Sizzling Beef marinade

 We really do enjoy a BBQ at our house and we BBQ all year round, we have even been know to BBQ in the winter in pouring rain underneath umbrellas, you just cant beat that smoke and fire flavour on good quality meat.

Talking of meat I am very lucky to have a good relationship with my butcher, totally fed up with being served with what ever the supermarkets want to sell me I made a big effort to get to know my local butcher and it really has paid off.  I have a real enthusiasm for learning from him different cuts of meat that are on offer that are not available from the super market and save me money and are better quality cuts.  The above piece is called a rose of beef it is the silverside or backend of the cow and is the likely cut that is used in salt beef.  It has a great wide grain perfect for taking up that marinade, lean enough for really fast searing over hot coal 2-3 mins each side depending on how thick your piece, make sure your rest your meat as well before cutting and serving.  This meat cost £10 per kilo where as a piece of rump steak the same weight would cost £16 per kilo.

So if your out BBQing this summer and looking for a marinade maybe give this a try instead of just having a plain BBQed steak. 

ingredients

this is for a 500g of beef steak

2 tbsp. coriander
1 tbsp. cumin
1/2 tbsp. black pepper corns

toast all of the above in a frying pan and then grind up

place the spices into a mini food processor and
add 5-6 garlic cloves
1/2 a red onion chopped
1-2 red hot pepper depending on how spicy you like it
1/2 tbsp. palm sugar
1 generous bunch of fresh coriander
Grated rind of 1 lime
Juice of 2 limes
1 tbsp. rice wine vinegar
2-3 tbsp. of kecap manis I really love this sauce as it is very flavoursome but the regular supermarkets do not stock this however I have found it in Waitrose.
a sprinkle of salt
wiz all the above together if you need a little more movement in the marinade add a little more vinegar.


I tend to make this marinade 2 days before I want to use it typically on a Thursday and I place the whole piece of beef in a zip lock bag and pour over the marinade and just leave it in the fridge until we are ready to use it.

Smoked haddock tower

Mid week meals can sometime get a bit repetitive and i like to get fish into my family every week and here is one of our new favorites, a kind of deconstructed fish pie i guess, Smoked haddock is a fish i enjoy it is meatier than cod and the smoked flavours lend well to this recipe.

The tower starts with a mash potato usually when we have had mash a day or two before i make a bigger batch if i know we are having this a few days later its still good an extra dollup of butte and a quick blast in the microwave sorts it out, followed up with a handful of spring onions.

The spinach is wilted last minuet seasoned with nutmeg salt and pepper and laid on top of the mash potato, followed by the smoked haddock and a lovely soft poached eggs and a generous helping of hollandaise sauce

Pop the yolk and enjoy

Hollandaise Sauce recipe 

125g butter
2 egg yolks
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp of white wine vinegar
squeeze of fresh lemon juice
splash of cold water if needed

This is an easy recipe to do and versatile for egg Benedict as well.  Melting the butter in a microwave in a jug for about a minuet making sure to remove the white solids and set aside.

I use a glass bowl heated over a saucepan of gently bubbling water and add the whisked egg yolks salt and vinegar and whisk constantly add a little cool water if need be until the mixture thickens about 4-5 minuets.

Once thickened removed from the heat and gently add the butter slowly stirring all the time until you get a silky sauce if it becomes to thick add a splash more cold water and whisk again.

Season with a good squish of fresh lemon juice and fresh ground black pepper.

Lemon and thyme cakes

I love the fresh and zinginess of lemon cake, and thyme is a great herb that works really well with the lemon, adding a fragrant edge and interest to the sponge as you bite your way through it. The sponge in this cake has a little more to it by adding ground almond the sponge has more depth, moistness and a bit firmer than your normal poofy fairy cake. Also the use of golden sugar lends itself nicely to the colouring of the sponge and fitting perfectly with the lemon theme.

200g butter

200g golden caster sugar

100g plain flour

100g ground almonds

1tsp baking powder

4 eggs

1 zested lemon

3 tsp thyme leaves

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Cream the sugar and butter together.

Add the whisked egg a little at a time with a spoonful of flour

Stir in the rest of the flour, baking powder add the almonds, zest and thyme

cook at 160 for 15 to 20 mins until you get a clean pull from the skewer test.

The topping is a cream cheese frosting laced with lemon curd... rude not to really.

125g cream cheese

300g icing sugar

50g butter 

be careful not to over whisk as this can easy collapse and go runny, in one side of a piping bag place lemon curd and the other the icing and pipe away on top of the cakes.

Pomegranate Molasses Salmon

For the salmon

mix 1 tbsp of pomegranate molasses
with 1 tbsp runny honey
and 1 tbsp soya sauce

brush the salmon and place in the oven at 180c to cook ever few mins while preparing the salad baste over more pomegranate mix to build up the layers on the fish until the fish is cooked.

reserve a tbsp of the sauce for the dressing

For the salad 

fine slice the following
red pepper
Chinese lettuces
ice burg lettuces
spring onion
mange tout
coriander

all the pomegranate fruits from 1 pomegranate

1/2 portion of jasmine rice per plate.

For the dressing

blend
mirin
sesame oil
fish sauce
1 tbsp of the pomegranate sauce from above

No Suet Mincemeat

Suet in mince pies has never appealed to me for me i would rather have more fruit spice and booze in my pies than the addition of course fat.

Sophie and i have been tinkering with a few made up recipes in the kitchen for mincemeat for our Christmas mince pies.

150g sultanas
150g currents
150g raisins
150g semi dried cherries, i get the ones that have been dried but then soaked in kirsh or you can do this yourself
100g dried cranberries
50g semi dried dates
50g semi dried figs
3tsp heaped cinnamon
3tsp heaped all spice
3tsp heaped ginger
1 fresh grated nutmeg
grated rind only of lemon and orange
4 tbsp heaped course cut marmalade
1/2 35ltr bottle of brandy more if you want

you can pretty much do as you please with this recipe putting in more things that you like and leaving out what you don't, just place it all fruit in a blitzer and mince slightly to break the fruit up then put everything into a bowl and stir together before spooning into a preserving jar i always add a layer of brandy to the top of the jar so the fruit can have an extra drink, i then leave this for a week or two before using.

When i come to use it i spoon into a bowl and then add
50g chopped walnuts
100g chopped pecans
2 grated fresh apples skin too
flesh of a clementine chopped and added

Honey and Cumin Almonds

Christmas Holidays are coming which means the girls will be off saying they are bored and they are hungry so here is a small activity they reaps the benefit of a nice nibbly snack too.

300g almonds
2tsp of black sesame seeds
2tsp of normal sesame seeds
4tsp of cumin seeds
1tbsp olive oil
4tbsp honey

toast off the cumin seeds in a pan and grind, add everything to a big bowl and mix together before turning out on to a lipped baking sheet and roast in the oven for 10 mins at 200c.  Leave to cool before eating.

Christmas tree cake

We are doing all things Christmas and this is the cake this year, and i dedicate this cake to my husband for climbing up the village tree to decorate it, what a hero.
 

This cake was so easy to do after the kids had lots of fun splotting icing, i used a waffle cone to create the Christmas tree and piped the branches on and then used strawberry laces to wind around the cake as the electrical lead and used m&m's as the lights. 

Rocky road

 It seems like an age since we have done any baking together, what with the big move and settling into our new home.  So it was time to dust off our pinnies and open the baking cupboard to see what we could make.  With Ella's love of chocolate and Sophie love of marshmallows Rocky road sprang to mind.

we did not have any mini marshmallows but never fear Sophie got chopping with some scissors and chopped some up followed by bashing some digestives into little bits.   After we melted the hot chocolate mix and poured this over the goodies in the tray and sprinkling with candy stars this was left it set before chopping up and serving.  Double yum from both Ella and Sophie.


150g mini marshmallows
150g digestives broken
100g Brazil nuts roughly chopped

place all of the above into the greased tray

125g butter
3 tbsp golden syrup
150g dark chocolate
150g milk chocolate

Melt all the above and pour over the biscuits and marshmallows add sprinkles over the top and allow to set in the fridge for 2 hours.

Tapenade

 The Tapenade is wonderful and is not only great for this tart but lovely with griddled lamb steaks.  Also it is very easy to wizz up in a food processor and has bucket loads of aromatic tastes  

170g Black olives

70g Capers

70g Anchovys

10g Fresh mint

Zest of 1 lemon and juice of 1/2 lemon

all of the olive oil from the anchovy tin aprox 30- 40g

Find out how to use Tapenade in a recipe 

Breadsticks

School run and at pick up time Sophie is always hungry as she comes out and always asks, "Do you have anything for me mummy" not wanting to be armed all the time with sweets and biscuits i decided to try a homemade breadstick.  A snack not just handy for school kicking out time but anytime and can be made to any flavour you fancy.

I made some sweet and some savoury and used a basic breadstick base then flavoured afterwards


Recipe 

125g strong white flour
125g plain white flour
3g dried yeast
5g salt
160ml warm water
drizzle of oil

knead all of the above apart from the oil till you get a sticky dough then add a drizzle of oil and work this in until the dough is smooth.

place in a bowl drizzle with a little more oil and cover leave to rise until doubled.

turn out onto a well floured surface add some flour on top so you dont get your rolling pin stuck and roll to a 5mm thickness.  Cut into stripes about 1cm.

To Flavour

for the savoury i brushed the breadsticks in olive oil and then made 4 different flavours

garlic, rosemary and sea salt
smoked paprika
Parmesan cheese
poppy seed and sesame seed

for the sweet i made 1 flavour and pushed small chunks of white chocolate and raisins into the bread dough

now leave your breadsticks to prove for 30 mins

To Cook

Pop in a preheat oven at 200c for 20 mins till golden brown.

Fennel salad

 Mid week meals and i am run off my feet and need something fresh fast and healthy to fix for dinner and i am loving my veg ottolenghi style, we normally eat fennel and sweetcorn but this has been pimped up with beautiful fresh flavours from all the added herbs.

Another fresh crunchy delicious side is this wonderful fennel dish, i love fennel and this has a feta in it however i found a wonderful smoked feta which i added to my salad.

1/2 pomegranate
1 fennel
11/2tbsp olive oil
2 tsp sumac
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 bunch of each fresh tarragon, flat leaf parsley chopped
70g feta

use a mandolin to fine slice the fennel add the chopped herbs, pomegranate and feta, olive oil, lemon juice and sumac, simple and fast as that.

This is why i love Ottolenghi he really does do fast easy recipes that are full of flavour unlike some other celebrity chefs that bleat on about their supposed fast recipes.

Spicy Carrot salad

Ingredients to serve 4
6 large carrots peeled and shredded
3tbsp sunflower oil
2 large onions
2 tbsp Harissa
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp caraway seeds ground
1/2 tsp sugar
3 tbsp cider vinegar
big handful of spinach shredded

Slice the onions and slowly fry till deep and sweet add the spices and toss 5 mins from the end to coat the onions and warm the spices through, cool slightly.

In a bowl add the shredded carrot toss in the fried onions, shredded spinach, Harissa and oil and cider vinegar.

This is a great side salad, equally the carrot salad makes for another great wrap with the addition of humus

Italian fish stew

As you probably gathered by now i am a totally wing it kind of chef when left on my own devices, so here is another of my made up recipes.

Inspired by a friend who is married to an Italian and has one of those traditional mother in laws that loves to feed people a bit like me but i am English and cant cook like an Italian oh i wish i could.

I adore fish and i have never had a fish stew and had a real hankering for it.  So for a few days i mulled over all the flavours in  my head that felt Italian and concocted this fish stew and i am so sorry if now i have insulted a lot of Italians but i don't have an Italian mama to feed me, so if there are any Italian reader i would love to know what you think, if i have forgotten anything if i should take something out.  Anyways it was really lovely and i loved mopping up the sauce with the home made bread rolls at the end and i will make this again.

it all seems to be about the sauce treat it slow and let the flavours infuse

Start with a tbsp of oil and fry gently half a red onion very finely chopped
add a passata
add a good splash of balsamic
and even better slug of rioja
a good few slugs of fish stock
crush in a couple of cloves of garlic
a sprinkle of oregano
a few sprigs of fresh thyme leaves taken off the stalks
a tsp or 2 or 3 of smoked paprika
some salt and fresh ground black pepper

leave on a low low heat to gentle plip plop to cook the wine out and develop the flavours

When you ready to eat increase the sauce temperature to a higher heat so it can cook fish
add fine slices of fennel ( i love fennel )
and a selection of mixed fish i had squid, salmon, prawns, monkfish, mussels

Do not stir as the salmon will break up and you will loose it when the fish is cooked through

serve with the sprinkles of the fluffy green fennel tuffs on top of the stew

Pineapple upside down cake

I do love a slice of pineapple cake and this one has a twist of chilli and lime syrup poured over the top which soaks into the cake giving it another depth in flavour.

Here is Ella my budding little baker learning from the expert Sophie.

INGREDIENTS

200g canned pineapple rings

110g caster sugar

110g butter

2 eggs

110g self raising flour 

1tsp baking powder 

1 fresh red chilli 

4 tbsp pineapple juice

4 tbsp of honey

zest and juice of a lime 

pre heat the oven to 180c

• Grease your tin or if like me use a fab tin that doesn't need greasing  
• Place 4 pineapple rings in the base of your tin
• Cream the butter and sugar, fold in the flour and whisked eggs and baking powder 
• cut up the rest of the pineapple and add to the cake mix
• Spoon the cake mix over the pineapple rings and cook for 25 mins or until if you put a knife in and it comes out clear.

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Making the syrup is easy add the pineapple juice, honey, chili and lime to a pan and simmer for 5 mins once the cake is out of the oven and tin and on the serving plate pour over the syrup.

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