Being a mean beast who cuts things very fine (Ratty in Wind in the Willows) I don't like to use the oven for just one thing, especially as ours is one of those with a double-sized space one side and a mini version (only ever used to warm plates) the other. So I try to remember to include a few unpeeled onions to give the makings of a simple onion with cheese veg dish, some beetroot, or baking potatoes, or most often a gratin.
The one-flame cookery idea easily incorporates such economy, as why should one flame mean on dish only? Saturday's party (very enjoyable thanks) included a 6lb brisket dry rubbed with spices and sugar roasted at about 120C for nearly eight hours. That would have been a profligate use of the oven had it been just for one dish. So I also did a big potato gratin, loads of onions, loads of cheddar, slow cooked for two and a half hours, and a toffee-crumb apple and quince pudding, conscious assuaged.
Gratins are such a simple thing to do as I was explaining to hopefully-soon-to-be student Sternest Critic. What they do need is time and thus patience. It's not something to throw together for a quick snack. And they can be very cheap filler-uppers. That was secondary in my thinking for the bonfire bash for which its forgiving nature was uppermost in my thoughts: it was ready a good half an hour before I took it out, but didn't spoil at all (if anything the cheese got a nicer browning) for being left longer, and could have remained at that heat without damage for another hour. Again it could have been cooked at 180C and been ready in less than half the time.
It's also the sort of cooking I love - no recipe, just a basic idea and method. If you have to weigh the ingredients for a gratin you're trying too hard. Just peeled and sliced spuds and onions (the latter very thin), grated cheese, layered onion-spud-cheese then repeated, a bit of salt and pepper, and cooking liquid (hot) which can be milk, milk and cream, stock or at a real pinch just water. The alchemy of baking turns these basic staples into a meltingly delicious whole. We have lots of celeriac on our allotment, another grateful for the gratin treatment, and parsnip likewise, so I have no excuse for not doing more and bringing in more variations as autumn turns to winter.
Showing posts with label Bonfire Night. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bonfire Night. Show all posts
Monday, 4 November 2013
Thursday, 31 October 2013
Bonfire Night Bash
For some reason not entirely unconnected to my date of birth we regularly have a party near Bonfire Night. There was no intention to make it an annual thing when we started, but it has become that way and I'm not complaining. Traditions can be enjoyable. Apart from anything else it gives me the chance to force a small crowd with no alternative sustenance to hand to try what I think should be eaten on such occasions.
One of those dishes is inevitably pumpkin-based, as we grow stupidly large ones for Halloween and then need to make the most of the flesh they yield. I bet that 95 per cent of all the pumpkins shifted by the supermarkets this week will make lanterns and nothing more, a sad waste. Pumpkin soup or curry, and almost definitely pumpkin pie will use some of ours, plenty more bulking out stews later on.
Another dish, and this is one with serious repercussions, will be Lancashire Pea Soup made with two boxes of dried peas and about a pig's worth of bacon ribs. Bacon ribs which have become expensive now, joining the ranks of lamb shanks and monkfish in my whinge-list. It's something I associate with Bonfire Night bashes, my Lancastrian-family-in-exile in Norfolk in the Sixties and Seventies adhering to such culinary traditions I guess more than those who remained in the county. Home-made bonfire toffee always featured too, made by my dad as the soup often was, and parkin (again, not shop-bought).
Maybe the third planned dish will become something my son will want to make a tradition of his own in the future. There's a good chance as his culinary ideal is large pieces of flesh. I'm nicking the Man v Food thing of a slowly-cooked dry-rubbed brisket served with BBQ sauce, the brisket ordered well in advance as it's not something always on the butcher's counter. The house on the day will be filled with the smell of herbs, spices, sugar and steaming-roasting beef.
Traditions start like that, being taken up without being purposely created. At my first university, which was a post-WWII creation and very wonderful too, some twit tried to make an instant tradition by having 'Fresher's Gate' painted over one small entrance beside a huge one. No takers, whereas borrowing refectory trays when it snowed, the polished wood becoming a perfect makeshift one-man sledge, certainly was adopted. Which may mean Sternest Critic goes for the pumpkin pie instead when he rules his own roost.
One of those dishes is inevitably pumpkin-based, as we grow stupidly large ones for Halloween and then need to make the most of the flesh they yield. I bet that 95 per cent of all the pumpkins shifted by the supermarkets this week will make lanterns and nothing more, a sad waste. Pumpkin soup or curry, and almost definitely pumpkin pie will use some of ours, plenty more bulking out stews later on.
Another dish, and this is one with serious repercussions, will be Lancashire Pea Soup made with two boxes of dried peas and about a pig's worth of bacon ribs. Bacon ribs which have become expensive now, joining the ranks of lamb shanks and monkfish in my whinge-list. It's something I associate with Bonfire Night bashes, my Lancastrian-family-in-exile in Norfolk in the Sixties and Seventies adhering to such culinary traditions I guess more than those who remained in the county. Home-made bonfire toffee always featured too, made by my dad as the soup often was, and parkin (again, not shop-bought).
Maybe the third planned dish will become something my son will want to make a tradition of his own in the future. There's a good chance as his culinary ideal is large pieces of flesh. I'm nicking the Man v Food thing of a slowly-cooked dry-rubbed brisket served with BBQ sauce, the brisket ordered well in advance as it's not something always on the butcher's counter. The house on the day will be filled with the smell of herbs, spices, sugar and steaming-roasting beef.
Traditions start like that, being taken up without being purposely created. At my first university, which was a post-WWII creation and very wonderful too, some twit tried to make an instant tradition by having 'Fresher's Gate' painted over one small entrance beside a huge one. No takers, whereas borrowing refectory trays when it snowed, the polished wood becoming a perfect makeshift one-man sledge, certainly was adopted. Which may mean Sternest Critic goes for the pumpkin pie instead when he rules his own roost.
Monday, 7 October 2013
Autumn Plenty
Keeping my journal of costs of growing stuff against value of what is grown has opened my eyes a little to the plenty we enjoy at this time of year - early October that is. On Sunday we had a harvesting session at the allotment that yielded a load of cooking apples picked with our stick of ultimate power (a telescopic thing with grabby fingers and a bag beneath them for picking fruit from tall trees), beet, kohl rabi, parsley, beans various including a second flush of broad beans, destined for pretend hummus; loads of courgettes, two massive and as it turned out sweet parsnips (typically we are not sure which of the three types planted they are), Swiss chard and a real bonus, a small punnet of very ripe raspberries.
Those berries joined some apples in a pie that was a real treat. The beans and parsnips went with roast chicken, and the courgettes filled a quiche rich with cheese that we'll eat tonight with a sharp salad made from some of the other produce. Veg soup beckons too when the chicken carcase becomes stock.
For the value I tentatively put down £10 the lot, a bit on the conservative side. And I left out of my calculations a massive pumpkin (about 30lb I'd guess) that is now drying in the garden greenhouse, safe from - we hope - robbers and vagabonds. The latter had visited our allotment shed, and those of many neighbours, but only a hunting-style knife had gone from one of them as far as we know. Per the police they are looking for petrol driven tools and booze. Happily we had decided against keeping our fine wines in the allotment shed this year.
As similar gits nicked a friend's prize pumpkin a few years back we picked ours for safety. It will have a fitting end too, both decorative and culinary for our Halloween/Bonfire Night party. How many pumpkins here are just for show? A sad waste as the flesh bulks out stews sweetly, and makes a particularly thick custardy filling for pies. The little ones are best for cooking, but we'll do justice to the giant one when we feed friends at the firework gathering. Having seen Sainsbury's selling pumpkins a tenth the size for £3 I don't think £10 would be far off, though feeding friends is pretty much priceless.
Those berries joined some apples in a pie that was a real treat. The beans and parsnips went with roast chicken, and the courgettes filled a quiche rich with cheese that we'll eat tonight with a sharp salad made from some of the other produce. Veg soup beckons too when the chicken carcase becomes stock.
For the value I tentatively put down £10 the lot, a bit on the conservative side. And I left out of my calculations a massive pumpkin (about 30lb I'd guess) that is now drying in the garden greenhouse, safe from - we hope - robbers and vagabonds. The latter had visited our allotment shed, and those of many neighbours, but only a hunting-style knife had gone from one of them as far as we know. Per the police they are looking for petrol driven tools and booze. Happily we had decided against keeping our fine wines in the allotment shed this year.
As similar gits nicked a friend's prize pumpkin a few years back we picked ours for safety. It will have a fitting end too, both decorative and culinary for our Halloween/Bonfire Night party. How many pumpkins here are just for show? A sad waste as the flesh bulks out stews sweetly, and makes a particularly thick custardy filling for pies. The little ones are best for cooking, but we'll do justice to the giant one when we feed friends at the firework gathering. Having seen Sainsbury's selling pumpkins a tenth the size for £3 I don't think £10 would be far off, though feeding friends is pretty much priceless.
Sunday, 4 November 2012
Onions and Le Creuset - Both Bargains
We had our annual bonfire do last night, feeding I think 19 in all. The biggest culinary hit was a simple accompaniment to a big bit of plain boiled gammon, onions in a cheesy bechamel. The idea was lifted from Nigel Slater, though I think his version was without cheese. I love the breadth of his ideas, and his frequent focus on things other than meat, but can't abide his writing style as it has evolved over the last few books. Still, he is probably not worried given I have at least five of his tomes.
The dish was made by peeling medium-sized onions and cooking them in boiling water for about 25 minutes, then halving them, placing them like little domes in two Le Creuset cast iron oval dishes, and covering them in a bechamel sauce before finishing in the oven for half an hour at 180C, by which time the surface was starting to brown and bubble.
Milk for the bechamel was infused in the morning (thinking ahead as it was a party) with onion, carrot, bay and nutmeg, and the sauce made in the usual way, on the thin side as the cheese then added would give it extra body anyhow. At the end of the evening there was some gammon left, about half the pate (too much bacon in it, a sin Elizabeth David railed against), but not a scrap of cheesy onion (nor a single sausage, that standby of the bonfire party). Sternest critic rightly said later that the onion was a touch watery, so I'd probably cook them for just 15 minutes in future and rely on the oven to finish them off.
Ten onions cost about £0.75, the milk and cheese maybe £1, so it was a cheap and tasty success, a bargain. As were those Le Creuset dishes about 25 years ago. Good cookware lasts, and helps the cook. I have two sets of pans, one stainless steel, the other LC cast iron, both bought in the late 1980s, and both pretty forgiving of wavering attention. They cost quite a bit back then, but had we chosen cheapo options with thin bases and delicate lids they'd have died at best three years later, and would have burned half the things cooked in them.
Biggest firework hit btw was Molten Madness from Sainsbury's, brought by a friend. It was roughly the size and weight of a fridge, and effectively laid down an artillery barrage for five minutes. Le Creuset Soup Pot with Lid, 2-3/4 quart - Cherry (Google Affiliate Ad)
The dish was made by peeling medium-sized onions and cooking them in boiling water for about 25 minutes, then halving them, placing them like little domes in two Le Creuset cast iron oval dishes, and covering them in a bechamel sauce before finishing in the oven for half an hour at 180C, by which time the surface was starting to brown and bubble.
Milk for the bechamel was infused in the morning (thinking ahead as it was a party) with onion, carrot, bay and nutmeg, and the sauce made in the usual way, on the thin side as the cheese then added would give it extra body anyhow. At the end of the evening there was some gammon left, about half the pate (too much bacon in it, a sin Elizabeth David railed against), but not a scrap of cheesy onion (nor a single sausage, that standby of the bonfire party). Sternest critic rightly said later that the onion was a touch watery, so I'd probably cook them for just 15 minutes in future and rely on the oven to finish them off.
Ten onions cost about £0.75, the milk and cheese maybe £1, so it was a cheap and tasty success, a bargain. As were those Le Creuset dishes about 25 years ago. Good cookware lasts, and helps the cook. I have two sets of pans, one stainless steel, the other LC cast iron, both bought in the late 1980s, and both pretty forgiving of wavering attention. They cost quite a bit back then, but had we chosen cheapo options with thin bases and delicate lids they'd have died at best three years later, and would have burned half the things cooked in them.
Biggest firework hit btw was Molten Madness from Sainsbury's, brought by a friend. It was roughly the size and weight of a fridge, and effectively laid down an artillery barrage for five minutes. Le Creuset Soup Pot with Lid, 2-3/4 quart - Cherry (Google Affiliate Ad)
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