Monday 10 October 2011

Slow Cook Partridge

Ingredients:
2 brace partridge
½ lb small dice smoked bacon
1 stick celery, stringed and cut into 1” segments together with the heart and young leaves.
2 clove garlic coarsely chopped
6-8 young thin carrots, brushed clean
1 onion coarsely chopped
handful of parsley
2 bay leaves
2lb of apples, peeled, quartered and cut into thin moons. I used Russets which keep their shape and are sweetish
Juice of one lemon and 2” of lemon peel
¼ pint cider brandyr
¾ pint chicken stock
3 Tblspn olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
Method:
In a large frying pan on a high heat, put in diced bacon and turn until coloured. Tip fats to one side, take off bacon and scatter around in slow cooker bowl.

Return pan to heat and sear all sides the partridge that you have wiped dry. When well coloured set aside.

Scatter garlic, carrots, chopped onion, lemon peel, celery segments and heart in slow cooker bowl with the broken bay leaves.

Put apple slices as they are cut into a bowl and toss in lemon juice.

Stuff two or three apple segment into the body of each partridge and press each bird breast down into the slow cooker bowl.

Pour off any excess fats and deglaze the frying pan off the heat with the cider brandy, stir in all the crusty pieces and pour over the birds together with the chicken stock.

Scatter the remainder apple pieces with the lemon juice around the birds, pressing into any gaps. Season to taste.

Cover slow cooker bowl, put in base, set to low temperature and leave to slow cook for four hours.

Check birds are moist and very tender. Take out birds and set aside in a warm place with about half of the apples and vegetables pieces.

Blitz the remainder apple and vegetables with the sauce until thick. Rub through a sieve, return to a clean pan and reduce over high heat until thick and smooth.

Take the breast and leg meat off each bird, arrange on a plate with the reserved apple and vegetable in the centre. Drizzle with the sauce, serve with the left over sauce in a separate boat. 

In the heat of the moment forgot yet again to take a photo. Note to self, I will really have to do better.

Sunday 15 May 2011

Curried Batter and Curried Chick Peas

Just came up with a couple of dishes that struck the right notes, spicy but not in your face, so worth recording.

First off, Hake fillets in a light curried batter.
To a cup of chick pea flour add tablespoon of ground coriander, half teaspoon of ground white pepper, turmeric and ginger, large pinch of asafoetido and cayenne. Add about half pint of water mix to smooth thin paste until like single cream. Beat the yolk of one egg, you may need to use another egg depending on the size of fillets. Beat egg white separately until beginning to stiffen, fold into chickpea batter mixture.
Dip Hake fillets into seasoned flour, dust off excess, dip and coat in egg yolk and then into batter mixture. Slid into corn oil at 190C in a wok, after a few minutes, turn over until all sides are just golden. Take out and put on paper towel to absorb excess oil. Eat immediately.

Chick Pea Curry
Precook the chick peas, reserve about a pound of the cooked peas with cooking juices to cover. Use the remainder perhaps to make a houmous. In a covered small pan, sweat off a large onion cut small in a tablespoon of olive oil. When softened, take off lid turn up heat and drive off moisture. Add about three tablespoons of chicken stock, carry on cooking till all moisture absorbed, repeat. Then drain chickpea juice into pan and carry on until moisture is just driven off. Be careful you cannot rush this or turn your back on it, it will quickly colour, then burn, not what you are after.
Now add tablespoon ground coriander, half teaspoon ground cumin and quarter teaspoon ground fenugreek. Blend. Then add two tablespoons of dark molasses sugar, turn until absorbed then add a whole can of chopped tomatoes. Stir in, drive off excess moisture, turn down heat to very low, to let flavours absorb,. Keeping stirring occasionally taking care not to burn. Add reserved chickpeas with one small red chille, seeds removed and chopped fine, leave for a few minutes to warm then turn off heat and leave to stand on ring to absorb any moisture. Stir a good handful of coarsely chopped coriander leaf. Serve

Friday 18 February 2011

Butter Bean Soup

Cheap, simple, easy and tasty soup, what could be better? Soak a 300g bag of butter beans over night. Rinse in freshwater a couple of times. Put in a large pan and boil, add a little oil to control the massive foam, for say five minutes. Discard water and rinse beans thoroughly, to get rid of the sulphur preservative. Put back on more moderate heat with fresh water bring to the simmer. Add one large peeled onion, three large peeled carrots left whole, a stick of celery and a clove of garlic.

After forty minutes check the beans are just tender, may take a little longer if they are old. Discard onion, celery and garlic, gently set carrots aside. Drain liquor off the beans and retain. Pick over the beans for the firm whole ones setting them aside. Liquidise the broken soft beans with say quarter pint of liquor.

Meanwhile in a pint of a rich stock, I used pheasant but duck would be good or even chicken, boil about half pound of celeriac peeled and cut into rough small chunks. When cooked, liquidise.

In a clean pan put the carrots, cut in half or quarters along their length, depending on size, and then cut into slices sat 5mm thick. Add about equal portions of the whole butter beans, say half, the strained liquidised stock and celeriac and then the strained liquidised butter bean and liquor. Gently stir and add more liquor to adjust thickness. A creamy loose soup with a good portion of beans and carrots is the goal. Bring back to heat slowly, stir occasionally, adjust seasoning to taste and serve.

Delicious. Sweet, creamy and rich flavoured. For those not needing to avoid, it cries out for two Tblspn of cream stirred in to lighten the colour. Garnish with four or five
thin chillie rings barely softened in hazelnut oil with a couple of drops of the oil.





Friday 21 January 2011

Review - Proper Cornish Pasty

In a moment of weakness believed the hype and tried a Proper Cornish Pasty to fill in after a later start. I had a steak and ale filling.

Hmmm. Pastry was good, crumbly and not that rancid flavour you so often get.
Well there was a piece of steak in it. Just the one bite sized chewy steak, so it was real at least. The rest was a slurry of meaty ooze, potato and suede. Seasoning was not too much to conceal the lack of flavour. The filling was excruciatingly hot, so much more likely microwaved rather baked reheat.

Not the worst I have eaten but well off the best. Struggling to find anything positive. Avoid, unless you are vegetarian!