/international/european/british/traditional-oatmeal-parkin https://www.daringgourmet.com/yorkshire-parkin-cake/ https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/nov/03/how-to-make-parkin-recipe-felicity-cloake https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/7322/favorite-old-fashioned-gingerbread/ There is a limit, so I settled on the first and last of the standard ginger cake…

  • Blog

    Cinnamon Fruit (Christmas) Cake

    27 December 2021 - By 

    Double the mixture makes 3 of the small round tins. Threw in some clove spice also. Fruit was mixed with cointreau, also used to feed the cake. The small tins used took around 1 hour 30 minutes to bake, though I forgot to note the exact timing it will be around this, and they came out just correct with no blackening. Only matured for 3 weeks, and would perhaps have benefited for a longer period.  However it’s a good cake with a tender, non-stodgy crumb.  Very pronounced, plump raisins and I wonder if in the more cakey less sticky and…

  • Blog

    Sautéed mushrooms

    20 December 2021 - By 

    A fine sourdough really makes this dish, I suspect without it there would be no hard feelings whatsoever, however the backbone, the texture and that tiny hint of sour just carries that whole mushroom mix on to the next rung of the tasty ladder.  Great bite provided by the cabbage here, which, though it is not currently in front of me, I believe was not the originally listed green.  Oyster mushrooms used, and very nice they were too. From 3 2 1, pg. 256

  • Blog

    Pho

    29 November 2021 - By 

    Quickly stir fried thinly sliced cabbage and bamboo shoots in place of bean sprouts, also made using home made chicken stock instead of a stock cube. This is really superb.  I’m not totally convinced it’s quite as quick as the book suggests… The preparation of the aromatics is not nothing.   But it is excellent.  Wonderful, fresh flavours and shame on you if you don’t use fish sauce.  It’s so much of what is great here.  That and the lime squeezed on just before eating commences.   From Eat to beat, pg. 199

  • Blog

    Pizza by poolish

    27 November 2021 - By 

    Not more flavoursome than the previous neopolitan, but a fine method for creating a great crust and handling the dough. Perhaps combining the best of both is worthwhile. 200g water luke warm 5g honey 5g yeast 200g 00 flour Mix, leave at room temperature for 1 hour, then put in fridge for at least 12 hours, up to 24. When ready to make the dough, mix 300g luke warm water with 20g of salt, set aside. Add the poolish to a bowl. Add 300g if strong bread flour, 200g of 00 flour, mix, when incorporated mix in the water salt…

  • Blog

    Spiced pumpkin soup with bacon

    15 November 2021 - By 

    Excellent soup, warming and packed with flavour.  I rescued out a ladleful of the pumpkin and onion chunks from the blended fate of their brethren to add once again before serving, for a little texture.  I also dropped much of the cream, instead drizzling just a little on top.  a couple hundred extra grams of pumpkin was used, however I still believe a little extra stock could be added here, it was perhaps a little thick?   From Nigel Slater, Kitchen Diaries pg. 58