Oh, I know I should feel bad, over 5 months since my last post. If you make this dish though, I feel sure you'll forgive me. It is inexcusably bad for you but what the hell!
I first made this, gosh, around 10 years ago when I was given Nanny Ogg's Cookbook, which just goes to show that life, sometimes, imitates art. As always, I play it by ear now when I make it, but my favourite Discworld witch (Nanny is a hedonethicist too I think!) was definitely the inspiration for this filling brunch.
Ok, so the first thing you need is a big ole fillet of smoked fish. Tartrazine yellow is not a colour I associate with a tasty fish dinner, so I tend to buy the undyed variety. I understand that some fishmongers sell naturally yellowed fish (undyed but turned yellow from smoking in a certain way), if you find that then buy it for some colourful fun! Vegetarian? Try chickpeas or lentils instead, they work very nicely with the same accompaniments.
Cook a cup of rice, either the old fashioned way or using a ricebot, at the same time boil up a couple of eggs until hard boiled. When the rice is almost ready, put the fish into a deep frying pan with a half and half mix of water and milk; the liquid should come to halfway up the side of the fish.
Poach the fish, skin side down, until almost cooked through, then flip over and cook for a further couple of minutes to finish it off. The fish should be opaque, but still tender. Drain the fish and place it to one side - don't leave unattended in the presence of greedy cats.
Chop up an onion, I like purple in this because they are sweet but any will do, and a good handful of mushrooms if you have any. Aubergine or any leafy greens work with this too. Heat an obscene amount of butter, as much as you dare, in the frying pan (wiped clean) and gently fry the vegetables.
When cooked, sprinkled over a good tablespoon or more, to taste, of curry powder, plus seasoning and give it 30 seconds to heat up before adding all the rice and coating well in the aromatic buttery sauce. Finally, flake in the fish, taking care to remove any bones, and top with chopped egg.
Fish is always a quick dinner and, if you're ok with sorting out the bones yourself, a whole fish is the tastiest of all. Lemon Sole has an mcs rating of 2, or at least the ones caught off the cornish coast are, so no need to feel guilty either.
This is a really tasty sauce to serve with lemon sole, and an uncharacteristically close rendition of a recipe for me, this time from The Abel & Cole Cookbook, I love this book and all the recipe ideas are cleverly grouped by seasonal ingredients. I've used it a lot and can really recommend it.
So, first put some jersey royals on to boil. Or whatever you want to serve with this, personally I couldn't wait to get my teeth into the jerseys, they are so lovely (just in case anyone doesn't know - jersey royals are a very special type of potato grown in, and only in, Jersey!).
Sprinkle a liberal serving of flaked almonds into a dry frying pan and heat until toasty brown. Put them to one side and add oil and a knob of butter to the pan to heat up, at the same time pop the oven onto its lowest heat.
Lightly coat the lemon sole with plain flour, put into the frying pan and cook for a couple of minutes on each side. Pop them into a baking tray and bung in the warm oven, turn it off though as you don't want them to keep cooking, just to stay warm.
Get some spinach (or whatever veg you're having) on to steam.
Back to the fish pan: be warned this sauce evaporates faster than last month's paycheck, so you need to be on the ball. Make sure the pan is really hot then chuck a glass of white wine in, let it bubble away for a bit and deglaze the pan with a spatula. Squeeze in the juice of half a lemon, and add a heaped teaspoon of capers that you've chopped up, all of the toasted almonds, another knob of butter and a load of fresh parsley.
Turn the heat right down and get the fish, potatoes and spinach onto plates. Spoon over the sauce and eat immediately. Yum.
What to do on the third day of using up leftover roast goose (or turkey or chicken)? Make a risotto of course! Easy leftover using-up strategy.
The prep is key here, so start by roasting a peeled and cubed squash until soft along with a handful of chestnuts, and chopping up your goose meat into small peices.
If you have leftover squash then use that, you could also use half of a vacuum pack of pre-prepared chestnuts if you like. Depends what you've got handy! Keep them hot in the switched-off oven if making the risotto right away, otherwise be prepared to reheat them before adding to the risotto.
As with so many recipes, kick off the risotto by finely dicing an onion, a couple of celery sticks and a fat clove of garlic or two. Warm up a splosh of oil and a big hunk of butter in a deep frying pan and gently saute them until soft.
At the same time, put a pint / 500ml stock in a saucepan on the heat to stay hot.
Add half a bag of risotto rice, about 250g, (to serve 4 people or 2 with leftovers) stir it in and let it sizzle for a few minutes before adding a wine glass of vermouth (or white wine). Stir until all the wine has been absorbed. Then, a ladle at a time, add the stock to the rice, stirring and stirring each time until it's all been absorbed into the rice. One thing I've found is that this goes much faster and works better if you keep the pan pretty hot, the stock should bubble a little when you add it to the pan.
Just as you finish the last ladleful of stock, add the squash, chestnuts, goose and lots of thyme leaves. Stir through to mix and then grate a load of parmesan into the dish, along with a few knobs of butter, some fresh chopped parsley, a squeeze of lemon juice, ground pepper and salt if needed.
Serve with a smile of satisfaction at thriftiness well executed.
Even my Dad eats this and he usually hates bread sauce. For me, a roast dinner isn't complete without it and I certainly wouldn't be happy if christmas dinner didn't include it. The trick is to leave the milk to infuse for a very long time.
Pop a pint of milk (about 500ml) into a saucepan with a small, halved onion (or two quarters of a large one) with a clove pushed into each peice. Add a bay leaf, a peice of mace and a few white peppercorns. Put on the heat and bring almost to a boil, but not to boiling point. When you see bubbles starting take it off the heat and leave. Just leave it alone, for hours.
Strain the milk into a bowl full of torn bread, preferably a bit stale. The best part of half a loaf will do the trick, just remember to take off the crusts. Pop in the fridge and leave until you are almost ready to eat it.
When you're ready, decant the milky bready mixture back into a saucepan with several knobs of butter and a splosh of double cream. Heat up gently and season with salt, pepper and grated nutmeg. Delicious.
Go to the Christmas Dinner (2011) post
If you can get hold of fresh wild mushrooms from somewhere, like Borough Market, during autumn and early winter then definitely make the most of it. Otherwise, a lot of shops sell them dried in little tubs or packets, which can be reconstituted in water prior to cooking.
All risottos start with the same basic essentials, or at least mine do: a diced onion and a couple of diced celery stalks, sauteed in butter and oil until soft.
Add 300g of risotto rice and stir it through, letting it get hot. From experience, it is worth forking out for the pricey arborio stuff, it cooks in half the time of the other, cheaper, short grain varieties I tried using. Slosh in a glass (or teacup) full of white wine and stir through the rice mixture until it's all been absorbed.
Keep 750ml of hot vegetable stock in a saucepan on the heat and pour the first ladleful into the rice. Keep the rice on a medium heat, at least enough to keep it at a low sizzle. Stir, stir, stir and stir again. Keep stirring. Even if your arm is about to drop off, keep gently stirring the rice.
Eventually the stock will be absorbed and you'll need to add another ladle of stock and do it all over again. I mean, don't beat it up or anything, but do keep stirring and adding stock and stirring.
After adding all the stock, the rice should be near cooked. At this stage I turn the heat down very low (or even off), put a lid on the pan and get on with the exciting part.
Pick over and clean your mushrooms, in this case we had a good few handfuls each of chanterelles, trompettes, girolles and ceps. Heat up a frying pan with a little oil and butter, with some crushed garlic. Saute the large mushrooms first, adding in the smaller ones after the chunky ones have had a bit of a start.
When the mushrooms are ready mix them into the hot rice mixture with tons of grated parmesan and chopped parsley.
If you can get hold of one (and I'm soooo lucky, my husband bought me one as a present!), grate in a lovely load of black truffle - also known as winter truffle.
Finish with some butter and freshly cracked pepper and some truffle shavings.
I have a lovely neighbour who looks after my car ("Big Sil") as I am rather mechanically challenged. Last week he very kindly filled her up with coolant, checked the oil and tyres and things so I thought I'd make some cookies for him and his family.
The recipe comes from Kitchen by Nigella and worked out absolutely perfectly. Instead of a bag of chocolate chips, which I think sometimes taste a bit... funny, I just got a bar of organic cook's chocolate and cut it into chips.
First, melt 150g of butter in a pan and then set on one side to cool down. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees C.
Measure out 125g of soft brown sugar and 100g of normal caster sugar into a large mixing bowl, then pour the warm butter over the top and stir together. Add 2 teaspoons of vanilla essence followed by a chilled egg and extra yolk. Beat them together until lovely and creamy and then slowly fold in 300g of plain flour and 1/2 a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda.
When you have a beautiful, golden, sticky dough, chop up your chocolate to make chocolate chips - about two thirds of a large bar - and stir it through.
Lay out a baking tray and line it with greaseproof paper, oil it lightly to make sure your cookies won't stick. Use an ice cream scoop to place dollops of dough on top, cook them in two batches as they spread out quite a lot when they cook. The recipe said this would make 14 cookies and that's exactly what I got.
Bake for 17 minutes and leave to cool slightly before transferring to a wire rack. They do need to be cool before you eat them for the texture to be just right.
