Christmas 2009 December 30, 2009

We always start our festive celebrations on Christmas Eve.  Once all the preparations are completed some time in the afternoon, we get changed, lock the doors, pop some champagne and head into the sitting room with a plate of nibbles ready for a happy family session of present sharing.  We started doing this before we had children and it is now firmly part of our festive family ritual, in fact H was looking forward to our “front room party” more than Christmas Day itself!  It gives us some quality time to enjoy our presents without the chaos of entertaining or visiting which Christmas Day involves and the boys actually get to play with their present before ripping into the next parcel.

The nibbles included cheese straws, mini pizzas, cocktail sausages baked in (home made) mango chutney, mushroom crostini (topped with a mushroom pate from a John Tovey recipe) and Chard & Feta Parcels from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook, zipped up with some added chilli.

  

Once the boys have put out the reindeer food and a mince pie & glass of single malt for Santa and are tucked up in bed with their empty stockings awaiting his impending visit, we end the evening with a special meal, often steak, with a nice bottle of red wine.  It has to be said that in recent years, this has got later and later and dessert has now been forgone, but it is a good excuse to take some time out from the festive madness and enjoy a meal together.

This year’s menu centred around a beautiful venison loin that I had bought at the recent village market from Chanctonbury Game served with a blackberry sauce made using a locally made blackberry liqueur.  This was accompanied by the last of our salad potatoes oven baked, some greens and the most amazing Parsnip Puree with Bourbon from Sara Raven’s Garden Cookbook (p427).  Not only did this taste wonderful but it was a great way to use up the offcuts from the marvellously misshapen parsnips that we had grown at the allotment and were serving with the turkey the next day.  It was a lovely meal; seasonal, home grown or local and very tasty!

So to Christmas Day, and we were hosting.  I had been a bit organised and made the bread sauce and cranberry compote in advance (both recipes from Sarah Raven’s Complete Christmas, and both recipes made at least twice more than was needed!).

 

   

It’s turkey all the way for us and as last year, I bought a 6kg Kelly Bronze turkey; delivered direct to the door and absolutely wonderful with the most succulent, tender meat.  I cooked it simply with some seasoning, herb butter rubbed under the skin and a couple of halved clementines in the cavity.  It was roasted breast side down at 180c without foil then turned the right way up for the last half an hour.  I had read that this is the best method for turkeys as their different structure prefers not to be started off in a hot oven as one would a chicken and it seemed to do the trick.  The only thing I would change next year is to wrap the legs in some foil, or at least make sure they are better tied in to the better as they were a little overdone.

The bacon wrapped chipolatas came from the butchers at Handcross and were very nice.  Stuffing was a recipe from Nigella’s Christmas series last year using gingerbread and bacon and made a change to a sausage meat based version.  other accompaniments were sprouts with a lemon & parsley crumb topping and a (jamie Oliver inspired) medley of oven roasted vegetables including our mutant parsnips, allotment grown chioggia, the first of our fennel (which were almost too beautiful to cut) with some shop bought carrots (very disappointing that these weren’t home grown).

                     

 

After such a rich meal we had a sea breeze sorbet shooter which really cleaned the palate.  This was a home made sorbet of pink grapefruit with some added cranberry juice topped (for the adults at least!) with a shot of limoncello!

 

 

 

I offered a choice of desserts: Cranberry Cheesecake and chocolate figgy pudding with white chocolate brandy sauce and gold leaf (from Xmas scans p 58).  They were both delicious, the steamed chocolate pudding being particularly light and yet with enough of a Christmas pudding feel about it.  Unfortunately the sauce was a bit too thin, but i think had it been given a bit longer to cool down it would have been much improved (being greedy gits, we couldn’t wait that long!).  The cheesecake some how survived the bottom falling out of the tin and was very popular.  This is the recipe:

Festive Cranberry Cheesecake

serves 6-8

100g fresh cranberries

15g golden caster sugar

1/2 orange

2 sheets gelatine

50ml cointreau

150g digestive biscuits

35g butter (at room temperature)

300g cream cheese

2 x 150g pots greek yogurt

35g icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

Place the cranberries in a small pan with the caster sugar, juice and finely grated zest of the orange.  Bring to a simmer then cook gently for about 5 minutes until the cranberries start to pop.  Puree the fruit in a blender then sieve to remove any pips & skin.  Set aside until cool. 

Put the biscuits and soft butter into a food processor and whizz until you have a fine crumb with the butter evenly dispersed (this saves on the washing up involved with melting the butter!).  Tip into a greased 18cm loose bottomed tin, press down and chill until needed.

Beat the cream cheese, icing sugar, vanilla and yogurt in a bowl until they are smooth.  Soak the gelatine leaves in a small amount of cold water and while it is softening, gently heat the cointreau in a pan but do not boil.  Remove the gelatine from the water and squeeze out any excess liquid.  Drop this into the warm liqueur and stir gently until it has all dissolved.  Once completely dissolved, stir this into the cheese mixture and pour it into the tin on top of the biscuit base.  Add the pureed cranberries in dots around the top and swirl in gently using a spoon handle.  Chill for at least 2 hours until serving then carefully remove it from the tin and for a bit of bling scatter silver balls over the top.

My final Christmas tip concerns mince pies.  I make these every year, either mini tarts in shortcrust pastry or puff pastry lidded pies, both of which inevitably leak and get stuck to the tin.  last year I tried an idea for mini eccles cakes using circles of puff pastry but this involved lots of rerolling and excess pastry with each pie.  This year I think I have come upon the solution!  In an attempt to make them simple enough for the children to help, I have found the perfect shape that is quick, waste free, looks good and eats well.

                   

Using ready rolled bought puff pastry, give the rectangle a little roll to make it slightly larger, then cut into 12 rectangles and place a small blob of mincemeat on one end of each rectangle.  with the tip of your finger, wet along 3 sides, and in the same way as making ravioli, fold over the spare pastry, gently pressing with the side of your little finger to exclude any air.  To seal and make it look pretty, press round the sides with a fork then add a couple of small slashes to the top to allow air to escape.  Simply nip off 2 corners to make it look pretty, brush with egg glaze, sprinkle with sugar and bake in a hot oven for 10 minutes (they can also be frozen before or after baking).  Et voila!  mince pies in 20 minutes – even a child could do it, and in fact they did!

Creative for Christmas December 18, 2009

Have had some fun creative moments over the last couple of weeks making decorations and some gifts for Christmas.

Today I made flavoured salt using a big bag of sea salt bought in France last year, but which was really too course to cook with.  I blitzed the salt in the food processor to make it a bit finer then made up 2 batches which have been decanted into some lovely dinky storage jars bought from the Jme range. 

The first batch was Mediterranean garlic, lemon & rosemary.  To approximately 300g salt I added 6 crushed garlic cloves, the leaves from 5 stalks of rosemary and the finely pared zest of 2 lemons.  Because the mixture is a bit wet, I spread it onto a baking sheet and put it in the oven at 60° for an hour after which time it dries out nicely and will store in an air tight jar indefinitely (although it will loose flavour over time so is best made in small quantities).  A friend gave me a jar of this several years ago and I use it every time I roast a chicken, in the summer on oven roasted new potatoes and for many other uses.

The second batch of salt was a Thai flavour.  To 300g salt I added 2 slices of galangal, a few dried shrimp (these were both dried so had been softened in some ht water first) and 8 dried kafir lime leaves.  these were all ground together and mixed with a teaspoon or so of dried chilli flakes and a teaspoon of lemon zest.  An experiment, I will have to come up with some ideas for using!

A few weeks ago I also made some chilli jelly using up the last of the cooking apples I had stored and a couple of my cayenne chillies.  I cooked down about 2 kilos of apples with the juice of i lemon to give a bit of pectin for the set.  when they had gone pulpy they were strained through a jelly bag and for each litre of juice, 600g of sugar was added.  I admit to being concerned that the jelly would not be clear as despite not squeezing the jelly bag the juice was quite cloudy, but i was delighted with the result – it looked just like amber! 

To the sugar and juice I added about 4 finely chopped cayenne chillies including their seeds.  this resulted in a pleasant medium heat and I think I would go a bit hotter next time.  the mixture was heated gently until the sugar dissolved then brought to a rapid boil until set point was reached.  I then left it to set slightly for about 20 – 30  minutes before decanting into sterilised jars.  the result – 6 jars of amber beauty ready to give to my lovely friends as a little gift for Christmas.

Every December for the past 15 years, I get together with my Mum and various friends and spend a lovely day making Christmassy bits to decorate the house.  It started when we went to a course run by a friend of Mum’s.  We had a lovely day and went back several years running.  She eventually stopped running the courses but we just kept on going!  Mum, who has a large garden, cuts a mound of greenery and over the years we have collected loads of ribbons, dried fruits etc and various other bits & bobs to use which all get brought out of the loft. 

I always make a wreath for the front door and always use an oasis ring as it is much easier to work with and keeps the material fresh for longer.  I love the more glaucous leaves such as eucalyptus and always form a good base of these using small “poochy” bits as we call them.  Once the (pre-soaked) oasis is well covered, I add some decoration.  This year I used some lovely dried hydrangea heads, twists of red wire and some gorgeous pink roses.  Finished off with a big bow the result is always quite stunning (well I think so anyway!).

This year we had even more fun and made some extra wreaths to sell for the NSPCC so I got to try out lots of different designs………………………….

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   and these are some creations from previous years:

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Lazy Sunday November 23, 2009

At this time of year, when the weather is foul, I really love nothing more than spending the day pottering in the kitchen.  And what could be better to cook and eat than a piping hot bowl of soup, especially when it uses up all those bits and bobs of veggies that are lurking around the house.

 

In this case I managed a final taste of summer in mid November as I had brought inside the last of the tomatoes and peppers from the greenhouse in an attempt to ripen them.  The problem is at this time of year, the lack of sunlight means they take so long to ripen that they are beyond use for much else other than soup.

 

 

So into a pan went one sliced red onion, a clove of garlic and a chopped red chilli with some olive oil.  these were gently sweated until soft then I added a chopped anchovy, a sliced yellow pepper and 3 small red peppers which were also sliced.  I had about 4 double handfuls of tomatoes of various types, sizes and levels of ripeness so these were just roughly chopped and added to the pan, skins, seeds and all.  In went a little vegetable stock to not even cover the veg and all was slowly simmered for about half an hour.  I then put the whole lot in the blender and passed it through a fine sieve to remove any remaining seeds and bits of skin – far less fiddly than skinning before cooking and keeps all the flavour and goodness in.  The result was a beautiful colour and really tasty despite the rather sorry condition of the veg before it was cooked.  It really does just show that very little food needs throwing away.

 

 

I also made another batch of bread dough as we needed some for packed lunches next morning.  1kg of flour (50% wholemeal and 50% white) with plans to make 2 loaves.  The first plain tin started off fine but as i moved it to put it in the oven I must have knocked it ever so slightly as before our eyes it dropped back into the tin.  Still edible but not as glorious as I had hoped.  The other loaf went to the opposite extreme.  I used up some odds and ends of cheese and mixed these in to the dough then split the dough into 7 pieces and having shaped them into rolls, tucked them into a spring release tin to make some tear & share bread.  Well, this rose so well that as you can see from the picture, it enveloped the whole tin, rather annoyingly right where the clip was so freeing it from the tin without loosing the whole crust almost proved impossible, but i got there just and have frozen the loaf to enjoy at a later date.

 

 

 

Dinner was roast pork.  Not a joint that I cook often enough and one which I am yet to master, certainly on the crackling front.  I can’t say that I’m a crackling fan so maybe my failure to get a crispy crust is subliminal but P really loves it so I will keep practising.  The crust you can see is rosemary, garlic, salt & fennel seeds.  Very tasty but no danger of broken teeth!

 

Smashing Pumpkins November 19, 2009

 

It was rather a miserable day today and since M and I had nothing on I decided to spend some of it in the kitchen.  Having tasted S’s fantastic pumpkin soup on Halloween, I was inspired to have a go myself.

 

I chose to use one of the Crown Prince pumpkins rather than a Red Kuri, for no better reason than it had a bit of damage so seemed less likely to keep.  This really is one of the best pumpkins for cooking with; the flesh is beautifully dense with really very few seeds as you can see.  The one problem with this is in the preparation and I have in the past broken my large Global chopper trying to cut through a pumpkin.  You really do have to give it some power to split the beast apart and even then, the flesh is so dense that cutting off smaller pieces is very difficult.  However with some careful chopping i managed to split it down and eventually peel it.  I have made pumpkin soup in the past following a Jamie Oliver recipe where he doesn’t bother to peel, since the finished soup is blitzed and it was as nice as one could hope for, but I do think that the skin colour on a Crown Prince would probably not enhance any soup made this way.

 

So, once I’d butchered the beast (well half the beast in fact which gave a good kilo of flesh), it was cooked with a couple of sautéed shallots (allotment grown and professionally peeled by my young assistant!) garlic, ginger and 2 red chillies (home grown cayenne chillies with seeds included), a lemon grass stalk quartered length wise, half a litre of vegetable stock (I always use the Bouillon variety), 30ml of fish sauce and a can and a half of coconut milk.  After 25 minutes of simmering, the pumpkin was cooked and had imparted its beautiful amber colour into the liquid.  The zest & juice of 2 limes and a handful of coriander were then added before blitzing everything in a blender.

 

The resulting velvety soup looked and tasted beautiful and is now residing in my, once again full, freezer until needed.

 

       

 

 

I kept on the pumpkin theme for supper and using pretty much the same ingredients, cooked a pumpkin curry.  The only variations was the addition of some freshly roasted and ground cumin and coriander together with some toasted cashews at the end of cooking.  The result was a lovely fragrant, tasty curry which was delicious served with Jasmine Rice and a coriander naan.

a Fennel bulb moment! November 17, 2009

Tonight’s supper was a simple and tasty little pie containing fennel and salmon.  From my November Scans (p4) the recipe couldn’t have been easier.  Simply thinly slice some fennel and gently sweat in some butter until soft.  mix in 2 finely sliced spring onions and stir together with some cubed salmon (2 fillets) and a few spoons of crème fraiche.  season well and pile onto one end of a sheet of puff pastry.  Fold over the end , seal well, glaze, make a couple of air holes and bake in a hot oven (200c) for 30 minutes.  Really delicious and actually rather filling.

 

I did feel that although quite small, a whole bulb of fennel would have been too much for the quantity of fish that I had, so as I had half a red cabbage in the fridge I decided (despite the fact that Mr R would rather eat his own toe nails than eat it) to make some coleslaw.  To the finely sliced and chopped fennel and red cabbage I added one grated carrot, a couple of sliced spring onions, some mayonnaise, some of the left over crème fraiche and a good seasoning. 

 

So I used up some left overs and made a really great accompaniment which will also be enjoyed tomorrow with some extra mature cheddar for lunch.  The people at Love Food Hate Waste would be proud of me!

 

                             

Halloween & Pumpkins November 16, 2009

We had a bit of a Halloween party on the 31st October – 11 children, 10 adults & 2 babies all dressed up and looking fantastic!  It was a perfect evening – dry, quite mild, with a bit of fog to add to the atmosphere.  The children had great fun with a torch light treasure hunt and were outside playing until 8pm.

Having had a bumper crop of (Connecticut Field) pumpkins at the allotment, I was able to really go all out on the carving.  The boys each did their own designs which I transferred to the pumpkins.  H’s is 2nd from left and M’s 3rd from left (ok there was a bit of interpretation on my part for his one!).  We did a Google to look for some design ideas and found this fantastic toothy creature (1st pic far right) which uses not only complete cut outs but also areas (the teeth and the eyes) where you remove only the skin of the pumpkin.  It is very effective and looks almost as good during the day as it does lit up.  I also tried a Yoda (2nd pic bottom right) using similar techniques (used a julienne knife to make his worry lines) but did draw the line at the death star (the demands of having a Star Wars fan in the house!)

The children then all had a go carving their own pumpkins at the party to great effect.  We had a really good mixture of styles and designs – even some names being carved out, they all looked fantastic!

Food wise, a friend brought the most amazing Thai pumpkin soup which we had in mugs with slices of the tomato focaccia which i had made a couple of weeks earlier and frozen.  This was really tasty and the garlic & rosemary topping worked particularly well.  The children had proper hot dogs while we enjoyed Sausage Cassoulet from “Jamie’s Kitchen”.  A great one dish meal which includes porcini, bacon, haricot beans and bread.  Dessert was either pumpkin pie or chocolate brownies both brought by friends and both fab!  All this was washed down by either bitter for the guys (Hobgoblin and the like) or bramble kir for the girls, the latter made using Blackberry liqueur made by some local Mums from our local hedgerows – really beautiful.

 

 A week later we had our village fireworks and bonfire.  A brilliant event that this year attracted over 7000 visitors.  Although P was away on a work trip, the boys & I went down to help set up in the morning and I was able to put my pumpkin carving skills to the test, albeit on a rather larger scale!  One of the parents from school grows the most enormous pumpkins (on a compost heap I think).  He always enters these in our village produce show and they normally top 17lbs!  This year he donated about a dozen, so armed with some pretty heavy duty knives and some fab designs we all set to carving these ready to sit around the bonfire along with other smaller ones which we all took down with us.

 

                          

The effect was brilliant and the fireworks to music spectacular, although M slept through most of them on his Granddad’s shoulder!

              

October Suppers November 10, 2009

 

Some of our more interesting October Suppers:

 

• Autumn pasta (October scans p1) – Broccoli, mushrooms, parma ham & pine nuts; autumn on a plate!
• Sausages in Apple Gravy (October scans p4) – really tasty with a lovely gravy which the boys really liked too.
• Home made Chicken Kiev (October Scans p18) – a shallow fried version.  Can be prepared in advance and is probably better that way.  Butter leaked when I made it but still tasted great!
• Chicken & roasted vegetables in cheese sauce – a great way to use up veg from the fridge!
• Chicken caesar salad – with our own lettuce and home made dressing
• Beef in beer – sliced onion, garlic, thyme, seasoned beef, carrot batons and prunes all simmered in some gorgeous dark ale – lovely
• Butternut Squash risotto
• Mushroom Tagliatelle (October Scans) – An Antonio Carluccio recipe
• Chicken, mushroom & squash curry – cumin, coriander, turmeric onion & garlic with coconut milk.  A bit bland, ginger definitely missing
• Rich Oven baked Vegetable pasta with sausages (October Scans)  another Antonio Carluccio recipe.  Rather involved but very tasty.  4 key elements: Tomato Sauce: used my own from the freezer; pasta: used a large conchiglie which was already in the pantry; vegetable & cheese filling: the last of our aubergines & courgettes, coated in flour, shallow fried then mixed in with taleggio, blanched fennel and sausage meat balls (not in the recipe but thought the men would prefer it!) and spinach balls (spinach, egg, breadcrumbs & parmesan).  Really fab flavours liked by whole family.
• cauliflower cheese with sausages

 

Our Daily bread November 5, 2009

I have been making more bread recently and have come to the stage where I am happy with my basic recipe to the point that I will now record it for posterity and have some fun playing around with it!

 

FLOUR

500g of strong white flour.  When I can, I use Waitrose’s Canadian Very Strong flour as it really does give a

nicer loaf, but any strong flour will do.  500g makes one large loaf (ie a 2lb tin); or 1 large focaccia or 3 big pizzas.

 

 

 

SALT

1 tsp added to the flour – vital.  I cannot begin to say how horrible bread is without it – suffice to say you only forget to add it once!

 

YEAST

I have started using fresh yeast recently and am completely hooked on this.  I mentioned in a previous post that this is available from the bread counter in Sainsbury’s (and I presume most supermarkets with an in-store bakery or of course a local bakers).  If you can, buy 100g or so and split it into 15g portions.  wrap in cling and freeze it.  It will defrost in half an hour and you will be able to make brilliant fresh bread the old fashioned way!

 

15g mixed into a small amount of your tepid water to dissolve (with a pinch of sugar or drop of honey to feed it) is sufficient for 500g of flour. 

 

if you cannot get hold of fresh yeast then use 2 tsp of dried yeast dissolved in 75ml of your water with a teaspoon of sugar and add it when it has 1cm of frothy head.

 

WATER

325ml of tepid water (it wants to be about 98° ie blood temperature.  To test this, stick your finger in and if you cannot feel any change in temperature it is correct).

 

OLIVE OIL

If I am making pizza or focaccia, I will add 30 ml of olive oil with the water to make the bread a bit richer.

 

KNEADING

Well, I’m afraid that I use my Kitchen Aid to kneed the bread for about 5 minutes.  Usually because I am doing other things at the same time.  I’m sure the purists will be up in arms, but I’m making the bread to eat, not for the experience of making it!  I do, however, always give it a couple of minutes by hand at the end to make sure the texture and consistency is right (and for a little bit of gratuitous feeling!)

 

PROVING

put a drop of oil in the bowl you mixed the bread in, drop the dough back in and turn it over in the oil.  Then, as it rises it will not stick to the bowl.  Cover with an oiled piece of cling film and leave it to rise for about an hour until at least doubled in size.  knock it back, shape it, put in a tin if using and leave to rest for another half an hour until doubled in size again.

 

BAKING

I have a new fan oven which does not seem to get overly hot so set this for 200°c.  you may want to reduce the temperature slightly depending on your oven, but it needs to be hot!  Carefully put the bread in the oven (don’t slam the door) and bake as follows:

• large loaf – 40 minutes
• focaccia – 15-20 minutes
• rolls – 15 minutes
• pizza – 8 minutes (and I will put the temperature up to its highest for pizza)

EATING

Oh, the best bit!  Fresh with proper salted butter and any topping you like, or just plain.

 

TWEAKING

Shape it, stuff it, top it, go mad with it!  What better way to use up bits and bobs from your fridge than sticking them in a loaf of bread.  A dry old end of cheese, a few cherry tomatoes, a bit of ham or salami will transform your bread, transform your life and make you feel so good for saving them from the bin!

 

Dinner at ours October 25, 2009

Had a lovely evening last Saturday with friends over for dinner.  Deb & Rob, Helen & Matthew and Alexia & Matthew, all friends from the village. 

 

Tried to keep to a seasonal menu and wanted to keep it reasonably simple as it was the mayor’s procession during the day so we were all busy with that.  So here is the menu for the evening:

 

Caramelised Swede & Cardamom Soup

Home made bread rolls

 

Pork fillet stuffed with chestnuts

Smashed roast salad potatoes

Greens with anchovy butter

Carrots

 

Pear and toffee trifle

 

The soup (December Scans p2), A Gordon Ramsay recipe, was already made and sitting in the freezer.  I had made it in the spring using swede from the allotment.  It has a really nice, delicate flavour – not what you would expect at all.  The rolls were made using another batch of fresh yeast.  500g flour made 8 perfect rolls.  Amazing texture – definitely the way forward!

 

The pork fillet (from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook) was rather fiddly and being a bit short of time, slightly stressful to bring together, but with a little luck I just about got there!  I would say that as there was too much stuffing and as I definitely didn’t beat out the fillet thinly enough, the whole stuffing process was quite tricky.  But given more time and less filling it would have been much better.  The combination of flavours (the stuffing included spinach, bacon, prunes & chestnuts) was really good and very seasonal and the fillets carved perfectly without falling apart.  The only downside was an insufficient quantity of sauce so less reducing next time!

 

The accompanying potatoes were also a recipe from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook and enabled me to use some of my anya spuds from the allotment which are still storing well in the garage.  It was a useful recipe as the potatoes were boiled in advance then tossed in a mixture of butter, rosemary and roasted garlic (a whole bulb of allotment garlic roasted in foil for 20 mins then squeezed out) and was hearty enough to go with the meat.  I also briefly blanched a selection of greens (see pic from l-r curly kale redbor; kavalo nero; swiss chard ‘bright light’s’) then tossed them in some anchovy and herb butter which was in the freezer.  Finally some organic carrots (sadly not home grown, but British at least) simply boiled.

 

Dessert was in my opinion the best course and allowed me to christen my new Jme trifle bowl.  A made up affair, it consisted of: a layer of treacle & ginger cake sandwiched with toffee sauce then sliced and liberally doused in marsala; followed by a layer of conference pear pieces which had been lightly poached in stock syrup as they were not quite ripe enough, next a layer of custard followed by lightly whipped double cream.  The piece de resistance was the caramel topping which I had made the night before.  I made up a batch of caramel and once it had reached the right colour, made a disc of swirled, lattice effect caramel on a piece of silicone. This dropped perfectly into the bowl and sat on top of the cream (put on at the very last minute to keep it crisp).  The really dramatic, albeit, unplanned part came about when I was trying to clean the saucepan which I had made the caramel in.  I’d added some water and was gently heating it to melt down the left over caramel when it started to pull away from the pan base in one piece and I ended up with a very dramatic shard of caramel which exploded out of the top of the trifle!

 

We ended the meal with English cheeses and biscuits accompanied by port and Sauternes.  All in all a pretty good feast!  It was a great evening; lots of hilarity and good conversation with friends new & old.

Bread making October 15, 2009

A friend who regularly makes her own bread turned up at a party the other day with a handbag full of fresh yeast!  Apparently there were some new staff on at the Sainsbury’s bread counter and they couldn’t work out how to sell her a small amount (she normally buys about 40g for approx 15p), so she came away with almost 400g for the same price!  Armed with a roll of cling film, she set about sharing her booty with us girls….

 

So, I’ve had a little bread making session, with mixed results……

 

I’ve only used fresh yeast once before and that was back at school so had to go back to basics somewhat.  However, my conclusion is that 15g of fresh yeast is sufficient for 500g of flour (although I did read that if making up 1kg of flour it DOESN’T follow that you would use 30g of yeast).  I softened the yeast in a little of the water and proceeded as normally, making:

 

A cherry tomato focaccia with rosemary & garlic.  The party we had all been at was a Jme party selling Jamie Oliver’s new range of kitchen equipment etc.  As part of the evening’s entertainment you get to watch a dvd of himself doing a recipe or two; and the recipe we watched was fortuitously for foccaccia.  I was taken by his basic garlic & rosemary flavouring which involved bashing up the flavours in a pestle then adding olive oil.  This gives a really good base “garlic bread” which you could leave plain or add any number of toppings.  I opted for simple cherry tomatoes using the last of my crop, but he had added prosciutto and mozzarella which looked rather good.  The texture and appearance looked great but can’t comment on the taste as it went straight in the freezer.

 

Make number 2 was some filled rams horn rolls; the intention being to make something interesting for lunch boxes.  Unfortunately, these were made in rather a hurry and I fear that was my downfall.  I rolled the dough into a rectangle after its first proving and spread this with some rhubarb chutney, then sprinkled with cheese and rolled in each side to give a log which was cut into inch thick pieces and laid on their sides to prove again.  unfortunately the inside edges rose fastest so the filling came to the surface which meant once they went in the oven, all the chutney burnt.  A shame as the bread itself was really good and the idea sound but the execution needs some more work.

 

So generous had Sainsbury’s been that I still have about 6 pouches of 15g portions of yeast sitting in the freezer – YES yeast can be frozen!  so expect more experiments and hopefully successes to come!