Reindeer Meat

There seems to have been a bit of a storm of controversy about Lidl's reindeer meat. Bit stupid really I think. Meat is often far worse treated in this country. I'm rather looking forward to trying it. I think I shall swing by Lidl to do my shop this week, and make some kind of stew with the meat.

Anyone cooked reindeer before? What works well?


In other news, it transpires that Kate and Wills are getting married. Apparently the last big royal wedding included a menu of fresh strawberries and cream, brill in lobster sauce, and supreme de voilaille Princess de Galles which is chicken breast stuffed with a fine lamb mousse (sounds delicious...ish). I wonder what a suitable wedding breakfast for royals will be this time. 

Bacchus Food and Beer Festival: The Food

For discussion of the beer see Chris's blog here.


Well, the time rolled around again last week for another Food and Beer festival at one of our favourite pubs in Newcastle, the Bacchus. These are gluttonous affairs, consisting of 8 courses, each matched with a half pint of real ale from one brewery. As time has gone on they have refined the format, and now the brewer usually comes and talks about each beer and the brewery.

It's not just about the beer though, despite its popularity among the Camra community in Newcastle. The festivals are a chance for Paul, the chef, to get away from the normal (always excellent) pub grub that is served the rest of the time, and experiment with ingredients and combinations he doesn't often get to cook in a restaurant environment.

This in turn, means that I often get new food experiences. It's at these festivals that I've had oysters and snails for the first time (the oysters were great, the snails were the one course I have ever not finished in the Bacchus - but then, I'm squeamish about snails anyway) and memorable combinations like Chocolate and Courgette Brownie, and Mexican Style Strawberries with nachos, sour cream and cracked black pepper.

Last week's festival was matching beers from Fyne Ales who are based at the head of Loch Fyne in Scotland. I think it was one of the best, and most consistent of the festivals, and I enjoyed it immensely. None the less, me being me, I can always suggest improvements.

So, on to the courses themselves:

Course 1: Caviar (with Hurricane Jack)

Straight away, something I've never eaten before: caviar, served with Scottish wheat cakes. Really simple flavours, that packed a punch for the first course of the day. I loved the salty, fishyness of it, and I was surprised that the texture wasn't slimy in the least. The savoury wheat cakes worked really well to balance the salt. Having said that, I'm not sure I'd ever pay huge amounts of money for it.

As for the beer match, I thought it was a great one.

Course 2: Moules Mariniere (with Pipers Gold)

Mussels are a recent love, but a great one, and these were done to perfection. I tried to claim our friend's, who doesn't like mussels, but his wife got there first. Shame. A classic combination, and I can't say much more about it (other than it inspired me to finally try cooking them myself the other day).

As for the beer, it was another good match.

Course 3: Piri Piri King Prawn Filo Parcel (with Avalanche)

The parcels in this course were served with Jasmine rice. It is a good combination, although I think the rice was a touch to delicately flavoured to stand up to the massive amount of chille and lime in the parcels. I did think however that the prawns were well spiced, in the sense that they were very spicy, but you didn't lose the flavour of the prawns or the lime. 

The beer match was great, and really helped to calm the spice down.

Course 4: Caramelised Onion, Bacon and Goats Cheese Tart (with Maverick)

This was one of the best presented dishes of the day - maybe not imaginative, but it was one of few that had a variety of colour on the plate. And sometimes I couldn't care less about stacking things on top of each other in an artistic manner, if there's no colour. The pastry was crumbly and buttery, and the filling packed full of salty sweet flavour. It came at just the right point in the meal as well, with the dairy being able to eradicate the storm of spice still lingering from the prawns. One of my favourite dishes of the day.

The beer match was ok, but not that memorable.

Course 5:  Lamb with Balsamic vinigarette

I think this course is designed purely and simply to show of the quality of the meat. It was superb. Yes, it was just lamb, lettuce, and a balsamic dressing, but the lamb was still gorgeously pink in the middle, melt-in-your mouth juicy, and the balsamic vinegar combined with the distinctive taste of lamb fat on the crunchy lettuce was to die for. It's a dish of contrasts - the bite to the lamb and the crunch of the lettuce, and the sharpness of the vinegar and the grease of the lamb. Great.


Course 6: Venison stuffed with Haggis

The flavours in this were great, really robust and warming on a cold autumn night, but I can't help feeling that it just looks boring on the plate. I would maybe have put a tiny heap of pickled red cabbage with it, more for the colour than anything else (although pickled red cabbage would have worked wonderfully well). I also found that my piece was just a touch tough and dry around the edges, although those near me didn't have that problem at all. Maybe it was one of the first to be plated and spent a little too long under the warmers. I have to give them a little leeway for getting 30 plates for each course out within 5 minutes of each other after all.

Course 7: Scone with fruit preserve and clotted cream

The scone was gorgeous - crispy top, soft and fluffy in the middle. Even Chris ate it without bothering to pick out or complain about the raisins. The fruit preserve was good, but not as good as our friend Cath's. But hey, who's complaining?


Course 8: Espresso Creme Brulee with Shortbread

The custard in this was nice, but unfortunately the sugar on top was not crunchy! And the shortbread was slightly undercooked, giving it a doughy middle. It's a real shame, because this would have been a fantastic end to the meal had it been perfect. Which is not to say I didn't enjoy it of course. Things have to taste pretty horrible before I won't eat them.




Over all, I think the balance of courses was great, although more vegetable matter would have been lovely. I really like fishy stuff but am not great at cooking it so I loved the fact that the menu was relatively heavy in fish. I thought some of the dishes were superb, most particularly the lamb, the mussels and the tart. It wasn't perfect, but that was ok. Each time the standard goes up as the Bacchus team get more experienced. I think the beer matches this time were the best and most consistent of any of the festivals I've been to - there wasn't one I disagreed with, although some worked better than others.

As ever, I had a great time, and I can't wait for the next festival we go to.

Cragside Soup

After a wonderful day visiting the National Trust Property of Cragside in Northumberland, it was definitely an evening for a warming dinner. The amazing autumn colours of the trees, along with this last week inspired me to create the following. It is named in honour of one of the most gorgeous places I've been in a long time.

Cragside Soup


2 Onion Squashes
2 small red onions
2 large cloves of garlic
1 thumb sized piece fresh ginger
Drizzle olive oil
Small tub single cream
Milk
Nutmeg
Chille Powder
Ground Cumin
Salt and ground black pepper.

Prehet the oven to Gas mark 6/200C

Slice off the bottom point of each squash, just enough so that it will stand upright. Slice off the top, leaving a big enough section to be able to get a soon into. You may also need to cut out some of the flesh in order to get into the seed cavity. Keep the top, but discard the bottom.

Finely chop the onion, garlic, and grate the ginger. Share between the squashes and drizzle a tiny amount (about 1/2 a tsp) of olive oil in each. Sprinkle about 1/2 tsp chille on top, and replace the lids of the squash.

Place in the oven in a roasting tray, for about an hour, or until you can stick a fork in the flesh of the squash easily, and the skin is easy to peel away.

It should be noted at this point that I had really wanted to be able to serve the soup in the skins of the squash, but unfortunately, the skins of onion squash apparently are too thin and unable to stand up when roasted. See picture for evidence.

Using a spoon, and your fingers (asbestos fingers helpful) remove the flesh from the skins and place in your blender or other blending implement. Add the cream and blend until smooth. Add milk to thin it to your desired consistency (I like soup quite thick, so mine was a bit thicker than double cream.)

Season with plenty of salt and pepper to balance the sweetness, add more chille if it is not hot enough for you, and some nutmeg to balance the creaminess with a bit of earthiness*. Serve sprinkled with grated nutmeg, another sprinkling of chille, and a nice bread roll.

Marvel at the bright yellowy orange colour, then dig in.

*I did not actually add nutmeg at this point simply because Chris doesn't like it. I just put loads on top of mine in the bowl.


Beer Match: We have been enjoying three lovely Rauchbiers. The smoky, meaty flavour goes wonderfully well with the soup. Read more here.

Genius food ideas

I just thought Id share the following video about food. I think there's some great ideas in it.

Proving a point

I'm involved at a cafe designed for international students to meet and get to know people. More and more often on Wednesdays this is involves food from various countries, depending on who fancies cooking. This clearly inspires conversation about how that food is made, and what food is like in people's home countries (further proof, incidentally, that food allows people to connect together on a really basic level).

Anyway, all too often, people wonder at my extolling the virtues of good British food, given its inherent blandness, and my obvious enjoyment of the Chinese/Spanish/Japanese/Persian/Indian/etc food I've just eaten. (Although I think some people assume I enjoy it so much because the concept of flavour in my food is a new one for me...)

Now, I've long suspected that so many of them believe this because of a couple of reasons:
a) what people think of in other countries when they think of British food is fish and chips, full English breakfasts* and not much else
b) the fact that so many British students can't/won't/think they can't afford to/think they don't have time to cook decent traditional meals.
c) if they aren't fed by friends who can cook british food, they might decide to try it at a restaurant. Unfortunately, most "British" restaurants are pubs, thereby immediately counting that out for an awful lot of my friends, especially the muslim ones. Those that do go might try something at Wetherspoons or similar, which, although it has its place, is hardly a great place to go for really excellent cuisine. Very few would even know where to look for decent pub grub.

I also have theories on the development of food, and cookery in this country that I feel probably do not help matters - e.g. the fashion for low-fat cooking that hit from (I think) sometime around the 80s, the increasing popularity of supermarkets, and the increasing detachment and squeamishness about food.

However this impression has been formed, I set out to prove to some of these people just why I love good, home cooked, British food, and most of all, to prove that the one thing it is not, is bland.

N.B. From this point onwards when I refer to British food, I mean British food cooked well. As with any food, it is entirely possible to do it badly.

British food at its best for me is about using simple, fresh, local ingredients, wasting as little as possible (hence sausages, stew to use the tougher cuts, crumble, corned beef hash...) and cooking them in a simple, unfussy way. It should be flavoured and seasoned well to encourage the flavours of the meat and veg, but not overpoweringly.

This does not mean I don't use non-native ingredients. But British cooking has long relied on imports of ingredients, especially spices. It's been limited at times by the cost, but, for example, ginger, black pepper, mace pepper, black and green cardamon, nutmeg, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, and myriad other spices would have been easy to get for those that could afford it since at least the time of the Roman empire. That's a good 2000 years. And if it's available, people are going to use it.

We also have, of course, many herbs, including many that, I bet, 100 years ago would have been commonly foraged but now have fallen out of use because we have no idea what they are.With all these sources of flavouring available to us, the idea that British food is bland is, frankly, ridiculous.

So, to prove all my hypotheses, I designed a British menu for today's Global Cafe, that used mostly ingredients that have been available in the British Isles for hundreds of years to a greater or lesser degree. The exception is things like oxo cubes, marigold vegetable stock powder, and Bisto gravy powder. I think that most of it has been widely availabe for at least the last 30 years. I had to provide for vegetarians, and I also wanted a dish to prove the heritage of British cooking, as well as a (relatively) more recent dish, the sort of thing that is absolutely classically British.


The menu was as follows:

-Beef stew
Using cubed stewing steak, fresh rosemary, garlic, onion, swede, carrots, parsnips, cabbage, mushrooms, leeks, and probably some other bits of veg I've forgotten about.
-Rosemary Dumplings
I use Jamie Oliver's recipe from Jamie cooks, which is great because it doesn't use suet and therefore I always have the right ingredients in. Makes great dumpings though.
-Potato Mash
With whole grain mustard
-Mashed Celeriac
Those that don't know - this is the root of the celery plant. I like it mashed with a little milk, and a lot of pepper and butter.

-Spicy yellow vegetable soup
Including squash, sweet potato, swede, carrot, onion, garlic, grated ginger, and again, probably some more veg I've forgotten about.

-Medieval Gingerbread
Made of breadcrumbs, honey and spice. Don't get me wrong, it might have been around since before the 15th C, but this amount of spice and honey would have been expensive. This is a dish for showing off your wealth, not for the commoners. None the less, shows the heritage of gingerbread.

It's not a great pic, especially of me, but it's the best I've got. As I didn't actually sit down until I ate I wasn't able to take any myself.

 


I'm glad to say I convinced most people, in particular two of the guys that were most convinced that British food is bland. The day has been a success!



It's just a shame I couldn't introduce people to British beer while I was at it, but you can't have everything.



*The two things listed by my spanish friend Juanmar when I asked him what he thought of when British food was mentioned, confirming my suspicions for a few people at least.

My perfect crumble recipe

Folowing a scrumptious dinner of beef stew, roasted veg, broccolli and cabbage last Saturday, I made a delicious apple and blueberry crumble for pudding. It turned out to be so good that Chris and I ate the entire thing in one sitting, so I thought I'd make another with the second tub of blueberries, and show you the recipe.

I also noticed this article in the Guardian last week. It seems there is much debate about the perfect crumble.

It must be said at this point that crumble is something that I make entirely by look, feel, and taste, and so the following measurements really are estimates.

Apple and Blueberry Crumble

4 medium cooking apples (we had been donated some by a friend who had a tree in the garden)
1 large punnet of blueberries (about 3 large handfulls)
1 tbsp brown (usually demerrara) sugar
1/2 tsp lemon juice


3 tbsp plain flour
1 1/2 tbsp rolled porridge oats
2 tbsp caster sugar
3 tbsp butter (you can use margerine if you really want, but real butter gives it a much nicer flavour, and, I think, texture.)


Preheat the oven to Gas mark 5/190C.

Peel, core and 8th the apples, and mix with the blueberries, brown sugar and lemon juice in the dish in which you are going to cook the crumble:

Put the flour, oats, sugar and butter in a seperate bowl.  Rub in using your fingers (or do all of this in the food processor - I haven't got room for such a luxury item in my kitchen). You will have to keep adding things until you get the right proportions. It should look like this:

taste like shortbread biscuits, and feel, in archaeological site terms, like a friable, clayey sandy soil with frequent small oat inclusions. For the non-archaeologists among us, this means if you were to press it into a small ball it would just about do it, but as soon as you poke it it would fall apart again, be a little bit gritty when you rub it between your fingers (but not so much as if you were rubbing beach sand. If it feels like that you may want to check you've added the flour, oats, and butter...), and have enough oats that you feel them and see them each time you pick some up in your fingers, but without it being the main constituent of the crumble.

Make sense? Excellent.

So, you have your crumble, and you have your filling. Here's the most important thing you ever need to know about making crumble:

Do NOT under ANY circumstances press the crumble topping into the filling. Instead, lightly shake on top, and push heaped areas gently into gaps from the side of the heap. I would go for a depth of aproximately 3 cm. Do not be tempted to attempt an absolutely even top. You will not achieve this, and will lose some of the light, crumbly texture by squashing some of the crumbs together into larger pieces. If you have underestimated the amount of topping needed (the proportions above are, after all, both estimates and for a relatively small dish) now is the time to make some more. If you make too much, I have been told it freezes quite well, which would make sense, or I might splash a little cold water in to bind it together, and turn it into a couple of biscuits.

By now, your oven should be well heated, so put your crumble in on the middle shelf. Cook for 30 minutes, or until the fruit is soft, and the topping a light golden brown.

Serve with custard, ice cream, plain yoghurt, or whatever you like best. I'm a fan of extra thick double cream when I'm feeling like treating myself.

As per usual, I have gotten too excited about the eating of the food to remember to take a photo of the finished product, but I assure you it was delicious, and had a bright purple filling. The colour of the filling is not entirely relevant, but it was pretty.

Custard v.2: Eggnog without the alcohol

Among other foody things I did yesterday (which I would have posted about yesterday, but was in deep mourning for the teapot), I made my second attempt at custard.

It was an improvement, it didn't curdle - I think the use of the electric whisk, and the bain marie were good ideas. Still tasted good, but still didn't thicken properly. I also used a mixture of cream and full fat milk this time.

We ate it as a "warming winter drink". I've never had eggnog, but I imagine it to be somewhat akin to an alcoholic version of yesterday's custard. I haven't inserted a picture of the final product partly becasue it didn't look much different at the end than it does in the picture above, but mostly because I forgot to take one.

Version three soon...I have no compunctions about this as I bought 30 free range local farm eggs for £1.15 at the farm shop I went meat shopping at yesterday afternoon.

RIP teapot

I dropped a bottle of vinegar on it from the top shelf of my cupboard:

Farewell, my teapot. You have served me well and faithfuly every morning for three years. May you rest in peace, with the memory of the last cup of Ceylon Blue Sapphire you served a fitting tribute to your memory.

The most amazing cake ever

I just wanted to share a picture of the birthday cake that Nicky made for my party on Saturday. I do cake, but I don't decorate them, not like this. I think she is actually a genius. (The cake was pretty good too).

As you may be able to guess, I am a bit of a knitter, hence the theme of the cake.

Lentil Curry

I love my slow cooker. Here is one of my favourite recipes, which went down very well at my birthday party on Saturday. As with most things that are spiced, in reality I throw in whatever and however much I feel like on the day, but the following is a pretty good guide to how much.

Serves 5000 (well, it feels like it). I honestly wonder if this is how Jesus fed the masses sometimes after I've well fed a group of mates and then am eating it for lunches the next week as well.

2 mugs of dried red lentils - about a pint.
1 tin chopped tomatos
A couple of potatos, cubed very small.
A green pepper, cubed
A red pepper, cubed
A large handful of chestnut or closed cup mushrooms, quartered
A small onion chopped finely
Half a bag of spinach
Plenty of garlic, finely chopped
Large bunch fresh corriander, stems trimmed and chopped, leaves reserved.
4 or 5 green cardoman pods
1 star anise
6 cloves
1 tsp ground cumin or cracked cumin seeds
1 tsp ground corriander or cracked corriander seeds
Chille powder or chille seeds to taste
2 tsp Marigold vegetable stock powder
Salt and pepper

Optional: Cubed lamb.

Throw all ingredients apart from the spinach and coriander leaves in a 3.5 L slow cooker or crock pot. Mix, and then fill up with boiling water. Turn to high and leave to do it's thing for about 3-4 hours, until the veg is cooked and the lentils have disintegrated. Throw the spinach onto the top, put the lid back on and let it steam and wilt down, then stir in. Stir in the chopped corriander leaves just before serving, check spice and seasoning and adjust and serve.

Mix a little bit of hot water in when reheating to loosen it up again as the lentils will absorb any moisture that is left over time.


Serving suggestions: With brown rice for a really healthy and filling main course/ on it's own for a lighter meal/ with a buttered plain bagel or english muffin and a poached egg.

My New Favourite Curry House

In Bradford, when you arrive as a student having heard all about Bradford's reputation as a curry capital, one of the first and most obvious things to do with your new friends is to try a curry house. But, not knowing which are the good ones, many of us see Omars on Great Horton Road. Omar's offers 15% student discount, and for many students coming from more affluent areas, the prices look pretty good (when I moved here, you could still get curry and rice for £3.50).

The biggest thing though (and whoever had the idea to implement it there was a business genius), is their loyalty card. The loyalty card is very generous, and so so many of the students when they arrive have a curry at Omar's, get a loyalty card, and so always end up going there with their mates. I did the same, until I moved away to York for a year. In that year, the portion sizes went up, the quality down, and the prices drastically up. Although I have been a couple of times since getting back to Bradford again, and it has got better quality again, I decided it was time to seek out the decent curry houses in Bradford.

You know the ones I mean: the magical ones that you can buy authentic curry at cheap prices from, where all the locals eat. The first on my list therefore was one I only found out about at the weekend. It was recommended to me by the absolute sweetie who owns Nomad who, it turns out, studied in Bradford. As he cooks fabulous curries himself, even on a field in a tiny van, I trusted his judgement, especially when I found out it is featured on tonight's Gordon Ramsay's Best Restaurants. When my brother emailed me last night to say he was driving by Bradford, and did I fancy a curry it was the first my mind jumped to.

Prashad is on Horton Grange Road, about 5 minutes from University (at the speed I walk anyway). It's a tiny little restaurant - basically its a converted end of terrace with the front room now the take away and the back a 20 seater restaurant, with the kitchen in the middle. The decor was simple, modern and bright, and in good condition, the chairs comfortable, and despite the small size of the room it did not feel cramped (although there were only about 10 customers eating in). After scanning the menu we both decided to order the Special Thali, which was £11.50 each. Forgive me for not being able to name the dishes: the waiter had quite a thick accent and I didn't catch all he said, but I shall describe them as best I can.

So, let's begin at the start (as someone once said - a very good place to begin). Forget those pale, flat, slightly greasy things you get at most Indians - the poppadums were indeed crispy and melt in the mouth, but they were also somewhat more flavoursome, and a slightly brown colour. Not being an expert, I have no idea if this is down to the type of flour used, or whether it is a regional difference or what. All I know is they were some of the most delicious poppadums I've ever had. The dips were the usual lime pickle, mango and chilli and mint yoghurt dips, but also a delicious bright green paste that had corriander, mint and chilli in it.

The Thali itself was what I have been told is a more traditional way of eating Indian food-lots of different dishes on the table at once, with sweet and savoury alike. There was another poppadum, perectly light, soft, fluffy plain rice, three delicious rotis, obviously fresh made. Some kind of bargee type thing that had vegetables and potato in it and was soft on the inside and crunchy on the outside like a dumpling (Tom had a bright yellow ball of spiced and fried lentils - we assume this was because he is allergic to nuts and that it was a replacement, although I didn't actually taste any nuts in mine). There was Daal like I've never had it - a thin broth type soup rather than the thick lentil curry I've always had before, a really spicy potato curry and a pepper curry that was a little sweeter. All were beautifully balanced and seasoned - enough heat for me, the regular curry eater, but not so much that Tom, who claims he has lost his ability to cope with large amounts of spice since moving north, was still able to clear his plate quicker than I could.

The real highlight for me, however, was the dessert. In Britain we have this idea that there isn't really much in the way of Indian deserts, butI rather suspect we are wrong about that. Certainly, the dessert on our plate this evening was an absolutely fabulous mango shikand. The sweetness and creamyness was the perfect palate cleanser to end the spicy meal. It was as thick and smooth  - almost glossy feeling in the mouth - as really good custard should be, and filled the last little corner nicely, without leaving me feeling bloated.

All in all, it is by far the best curry I have yet had in Bradford, for a very good price.  Omar's, you now have to give me a very good reason to go back.

I will leave you with Tom's comment though:

'That was really good. We should do this again. Next time though, take me somewhere they serve meat.'

York Beer Festival

I spent the past week working at the York beer festival. Fool that I am, this meant camping the entire week too, (although of course it was fully made up for by the excellent beer.)
I refused to give in to the idea of spending money on breakfast at Tescos and dinner out every day - I'm a poor student, I couldn't afford to! Also, a childhood camping with my Dad and in the Guides has meant I am a somewhat proficient cook with open fire and trangia, so the trangia was again my weapon of choice for when the food tokens ran out.

Breakfast most mornings was a fry up of some variety - you need it in the cold and when you're working that hard. But Saturday's was by far the best - Bacon and mushrooms fried in an excellent draught American beer from Stone in San Diego called Sublimely Self-Righteous Ale.  Put in a bun. The beer is sweet and rich and malty, and the bacon was salty and, well, bacony, and the mahoosive flat mushrooms were meaty and earthy.There are two things to learn from this experience:

Firstly, that Americans are excellent brewers - assuming you can find the beer. (Pivni in York, the Sheffield Tap, and the soon-to-be-open Euston Tap are good bets in this country and indeed supply and manage the foreign beer bar that was where I could be found most of the week.

Secondly, that just because a drink tastes fabulous as is, does not mean that it is "wasted" by cooking with it (although care should be taken and respect given to the alcoholic beverage of choice when cooking with it.)

So, here is my recipe for the week:

Beer Bacon and Mushroom Butty

Serves 2

4 rashers bacon
1 large flat mushroom (or similar amount of meaty mushroom)
2 cheap white rolls

Heat frying pan to a medium heat. Add bacon and cook for a few minutes until it's about 2/3 original size. Add chopped mushrooms. Stir every so often, keeping bacon touching the bottom of the pan as much as possible, until most of the water has reduced from the mushrooms. Add about an inch of a pint glass of beer (if you can't get hold of Stone, and let's face it, it's going to be rare that you do, use a strong porter or stout - something like Old Tom from Robinsons would work nicely). Let the beer reduce until there is no liquid left and the bacon and mushrooms are crisping and browning nicely. Stick in a butty. No need to use posh bread - you only really want it so you can pick up the bacon.

Enjoy as a late brunch or early lunch with a couple of mouthfulls of the beer you cooked with.

I advise making enough for two - then when the other person has fallen at your feet in a haze of adoration, you can extract a promise of washing up from them.

As I have not yet sorted out a digital camera to photograph my food etc, here is a gratuitous picture of the foreign bar at the festival (with thanks to Chris who took it and hasn't yet been told I've borrowed it:

Custard

This evening I attempted to make custard. Not from powder, as normal, but properly. I failed. It curdled.

I tried to make it using a modified version of the recipe in Cook with Jamie by Jamie Oliver, but quartering the recipe and using all milk rather than the mix of milk and cream listed. Unfortunately, I a) didn't read the recipe properly and used the whole egg rather than just the yolks and b) managed to curdle it when reheating. Sieved it, which got the big lumps out and ate it anyway on some stewed rhubarb - tasted good, although obviously the texture was off and it was too runny.

I shall attempt it again sometime. It tasted good enough that I think if I can get it right it will be worth making from scratch. Until/even then, however, both Birds Custard Powder and tins of Ambrosia will keep their alloted place in my cupboards and cooking.

Adventures for Blackberries

How do I introduce my blog? Well, I love food, I think it is entirely possible to eat really well on a small budget, and most importantly of all, I think that good food can, is, and should be the cornerstone of any social gatherings, from meeting up with a friend you've not seen for ages, through to huge parties celebrating important occasions.

Anyway, on Saturday four of us decided to find our way into the wasteland that our houses back on to to pick blackberries. It's the site of an old, now demolished mill factory, and, we think, owned by the university. It's seperated by a wall that is at least 6 ft down from the back yards, but there is an open gate at one side which was the way we went in this time. We had to fight through some huge patches of nettles and climb around the trees to get to the brambles, but boy was it worth it.

I love blackberries. Seriously love them. And the ones on the wasteland are magnificent specimens. Away from busy roads - so not full of pollution, and on truly uncultivated land, so no pesticides. There are masses, just begging to be picked. Four of us within one hour had picked more than enough to make a load of Blackberry wine (which I left Joe in charge of as I have never made wine before). I can't give you a recipe for the wine, although I do know it required 1.8 kg of backberries and 900g of sugar. The rest Vic turned into blackberry and apple crumble. The wine is now bubbling slowly away, and should be ready to bottle on Wednesday afternoon, and ready to drink in a few months.

Cat and I (but in fairness, mostly Cat) turned our hand to a risotto made from whatever we had in the fridge. As it happened, we had a fine selection of ingredients, and the following was born:


Cat's Smoked Salmon, Rocket and Parmesan Risotto

Slice an onion and a couple of cloves of garlic. Fry gently in olive oil. Stir in enough risotto (arborio) rice for four people. Meanwhile, make at least a pint and a half of vegetable stock. I like Marigold Vegetable Boullion powder, which most supermarkets have these days. Add the water about half a pint at a time, and simmer, stirring regularly so that it doesn't stick to the bottom of the pan. Add more water as it gets absorbed. Add a handful of sliced green beans and a large handful of sliced button mushrooms. If the rice is still hard, continue to add more boiling water a little at a time until it is tender.

My tip at this point is to turn the heat off, place a clean tea towel over the pan and then put the lid on. The towel seals the pan and keeps the heat and steam in. Leave it for about 10 or 15 minutes, and the rice will have absorbed a little more liquid (the bit that always just seems too thick and sticky and starts burning if you carry on cooking without constant vigorous stirring) and be less sticky. If you really don't like sticky risotto you could rinse the rice before cooking as well (but drain it really well) to wash off some of the starch.

Once the risotto has stood for a while, remove the lid, season with plenty of black pepper, stir in 2 huge handfuls of rocket, plenty of fresh shaved parmeson and a little sliced smoked salmon. Dish up immediately, before the salmon cooks. We served it with a little more rocket and salmon on top. Gotta make it look pretty.

Enjoy.