Monday roasts – the way forwards?

Mondays. They are challenging aren’t they? It takes a very special set of plans to take away the post weekend blues. By chance last weekend (as all truly great discoveries are made) I was forced into making a Monday roast by a fast-perishing chicken in my fridge. At first I thought it would be too much of a faff, who wants to wait around on a Monday night for their dinner?  More to the point, who wants to have to wash up more than one pan on a Monday night?

This is where the one tray roast comes in. Granted it won’t work so well if you are a large household but if there are two of you, it is roasting genius. Gentle crush three or four garlic cloves and rub the insides over the chicken. Cut a lemon into 8 segments and squeeze some juice over the chicken. Pop some of the lemon and garlic in and around the chicken along with some wedges of red onion. Pour over some olive oil and into the oven it goes for about an hour and a half for a small chicken, but check the packaging for guidance and pock it in the leg with your carving fork to make sure the juices run clear when you think it’s done.

Peel  some potatoes and boil for ten to fifteen minutes. Drain and bash them around in the pot a little to rough up the edges for extra crispy bits. Chuck these in the pan with the chicken when it has about forty five minutes to go and coat in olive oil. Serve with some gravy thickened out using your roasting juices and with the red onion mixed in for a scrumptious feast that will make any Monday worth getting going for. 

I am convinced that the smell of a chicken roasting on a cold day with a big glass of red in hand is one of the greatest things about our seasonal weather and THE best thing to do with a dreary winter’s Monday night. I hope you agree!

Warm Winter Salads

If you’ve started growing your own winter veg you will be rewarded by now with a bountiful crop of salad greens that you can dress up to the nines to make some fantastic winter salads.

I made this creation last weekend by tweaking a recipe from the new book from Lorraine Pascal, Home Cooking Made Easy. I used mostly frill mustard leaves and land cress which grows so fast in my shady garden that I struggle to keep up!

The recipe is very simple. The slight peppery taste of the mustard and cress goes really well with some fried super thin strips of pancetta which are cooked first of all and set aside. I then put some peeled and quartered pears into the hot pan with a drizzle of honey. Cook these for about five mins and then splash over some balsamic vinegar. Serve these on top of the salad leaves, top with the bacon. Meanwhile add some more honey to the hot pan and a spoonful of Dijon mustard. Cook through and pour over your salad. I then added some mozzarella balls though Lorraine used blue cheese (I’m not a fan of stinky cheese!)

This was so delish that even my salad hating husband rated it. I served it with some garlic bread and the opportunity to put my feet up. What more could you want on an autumnal day?!

The best chocolate brownie in the world

There are two things in life that I like to think I know a lot about. The first one is tea. The second is chocolate. In particular, chocolate cake. I am not one of these weak people who can be overcome by the richness of a chocolate cake. Oh no. I am a trained cake eater, practiced over decades. I am Olympic level. There is a restaurant near us that boldly announces that it has the ‘chocolate nemesis’ on its menu. Eating that was like a walk in the park for me as a true chocaholic. I blame my mum for this as when we were kids she would make us a big chocolate pudding and pour a melted mars bar over the top of it. THAT is a chocolate nemesis.

My chocolate brownie with a cup of tea pigs chocolate flake tea

Being a self-confessed chocaholic and a keen baker there is nothing I am more fussy about than chocolate brownies. First off all the chocolate has to be good, it must be dark and it must be good quality. Second of all it has to be slightly goo-ey and slightly cakey. Too gooey and it feels like eating chocolate flavoured butter (a bit wrong) and too cakey and, well, it’s a cake not a brownie.

As a chocolate purist I never add nuts to my brownies. You may well disagree, that is your prerogative, but this is my way! Baking your brownies is the real make it or break it moment. They should be thick so quantities and correct tin size is important. They should come out of the oven when the top is hard and just starting to crack a little at the edges. I insert a piece of uncooked spaghetti into the edge of the brownie first. From here it should come out pretty much dry. I then insert it into the centre of the tin where it should come out gooey but should feel firm as the spaghetti goes in - not like a big sloppy mess. A big sloppy mess is not cooked and will fall apart when you cut it. Unpleasant.

Now for the moment of truth, my brownie recipe. What you are about to receive has been honed over years of struggle. You are lucky people, standing on holy brownie ground. Enjoy it. And use it wisely.

150g dark chocolate

150g butter (unsalted)

25g cocoa powder

3 eggs

225g caster sugar

1tsp vanilla extract

100g plain flour

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C/Gas Mark 4.

Line your tin with baking parchment and grease.

Melt the chocolate, butter and cocoa powder in a bowl over a pan of simmering water.

In another bowl whisk the eggs, sugar and vanilla. Continue whisking as you add the slightly cooled chocolate mixture until well combined.

Sift in the flour and fold in using a spatula.

Bake for about 25 mins using the advice above for pefect brownie consistency.

Cool in the tin, cut into square and enjoy!

Things to do with blackberries

It’s officially soft fruit season and if you value your finances and enjoy the odd berry or hundred then get ye to a bramble bush and get picking! Once you’re there you will likely find yourself overcome with fruit pickers enthusiasm as you survey your potential bounty. Never again will you be tempted by the sorry punnets on offer in the supermarket, a painful price for minimal fruity goodness. You may even find yourself cackling with glee in the fruit section as you remember your well-stocked freezer gained from just one delicious afternoon's fruit picking.

 

There are several fabulous things about blackberries:

1. They grow everywhere
   I'm a bit fussy when it comes to where I pick. I prefer some rambling rural landscape rather than by a polluted roadside but hey-ho, each to their own. You can find berries in surprisingly urban settings though where you won't be putting car fume blackberries on your cereal. Try local parks or go for a walk by the river and have a hunt. Once you've discovered your patch you will return year on year, guaranteed. When picking go for the plump, soft but not squashy ones. Try as you go to make sure they are sweet and ripe.
2. They freeze really well
   When you get home with your blackberries wash them really, really gently and then spread them out into a single layer on a baking tray. Pop them in the freezer for about forty minutes until they are hard. You can then scrap them off and bag them up and they won't stick together. This means you can take out handfuls as and when you need them. Perfect!
3. You can rustle up amazing puddings all winter at the drop of a hat (or scarf)
   Grab some cooking apples, peel, core and slice them and drop them in a dish, sprinkle in some golden caster sugar and a couple of handfuls of frozen blackberries and top with crumble. Pop in a medium oven until the topping is golden and you have a delicious bubbly crumble. Domestic goddess status in no time at all!
4. You can make smoothies from frozen
   If you put frozen berries in a blender with some yoghurt you will get a cool berry smoothie. No defrosting required.
5. Cakes - many, many cakes
   My favourite cake to make with blackberries is upside down cake. Upside down cakes always remind me of being at my Grandma's house, stuffed and satisfied. Give it a go:

Blackberry Upside-down Cake

About 200g of blackberries (enough to cover the base of your cake tin without them being squashed in together, if they are squashed in it will be a nightmare to get the cake out of the tin in one piece)

220g golden caster sugar

200g plain flour

1 tsp of baking powder

½ tsp salt

120g unsalted butter (I use Stork for cakes)

2 large eggs

1 tsp of vanilla extract

Zest of a lemon

100ml of milk 

• For this recipe you will need at 22cm cake tin with a loose bottom. Grease the tin and put a round of baking parchment in the base. Butter this as well and dust the whole tin with flour. Shake out the excess
• Lay the blackberries on the base of the tin (see the note above) and sprinkle over a tablespoon of caster sugar.
• Cream the butter and remaining sugar together until light and fluffy.
• Beat in the eggs one at a time with a spoonful of flour to prevent curdling. Add the vanilla extract and zest.
• Mix together the flour, baking powder and salt. Sift it into the creamed butter and sugar alternating with adding some milk. Fold until just incorporated. Add enough milk to have a smooth, thick batter. If it is starting to look runny then leave the rest of the milk as this will also lead to a cake that falls apart and you need it to flip successfully!
• Pour the mixture over the blackberries and bake in a 180ºC/gas mark 4 oven for forty minutes.
• Leave the cake to cool in the tin then flip it over onto a plate, peel off the paper and you have a delicious, blackberry speckled cake for tea. Dust with icing sugar for a pretty finish.

The only downsides to blackberries that I can see is the inevitable scratches you will acquire as you throw yourself enthusiastically into hedgerows in search of the plumpest fruits. There's something nice about war wounds for your food though, well earned dinner.

  

Happy blackberry season!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mighty courgette

As well as eating lots of food I also love growing it. This season has been tricky due to what I call 'The Great Slug Infestation of 2011'. It has been a one woman crusade against what seems to be an army of slugs. I have won the battle of the lettuces but sadly not of the French beans who died valiantly in the early season after being mercilessly munched in the course of one evening.

What has been doing well, and is just started to produce, is my courgette plants. These are really so easy to grow (everything in my garden is because I am a very lazy gardener and just like to leave plants to do their thing!). I always get mine as baby plants because you only need three or four plants to keep you in abundant courgettes all summer. When courgette plants flower they produce these gorgeous orange flowers that remind me of Asiatic lilies which incidentally were the flowers I carried on my wedding day three years ago today!

When you do get a crop of courgettes from your garden they are so easy to use. They are much less watery than the kind you get in the supermarket and have a much stronger flavour. This makes them great for things like courgette fritters where the high water content is a problem and needs to be drained off when using shop bought varieties. I cook my home grown courgettes very simply by frying up some garlic and chilli in a saucepan, adding a tin of tomatoes and letting it simmer away while I fry 1cm cubes of the courgettes in a frying pan until lightly golden brown. I then mix the two together and serve with pasta and some parmesan. Delicious!

One last courgette tip, cut your courgettes off your plants when they are no more than 5 inches long. They are more flavoursome and it is healthier for the plant as if you leave them to grow to shop size the productivity of the plant will be significantly reduced and you may end up with a giant marrow. Fun for you but very sapping for the poor plant!

Happy courgette growing!

Lady Grey and Lavender Biscuits

The weather may not be quite the glorious summer we hoped for just now but the garden is enjoying the rain, and never fear, you can create that summer feeling inside with this week's Tea of the Week - Lady Grey, and its delightful accompaniment, lavender biscuits. You'll feel quite the laydeee, or man, whatever..!

This combo is dedicated to a very dear friend and fellow Windsorian @ladytaylorgray who came to my house recently requesting a lavender biscuit recipe. If you have a lavender bush at home it is likely to be growing like there is no tomorrow just now and let's be honest there are only so many lavender bags a girl can make. These biscuits are a great use for your excess lavender, are very yummy and so easy to make like so!

150g butter

90g caster sugar

225g plain flour

1 egg yolk

1 tablespoon fresh lavender leaves, chopped up.

1 teaspoon of lavender flowers removed from the stalk

Preheat your oven to 160ºC and line two baking trays with parchment. Cream the butter and sugar together until it is light and fluffy and then mix in the flour, egg yolk and lavender leaves until the mixture comes together into a big ball. On a floured work surface knead the dough until it is smooth and then roll into a sausage shape that is a couple of inches across. Chop your sausage into between 15-18 disks (just under a cm in width) and place on your baking trays. Put a lavender flower on the top of each biscuit and pop them in the over for 20 – 25mins depending on your oven speed. They won't go brown (a bit like shortbread) but should be firm to the touch. Leave them on the tray to cool for five minutes before moving onto a cooling rack. Pour yourself a cup of tea, savour your biscuits and make it summer inside even if it's tipping it down!

These really do go great with Lady Grey, which is black tea with oil of bergamot and lemon and orange peel. Lady Grey is a Twinnings Trademark tea so the only place to get it is from http://www.twinings.co.uk/ or if you are in London pop into their shop on The Strand. It is amazing and they let you try before you buy. There are also some other variations and with my lavender biscuits I enjoyed a cup of Empress Grey for good ol' M&S which contains white tea instead of black. It is delightfully refreshing with just a nice zing of citrus.

Summer has arrived!