A Hearty Breakfast

When embarking on a long shopping trip, particularly a Christmas shopping trip, you need a good breakfast to keep you going. The bacon and egg sandwich Rob made this morning was just the thing. Oh my, this is true love.

Port Gravy For Roast Pork

Sweetness with roast pork goes so well which is why apple sauce is a classic to serve with it. But if you don't fancy that and want something different try this port gravy. Well, it's actually more of a sauce than a gravy and you only need a little as it is very sweet. To make it simply add a glass of port to the juices in the pan in which you've roasted the pork. That's all you need, no stock, no flour, simply port and roast pork juices. Remove excess fat from the pan first though. You want a little fat but not too much. Simmer whilst stirring and reduce until you have a good consistency.

Chestnut And Bacon Soup

There's nothing like roasted chestnuts at this time of year, I adore them. This soup really brings out their flavour and I think it's equally good as a special starter for guests or just a solitary comfort.

I used 500 grams of uncooked chestnuts and roasted them at 200c for half an hour (with slits in the shells to stop them exploding), but if you don't want all the hassle of peeling them just use pre-cooked ones, vacuume packed or tinned.

Sauté 2 rashes of chopped smoked bacon in a little butter until the bacon starts to release its fat. Now add one carrot, one stick of celery and one onion, all chopped.

Sauté until the vegetables start to soften and colour then add the chestnuts and 1 litre of chicken stock. Bring to the boil then simmer for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are cooked through. Puree and season. Add a little cream if feeling decadent.

Now I feel Christmassy.

Nigella Lawson's London Cheesecake

I said on my food blogger's welcome dinner post that this cheesecake is my standard one. There’s a very good reasons for this; quite simply it’s fantastic. Totally and utterly. It tastes wonderful and the texture is perfect, creamy and velvety. It never fails to impress, friends and family love it and Rob asks for it more than any other dessert I make. I can’t recommend it highly enough. Nigella, thank you, you are my heroine.

Click here for the recipe

Lamb Shanks

I used 2 lamb shanks when I made this but you could use the same quantities for 4, as this makes plenty of sauce.

Brown the shanks in olive oil over a high heat, then remove and set aside. Add to the pan 2 celery sticks, 4 shallots or a small onion and 2 carrots all roughly chopped, along with 4 peeled garlic cloves.

Cook the vegetables until they start to take on some colour then put the shanks back in the pan. Now add a tablespoon of flour and stir well, then pour in half a bottle of good red wine and add 2 or 3 sprigs of thyme and a bay leaf. Add 500ml of beef stock and season well. Bring to the boil then reduce the temperature right down to barely a simmer. Put a lid on and either cook on the hob on the lowest heat or in the oven at about 150c for about two hours, turning the shanks occasionally.

When the lamb is almost falling off the bone remove it and then sieve the liquid into a pan and discard the vegetables and herbs. Now simmer the liquid to reduce it to a sauce and serve with the lamb.

Christmas Is coming

The signs that Christmas is fast approaching are all around. The shops are bustling and full of decoration and gifts, our family are sending gift lists to and fro, yesterday saw the launch of our ‘Secret Santa’ in the office and today I had an email from a friend telling me that it’s only 34 days until Christmas. Oh yes, you read that correctly. I did a double take too.

So, love it or hate it, it really is that time of year again. Personally, I love it. I embrace Christmas fully and still see it through the eyes of my childhood. My Mum used to make our house up like Santa’s grotto, full of tinsel, paper chains, balloons and twinkling lights. The anticipation and excitement was fantastic and has stayed with me.

This year, however, the buzz seems to have passed over me and I haven’t been swept up in it yet. I’ve not really felt the excitement. Perhaps it’s age, or walking through Oxford Street every day on my way to and from work and having to fight my way through endless crowds - surely that’s enough to dampen anyone’s enthusiasm.

But today I started to go with it. I popped into a supermarket for a few everyday bits and came back with chestnuts, clementines, brandy laced mince pies, a Christmas edition of a food magazine and a tin of goose fat. How did that happen? Yes, yes, I know. I’m weak. I think I’ll go and console myself with a mince pie.

Simplicity At It's Best

Light, fluffy eggs sprinkled with seasoning and just-cooked to perfection, folded over to encompass melting cheese and sautéed vegetables. Who can resist?

Omelettes are one of the simplest meals you can make. They are quick, filling and versatile. Have them for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Serve them simply as they are or dress them up with herbs, cheese, mushrooms, bacon, peppers, or whatever takes your fancy. The possibilities are endless. Whip up a simple cheese omelette for an unexpected visitor when the cupboard is bare, in no time at all. Serve an omelette with a little rocket and a glass of white wine and you have a rather wonderful dinner with a touch of class.

Lightly combine 2 or 3 eggs with seasoning and pour into a hot non-stick pan containing oil and a little butter if you like. Butter on its own will burn at high temperatures so it’s always best to use it with a little oil too. Pour the egg in and wait a few seconds for it to fluff up around the edges. Now drag the edge of the omelette into the middle of the pan and swirl the pan around so that the egg that is still liquid fills the gap and the bottom of the pan is covered in egg again. Do this a few more times if necessary. I use a wooden fork for this purpose, so that I don’t scratch my pan.

When the bottom of the omelette is set and lightly golden, take the omelette off the heat (the egg will continue cooking so don’t worry if it’s still a little liquid on top) and add your filling, if you’re using it, to one half (today I used grated parmesan and sautéed peppers). Then fold the other half over and slide onto a plate. Enjoy.

Pork Crackling

As much as I love roast pork I never used to eat the crackling - the thought of fatty pig's skin didn't really do it for me! I have to admit to feeling a little disgust when Rob used to chew on it. When he told me I was missing out on the very best bit I was a somewhat disbelieving. But now I've tasted golden, crispy crackling I'm a complete convert. The flavour is fantastic and it's great to crunch on. BUT, if it isn't crispy you just get a mouthful of fat. Nice.

I've noticed, when checking my blog stats to see how people are finding my blog, that there are a lot of people out there on a quest for crispy crackling. So to maybe help those people, here are my tips.

The key is dryness and heat. The skin should be scored to release the fat and help dry it out – get your butcher to do the scoring as the skin is really tough. When you get it home dry the skin off with kitchen paper and then rub salt into it to further dry it out.

Pork belly, which we had tonight, is best slowly roasted, and you need a low temperature for that, but you need a high temperature to crisp up the crackling. So, give it a really high blast of heat for half an hour either at the beginning of your cooking time or at the end, with the time in between at a low temperature.

I find the meat at the bottom of the joint, which is laying on the roasting tin, can become too dry if it is cooked for too long at too high a heat so it’s sometimes a good idea to add a glass of water or wine during the last hour of cooking to prevent this.

If you find the joint is cooked through but the crackling isn’t crispy enough you can always remove the skin from the joint and put the skin back in the oven at a high temperature to really crisp it up. It’s really fine to do this - the crackling usually separates from the joint during carving anyway.

Oh, one final thing. There is one downside to this naughty treat and that would be an aching jaw. But hell, it's worth it.

Ask Me A Question

(Photography by Gene Weatherley)

I'd love for this blog to become really interactive so that you, the reader, can contribute and tell me what you think and what you'd like to know.

So, I thought I'd create this area for you to ask me a question or tell me what you'd like to read about.

I'm no expert and completely self-taught, but if you'd like to ask me a cooking question please do and I'll do my best to answer, or if you have a dilemma I'll try to help you out.

Just post a comment against this post. Hope to hear from you soon!

Simple Pleasures

Ahhh…another Friday night, at last. Home from work, feet up, Dirty Dancing in the DVD player and a glass of chilled white wine by my side. It doesn’t get much better than this, does it? Well…actually….it does.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have something very good going on in the kitchen. My favourite thing to cook and eat is in the oven – a chicken, free range, of course. I’m pot roasting it tonight, which is so good yet so very simple and, most importantly for a Friday night, a quick bung-it-in-the-oven job.

Although there are hundreds of recipes out there for this very old dish you really don’t need one. It’s just a case of putting the chicken in a pot and adding chopped vegetables of your choice (onions, leeks, carrots, potatoes, are all good choices), fresh herbs, seasoning, water and some wine if you like. It goes into the oven at around 190 or 200 degrees with the lid on for about an hour, then about another half hour with the lid off to brown up the chicken. As usual with chicken check that the juices run clear and then you know it’s cooked through.

If you haven't already, try it - it's really good. You get moist chicken with a soothing broth. Lovely for this time of year in particular.

Here are some pictures I took last time I pot roasted a chicken.

Beef With Port And Red Onion

Sauté about 500g of good casserole beef in olive oil over a high heat until well browned. Remove the beef from the pan then sauté 2 sliced red onions in the same pan until they start to soften and colour. Add 2 crushed garlic cloves and sauté for a couple of minutes more. Put the beef back in the pan and sprinkle over 1 tablespoon of flour. Stir well to mix then add a wine glass full of port and simmer for a few minutes to cook off the alcohol. Add 1 litre of beef stock, a little dried thyme and seasoning, then pop in the oven with a lid on at 200c for about two hours, until the beef is very tender and the sauce is thick and glossy. If the sauce needs thickening up towards the end of the cooking time, remove the lid and simmer the casserole on the hob.

This is a deliciously rich casserole and best served with something for the sauce to coat, such as mashed potato or rice.

A Little Childhood Nostalgia

Do you remember thinking when you were a child that when you grow up you’ll buy all the sweets you want? Me too, and that’s exactly what I did when I discovered A Quarter Of, a wonderful on-line company which sources and stocks all the old favourites.

I was thrilled to discover this website which transported me back to my childhood. Browsing the site I squealed with delight at each new discovery. All my lovingly remembered sweets were there along with ones I’d completely forgotten about. I could hardly wait to place the order.

But then came the dilemma – what to choose? I had to give this some serious consideration and fight off the urge to order everything. Sherbet was always my favourite as a child, so I put a good selection in my basket. Rob’s requests were simple, winter mixture and bazooka bubblegum –lots of it.

There really is every sweet you could imagine here and in the unlikelihood that you don’t find something you’re looking for you can put in a request to see if it can be found. And sugar-free varieties are available to. How fantastic is that?

The idea for A Quarter Of came to Managing Director, Michael Parker, 4 years ago when he and his brother were in a pub reminiscing about all the sweets they used to buy from their local sweetshop. After some investigation Michael discovered that all the sweets he remembered were in fact still being manufactured. You can read the full story on the website.

Our order was delivered to Rob’s office, but he had to work very late on the day it was delivered so I had to wait all evening to taste the goodies. When he finally got home I was in my pyjamas and we opened the box on the bed. It was like Christmas had come early. We were absolutely delighted. Rob said the smell from the box was just how sweets should smell. The little white paper bags the sweets came in brought the memories flooding back to us. Suddenly we were seven years old again. The creamy white chocolate had that same distinct smell and taste as it did all those years ago. The twisty marshmallows, or flumps as I remember them, tasted even better than I remembered, the wham bars were fantastic and the parma violets, another of my favourites, were just as sweetly perfumed and delicious as they always were.

But the real fun came when we opened the popping candy, Space Dust as it used to be known or Fizz Wiz as it is now. I’d forgotten the sensation of the fizzing and popping in my mouth and it was fantastic to experience it again. We had great fun opening our mouths and hearing the loud crackling. To see us you never would have thought we were grown ups with sensible jobs and bills to pay.

The Night Sky Ablaze With Colour

Bonfire Night is upon us once again, the great British tradition celebrating the failure of an attempt by Guy Fawkes and fellow conspirators to blow up the Houses of Parliament in 1605.

People all over the country wrap up warm in gloves, scarves and hats and venture outside to watch spectacular fireworks, gather around blazing bonfires and eat hot food to keep them warm. Smoke fills the night sky long after the fireworks have ended and people are back in their warm houses.

Jacket potatoes, hot dogs with fried onions and soup are just some of the traditional foods eaten on this night and in fact, with firework displays and parties often taking place the weekend before or after, the celebrations stretch over more than one night.

Last night we went to Rob’s parents’ house for a barbecue and to watch the nearby fireworks display. Some of our group took a walk to watch the display and others stayed in the warm and watched from the upstairs window or the garden by the warmth of the barbeque.

I’ll leave you now with some more pictures from the night.

Bunny In A Pot

How do you feel about rabbit? I know a lot of people don’t like the thought of eating it, unable to get the thought of cute furry little animals out of their heads. I guess the fact that many people keep rabbits as pets makes it hard to think of them as food. I’ve never eating it myself (before tonight, that is), simply never having been presented with cooked rabbit and never feeling the desire to cook one myself. But now that I have a greater interest in food and game is becoming more popular, with TV chefs bringing it to our screens, rabbit is something that has been intriguing me. And anyway I really didn't think I could consider myself a proper foodie until I’d tried it!

Perhaps a few years back I, too, would have been unable to face the thought of eating rabbit. But now I’m a little older and have thought about it more I have to consider why it’s any different from eating a duck, a lamb or a cow. I guess at the end of the day it comes down to what you know and are used to. If you grew up on a farm or in the depths of the country and regularly ate rabbit growing up then I doubt you would see what all the fuss is about.

So with all this in mind when I went to the butchers the other day and saw that he had skinned and prepared rabbits I decided there and then that it was about time I tried one. So the butcher chopped one up for me and I brought it home, feeling rather brave and proud of myself. Then I got it home and I did start to feel a little funny about it. I’ve never had a rabbit in my fridge and the last time I was close to one I was stroking my friend’s house rabbit. Oh dear, there’s that image of the cute furry little animal again.

With that thought pushed out of my mind I started cooking and was actually taken a back by just how good it smelt. It put me in mind of Christmas, with the turkey cooking and making giblet gravy.

When I tasted the liquid in the stew I really was quite blown away. This was good, really good. Time to try the meat. The texture is like chicken but the taste is deeper, gamier, as you’d expect. It really is very nice. If you haven’t already, give it a go – you may be pleasantly surprised.




Rabbit Stew

Brown a jointed rabbit in olive oil. Remove from the pan and add 4 rashes of roughly chopped smoked bacon. Sauté until golden then add about 6 shallots (halved if they are large) and two crushed garlic cloves. Sauté for a few minutes more then deglaze the pan with a large glass of white wine. Add 1 litre of chicken stock and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and gently simmer on the hob on a very low heat for about 2 hours until the rabbit is tender and falling off the bone. Season to taste at the end of the cooking time.

Grey Mullet with Mashed Potato and Beurre Fondue Sauce

The weather has turned and it seems that the warmth we’ve been spoiled with this year has finally given way to cold air. The heating has been on and the clocks have gone back. Time for comfort food. White flaky fish, creamy mashed potato and lots of buttery, buttery sauce. Rick Stein’s Beurre Fondue Sauce made with shallot, white wine, fish stock and lots of butter was just the thing. All that butter - so bad but oh so good.