Recipe LXXIII - Mint and Mustard Marinade

I love lamb. But here in Germany, it's really hard to find. In fact, if you go to the supermarket in this area, you find a thousand kinds of pork. I had an argument with the local butcher because once I dared ask for wild boar and she thought I was being awkward. Who's the customer here?? So I do most of my non-pork meat shopping in Luxembourg. I picked up these delicious lamb chops on a recent shopping trip there and I wanted to give them proper respect, especially as the pack said "Origin: UK", which was a pleasant surprise. The proportions in this recipe are purely by rule of thumb, so if you want it sweeter or spicier or sharper, you just add more of one ingredient!

Ingredients:
A few sprigs of fresh English mint
A teaspoonful of ground cumin
A tablespoonful of mustard (you choose the kind - I used a Dijon-style, but I'm pretty sure English or Russian would be just as good)
A tablespoonful of balsamic vinegar
A tablespoonful of golden syrup, molasses, caramel or honey
Ground black pepper
Salt



Chop your mint into small pieces. I used a blender. Put all the ingredients together in a bowl and mix until they form a sticky consistency. Dip the lamb chops in there one by one or all together and coat them. Put them in the fridge to marinate for a minimum of two hours.



They will take on a tremendous amount of flavour in that time.



Put a high-sided non-stick frying pan with some olive oil on a medium-high temperature and once hot, place the lamb chops in there. Fry them until the outside is done to your liking.



I served mine with roast carrots and potatoes, but use your own discretion, of course.



I will be making this again very soon!

Recipe LXXII - Chicken Clare Balding

This is a recipe I designed myself with very careful thought. I wanted to honour the person who most epitomised my wonderful summer of sport on TV and my time in London during the Games. This person is, for me, someone who straddles classes, who is at home sitting next to other presenters and pundits in the studio, interviewing an elated tongue-tied competitor or mingling with crowds inside and outside venues. She explains everything so clearly and is most obviously hyper-intelligent without having any airs or graces. She is also one of those who is on my list of living people I'd most like to invite to a dinner party. I hope she gets to read this recipe one day and if she makes it, that she likes it. I apologise for the three horrid photos, but I have a new light in the kitchen and it is somewhat over-bearing for my poor little camera... Just like Clare Balding, this is an extremely adaptable recipe for the season, the taste and the consistency, but below are the original ingredients I used, the essential items having asterisks (*).

Ingredients (for 2 people):
200g Greek krithiraki / manéstra pasta * (an Olympic commentator should have something Greek in her eponymous recipe, although I used Turkish as that's what they sell locally!)
Half a courgette
Half a pâtisson (yellow squash or in the US pattypan squash) *
(in different seasons I see no problem in using sweet potatoes, aubergines or the like to add seasonal taste)
1 sweet red pepper *
1 onion
1 spoonful of chili powder *
2 breasts of chicken (sliced into strips) *
(A handful of green beans is a pleasant variant)
1 carton of single cream *
Some olive oil *
3 sprigs of English garden mint *



Instructions:
I think it was a pleasure to make this dish. Slice the squash into thin strips. You can halve those strips or keep them the same size, but they should be no thicker than a third of a centimetre. Cut up the chicken breasts into chunky pieces. Slice the courgette, pepper and onion in any way you wish.
Take two frying pans, on a medium heat, with olive oil - in one, begin frying the chicken, in the other, the squash. In the one with the squash, add some chili powder, and in the other once the chicken is sealed, add the vegetables. Stir-fry both pans, the squash for a good ten minutes. Add the chopped mint to the squash after seven, and in the other pan stir-fry the chicken for up to half an hour, or until everything is nice and soft and the flavours have run.



Once it is cooked, add the squash to the chicken for the remainder of the cooking time, and with ten minutes to go, turn down the heat and add the cream to gently heat up without evaporating. While the other ring is hot, heat some salted water and cook your Greek pasta. You can either mix it in with the other ingredients once cooked, or as I did, serve the chicken on a bed of pasta.


Above is one I made with green beans.

Serve in wide bowls or flat plates, with a nice bottle of medium Kent, Sussex or Hampshire wine.


My person of 2012, Clare Balding - photo: www.tvnewsroom.co.uk

Recipe LXXI - Bread and Butter Pudding and Custard

Yes, you read that right. Bread and butter pudding; the childhood memory of most British adults who went to a school with a good kitchen. And here's the thing: with the UK being this year's country of focus, it heartened me a lot to read reports of its culinary resurrection. The UK has always been a pioneering food nation, but this is back to basics.

Whilst I was in London a few weeks ago, I went to "Fish!", my favourite restaurant, and as I promised, a recipe from their desserts menu. This is it. I love that restaurant's commitment to excellent food without the pretentiousness and stuffiness of many quality establishments.
It is so simple, so delicious and so pleasing to the eye and the stomach that it is a wonder that it has not ventured out of the English-speaking nations. You hardly need anything for it, and it
makes a truly lovely setting on the table after a delicious dinner.

Ingredients:
A bag of sliced bread (but you can do your own, for example sweet bread, panettone or something similar)
A block of butter
3 to 5 eggs
About 0.5 litres of milk
3 to 4 tablespoons of sugar
Some vanilla essence or sugar
A bag of raisins/sultanas
Some cinnamon powder
A decent baking tray



Instructions:
Put the milk, eggs, sugar and vanilla into a bowl and give it a very good mix. Leave it on the side. Turn on your oven to 180°C.



Cut the crusts off your bread, butter both sides of the slices and start packing them into your baking tray in layers. It's easier to butter one side of the bread before you put it in, then the other side once it's fit into place. Put some raisins onto the first layer, then do the second with more raisins, until you have reached about two-thirds of the way up the baking tray. I used only half the bread, so I'll make some more tomorrow when I've been to the shop for more eggs and milk! You can put some cinnamon in each layer, or just sprinkle the top layer with it.



Then return to your milky mix and give it a good stir before you pour it over the bread and put it in the oven for twenty to thirty-five minutes, depending on your preference. I like the tope slightly burned, so I had mine in for about half an hour.

Serve it with custard (see the second part of recipe LIII for details, or make some from an instant packet, like back at school!)

Recipe LXX - Lamb Cacciatore with Cellentani

To make up for last month's sparse amount of recipes, here is a midweek extra for you...
This Italian recipe is so easy and perfect for a romantic meal where you'd rather not spend all evening in the kitchen making, if you know what I mean... Anyhow, although lamb is the principal meat here, the true star of this recipe is the wild mushroom. It is a true flavour provider, and quite meaty, so you don't need too much lamb. I got mine from Poland in a jar, but if you go out picking your own, don't forget to take someone who knows a bit about wild mushrooms, as you don't want to have a romantic meal only to start seeing dancing purple squirrels and singing lemons...

Ingredients:
1kg of leg or shoulder of lamb
1 long red pepper (of the sweet variety)
a minimum of 10 dried mushrooms (e.g. porcini)
5 cloves of garlic clove, crushed and chopped
some dried or fresh rosemary
some dried or fresh sage
1 tsp plain flour
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
about 250ml of hot water
10 roughly crushed black peppercorns



Instructions:
Pour boiling water over the mushrooms in a bowl until they are just about immersed. You can remove the mushrooms after fifteen minutes, Cut off the fat and skin from the outside of the lamb, then chop the lamb into bitesize pieces. Cut the pepper into small, long strips and chop the garlic and herbs.



Put some olive oil into a medium-hot casserole dish then add the lamb, and seal the outsides. The lamb will start leaking in to the oil, so that's what the flour is for. Put it in to soak up the liquid, along with some salt. Then add a little more oil and the red pepper, and soften it. Then put the herbs, peppercorns and garlic in. Shortly after, add the vinegar, and some hot water. Turn the heat right down and cook on a low heat for up to an hour. About twenty minutes before you serve up, put the wild mushrooms in.



Serve with one of the three Ps: polenta, potatoes or pasta. I had mine with cellentani, but farfalle or tagliatelle go well too.

Recipe LXIX - Parsley Sauce (on fish)

I'm not a great fan of fish. However, my favourite restaurant in the world is under London Bridge and is called "Fish! " and if you know someone who has a fishphobia, that's the place to take them. Their desserts are delicious too, and I'll do one of them soon. This tremendous English recipe, though, is so easy to make and thankfully gives you time to do the rest of your cooking.

Ingredients:
400ml full cream milk
1 bunch of parsley, chopped (keep some of the stalks!!)
1 small onion
60g butter
Up to 150g plain flour
1 bay leaf
A mix of whole and crushed peppercorns
Some nutmeg or mace
a pinch of salt

Instructions:
Cut up your parsley, keeping some of the stalks. They are very, very flavoursome and give such a kick to the sauce. Let's be frank - you an either use a knife to cut it up or you can stick it in the blitzer. I stuck it in the blitzer.
Slice the onion in half. A small one is good as they're much more pungent. Put some milk into a saucepan, and add the parsley stalks, onion, peppercorns, nutmeg (or mace), the bay leaf and salt. Then very slowly heat it up to simmering point. Milk is notoriously volatile boiling, so you need to do this carefully.

 

After a few minutes of simmering, strain the larger bits out and leave the flavoured milk to cool. You can do your fish now. *See after the last photo below for a frying tip for your fish.

 

Once you are almost ready with the fish, it's time to make the sauce, and it'll take just a couple of minutes. Put your butter in a saucepan and in Béchamel-style, add the flour until it thickens. Once this happens, add the milk back bit-by-bit, allowing the fluidity to return, whisking as you pour it in.

 

Add the parsley to the mixture and continue to whisk.

 

Pour it on your potatoes and fish. I made mine very thick, but if you have a lot of visitors and you need a lot more, you just need to add more milk as you whisk. It won't affect the overall flavour. Some people add some lemon juice but I think it's fabulous without.

*TIP: If you decide to fry your fish, cut up some garlic and fry it in the olive oil for a couple of minutes before you add the fish. Remove the garlic first, as it'll just go black and give your fish a burned flavour.

Recipe LXVIII - The Yorkish Pasty

Thanks for your patience over the last month - I have been taking a break from cooking for a while, spoiling myself away from the kitchen. I went to London for the Olympic Games and had some of the most memorable days of my life. While I was there, I gained a lot of inspiration for some future recipes, one I wish to tell you about here.

In the UK, there is a great pie tradition. Some languages have only one word for the casing, but in English there is dough, or batter, or pastry, to name but three. I tried a few pastry-based items, however one pie above all really stood out for me during my stay in London. In M&S in Stratford's new shopping centre, right next to the Olympic Park, there are two restaurants. In the top one, there is a tremendous view of the stadium and many other fabulous buildings, but the greatest feature is its Yorkish pasty.

I had only ever been moved to tears once before because of the delightful food put in front of me, but the second time happened there. And I really wanted to share the recipe with you because it is probably the best item of prepared food in the country. This is not precisely the recipe, because it's a closely-guarded secret, but it's as near as I believe to the original as possible.

Ingredients for the pastry (I made half twice - it was easier):
450g plain flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
120g butter
2 egg yolks (keep the whites!!!)
Some water
A pinch of salt

Instructions for the pastry:
Knead the flour, baking powder, salt, butter and egg yolk together until it looks like crumble mix.

 

Add some water very slowly until it makes the pastry form a dough. Wrap it in clingfilm and put it in the fridge for an hour.

 

Ingredients for the filling:
About 100g of swede (US = rutabaga)
About 300g of potato
2 onions
300g of finely chopped beef
Some finely chopped parsley
Some ground black pepper
Some salt

 

Instructions for the filling:
Cut up the potato and swede into very small pieces and drop them into salted boiling water for 4 or 5 minutes. Drain the water and leave them to cool.

Cut up your beef up into adequately small pieces. Do the same with the onion.

 

Instructions for the combination:
Switch the oven on to 180°C. Take the pastry out of the fridge. Pull off a lump and roll it out on a well-floured flat surface. Take a bowl or a plate and cut out a circle. Put some onion slices in the middle of the circle. Add some beef pieces. Put some salt and pepper on it, and add some chopped potato and swede. Sprinkle some parsley over the top. Use some of the egg whites to brush over the periphery of the pastry to be able to close it up over the top of the filling, making an envelope. Use some more egg white to baste the outside of the pasty so it goes a nice shade of brown. Repeat until all the ingredients run out.

 

Spread some butter inside a baking tray and put each pasty into it. You may end up with more pasties than room. Just baste a second baking tray. Put it in the oven for a minimum of 30 minutes. I put mine in for 45 minutes.

 

I made nine in the end, and they were utterly delicious. But it doesn't come close to the taste of a real M&S Yorkish pasty. Maybe because it was put in front of me.

If you do go to M&S in Stratford, you'll be surprised how many members of staff there are. It was a pleasure to not have to wait round until someone shows up. I hope they open up in Germany.

Recipe LXVII - Summer Pudding

So finally, summer has arrived. It's almost August already, but better a few weeks of sun than none at all. Anyhow... This weekend, I was invited to make an al-fresco dinner for our friends in Portz, up in the hills near Saarburg. You can see for miles there. The weather was gorgeous and the wonderful setting under the trees set me about concocting a simple yet sumptuous meal under the trees. After the starter and main course, I made a typically English summer dessert, one of my favourites alongside tiramisù or apple pie, known as Summer Pudding. The ingredients are startling, the way you need to construct them makes you doubt they'll ever work, but the final result is glorious, and a perfect end to a perfect day assured.

Ingredients:
2 loaves of thinly cut, plain white bread, preferably not too salty
800g red fruits, e.g. strawberries, blackcurrants, redcurrants, raspberries, etc...
200-300g caster sugar, or fine white sugar
(A drop of cherry or plum schnapps)
Plus:
Some clingfilm & scissors
4 pudding basins (cheap ones from the supermarket work fine)
4 saucers and a weight of some kind (some cans of tomatoes, or a couple of heavy glasses, for example)



Instructions:
Take your fruit and sugar, and heat it up gently until the sugar has melted, but no more, because you do not want the fruit to burn, or the juices to evaporate. Put a little alcohol in it, if you want, although it is not necessary.
In the meantime, take the clingfilm and cut out enough to line the inside of the pudding bowls.



Cut off the crusts of the bread (do not throw them away - keep them for stuffing a chicken, for example) and mould them into the bowls, forming the outer layer of your eventual pudding.
Some say you should use slightly stale bread, but I believe fresh bread moulds and sticks better together.



Finally, cut out a layer for what will be your base, and make sure it is completely sealed so nothing can cause too much leaking, and is at the same height as the top of the bowl. Save some juice for the opening, as not all the puddings may turn purple, although that has its charms too (see final photo).



Put a saucer on top of it and a weight (see ingredients list) and put them in the fridge until it is dessert time. As we were outside, I put them in a freezer box, which worked quite well. To remove, keep them base facing up, then pull the clingfilm ever-so-gently away from the bowl round the outside to unstick it, whilst making sure it stays in the basin. Then put the final serving plate on top of the pudding and turn it over. Let the clingfilm separate from the bowl and fall onto the plate.



Serve with lightly sugared whipped cream.