BUBBLE AND SQUEAK TWO WAYS

 

Oh, the joy of leftovers!

The first version is simply leftover mashed potatoes and green veg, mashed together.

The mixture was piled into a well greased muffin tin and baked in the oven at 180° fan for about twenty minutes then sprinkled with grated cheese before returning to the oven to finish cooking.  After another ten minutes the cheese was melted.  We had ours with baked beans.  Yum!

For the egg version I used all the leftover veg we had, including carrot and half of a small tin of sweetcorn.  I added some fried chopped onions and leftover spaghetti.  I mixed in a tablespoon of panko breadcrumbs for a bit of texture.

I made depressions in the mixture ready to receive the eggs and baked it for 20 minutes at 180° fan  before dropping an egg into each well.

It was then finished off in the oven at 180° fan for around 10 minutes more until the eggs were cooked but the yolks still runny.  Double yum!

BRIOCHE PLUM PUDDING and is the British pudding becoming extinct?

What do you do when you have over purchased on bakery products?  

You turn them into a pudding!

This "tear and share" style brioche was surplus to requirements but luckily we had friends coming round for dinner so I turned it into a version of bread and butter pudding.

It looks like a batch of cinnamon rolls but is actually fluffy and light brioche dough filled with a vanilla custard.  I was slightly stumped as to what to do with it so as a guide used Mary Berry's recipe which you can see here.  Using a filled kind of brioche bread I decided against buttering the rolls but added some fruit by tucking some of my cinnamon baked plums in between the pieces.  You can see that recipe here.

Another challenge was timing its cooking so as to have it ready to serve warm at the right stage in the meal.  Bread and butter pudding can become a bit stodgy when it's gone cold.  To achieve this I sliced and arranged the brioche in the dish, and whisked up the custard, well in advance, keeping the liquid in the fridge until it was needed.  I did the soaking stage just before serving the starter and had the kettle full and ready for the bain marie, and put it in the oven to bake just as the main course was served.

In France it is traditional to have the cheese course before dessert so it came out of the oven at that point and was still warm and fluffy when it was served.  Result!

It did look alarmingly like toad in the hole when it arrived at the table but in fact was delicious and everyone loved it.  Brioche certainly makes a light pudding and it was so good that I would definitely do it again!

I'm not sure I have seen the exact same brioche product in the UK but if you refer to Mary's recipe you will see that you can simply use buttered slices of a normal brioche loaf.

As it happens, there was a little of the custard mixture left over after filling the dish so I kept it in the fridge for a couple of days and then baked it by itself in a small buttered dish for about 30 minutes at 150° fan.  An added bonus of a baked egg custard!

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As an aside, in the news a while ago there was a report of research by English Heritage which showed that only 2% of British households regularly eat a home made pudding as a dessert. Blogger Karen at Lavender and Lovage also posted about this here.

This got me thinking.  Often we have a yoghurt at lunchtime and no dessert in the evening but at least once a week we will have some kind of baked pudding, often just a humble crumble.  We're most likely to have a pudding if we have friends round for lunch or dinner, in which case I nearly always make two different ones so that people have a choice and we have leftovers to enjoy later!  

The writer of the article baked and reviewed ten of the puddings allegedly under threat of becoming extinct and which were:

Jam roly poly, Sussex pond pudding, bread and butter pudding, queen of puddings, treacle sponge pudding, Malvern pudding, flummery, spotted dick, cabinet pudding and rice pudding.  

He reckoned the only one worth saving was the Malvern pudding.  Queen of puddings is something I make occasionally, bread and butter pudding regularly in some form or other and rice pudding is a very special treat.

I have never made or knowingly eaten a flummery, Sussex pond, cabinet or Malvern pudding and it’s a long time since I made a steamed or suet pudding of any kind.  These were served frequently when I was at school and when the school had a real kitchen.  Spotted dick always had the boys sniggering and had a bad press but I loved it and seconds were in high demand at school dinner.  My mum used to make steamed sponge puddings regularly, steaming it for hours on a Sunday morning.  I still remember the sense of anticipation and excitement as the kitchen filled up with steam!  A treacle sponge with Birds custard for "afters" was such a joy!  I think I would be more likely to make a microwave version these days.  

What the article doesn’t make clear is whether most households are skipping dessert altogether or serving shop bought ones.  "Ready meal" versions of numerous old fashioned puddings seem to be in plentiful supply in UK supermarkets; clearly still very much in demand even if people can’t find the time to make them for themselves.  They are also frequently on the menu in our favourite UK restaurants, so they’re not really becoming extinct, just not made at home as often.

Of course, in France the situation is very different. The average boulangerie will have a range of delicious tarts and pastries available every day.  Very tempting and if you turn up in the late afternoon the choice will be limited so that’s clearly the dessert solution in French households!

Personally I feel there is no risk of baked puddings becoming extinct in this house, nor in most where we are lucky enough to be invited elsewhere!  The English, or at least certainly the British ex-pat, love a nice pudding!  The French are fascinated by them too and are always keen to try one!

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Ingredients

1 brioche "tear and share" loaf 

150g cooked plums

3 tblsp demerara sugar

3 eggs

75g caster sugar

150ml double cream

600ml full fat milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

zest of 1 small lemon

Method

Butter a large baking dish.  Cut each roll from the loaf in half horizontally and arrange them in a spiral in the dish.  Tuck the plums between the slices.

For the custard, put the eggs, cream, milk, vanilla and lemon zest into a bowl and whisk together.  Pour this mixture over the brioche and press down with the back of a spoon.  Sprinkle the demerara sugar over and leave to stand for 30 minutes.

Heat the oven to 180°C / 160° fan / gas mk 4.  Stand the dish in a large roasting tin and pour in boiling water to about half full.  This is called a bain marie.  

Bake for 40 minutes until the brioche is golden brown and puffed up.  It will shrink back down a little.

Serve warm with cream.

Serves 6 generous portions.

TOMATO MINI TARTS FOR APÉRITIFS

 

These little bite sized tarts are so easy to make and work really well as nibbles for a crowd.

Scoring the lines in the pastry is the only fiddly part.

You can get 48 tarts from one sheet of puff pastry!

(Depending on the size of your tomatoes!)

There are endless variations you could do.

Ingredients

1 sheet of oblong ready made puff pastry

A handful of cherry tomatoes, a mix of colours makes the nibbles more interesting 

A handful of grated hard cheese, any type

1tblsp grated parmesan (optional)

1-2 tsp mustard (optional)

1tsp dried herbs (optional)

Method 

Remove the pastry from the fridge 10-15 minutes before using, otherwise it may crack when you unroll it.

Preheat the oven to 200°C / 180° fan.  Unroll the pastry and leave it on the paper it comes rolled in. 

Being guided by the size of your tomatoes, cut the pastry into even squares.  Then mark out border lines just within all sides of the squares but not cutting through.

Smear a little mustard onto each square if using and sprinkle with the grated cheese.

Cut your tomatoes into slices about the thickness of a £1 or 1€ coin and place one slice in each square.  

Lightly grind salt and pepper over the tarts and sprinkle over the parmesan and dried herbs if using.

Transfer the paper loaded with the tarts to a baking sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes until the pastry is golden brown and cheese bubbling.

Makes up to 48 nibbles.

FOCHABERS GINGERBREAD

 

This cake was quite unlike anything I had made before.  It comes from a book by the Scottish food writer Sue Lawrence, Fochabers being a small town in the north of Scotland, not far from Inverness.  The recipe includes dried fruit, black treacle and beer.  (It also includes mixed peel, which I didn't have as all of mine had gone into the Christmas cake, so I added the same quantity of chopped walnuts instead.)

It started when Nick spotted a Nordic Ware tin that was less than half price in a sale in the fancy kitchenware shop in Loches.  Having bought me a lovely new tin I thought he deserved a cake and his favourite is a ginger cake so I looked through my cookbooks for a new recipe to try.

I remembered the rule not to overfill the tin with mixture and made just five little buns with the excess.  Soon after they came out of the oven, we had unexpected visitors, a friend and her two granddaughters, aged thirteen and four.

I pointed out that the cake was probably a very grown up cake with beer and treacle and that the children might not be too keen but I was wrong.  They both loved the little buns and there were barely a few crumbs left.

The cake had a firm texture and would be excellent for a picnic or to be handed round at a gathering as it didn’t fall into a mass of crumbs in the hand.  It was somehow not too sweet, not too gingery but satisfying.   We had the last two slices toasted and buttered.  It was not the sort of cake you might serve at a fancy tea party but definitely worth remembering.  It would be perfect for St Andrew's Day which is on 30th November.

Ingredients

170g unsalted butter, softened

170g light muscovado sugar (or light soft brown sugar)

4 rounded tablespoons black treacle

1 egg

340g plain flour

60g sultanas

60g currants

60g ground almonds

60g chopped mixed peel  

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp mixed spice

½ tsp ground cloves

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

142ml (¼ pint) beer

Method

Preheat the oven to 150°C / 130°fan / gas mk 2.  Grease and base line a 20cm square tin or a 900g loaf tin.  If using a Bundt tin grease with cake release paste (see side bar for recipe).

Beat together the butter and sugar until light and creamy.  Heat the treacle gently in a small pan or microwave and add to the mixture.  Stir in the egg and combine well.

Mix in the flour, ground almonds, currants, sultanas, mixed peel and spices.  

Dissolve the bicarb in the beer then beat into the mixture.

Spoon the mixture into the tin, level the top and bake for 75-90 minutes until it passes the skewer test.  (The deeper tin will take the longest time.)

Remove the tin to a wire rack and leave the cake to cool in the tin before turning out.  If using a Bundt tin, turn out after 15-20 minutes.

Cuts into 10-12 slices.

CLEMEMTINE AND ALMOND CAKE

This is one of those cakes that I had the urge to make the minute I spotted the recipe which was in Dom's blog here.  I had made something similar before to a Michel Roux recipe which was a lovely dessert cake (see here) but this one sounded easier.  So, with a number of clementines in the fruit bowl I had all the ingredients needed and decided to give it a go.

Dom mentioned that it's originally a Nigella Lawson recipe so I googled it and it's from her book "How to Eat".  The only tricky bit is that the clementines should be boiled for one and a half hours.  Ah, I thought, I don’t have time for that…..I wonder if there’s another way.  

Sure enough, on Nigella's website (see here) it says that you can microwave them instead, so that’s what I did.  Nigella recommends cooking them in a covered dish with a vent in the lid so I used my lovely old Pearsons of Chesterfield stewpot.

This is a fabulous cake.  Beautifully moist with flecks of the clementine zest running through it and of course it’s gluten free.  It's very easy to make, keeps well, freezes well and makes a delicious dessert.

Ingredients

375g clementines

250g ground almonds

225g caster sugar

6 large eggs, lightly beaten

1tsp baking powder

Method 

Preheat the oven to 19°C / 170° fan / gas mk 5.  Butter and line the base of a 20cm springform tin.

Put the clementines into a dish with a lid that has a steam vent.  Add a little water and microwave on high , 800-900W, for 8-10 minutes, turning half way through until soft. Drain and allow to cool while preparing the other ingredients.

Cut each clementine in half and remove the stalk ends and any pips.  The easiest way to do this is to flatten out the halves of fruit and dig out the pips.

Put them all into a food processor and blitz briefly to a rough pulp.  Add all the other ingredients and process until smooth.

Transfer the mixture to the tin, level the top and tap on the worktop to dispel any trapped air.

Bake for 40 minutes until the cake passes the skewer test, covering loosely with foil after 20 minutes to prevent the top from scorching.

Remove from the oven and sit the tin on a rack until the cake is cool.

Dust with icing sugar before serving.

Cuts into 10-12 slices.

BEAN SOUP (soup maker recipe)

This was a very tasty soup.

At this time of year I have a clear out of our food cupboards.  At the back of a cupboard I found this bag of dried white haricot beans.  They were just past their sell by so it was time to use them up!  The next day I looked in my recipe books for things to do with beans and came up with bean soup, perfect for the freezing cold weather we were having last week.

What I hadn't bargained for was that the dried beans had to be soaked overnight before they could be cooked.  I should have realised this as it's exactly what we now do with our mushy peas so I wrote it on the pack of beans to remind me!  (I have never seen mushy peas for sale in France and instead of bringing tins of them from the UK I bring packs of dried marrowfat peas which I then cook and freeze in portions.)

A rummage at the back of the pantry shelves turned up a tin of pre cooked beans so we could still have the soup. 

Another thing I found in the cupboard was a pack of half baked demi baguettes that were just at their sell by date.  These are very handy to have in stock for when you want nice crusty bread and the boulangerie is shut or the baguette machine in the village has sold out.  I always make sure we have some in stock.  They’re not quite as delicious as a fresh baguette but better than none at all!

The soup was cooked in the soup maker on the "chunky" function which means it's all boiled up but not blended.  Consequently I chopped the veg smaller than usual as that's the size the chunks were going to be in the finished soup.  As the blender function is not used you could simply cook the soup in a saucepan!

It was delicious, definitely a keeper and Nick declared it one of the best soups I had ever made.  It was just the job for a chilly day when we didn’t want to head to the shops on slippery roads.

Ingredients

1 400g tin chopped tomatoes

1 400g tin haricots blancs or cannellini beans, drained and well rinsed

1 large onion, peeled and finely chopped

2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped into small dice

2 sticks celery, washed and thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped

1 vegetable stock pot

1 tsp mixed herbs

Method 

Put all the ingredients into the soup maker with enough water to fill to the top line.  Give it all a good stir.  (Or put it all into a large saucepan with a litre of water and bring to the boil gently, cover and cook for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until the carrots are tender.)

Cook on the chunky setting.

If the carrots are still slightly firm, stir the soup and give it another few minutes on "chunky".

Serve with warm, crusty baguette.

Makes 4 generous servings.

MICROWAVED POACHED EGGS

I first wrote about how to poach an egg here.  It's the method I use when I have more than one egg to cook and it works well every time as long as the eggs are quite fresh.  If they are not so fresh the whites tend to spread a bit but they still taste good!

A perfectly cooked microwaved poached egg.

Then I spotted on the internet a way to do them in the microwave, which is very handy and quick if I just want to poach one egg for myself.  There were various methods involving mugs, cups, ramekins and other dishes, water on top, water underneath, and I had mixed results including exploded egg all over the inside of the machine!

In the end I arrived at this method and came to the conclusion that the shape of the dish has a lot to do with the success. 

My best results came from using a rather conical shaped dish.

I acquired a set of these little Pyrex dishes (not actually Pyrex but ovenproof anyway) in order to bake a batch of Queen of Puddings (see here) which were a great hit.  The worst results (exploding eggs) seemed to happen when I used a straight sided mug or ramekin.

I also found that these small jars work well as they are about the right size.  They are Weck jars and they are sold in France with paté or rillettes in them.  They have a rubber seal rather like a Kilner jar seal and being oven proof are very useful for various things.  (The lids also make good wine bottle coasters.)

As you can see, they also have a slightly conical shape.

Another rather weird thing I discovered is that the rate of success improved if I put water on top of the egg rather than into the dish before dropping the egg in!

Obviously I have no idea if there is any sensible scientific reasoning behind any of this but as it's now quite a while since I had a less than perfect poached egg using this method I decided to risk sharing it!  I dare say any conical shaped container would work as long as it's the right sort of size.

I recently discovered the quick function button on my microwave too!  One press gives it thirty seconds at 800w, two presses sixty seconds and so on.  This is very handy for cooking the egg just right!  I give it two presses but open the door and have a look when there are still ten to fifteen seconds left on the clock.  If it's not done it goes back in for five seconds more.

Finally, remember to get your toast on first as it takes longer to do than the egg and you want it to be ready on the plate when the egg is nice and hot.

Method

Drop your egg into a smallish slightly conical shaped dish, mug or pot.  Very fresh eggs definitely work best.

Put about 1 tablespoon of cold water on top.

Microwave on high (800w) for 40-55 seconds.  The time required depends on the size of your egg so give it 40 seconds and if the white is still uncooked put it back in for 5 second bursts.  It only takes 5 seconds too long for the yolk to be solid not runny.  Another extra burst may result in your egg exploding all over the inside of your microwave!

Tip the egg into a slotted spoon to drain off the water and slide it onto your toast.  

Poached egg on toast for one!