Salmon Yakatori

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The Salmon of Knowledge

So this is my first proper cooking after finishing the course. I spent a good week eating mostly vegetables and drinking plenty of water. Then my wonderful friend Kate bought me a flight to Madrid for my birthday, so off I went to relax and soak up this beautiful city with it's wonderful art, architecture and tapas! The culinary highlight of the trip was a visit to The Mercado de San Miquel just off Calle Mayor. If you are ever in Madrid I urge you to check it out. It's housed in the old fish market. Under the ornate metal arches are housed vendors of every kind. You can stroll around collecting small dishes from an array of delectable treats. Everything from caviar, Spanish cheeses and ham, to churros and fantastical chocolates. There are great wines and prosecco for sale by the glass. I could have spent all day there, gently grazing. The best thing about Spain is the portions - allowing you to tailor your meals to just how hungry you're feeling - not a bad idea?


Back to the point in question. After completing my course I was hoping that all my new skills would transfer to my kitchen - with it's significantly more humble set up than the spacious Cooks Academy. This salmon yakitori was delicious when I prepared it during the course. Could I recreate at at home. The answer was a resounding yes - phew well that's money well spent so!

Ingredients
4 Salmon fillets - skin removed
Sunflower Oil
Marinade
100 ml Soy Sauce
200 ml of sherry (Sake if you have it)
2 tbsp of caster sugar
Salad
1 tbsp Mirin (or red wine vinegar)
1 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp caster sugar
1 red chili finely sliced
1/2 cucumber - julienned
2 carrots - julienned
Coriander finely sliced

• Mix together the marinade ingredients in a large bowl. Pop in your salmon fillets then refrigerate for a few hours, or overnight if you're highly organised.
• In a large bowl place your cucumber and carrots. Then combine the other ingredients for the salad dressing. Pour over and set aside for 20 minutes before serving.
• Heat the olive oil in a large non stick pan. Remove the fillets from the marinade and pat them dry on some kitchen towel. Keep the marinade liquid.
• Fry your fillets for around 4 minutes on each side - time is dependant on the thickness of your fish. Don't forget to cook the presentation side first as this always looks prettier!
• While the fish is cooking - add in the marinade liquid - this reduces down pretty quickly.
• Stir the chopped coriander through the salad before serving.
• On your plate - put a small mound of the pickled salad. Top this with the cooked salmon and then spoon some of the reduction of the salmon fillet. Garnish with a sprig of coriander or some fried ginger.

Enjoy! 

Chicken Rice

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Inspired by a meal I never ate in Singapore

On my travels in Thailand there were some anti government demonstrations that closed down all the airports. I had to travel overland through Thailand and Malaysia to get to Singapore to make a flight. The trip down was great fun and met some great people along the way, who were all in a similar position to me. So really felt like a bonus as I got to visit Kuala Lumpur and see parts of Malaysia. Also I got to visit my friend Alan who was living in Singapore at the time. This is the most incredible city for food - every corner is overflowing with amazing places to eat, every kind of food imaginable - super extra bonus food!

Alan's friends insisted on taking us to eat 'Chicken Rice' that she'd always had growing up. After some driving we arrived at the place only to discover it was closed, we found something else equally delicious to eat in an old golf club. The idea of the dish however never left me. This recipe is based on what I think chicken rice would have been like!

Ingredients

1 chicken

2 onions - peeled and halved

3 carrots - peeled and halved

2 sticks of celery - halved

1 thumbs length of ginger finely sliced

6 cloves of garlic gently crushed

1 red chili finely sliced
2 cups of rice (I used basmati) but any fragrant rice would be good

2 tablespoons of soy sauce

2 scallions finely sliced

1) Put the chicken, onions, carrots, celery, ginger, garlic and chili in a large saucepan. Cover with water and bring to the boil. Leave to simmer gently covered for about 2 hours.

2) Remove chicken and veg from the pot. Discard pieces of ginger, celery and most of the garlic.

3) Add the rice into the stock then bring to the boil. Simmer until the rice is cooked. 

4) Meanwhile shred the chicken, and chop up the carrots.

5) When the rice is nearly cooked add back in 4/5s chicken, carrots and add in the soy sauce. Serve scattered with some scallions and the remaining shredded chicken.

Perfect for a grey wintry day - oh yes! This dish is only a little Asian but very delicious

Carrot, Chickpea & Harrisa Soup

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A Thoroughly Super Soup

So I spent a lovely weekend at home with my parents and visiting my friends and all of their little babies! Cute the lot of them. My mum cooked a great soup which she got from the BBC Food magazine. It was delicious, spicy filling soup, with a hearty consistency. A real winner and super healthy of course, thanks mum!

Ingredients
Olive oil
1 onion dices
50g of carrots
2 cloves of garlic
1 tsp of cumin seed
1 tsp of coriander seed
1 tsp of caraway seed
1 tbsp of harrisa paste
1 litre of vegetable stock (or chicken of you like)
a small bunch of parsley
410g can of chickpeas
To serve – plain Greek yogurt

In a large pan cook the onion in some olive oil on a medium heat for 5-10 minutes until translucent and soft. Next add in all the carrots and the garlic and cook uncovered for another 5 mins.

Meanwhile grind all the whole spices in a pestle and mortar or spice grinder. Tip this mixture into with the carrots and onion long with the harissa. Stir well to mix and then add in all of your stock. Bring to a nice simmer and cook for 10-15 minutes until the carrots are soft.

Then add in the drained chickpeas, and allow these to heat through. Remove one cup full of the mixture and blend the remaining with a stick blender. Add back in the cup and stir before serving with a big dollop of yogurt.

This soup sounds pretty simple – but it’s pretty spectacular. It must be the harissa – seriously make it – it’s great!

I went a bit crazy with this photo – but I like it.

Spicy Curly Veggie Fries with Mint & Chive Dip

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I discovered a nice new blog yesterday from fellow Dubliner, David - Kitchen 72, there are some nice recipes with a healthy bent. I read his recipe for carrot and feta salad with mint and harissa and decided that I would make this for my dinner. One hugely failed shopping trip later and I had half the ingredients - so I made this instead - it has carrots, harrisa and mint in too - same same but roasted!
 

Ingredients
Serves 2
2 Yams
1 Sweet potato
2 Large carrots (all cut into thin batons
1 Tablespoon of harissa
5 Cloves of garlic
Salt & pepper
A good dash of olive oil

For the dip (serves one)
2 Tablespoons of yogurt
A handful of chives (finely chopped)
A handful of mint (finely chopped)
A sprinkle of smoked paprika

Pre-heat your oven to gas mark 6. Toss all the fries ingredients well in a big baking tray - the thinner you can spread them apart from each other the crispier they’ll be. Bake on a high shelf for 45-50 minutes turning once or twice to ensure even crisping.
 
To make the sauce simply mix together the yogurt and herbs and sprinkle with a bit of paprika.  The spicy harissa is balanced out with the mint ad yogurt beautifully.
 
This dish would be great with baba-ganoush as a dip  - or roast breast of chicken on the bone  - or some grilled halloumi.

Thick Minestrone Soup

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Mammy Minestrone

Yup so this is a minestrone I made with my mum while home over the bank holiday. I decided to make it when I saw how much lovely homegrown spinach that they had in their cupboard. Then I forgot to add it in - whoops- well it was still a great soup and a nice filling lunch that got me the whole way back to Dublin in the car without any belly rumbles.

Ingredients

 1 white onion finely diced
2 cloves of garlic finely sliced
6 fresh tomatoes (chopped, skinned if you like)
3 carrots diced
3 sticks of celery finely sliced
big bunch of green beans cut into whatever size pieces you like
1 tin of mixed beans
1 tablespoon of tomato puree
3 handfuls of dry pasta (whatever shapes you like)
1 sprig of thyme
1 bunch of parsley
1 pint of vegetable stock
A couple of handfuls of basil leaves

To Garnish 

freshly grated Parmesan
basil leaves
 
Fry your onion over a medium heat for two minutes before adding in the garlic. Cook until the onion begins to soften, then add in the diced carrots and celery. Cook for a further 5 minutes. Then add in the sprig of thyme, the bay leaf, tomatoes and cook until the tomatoes begin to soften. Then stir in all the other ingredients, except the basil, mix well and bring to a gentle simmer. Cook for about 12-14 minutes until the pasta shapes are cooked. Stir in the fresh basil just before serving and garnish with a few leaves and a generous grating of Parmesan. Enjoy with some nice brie and a glass of good red wine.

I only used about 1/2 litre of stock in this and it turned out very thick, so I recommended more stock in the recipe to make for a more liquid soup. I love cooking with my mum, she ways things like 'what'll I chop next?' and 'I'll get that from the garden' the perfect cooking partner

Thanks Mum!

Lemon and Thyme Roasted Chicken

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Chicken a la Stephen

Trying to look like we were just having a casual conversation instead of gossiping in work, me and Stephen started talking about the best way to roast a chicken. His suggestion sounded fresh with a touch of spring, so I gave it a shot!

This recipe comes from Stephen but possibly he thinks via Jamie Oliver - but I might give Stephen credit. It’s a really wonderful dish.

Stephen is the namesake for Stephen my canary - so if you haven’t met him already here a photo of his cute little yellow self. He was found by Stephen M, who was working late, one cold Sunday evening in May. He was hopping up Pearse Street, cold and lost. He opened the door of our office and in he came where he revived well and I adopted him the next day. Seems strange to put a photo of him in the same post as a roast chicken recipe, oh well! He eats boiled eggs so it’s the same thing really!

Ingredients
1 medium chicken
1 lemon
small bunch of fresh thyme
3 oz butter
1 red onion
3 parsnips
2 carrots
3 sticks of celery
1/2 a turnip

Wash the chicken inside and out - then pat dry. Pre-heat your oven to Gas mark 5. Peel your veg and chop into large chunks . Put into a large baking dish along with a good grind of black pepper, some salt and a few sprigs of thyme.

Make the herb butter by combining the zest of the lemon with the butter and 3 tablespoons of fresh thyme. Then gently press the butter in between the skin and the top of the breast - the skin needs a small amount of convincing.

Place the chicken on top of your bed of vegetables - give the outside of the chicken a little seasoning also. Cover the whole thing in tin foil, then cook in the middle of the oven for 2 hours.

Remove the tinfoil, drain away the excess juice and retain for gravy later. Pop back in the oven for another 30 mins to brown and allow the skin to crisp.

After 30 mins - remove chicken and allow to rest for 10-15 minutes, while the meat is resting take the veg to the top shelf of the oven and crank up the heat to gas mark 8/9 to get a nice crisp finish to your root veg.

Prepare the gravy - in the roasting tin, throw a large dash of sherry, scrape of all the nice juicy bits with your wooden spoon. Then mix in one heaped tablespoon of plain flour. Mix well so that it forms a paste with the sherry. Then the juices from the chicken that you removed earlier would have separated. Drain off the excess fat from the top, then stir the juices into your flour mixture a little at a time, until well incorporated, continue doing this until you have a nice thick gravy. Check the seasoning.

Then carve your chicken, a good sharp carving knife is always good to have around. Serve on a bed of roasted veg drizzled with gravy, the lemon. A fresh and subtle lemon flavor will be throughout the meat and gravy, the edges of your veg will be caramelised and crispy - wonderful! The butter above the breast made it fantastically moist and tasty.

Thanks Stephen, Lola declared it - the best roast chicken she’s ever had

January Detox Vegetable Bowl

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It's never too late

Well now, I know that this recipe is coming a little late into January, but after the turkey, ham, 20 different kinds of cheese, new years in a house with a deep fat fryer, the big freeze necessitating comfort food and then a quick trip to the alps with all the fondue and frites France could provide, I’m just getting down to a bit of healthy eating. It’s never too late don’t ya know.

I got loads of nice food pressies for Christmas - and this dish gave me a chance to use my new mandolin, thanks mum! It’s grate!! (sorry it had to be done) Basically it’s a nice big bowl of stir-fried veg with some nice dressing and a sprinkling of omega 3 rich nuts and seeds. It would make a nice side dish with some grilled salmon or a nicely fried pork chop, to make a nice low carb meal. The cabbage really looks like spaghetti in this shot, so you could pretend. It would also be super yum with red cabbage

Ingredients
Serves 1 as a main - 2 as a side
1/4 of a head of cabbage - finely sliced
2 small carrots - finely slice
1 white onion - finely sliced
4 spears of asparagus
3 cloves of garlic finely sliced
a handful of sliced almonds
2 tablespoons of sesame seeds
a dash of soy sauce
1 tablespoon of white wine (or other ) vinegar
2 tablespoons of olive oil - and a little extra
1/3 teaspoon of English mustard
a handful of raisins/sultanas
Salt and Pepper

Under a hot grill toast the slivered almonds and sesame seeds, until turning nice and golden.

Heat up a dash of olive oil in a large frying pan/wok. When hot fire in your onion and garlic,, keep it moving gently with a wooden spoon, until soft and starting to take on a nice tinge of dark brown on some parts. Throw in the cabbage and carrots, and cook for two mins, keeping it moving still then fold in your asparagus tips and cook for another one minute.

Mix together the remaining ingredients to make your sauce., then stir it into the frying pan. Serve sprinkled with the toasted nuts and seeds, enjoy and feel virtuous. (PS I had a dream that there was lots of parsley in the fridge last night - Freud would say that if I could have, I would have, added some Parsley)

Roast Loin of Pork with apple stuffing and roasted winter vegetables

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We had 10 for a pre christmas Monday night dinner. Lu, Sarah & I ( all three residents of number 7) decided we would each cook a course and really wanted to do a big roast, so I asked if I could do the main event. Sucker for punishment, me.

Thinking we were going to be feeding 12, I bought two MASSIVE pieces of pork loin and asked the butcher to open them out so that I could stuff them. In the end we had 10 people but two were veggies. So between 8 of us we still managed to polish off almost all of the pork, which is a testament to how well it turned out!

We dressed up the table with green napkins, my green goblets from Habitat and some gorgeous green and pink woven fabric that Sarah had spare as she works as a textile designer. Then Pamela arrived with a big poinsettia which we used as a centrepiece. The whole thing was very christmassy indeed!

I made the stuffing the night before heres the recipe for it, first of all

Apple and rosemary stuffing:

4 oz butter

4 tbsps olive oil

1 bag breadcrumbs

1 white onion,

1 red onion

4 cloves garlic

1 handful sage

3 or 4 stalks rosemary

1 eating apple, diced.

Melt the butter with the oil in a large pot. Dice the onion and garlic finely and saute in the butter and oil. When almost soft add the diced peeled apple. Cook for 2 minutes or so but don't let the apple get too soft. add the chopped sage and rosemary and stir in for a few seconds, then add the breadcrumbs and stir well so that they absorb all the butter and oil. Season to taste. Leave to cool.

Roast stuffed loin of pork with roasted winter vegetables.

Loin of pork

olive oil

1 quantity stuffing

5 rashers of streaky bacon

8 cloves of garlic

parsnips & carrots peeled & cut into quarters or eighths.

Salt & Pepper

Open out the loin of pork where the butcher has cut or 'butterflied' it. using a rolling pin bash the meat to flatten it out a bit, then make a 'sausage' shape out of the stuffing and place in the centre of the cut. Bring the sides of the meat back together. Cover the join with the rashers and use string (not plastic string or it will melt!) to tie the whole thing together. You will need to ties 4 -6 lengths of string around the joint.

Place the parsnips, carrots and garlic cloves (unpeeled!) in a large oven tray and toss in about 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Place the Pork, bacon side up on top of the vegetables. Rub salt, pepper and olive oil all over the joint. The meat will need to cook for 20 mins per pound so weigh it and place it in an oven at about 230c for however long you need. Mine took 2 hours and 20 mins!! so that tells you how ridiculously big it was! Have a peek at it every now and then and if you think its getting burned or dry on the top just put a bit of tin foil over it.

This makes the best gravy as roasting it on top of the veggies will produce delicious juices. When you are almost ready to serve, transfer the meat to a chopping board and let it rest in a warm place with some tin foil over it. Put the vegetables in a dish and put them back in the oven to keep warm. Take the roasting dish and place it on a low heat on your stove. remove any large bits of burned material, and take the roasted garlic cloves out of their skins. Using the back of a wooden spoon, mash the roasted garlic cloves into the juices. Add 1 or 2 tbsps of flour, depending on how thick you like your gravy and stir. Then add some stock & white or red wine. you will need about 1 pint of liquid altogether if you are cooking for 10 people. Stir the liquid in to the pan juices. Season to taste. I also like to add a bit of apple sauce when making pork. Stir until thickened and pour into a jug or gravy boat.

Serve with roast potatoes and apple sauce, which you can make by cutting up 4 or 5 apples and throwing the pieces in a pot with about 3 oz of butter. Stew this for about 10 mins, stirring all the time and add some salt to taste.

Roast Chicken with apricot and white clonakilty pudding stuffing

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Post pub roastiness

It was a Saturday afternoon. Lu and I were very much looking forward to a certain television show that will remain nameless, but for convenience I will code name 'The Y Element' (say no more, its shameful, I know), both our respective boyfriends were coming over and in a snap inspired decision we knew that a traditional roast was the order of the day.

This was the easiest ever to make, as we just stuffed it, surrounded it with vegetables, shoved the whole thing in the oven and repaired to the local for a few well deserved pre-prandial Guinnesses. We returned to a house that smelled amazing, made some gravy and were all sat down in front of the fire and the box by 8pm.

I'm going to go through it step by step, starting with the stuffing. A long post but worth it!

Stuffing ingredients:

1 red onion

4 cloves garlic

A few sprigs fresh sage

2/3 pack of breadcrumbs

3 oz butter

about 10 dried apricots

1/2 a Clonakilty white pudding

Begin by chopping the onion, garlic and sage. melt the butter in a saucepan and add the onion and garlic. Cover and sweat until they are soft and translucent. add the sage and breadcrumbs and mix well so that the butter soaks in to the crumbs. If you need more butter of crumbs, now is the time. Finely chop the apricots and mix them in. Then slice and crumble the white pudding and mix this in too. Allow to cool for about 15 mins and use to stuff your chicken.

Chicken prep:

Drizzle olive oil on the bird and sprinkle with salt. Then rub the salt well into the skin. This will make sure it is lovely and crisp. Slice 3 cloves of garlic in half lengthwise. Use the point of a knife to make 6 slits in the skin of the chicken, and push the garlic slivers in underneath the skin.

Veggies:

We used carrots, parsnips and new potatoes (which we didn't bother to peel).

Peel the parsnips and carrots and cut them into long pieces of roughly the same size. Get your roomiest roasting dish and drizzle it with olive oil. In the middle of the dish, build a sort of platform of parsnips and carrots, and place the chicken on top of this. Scatter the remaining veg, including the new potatoes (or peeled old potatoes, cut into smaller pieces).

Place the whole thing in the oven at 190c for 1 1/2 -2 hours, or until the skin is golden brown and crispy and the juices run clear when you poke a skewer in under the chicken's leg

Gravy:

At this point, take the chicken out and place it in a different dish. Ditto the veg. Put it back into a very low oven to keep it warm while you make the gravy.

Cook up whatever green veg you are using (Broccoli is my personal fave) and reserve to cooking water. Place your roasting tray which you used to cook the chicken onto a low heat on your stove. Sprinkle 2 tbsps flour into the pan juices and stir it around until its all mixed together with the juices, little burned bits, stray pieces of garlic and escaped stuffing. All of this will make your gravy more delish. add some of the water from the veg, and a good glug of white or red wine. Bring to a simmer and stir until it has thickened. I prefer my gravy to be nice an light and thin rather than gloopy and brown like Bisto. If you need to get more flavour in to the gravy, you can add half a chicken stock cube, a few drops of Worcester or soy sauce, and of course, salt and pepper.

Carve your bird and serve!

I love to use the carcass of the chicken to make a gorgeous roast chicken broth. Recipe to follow in next post!

Tasty Filling Barley Stew

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Come share with me your pearls of wisdom, and give us some of your soup while your at it

I have loved pearl barley ever since I was a kid and my mum would put it into Irish stew. I wanted to make a nice barley filled chunky soup, this soup however got so thick it turned into a stew!

Ingredients
2 onions finely diced
2 cloves of garlic
3 carrots diced
3 sticks of celery finely sliced
3 small potatoes cubed
1 cup of pearl barley
1.5 pints of stock
6 leaves of sage shopped (can use dried if you like)
Sprig of rosemary - chopped
Salt and pepper
Oil of choice

Fry up your onion for 1 minute in your oil over a medium heat, then add in your garlic, rosemary and sage- cook until soft and translucent. Stir in your barley and fill up with stock, bring to a gentle boil. You can now use this time to prepare your vegetables. After about 20 mins of simmering pop in your veg and potatoes. Leave to simmer for another 20 mins until the barley is soft with a little bite and the potatoes are cooked. Serve!

Of you want a more soupy consistency - just add more stock

Carrot Salad with Galangal, Honey & Soy Dressing

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I'll Admit it's Autumn Salad

Now this week we're trying to detox a little - add a few vegetables back into the diet after a pretty unhealthy few weeks in New York. Having said that this recipe is inspired by a green salad that I ate on Broadway in a Japanese restaurant.. It had the most amazing ginger dressing - now that's an ingredient I hadn't considered as an ingredient in dressing before.

A simple carrot salad - improved by the addition of ginger - but alas - there was none in the house, so I used galangal root instead - which is similar to ginger but with a more intense heat and peppery taste.

Ingredients - two servings

4 carrots - peeled and grated

A handful of raisins

A handful of pumpkin seeds

A spoon of sesame seeds

Dressing

1 dessert spoon of white wine vinegar

1 serving spoon of olive oil

a thumb sized piece of galangal root - grated

1 teaspoon of honey

1 dessert spoon of Thai chili sauce - optional

1 clove of garlic minced - optional if you're not too keen on garlic

a pinch of asa foetida - optional

a pinch of salt

Freshly milled black pepper

a small pinch of turmeric

Pop your seeds on a baking tray under a hot grill for about 4 mins - keep an eye on them as they burn easily. They should start to pop when done. Add these seeds to the raisins and carrots in a bowl. Combine the other ingredients in a cup and blend with a fork - or if you prefer make it in a jam jar and shake it together - any remaining dressing can be stored in the fridge for a week or so.

Pour dressing over salad - toss and serve. Can be served as a side to many dishes - the galangal root/chili sauce gives it a hot kick, seeds are nice and crispy against the carrot sweetened with raisins.

Bringing the carrot salad kicking and screaming out of Summer and into Autumn - that's where we're at

Beef and Guinness Pie

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Ohm nom nom As Alan has been in Singapore for the last year eating only foreign muck (joking, he has told me many a tale about the wonderfulness of food in Singapore) we decided that he needed a good auld Irish dish as a welcome home.

I was going to cheat and buy the puff pastry, but they didn't have any in tesco's (bloody tesco parnell street is sooooo bad) so i had to make it from scratch. This was my first attempt at puff pastry, and while it was not actually that puffy, it did taste very good and was nice and light and crunchy.

We made the filling the night before the party for two reasons: 1- less stress on party day (considerable factor when you are cooking for 14) 2- leaving it overnight makes it more delicious. You could do it all in one day if you wanted to though Again, bear in mind that this recipe serves 14 so you can reduce all the amounts accordingly Ingredients: 11/2kg good quality stewing beef, cut into cubes by your butcher.
20 shallots
8-10 parsnips
8-10 carrots
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic
1 can Guinness extra stout
ltr good beef stock flour
salt & Pepper

Heat some oil in the biggest pot you own. Chop the onion and garlic finely and sweat them in the pot, covering them with the lid so they don't burn or colour. Toss the meat in a generous amount of flour into which you have added salt and ground black pepper until all the cubes are well covered. Toss these in the pan with the onions and brown all over. Stir constantly to stop the flour from burning on the bottom of the pan.

When all the meat has browned, add the peeled and chopped veggies (leave the carrots and parsnips in big-ish chunks) and stir until everything is combined. Then pour in the hot beef stock and stir to dissolve all the flour that has stuck to the bottom of the pan. Pour in the can of Guinness, cover and simmer for 15 mins.

Preheat your oven to about 175c and shove the whole pot in there. Leave it for about 3 hours. When you take it out the stew will be melty and gorgeous. Adjust the seasoning at this point, adding more slat and pepper if necessary. If you have time, leave it overnight and let all those gorgeous flavours intensify.

For the puff pastry: (this recipe is from Delia, her complete cookery course is my bible for basics like this)
1 lb strong white flour
8 oz lard
8oz margarine
10fl oz ice cold water


Sift the flour into a bowl with a pinch of salt. Chop up all the fat into inch sized squares and add to the flour. Now add the water and, using a palette knife make a series of straight cuts (like you are cutting a big cake) to incorporate everything. The aim is to leave the fat as intact as possible and still bring everything together into a dough-like ball.

When you have a reasonable ball of dough-like substance, take it out of the bowl (don't worry if it doesn't use up all of the flour) and place on a floured board. Shape it into a rough brick shape, and using a long, floured rolling pin, make 3 depressions across the brick. Make sure the dough and the pin are well dusted with flour at all times.

Then roll the whole thing out into an oblong that is roughly the length of your forearm (not including your hand!) and about 1/2 as wide. Now fold the top third down and the bottom third up so its a bit like an envelope. Seal the edges with a sharp press from the rolling pin. this locks in air, apparently. The dough will now be roughly the same size and shape as your original brick, so make the 3 depressions again and repeat the process again 4 or 5 times. What this does is spread out the large chunks of fat into layers with flour that you have used to dust the board, dough and pin. Clever, eh!

Allow the dough to rest in the fridge for at least half an hour before you roll it out. When you cut the dough in half you will be able to see all the layers of flour and fat, like the strata of a cliff. Because we had so much stew we had to use 2 pie dishes (big rectangular lasagne ones) but if you are making a smaller amount you could use a pretty round dish. Fill your dish up to almost full with the stew filling. Then cover with the rolled out pastry and make nice decorations on top (not a big penis, like Alan did) and a few cuts to allow steam to escape. I was going to put an egg wash over the pastry to make it nice and shiny (just a beaten egg brushed all over the pastry) but I forgot. We served this with boiled new potatoes and steamed broccoli. YUUUUMMMM

Carrot & Corriander Salad

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Not one to blog the odd lunches I cook myself sometimes, but this one turned out so well that I really wanted to write it down. So in the morning as I have my coffee and breakfast sometimes I knock together my lunch for that day. This is a good and filling lunch that you can make in ten minutes or so, Bulgar wheat is a tasty and fast way to bulk up some light dishes.

I large carrot grated -grated
A handful of fresh coriander
1 clove of garlic - crushed
¾ cup of Bulgar wheat
Olive Oil
Mustard Seeds
White Wine Vinegar
A handful of cashew nuts
Some toasted almond flakes
A small handful of raisins

Cook the Bulgar in twice it’s volume of water – cooks in about 5 mins or so.

Put a layer of chopped coriander at the bottom of your lunch container (I use an old soup pot – the cylindrical plastic ones – with the pop top lids – so no leaking in my handbag) Then add the almonds and then the chopped carrot.

When the Bulgar is cooked stir in the olive oil, salt, pepper, mustard seeds, cashew nuts, raisins and vinegar, mix well and allow to cool for as long as you have till you leave the house.

When it was time for lunch I mixed it all together, and popped it in the microwave – it was thoroughly delicious, a little squeeze of an orange would have made it divine, I’m sure it would be equally as good cold.

Carrot Muffin Cupcakes

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Have you see the Muffin Ladies?

190 g Self Raising flour
150 g Sugar
pinch salt tsp
baking powder
80ml Vegetable oil
1 egg
80 ml milk
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 small carrots, grated
1 handful sultanas
8 Dates
1 big handful pecan nuts
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to gas 6/200c Line a bun tray with bun cases or (like we did) squares of baking parchment. Mix the flour, salt, baking powder, sugar and spices in a bowl. In a measuring jug, combine the egg, milk and oil. Whisk and pour in to the flour mixture.


Mix up and add all the other ingredients. using a teaspoon, transfer the mix into the prepared cases. bake for 20 mins.

To make the icing combine 200g low fat cream cheese with 2 tbsps honey. Wait until the buns are cold, then swirl the icing on top of them. Enjoy!

If you leave out the spices, fruit and carrot, you have a basic muffin recipe, to which you can add fruit such a blueberrys, raspberrys etc. Also good is to substitute brown sugar for the sugar, add some rolled oats or bran, some chopped apple and cinnemon and you will have the perfect breakfast muffin. We will post some photos and a proper recipe for this soon!

Berlin Frankfurter Pottage

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Anne Wieland’s Soup

This recipe was cooked for use by the lovely Anne Wieland from Berlin who stayed with us at no.7 recently. For her leaving dinner she prepared us this wonderfully simple soup. Delicious, hearty and straight forward it was an instant winner. Here is a photo of her & our other lovely no.7 resident Sarah, she promises to share her recipe for homemade brown sauce soon - oh yeah!!

4 potatoes cubed – cubes 2cms
5 carrots sliced - thinly
Stock (the best you have – good stock cubes will do)
A packet of frankfurters
Parsley
Salt and freshly milled black pepper

Cover potatoes and carrots with stock, bring to the boil and simmer till tender. Meanwhile slice the frankfurters into little slices or chunkier if you fancy and fry in a little oil until the start to brown.


When the potatoes and carrots are done mash them gently with a masher – to get a nice consistency of veg and broth. Add in your sausage and mix and serve, sprinkle with a little chopped parsley, serve with beer, cheese, sourdough bread and a German friend.