The Value of good ingredients

Today, after a week of eating crew food at work for the whole week, I decided to go extra simple with my lunch, and try out my latest purchase at the same time. When I was in Leeds over the Bank Holiday, I bought some VERY good Italian olive oil made by Planeta Winery (who make some great wines too) on the island of sicily, in Val di Mazara. Long story short, It's a lovely fresh fruity tasting olive oil, quite green in colour but tastes delicious.

To me, good ingredients speak for themselves, so I decided to keep the messing about to a minimum, and serve it simply on some linguini with a little black pepper - This is the ideal way to realise the value of good quality ingredients - for Dried Pasta, De Cecco is the best you can get, and makes a huge difference.

For a great summery pasta dish, that can be enjoyed all year round, boil up some pasta (remember; big pot, lots of water, 10g of salt per litre of water). while it's cooking, take some great olive oil, (about 25ml per serving) the Juice of half a largeish lemon per serving, and grate in some parmesan (about 20g per serving). season with S&P, and add more lemon juice or oil to taste. Finely chop some fresh Basil, then drain the pasta, add the oil mixture and shake around the pan until the pasta is evenly coated. stir in the chopped basil, and garnish with lemon zest. Delicious.

orange cake - a summer delight :)

Summer is in full swing now (at least as much as it can in Britain) so it's the perfect time to sit outside with a good tea/coffee and a slice of cake. Today I made an orange cake based on a victoria sponge, and it looks delicious :)

As with any victoria sandwich, the basic recipe is along 4/2 or 6/3 or even 8/4 (the first number representing ounces of the dry ingredients, the latter being the number of eggs.) For my cake I used a 6/3. [if you don't know what an ounce is in metric, it's more or less 25g, but you should have Oz on your scales anyway]

So for my recipe I used

6Oz Castor Sugar

6Oz Butter/soft spread (softened)

6Oz Self raising flour

1 large orange, zested and juiced

3 Eggs

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

Lightly grease a deep sandwich tin (or two shallow ones) and line the bottom with baking parchment

Start off by zesting the orange onto a plate and reserving for later, and juice the orange into a sepreate bowl/ramekin.

Grab a bowl and a spoon, and cream together the butter and sugar until fluffy, then add the three eggs. mix together until all incorporated.

sift in the flour and baking powder, mix together thoroughly. Add in 1/3 of the orange zest and a couple of tablespoons of orange juice as well (be careful not to make the mix too wet, if it is add in a touch more flour)

bake at around 190c for c25 minutes - the cake should be golden brown, and spring back when pressed. leave to cool slightly in the tin, then run a palette or thin knife around the edge to free the cake, and turn out onto a rack to cool.

once cooled, slice in half (or not if you've made 2 small ones).

get a couple of Oz of butter, possibly more, and sift in icing sugar until you have a nice fluffy buttercream. add another 1/3 of the zest and a teaspoon or two of the orange juice, and spread over the bottom half of the cake, then put the top back on.

sift icing sugar into a bowl, about 100g or something (i don't know, I do these things by eye, doesn't matter if you have too much of this icing, it's delicious, and a great reward after making the cake) add the orange juice a teaspoon at a time and blend until you get a really nice thick icing, add most of the rest of the zest to the icing, and ice the top. sprinkle with the last of the zest as decoration, and there you have it. cake :)

new recipe: Cajun Chicken goujons

Hello again anyone who reads this :)

Just threw this together tonight, and it's a perfect recipe for a good tasty tea, as well as a good alternative to those horrid reformed nuggets if you have kids knocking about. These can also be frozen down after cooking and put in the oven to reheat at a later date :)

First, get a nice skinless chicken breast, and slice into goujons, (strips, the size isn't vital, just not too thick or the crumb will be burnt before the chicken is cooked.)

2 breasts will make enough for 3 good size portions.

get a blender or food processor, and put in some stale bread (crusts removed) - I used 4 slices for the 2 breasts. blend it up into a fine crumb, and season with salt, pepper and a good helping of blackened cajun seasoning - the crumb should be flecked, and you will be able to smell a hint of the seasoning - don't go overboard though as some may not like it too spicy.

then grab some plain flour, season (i like to use S&P and smoked paprika) and beat a large egg into a bowl, then coat the goujons in flour, egg and breadcrumbs.

get a non-stick frying pan, heat up a good amount of oil in there, at least 5mm deep, more if you like. get it reasonably hot to prevent the crumb soaking it up. cook the goujons in batches until golden and keep warm on kitchen towel as you do the others. (you can deep fry too if you have a fryer)

serve with either your choice of potatoes (chips are a good match, as are wedges spiced with a bit more cajun spice)

you could, if you're feeling healthier, put some of the goujons in a tortilla with crisp lettuce and a bit of salsa.

Grab some ramekins of mayo and mix one with cajun seasoning for those who like it hotter, and one with a bit of lemon mixed in to cool everything down (set soured cream works too)

Hopefully they will looks as good as, if not better than the ones in the photo, and they should taste just as good. (and yeah, i did burn the kitchen towel on that plate.)

and there you are. easy peasy tea, and tasty as too :D

Going shopping

How do you shop? It's an interesting thought that has occured to me of how differently it is possible to shop for food and drink.

firstly there is the traditional, specialist way - butchers for the meat, greengrocer for the veg, baker for bread etc. Personally I love this approach, especially going down to the bullring market in birmingham and being able to speak to the people, talk about what is good and where it has come from, and also get a bargain too.

The same is partly true when I'm at home in shropshire, as I am now, and there is a great farm shop, several infact, in my local area where I can get great produce from. (plug for the farm shop: http://www.citadelfarms.co.uk)

However, for decades now, the supermarkets have been the behemoths of food in the UK as well as in most developed nations. Despite the seemingly relentless march of the supermarkets into every retail area, much of the fresh food is kept along this specialist principle. The 'big boxes' still have fishmongers, bakeries, butchers and greengrocers in store, particularly morrisons with their 'market street' concept.

This idea intregues me, as although the smaller 'metro' and 'central' branches deal in only pre-packed produce, the bigger stores still have deli counters, butcheries and the rest.

Surely it would be cheaper to take the same produce, prepare it at a warehouse/RDC, vacuum pack it and THEN ship it to store? The space in store could be better used, less employees would be needed, and shipping costs would reduce, and shelf life would increase.

So why haven't they done this? This is somewhat of an unanswerable, as it is difficult to ever know the motivation for the supermarkets, but I can think of two reasons.

1) They can charge more for products, and are more likely to sell them if people can choose the quantity.

There is certainly an aspect of this, though I don't feel that the increased price does anything much more than cover the extra costs.

2) People want it.

This is the point that brings me great joy to think of. People actively want this service available. rather than having everything from a packet at the lowest edible quality.

And while the supermarkets have taken the 'pile it high, sell it cheap' philosophy onto new levels with much of what they sell, it is nice to see that the core business, fresh food, is still produced with quality in mind, as well as convenience.

My second thought is that in this recession, the takeaway is increasingly an expensive luxury, but something that many find difficult or costly to replicate.

The key to it, in my mind, is to shop smart. Supermarkets are, by and large, very pricey, and have a poor selection of 'ethnic' or 'world' foods. By going to a chinese or indian supermarket, you can get two very important things - good, authentic ingredients, and good prices. Look up your recipes (bbc's indian and chinese food made easy series are great for ideas) and what sort of things you will need, then go have a look. you can pick stuff up for far less than you can in tesco and the like, and often in larger quantities. My picks of the bunch from ethnic supermarkets:

- Big bags of spices. Particularly Turmeric, Garam Masala, tandoori masala, and chinese 5 spice.

- Rice or noodles. If you eat alot of these, though I do mean ALOT, you can buy these in serious bulk, and save a small fortune in the long run

- OK sauce. a delicious fruity sauce made by colemans' that only seems to be available in chinese supermarkets these days. Makes a great stir-fry sauce let down with a bit of soy and rice wine.

- kitchenware. You can pick up woks, steamers, ladles, and much more in these places for great prices, and it is well worth a look.

I may update this when I get the chance, but i'm not sure I will tbh!

comfort food

It's exam season at the moment, and as such I am a miserable twat. Due to this I like a bit of comfort food, especially when it's quick and simple.  

My favourite is mushrooms on toast. I love good meaty flavoursome mushrooms, and think they should be treated simply. 

I grabbed some nice fresh ciabatta bread, banged on a touch of olive oil, and stuck that under the grill to toast off and go nice and crisp. 

Then I grabbed a non-stick pan, and melted some butter, chopped two large flat mushrooms into slices about 5mm wide, sauteeing them off in the butter, seasoned, and added a touch of garlic paste (about 1/5 of a teaspoon).  Let most of the liquid reduce down and evaporate off, and then added some double cream - enough to make a creamy sauce and coat all the mushrooms. Heated the sauce through and reduced it slightly, then straight on top of the ciabatta bread. 

Ooh. if you want you can bang in a touch of chopped flat leaf parsley just before you add the cream to add an extra dimension. I didn't though, as CBA walking to a big shop to get some parsley. 

Total time is about 5 minutes, and the result is a delicious starter or supper dish. 

Cocktail season is coming!

Cocktail recipes! Summer is approaching, which means it's cocktail season, so I'm going to post up some recipes I have copied out to another forum listing some classics and some ones you may not have tried, all with reasonably simple recipes. Any requests, then leave a comment and i'll give it some thought :) 

Dry Martini: 
50ml Gin
10ml Dry Vermouth 

(there is a variation with 2:1 (so single vermouth, double gin) that you may want to try) - the gin can be changed with vodka for a vodka martini.

Shake or stir in a mixing glass over ice, then strain into a martini glass, serve with olive on a stick (cliche and annoying imo) or a twist of lemon.

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Vesper Martini (Mr Bond's favourite!)
60ml gin
20ml vodka
10ml Lillet Blanc (kina lillet)

shake over ice and serve with a lemon twist
(the ratio is the important thing here, so 3 gin, 1 vodka, half lillet in any quantity will provide a good vesper martini)

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Classic Mojito

50ml White Rum (eg. bacardi, havana club)
10-20ml lime juice, depending upon taste, 
plenty of mint leaves, 
2 bar spoons of fine sugar ( i like to use brown sugar - a good teaspoon will be fine) - gomme syrup can be used, but not exactly something we all have.

Muddle these ingredients together in a glass

add ice, a lime wedge and top up with soda, garnish with a mint sprig.
(I like to add a little bitters to a mojito, but this is personal taste)

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Manhattan

50ml bourbon
20ml Sweet vermouth
dash of bitters (optional)

Stir in a mixing glass with ice, then strain into a cocktail glass, serve with cherry.

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Margarita

50ml Tequila
20ml Lime Juice
15ml Triple Sec (eg. cointreau)

Shake over ice and strain into cocktail glass - tip if salt-rimming the glass, try only doing half, so people who don't like it don't have to drink from it - to salt rim rub the outside of the glass with a lime wedge, and then roll in ground salt. 

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Woo Woo

50ml vodka
15ml peach schnapps
70ml Cranberry Juice

Build in this order in an ice filled highball glass.

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Cuba Libre

50ml White Rum
Squeeze of lime

add to a tall glass with ice, top with cola (yes this is a posh way of saying rum and coke, but if it's worth doing........)

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Long Island Iced Tea

25ml Vodka
25ml Gin
25ml Light Rum
25ml Silver Tequila
25ml triple sec
25ml fresh lemon juice
20ml sugar syrup

Shake over ice, strain into a collins glass (12oz e.g half pint) add ice and top off with cola, garnish with a lemon wedge
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Whiskey Sour

30ml Lemon Juice
1/2 tsp Sugar
50ml Bourbon
50ml orange juice (optional)

Shake over ice and strain into a sour glass with a lemon wedge to garnish

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Black Russian 

50ml Vodka
20ml Kahlua 

serve over ice.

(for a white Russian, float cream on top
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Screwdriver

50ml vodka

add to a highball glass, fill with ice and orange juice, twist of orange.

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Bloody Mary

50ml vodka
2 dashes Worcestershire sauce

sprinkle salt, pepper, celery salt

Add tomato juice and ice.

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Cosmopolitan 

50ml Vodka (a citrus vodka would work well here e.g stoli lemon,)
25ml triple sec
15ml fresh lime juice
Dash of cranberry juice to colour.

shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass, garnish with a lime wedge.

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Sex on the beach

50ml Vodka
30ml peach schnapps

add to a highball glass with ice, top off with cranberry and grapefruit juice.

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Tatanka

50ml Zubrowka

add to an old fashioned glass (a whisky type glass is fine) with ice

top with apple juice, and add a pinch of cinnamon (optional) and garnish with a lemon wedge.

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Moscow Mule

50ml vodka (42 below manuka honey is GREAT for this)
15ml Lime juice

add to a highball glass with plenty of ice, top up with ginger beer/ale and garnish with a lime wedge

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Classic Pimms' & Lemonade

10ml Pimms' No1 Cup (there is a vodka pimms, the no6 cup, which of course lacks the flavours of the gin from the no1, but is harder to come by, the no1 is the most common.)
100ml Lemonade
(the 10/1 ratio is the classic ratio) 
Then comes the important part. The rest of the drink is fruit and other flavours, which make the drink what it is. Common ones include the main citrus fruits (lemon lime orange), apple, mint, strawberries and others too. My recommendation is the three citrus, a halved strawberry on the stirrer, and importantly, Borage. Hard to come by, and cucumber is commonly substituted in instead, but borage is traditional and imo, better :) 


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Daquiri

This will be a classic daquiri base, to which you can add any fruit purée you like (within reason), and go wild really!

5 ml grenadine, 
10ml lemon juice
20ml white rum.

add your fruit purée, and mix with crushed ice, and serve in a martini glass.

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Tequila sunrise

50ml tequila,
15ml Grenadine,
orange Juice

Put the tequila in a chilled glass with a little ice (though the effect is easier with no ice), top off almost completely with orange juice, then gently pour the grenadine on top. It'll gently sink to the bottom = sunrise. :)

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Sea Breeze

50ml Vodka
75ml Cranberry juice
75ml Grapefruit juice
1 Lime wedge
5 Ice (crushed)

simple stuff. Pour, stir, garnish with the wedge. job done.

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Harvey Wallbanger

25ml Vodka
2 teaspoons Galliano
100ml Orange juice
6 Ice cubes
1 Orange slice

put half the cubes into a shaker with the vodka and orange and shake well, put the remaining ice in the glass and strain the mix over the top. Float the galliano, and decorate with the orange slice. 

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Champagne/sparkling wine cocktails.

Basic similarities is that you put about 15ml into the bottom of a flute, and top up with champagne or prosecco. Differences/exceptions are detailed in the recipe.

Bellini - white peach purée,

Black velvet - Half stout, half champagne, layered. (in flutes for the ladies, in pint glasses for the men)

Mimosa - 2xOrange juice, and a dash of orange curacao if you like/have. (also known as bucks fizz)

Nelsons' Blood - tawny port

Kir Royale - Creme de cassis

oscar wilde - brown sugar cube, soak in absinthe, set alight and place in the glass, then top off with the wine. 

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Coffee,Coffee,Coffee!

For my second post, I thought I'd talk about something dear to my heart - coffee. 

I love a good cup of coffee, be it a quick cup of instant or a lovingly made latte. A good cup of coffee and a biscuit or slice of cake is a simple, and relatively healthy pleasure. I must start out by stating that I am not a coffee snob, and that I primarily drink instant for the convenience of the thing. 

However......... I do enjoy really good coffee, and want to discuss, and give a few tips and opinions. 

My favourite drink is a really good Macchiato. For those who don't know of this, it is an espresso, topped off with a delicate small layer of milk foam. It's a little less harsh than a straight up espresso, so is great to drink if you are not sure of the quality of the coffee/barista in the place you are drinking, or if you're pulling the first shot of the day. The sweetness of the milk is a great foil to the strong espresso, especially if you are using a blend with some robusta in it. 

My first plug goes to www.coffeegeek.com - they are far more knowledgable about all things coffee than I am, and if you are looking to learn more about coffee, it's a great place to go. 

Right, onto my coffee tips

1) If you are buying instant, please, get some decent stuff. I like the Kenco single origin stuff :) 

2) The same goes for beans. Find a good independant coffee merchant, and go in and talk. As with most things food and drink, specialist and independants are the best option. You can talk about blends and the suchlike, and get it ground to your requirements. If you can't find a merchant, buy Illy. 

3) Buy in small quantities, About a fortnight is as long as coffee will be at its best once ground.

4) A good coffee maker is not cheap. the very lowest end of good gaggia machines are about £1000 new, plus your grinders and accessories. Below that, I would suggest Nespresso. Makes great coffee first shot to last, and has enough variety in the pods to keep you happy.

5) Don't drink at starbucks. It's terrible. the coffee is in the groups too long and it burns it. Find a good local coffee shop with great baristas using more hands on machines, and taste real coffee. 

Finally, as I am rushing this off slightly due to the immense lateness of this second post, my guide to coffee if you are starting from cold/instant

Start off with a cafetiere/french press. mellow coffee, difficult to mess up, and drink it as you like. Once you get to know more about coffee, move onto a moka pot (classic stovetop espresso) and put in your favoured beans. A cup of this in the morning is the ONLY way to face the day, IMO. Then go from there! The possibilities are endless, but be warned, once you start, you will go from a £20 french press to looking at £10,000 la marzocco beasts. 

Enjoy! and if you fancy something a little stronger, keep your eyes peeled for the cocktail guide that is about to be published on here too :) 

My first Blog Post :O

I know I'm a little late to the show on the whole blogging thing, but decided that as I have some time to spare, i'd set one up, and share my musings, ideas and of course cooking, with the internet.

A little background: I'm a student who loves to cook when he gets some spare time, and have also worked in numerous kitchens, in various capacities. I cook a variety of foods, though I'm heavily influenced by Italian food. 

anyway, enough about myself, and onto the food. Recently I have made two things. well, I've made far more, but i've made 2 things that i've also photographed to post here: Cheesecake, and Chocolate Brownie. 

The cheesecake was a joint project between myself and the girlfriend, A simple strawberry one. I rarely measure things out, so have appropriated a recipe of rough measurements for a 20cm tin.

100g Digestive biscuits (if you want more crunch and a gingery flavour, use 50/50 digestives/gingernuts, my GF's preferred mix) I Prefer a sprinkling of cinnamon in there for some warm sweetness, and maybe a touch of powdered ginger. mmm...

50g unsalted butter. 

400g Mascarpone Cheese.

Punnet of Strawberries.

200ml Double Cream

1tsp Vanilla Extract

Castor Sugar

grease and line the tin with baking parchment (a springform tin and parchment makes removal and presentation SO much easier)

Crush down the biscuits to a fine crumb, and melt the butter. 

Combine the biscuit crumbs and butter, add to the tin and press down, evenly. 

Chill it down in the fridge until nice and solid.

hull the strawberries and reserve some for decoration (around a dozen or so for decoration should do) 

Blitz down the remaining strawberries with some sugar, adding a teaspoon at a time until the puree is sweet enough for you. pass it through a sieve to remove the bits, and you will have a nice fine coulis :)

In a seperate bowl, combine the mascarpone, vanilla extract and cream, and once combined, add the coulis a bit at a time and stirring, until you get a nice pink, strawberry flavoured mix. 

Keep in the fridge if the base is not yet set, then add to the tin, smoothing down with a palette knife.  Chop the strawberries and decorate the top. Serve with fresh cream, and decorate the plate with some coulis. Drink recommendation, Fruli strawberry beer for the guys, a strawberry bellini for the girls (you may have to make more coulis!)

The other is my brownies, which I may have left in the oven too long to be gooey, but are lovely and crumbly, and very receptive to cream :)

115g/4oz unsalted butter

170g/6oz caster sugar

2 eggs (i suggest large ones, as my mix was not as wet as expected, but 3 would be overkill)

40g/1½ oz plain chocolate (I used a bit more chocolate than this, but i was being wicked. Green and Blacks' cooks chocolate is fantastic for this, and for making chocolate sauces etc.)

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 tsp instant coffee granules

1 tsp baking powder

55g/2oz plain flour

55g/2oz cocoa powder

Preheat the oven to 180c, and grease and line an 18cm square tin, or similar. 

cream together the butter and sugar until smooth and fluffy, then beat in the eggs one at a time.

Dissolve the coffee in a couple of tablespoons of warm water, add this, the vanilla, and chopped up chocolate into the mix, and combine well. 

Add the baking powder, then sift in the cocoa and flour. 

Mix it all up very well, then spoon into the tin, and flatten off.

Bake for 30-40 mins until cakey but still soft, then allow to cool in the tin for 10 mins before transferring to a wire rack. 

dust with cocoa or icing sugar, depending on your whim, and serve with some cream, in chunks. 

The results should hopefully look like the pics above :)

Lodz x.