Food

October 17, 2014 FrontPage

Giant couscous, vegetables, herbs, pea-shoots

This dish is based very loosely on another Ottolenghi dish from Plenty – in it he combines rocket, onions, couscous and herbs. It struck me that it’s the perfect sort of dish to adapt based on what you love, or have available. Whilst rocket is peppery, for me pea-shoots impart a sweet freshness to the dish, that echoes the sweet and savoury shallots and cumin. I rustled Hubby up some blackened chicken to go with his dish, and the whole thing was done and dusted in the time it took to roast – no more than 25 minutes from beginning to end. This is one dish I’ll make dozens of variations of, and will treat as a method, rather than a recipe to adhere to rigidly.
Ingredients:

2 shallots
1 medium courgette
100g giant couscous
200g boiling water
1 tsp ground cumin
1 large clove of garlic
A handful each of parsley, mint, chives and chervil (whichever you have to hand or love)
80g pea-shoots
50g dried cranberries
olive oil, to fry the shallots in
Juice of one lemon, to dress
Extra virgin olive oil, to dress

Method:

Measure one mug of giant couscous into a bowl, and measure two mugs of boiling water, at the same level, pouring into the bowl. Cover the bowl with cling film and set to one side (the couscous will cook in the residual heat of the boiling water – this method is sometimes called the absorption method, and will take around 15 minutes).
Finely slice two small shallots, and add to the pan with the olive oil. Gently fry until they are golden brown. Add a scant teaspoon of cumin powder, and lightly toss the mixture together.
Add the crushed garlic to the pan and soften without browning.
Cut the courgette into diagonal slices (if it pleases you), and if large, cut those slices in half. Cut the broccoli into manageable sections, and add both the broccoli and courgette to the pan. When lightly cooked, set the pan aside to cool a little.
Finely chop (or mince) a large handful of mint, parsley, chives, and chervil – or whichever herbs you prefer.
When everything is ready, combine your pea-shoots, drained couscous, herbs and vegetable together in a bowl. If you don’t mind fruit in your couscous, and I realise it’s not for everyone, add around 50g of dried cranberries, or sour cherries.
Drizzle with a little good virgin olive oil, and the lemon juice

October 16, 2014 Cheese

Butter and Sage Gnudi

I’m such a lucky gal, I’m so lucky to have a Hubby who likes to cook as much as I do. Normally it’s curry (and he makes fabulous curry), but he was recently captivated by Jamie Oliver’s gnudi recipe. He likes the combination of multiple cheeses, and lemon particularly. So lucky me, he undertook the two day task as earnestly as I would have done. Don’t let the fact it’s a two day recipe put you off, you really need the drying out time to allow the gnudi to set-up.

Ingredients (for 3-4 portions):

500g best-quality ricotta
50 g Parmesan cheese
½ whole nutmeg, for grating
Zest of one lemon
fine semolina, for dusting

Method:

Put the ricotta into a bowl with a pinch of sea salt and black pepper, then finely grate in the Parmesan and a few scrapings of nutmeg, along with the lemon zest. Beat it together, then have a taste to check the balance of seasoning is right – you want the nutmeg to be very subtle.
Generously cover a large tray with semolina, then roll the ricotta mixture into 3cm balls, rolling them in the tray of semolina as you go until really well coated. You should get around 20 gnudi from this amount of mixture. Shake and cover really well with the semolina and leave for 8 hours or preferably overnight in the fridge (don’t cover the tray) – the semolina will dehydrate the ricotta, giving the gnudi a lovely fine coating.
The gnudi will only take 3 minutes to cook, cook them in 2-portion batches to take care of them. Shake the excess semolina off 2 portions-worth of gnudi and cook them in boiling salted water while you melt a large knob of butter in a frying pan on a medium heat and pick in about 10 sage leaves to crisp up. Remove the crispy leaves to a plate and scoop the gnudi directly from the water into the frying pan, adding a spoonful of the cooking water. When the butter and water have emulsified, take off the heat and grate over a layer of Parmesan, add just a few drops of lemon juice, then toss together. Serve in warm bowls straight away with an extra grating of nutmeg and Parmesan and the crispy sage leaves, while you get on with the next batch, wiping the frying pan clean between batches.

Notes:

Do not place the gnudi in boiling water – bring it to the boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer, carefully put the gnudi in, so that they don’t break up
The size of Jamie’s gnudie is a little too big, in our opinion, we think they should be about half the size.
Jamie doesn’t include the zest of a lemon in his recipe, though he did on the TV episode. Hubby included the zest, and we do think it’s necessary, to offset the richness of the ricotta
In his new book, My Perfect Pantry, Geoffrey Zakarian has a gnudi recipe with mushrooms – that looks amazing!
They are quite rich, but they’d make an amazing starter… We’re already trying to work out combinations… It would seem sensible to have a category of variations that were light and herby, others that were meaty and full of depth, like the mushroom, and others that might include spices and a little heat… Think of it as your new pasta..

October 13, 2014 FrontPage

Crusted pumpkin wedges, with soured cream

This dish is from Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty, and he’s quickly becoming my go-to chef… Though I still blog meat and fish dishes, I’m increasingly eating vegetables, and you can guarantee his recipes still pack enough punch to make up for that. For some reason, an onion squash has appeared in my kitchen… No doubt one of the children has spotted it somewhere, and convinced that halloween is on the way, coerced Hubby into buying it. Little do they know it’s just become my supper… Well, after all, they can always buy another… Though the recipe calls for a larger squash than mine, it still tastes magnificent.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

700g pumpkin (skin on, or any other squash)
50g Parmesan, grated
20f dried white breadcrumbs (panko in my case)
6 Tbsp finely chopped parsley
2½ tsp finely chopped thyme
grated zest of 2 large lemons
2 garlic cloves, crushed
60ml olive oil
120g soured cream
1 Tbsp chopped dill
salt and white pepper

Method:

Preheat the oven to 190ºC/Gas Mark 5. Cut the pumpkin into 1cm thick slices and lay them flat, cut side down, on a baking sheet that has been lined with greaseproof paper.

To make the crust, mix together in a small bowl the Parmesan, breadcrumbs, parsley, thyme, half the lemon zest, the garlic, a tiny amount of salt (there is salt in the Parmesan) and a little pepper.

Brush the pumpkin generously with olive oil and sprinkle with the crust mix, making sure the slices are covered with a few millimetres of the coating. Gently pack the mix down a little.

Place the tin in the oven and roast for about 30 minutes or until the pumpkin is tender: stick a knife in one wedge to make sure it has softened and is cooked through. If the topping starts to darken too much, cover loosely with foil.

Mix the soured cream with the dill and some salt and pepper. Serve the wedges warm, sprinkled with the remaining lemon zest with the soured cream on the side.

Notes:

If you have a combination of herbs you prefer, do feel free to use them. On my counter I had chervil, parsley, dill and thyme, and as I like that aniseed hit, I went with that
It would have been nice to use a larger squash to give a larger surface area, but the onion squash worked perfectly well. It also has the advantage of having a delicious skin when cooked
The smell of the garlic and lemon, as soon as this hits the oven, is ridiculous. It’s worth doing as a side-dish for that alone, your kitchen will smell amazing… For vegetarians, this is enough of a dish to satisfy your taste-buds
We dressed ours with a little extra-virgin olive oil, and some lemon juice

October 12, 2014 FrontPage

Fregola Sarda, with Salsa Verde

Fregola Sarda is a form of pasta from Sardinia, similar to Israeli couscous, or giant couscous, but toasted in an oven which gives it an additional dimension. If you can’t find fregola sarda, you could substitute giant couscous.

Cook as per the cooking instructions – in my case it was simmering in boiling water for around 10 minutes. Make sure you drain the fregola well, allowing it to sit in a sieve over the pan for 5 minutes, to let off a little of the steam.

Salsa Verde Ingredients:

4 anchovies (in olive oil)
4 large handfuls of herbs (I used parsley, chervil, basil, coriander, and mint)
2 Tablespoons of capers
Extra virgin olive oil (as much as it takes to emulsify the sauce, about 200ml for me)
Juice of 1 lemon
2 cloves of garlic

Method:

I much prefer to chop my herbs and capers by hand, as I hate the texture when I process them, but that doesn’t stop me whizzing my anchovies, olive oil, lemon juice and garlic into an emulsion. When it’s a near fine consistency, pour over the hand-chopped herbs and capers, and season to taste (it should already be pretty punchy, but don’t forget you’re going to use it to sauce the fregola, so that will dilute it somewhat.

When you’re ready to serve the fregola, mix in the salsa verde thoroughly.

This is an excellent accompaniment to any dish, though I’m not sure I’d have it on its own.

October 12, 2014 Baking

Doughnuts, the Justin Gellatly way…

Amazingly, I’ve made doughnuts several times before and the results were very disappointing, and certainly not worth repeating. I knew I’d followed the instructions properly, so something else was going wrong. Hmmn. Maybe doughnuts weren’t for me.

I became aware of Justin Gellatly on twitter (of course) – famous for his doughnuts at the St John’s Bakery, he left after a decade to set up his own Bread Ahead in Borough Market. Soon the twittersphere was flooded with instagram pics of his ridiculously good combinations, and though not a huge doughnut fan, I became quietly obsessed with checking out the pics. When he released his book earlier this year, it quickly made its way to the top of my pile. But still – no doughnuts.

…

October 11, 2014 Bruschetta

Heritage Tomato Bruschetta

Heritage tomatoes have so much more flavour than the industrial variety – sure they may be a funny shape, or sometimes a little ugly, but beauty occurs in the mouth too. I’ve been reading an amazing book about umami recently, which is why my timeline is flooded with things like tamarillos, but I wanted to use tomatoes too. Both have high levels of glutamate, which is a key component in umami – probably explaining why so many of us like them. By far the most popular tomato dish in our house is the simplest, but with perfectly good ingredients, simplicity really is key.

I’m not really going to give you any more than a cursory recipe – as that’s all it requires. Cut a ciabatta in half lengthways, and pop it into a hot oven (200ºC or so), and let it become golden. As you remove it from the oven, smear it with a whole clove of garlic, the roughness of the ciabatta will gate it over the surface. Concentrate particularly on the crusty edges. Chop your tomatoes by hand, not in a machine, and include some herbs.

September 28, 2014 Burrata

Burrata, Tamarillo and Fennel Pollen…

I have a whole post on the delights of tamarillo’s, so I shan’t bore you again, except to say that they must be in your top 100 foods to try before you die… Trust me – they’re stunning… This particular dish makes the most of the tamarillo’s ridiculously high umami levels, and pairs it with silky smooth, creamy burrata.

For those who’ve not tried it, burrata is a combination of mozzarella and cream, and must be eaten as fresh as possible – make sure you buy when you intend to eat it. The chef who created this dish is Ollie Dabbous, of the eponymous Dabbous restaurant, and is from his long-awaited cookbook. If you can’t get a table at the restaurant, at least you can try his food at home…

With a dish this simple, it’s crucial that you buy the best possible ingredients.

Ingredients:
2 large tamarillos
25ml extra virgin olive oil
25g caster sugar

Method:

Score the base of each tamarillo with a cross
Blanch for 5 seconds in a pan of rapidly boiling water, then drain and plunge into a bowl of iced water
Peel, then cut lengthways into quarters
Pour the olive oil into a baking tray and sprinkle over half the sugar
Place the tamarillos in the tray cut-side down and scatter over the remaining sugar
Place in an oven on its lowest setting for about 30 minutes, basting regularly with the pan juices
Turn the tamarillos on to the other cut side and repeat the process
Finally, place on the exterior side and repeat the process once more
Remove from the oven and leave to cool

To assemble:
240ml extra virgin olive oil
32 basil leaves
2 burrata, sliced into 4 pieces each
fennel pollen

Divide the olive oil between 8 serving bowls
Place 4 basil leaves on the right-hand side of each bowl and top with a slice of burrata
Sprinkle a pinch of fennel pollen over each one
Place a wedge of confit tamarillo alongside

Notes:

Yes, that cooking temperature is a little vague. I tried it first on 35ºC, and frankly I’d have been there all night. I moved up to 60ºC, then 120ºC, in each instance I had to up the timing. Given that this is something you can make ahead, just give yourself loads of time, keep them as low as you can, until you reach the desired colour. By taking mine up to 120ºC I made them a little more candied than confit, and the second time I just took it really slowly
Do sprinkle a tiny bit of salt onto the tamarillo, it just sets it off
Do use the best olive oil you can for the plating process – I used one we bought cases of in Italy – you can read about it here
I’m not sure I’ll do the whole peeling thing in future, but will just whip of the skin with a knife, as I’ve always done
Ollie says raw tamarillos are inedible, actually that’s not true – try them – but the skin should be removed before you do
It’s worth making a batch – like confit tomatoes, or sun-blush tomatoes, you could keep these in the fridge until you wanted to use them (perhaps not in quarters, but maybe eighths?

You can purchase Ollie’s book here:

September 13, 2014 Baking

Pain Perdu, Pineapple and Coconut

We haven’t been to Marcus Wareing’s eponymous restaurant since it was re-branded. It’s a little art-deco jewel-box of a restaurant, but the atmosphere seemed just as hushed at lunchtime as before… Still. The food was good, and I was particularly enamoured with this dish – a little chef’s joke… The pineapple tastes of coconut, which initially confuses the senses, especially as you try to work out how… I pressed the waitress, it’s clearly compressed, because of the texture, but what with? And then of course it struck me – Malibu – the scent led me by my nose to my teenage years. Malibu. When was the last time you tasted Malibu? Well, rest assured, in this dish it’s absolutely delicious, as long as you like coconut and pineapple.

The plate comprised Malibu compressed pineapple, a coconut ice-cream, coconut curd, toasted brioche cubes, and coconut meringue. I wasn’t terribly fond of the coconut curd, so I thought I would experiment with a coconut-milk creme patisserie (in the Thermomix)… For the coconut meringues I used the Meringue Girls recipe, which I’ve made often before. It’s a very clever little dessert – you can prepare all the elements well in advance (perhaps with the exception of toasting the brioche), and then assemble when you’re ready. You see. I make sweeping statements like that. Yes, it’s a clever dessert, and easy, if you own a chamber vacuum sealer and a Thermomix. I’m still posting it, because someone out there will…

As the recipes are quite long, you can find them listed in the Plating section. The pineapple was cubed (as accurately as your patience will allow), and popped into a vacuum pack bag – I included 40ml of Malibu, and compressed under full pressure. I left it in the fridge for 48 hours to absorb the flavour. The compression will also change the texture of the pineapple, making it denser, and less fibrous (it effectively changes the cell structure of the fruit – it’s also an amazing technique to use on watermelon, for example).

To Plate:

Malibu compressed pineapple
Coconut meringues
Coconut-milk creme patisserie
Coconut cream ice-cream
Brioche cubes, dipped in egg and fried in a little butter

Notes:

The coconut version of the creme patisserie worked incredibly well – I used 300g of coconut milk, and upped the flour to 45g, but that was because I included 20g of Malibu, and also wanted to be able to pipe the cream into quite firm ‘peaks’… The coconut flavour was subtle, but discernible, and the texture was exactly like the normal version. I didn’t refrigerate it, but did whisk through some more malibu before piping onto the plates.