Tag Archives: easy

Peanut Caramel Slice

Posted on by
Reply

If you have a packet of miso paste in the fridge, bought for a recipe which only required a tablespoonful or two and you’re wondering what to do with the rest, this is the recipe for you. If not, go and buy some.

Miso paste keeps for weeks in the fridge and is a useful addition to all sorts of dishes, both sweet and savoury. It adds an intensity of flavour known as umami, the fifth taste sensation after sweet, sour, bitter and salty. Try adding a tablespoonful to your next casserole or bolognese sauce.

This yummy slice has miso in the shortbread base where it combines with the other ingredients to make a very moreish snack. If you like peanut brittle you will like this slice which is totally addictive. If you don’t have any miso you could just leave it out.

Shortbread base:
125g butter at room temperature
5 Tbs sugar
1 egg yolk
1 Tbs miso paste
1 cup flour
2 Tbs cornflour
½ tsp salt
1/8 tsp baking powder
Caramel:
1 cup brown sugar
2 Tbs honey
50g butter
Good pinch of chilli powder (optional)
250g salted roast peanuts
½ tsp salt

Preheat oven to 180°C. Line the base of a 9″ (22cm) square cake pan with baking paper and grease the pan. Place butter and sugar in food processor and mix till creamy. Add egg yolk and miso then lastly the flour, cornflour, salt and baking powder. Mix well, stopping halfway to scrape down the sides. Put blobs all over the base of the tin, then press it to a uniform thickness with slightly damp fingers. Bake for 10 minutes or until golden.

Meanwhile, heat brown sugar, honey and butter in a saucepan until melted, stirring. Add chilli powder, peanuts and salt and mix well. Put blobs all over the shortbread base, then spread evenly with a knife. Put back in the oven for 10-15 minutes, or until golden brown.

Cool for 20 minutes, then cut into about 20 squares while still warm. Keep in an airtight tin. If kept in the fridge the slice will be more chewy. As an after dinner nibble cut the pieces in half again so you get 40.

Makes about 20 pieces

Variations: use slivered almonds, roughly chopped macadamias or a mixture of nuts instead of the peanuts.

Smoked Trout and Corn Risotto

Posted on by
Reply

Laurie is a massage therapist who works with my osteopath. He’s a keen cook and follower of this blog, so while he’s digging into my back with his elbows we talk about food, to take my mind off the torture.

This is one of Laurie’s recipes. I have changed the method slightly, cooking the corn kernels after they have been removed from the cobs, rather than while still on the cobs. If you’re a fan of risottos and smoked trout you will love this recipe.

30g butter
2 corn cobs
1 litre chicken stock
Flesh from one smoked trout, carcass and skin reserved
1 onion, chopped
1 small leek, white part only, chopped (keep the green part)
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1½ cups arborio rice
½ cup dry white wine
Chives or spring onion tops, chopped, to garnish

Melt a third of the butter in a wide, shallow pan and cook corn on medium to high heat, stirring, for 8-10 minutes, or until starting to brown. Remove from pan. Add stock, reserved trout carcass and skin to the pan with the leek tops. Bring to the boil, simmer covered for 15 mins then strain, discarding the solids and keeping the liquid.

In the same pan, heat half remaining butter and cook onion, garlic and leek for 4-5 minutes until soft but not browned, stirring often. Add rice and cook, stirring for 2 minutes, then the wine and cook for another 2 minutes. Add reserved stock, a ladle at a time, allowing the rice to absorb the liquid before adding more. Cook for 15-20 minutes or until al dente, stirring constantly.  If rice isn’t quite done when all the liquid has been absorbed and it’s starting to stick, add a little water, a tablespoonful at a time, until it’s done. Check for seasoning.

Carefully mix corn, trout pieces and remaining butter into the risotto with half the snipped chives or thinly sliced spring onion tops. You don’t want the smoked trout to break up too much.

Garnish with remaining chives or spring onion tops.

Serves 4

Substitution: use frozen corn kernels, thawed.  Add some diced red capsicum (pepper) with the onion and leek, for added colour.

Sponge Cake with Jam and Cream

Posted on by
Reply

Hill House is a dairy farm located on the heather-clad moors of County Durham, in the very north of England. I learnt to make this sponge cake when staying there in my early teens. Unlike a Victoria Sandwich, an egg sponge doesn’t contain any butter.

My Dad’s cousin, whom we called Auntie Vina (pronounced Vyna), taught me to make many of the cakes I still make today. My first sponge cake turned out so well I made another one and entered it into the Butterknowle annual agricultural show’s cooking section and won First Prize. You couldn’t wipe the smile off my face. The sponge in the photo got a bit overcooked on the sides, as you can see in the photo, but it still tasted good. I always think of my dear old Dad when I make this cake as it was one of his favourites.

3 large eggs
2 tbs warm water
¾ cup sugar
1 cup plain flour
Filling:
¾ cup raspberry or strawberry jam (preferably homemade)
1 cup cream, whipped
Icing sugar

Preheat oven to 180°C. In a large bowl, whisk eggs, sugar and water until very thick and tripled in volume. Add flour through a sieve and fold in carefully with a metal spoon. Scrape into a 20cm cake tin, greased and bottom lined with baking paper. Bake for 20 minutes or until well risen, golden brown and firm to touch in the middle. Don’t overcook. Cool in the tin for a few minutes, then run a knife around the outside and invert carefully onto a cake rack.

When cold, remove paper from the bottom, then turn over. Cut sponge in half horizontally, then cut the top layer into 8 slices – this makes it easier to cut the cake after it has been filled. Fill with jam and whipped cream. Place the 8 slices back onto the uncut bottom layer and sieve some icing sugar over the top.

Chocolate Sponge: use ½ cup self-raisig flour, ¼ cup cornflour and ¼ cup cocoa. Omit the jam and fill with whipped cream.

Note: if you make the cake in a tin with a larger diameter you need to increase the ingredients, otherwise it comes out thin and unimpressive. So for example with a 22cm tin use 4 eggs, 3 Tbs water, 1 cup of sugar and 1¼ cups of flour.

Ebelskivers – Danish Apple Pancakes

Posted on by
Reply

We bought this antique copper dish in a market in Damascus in the late 1970s.
The photo shows the back of it. I’ve always used it as an ornament and it never occurred to me to use it for cooking.

In Syria it was probably used for cooking eggs. It certainly wasn’t for making Danish apple pancakes, but I decided to give it a try.

Ebelskivers are traditional Danish pancakes with applesauce in the middle. Danes eat them with red jam and cream, but we ate them as they are, coated in cinnamon sugar.

I halved the recipe I was given by a Danish friend while we were living in Copenhagen and made 21 little pancakes in my Syrian baking dish. I cooked the first seven on the stove top, but it was difficult to control the heat and they got a bit overcooked. The next two lots of 7 were baked in the oven and came out perfectly.

The good news is that having brushed each hole with melted butter the pancakes didn’t stick, which was my biggest worry. My Syrian copper dish has been moved into the cupboard with the other baking dishes. If you don’t have a special tin for making ebelskivers use a muffin pan.

1 cup SR flour (or 1 cup plain flour and ½ tsp baking powder)
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
½ tsp ground cardamom (optional)
1 Tbs sugar
Pinch of salt
2 egg yolks
1 cup buttermilk
2 egg whites
50g butter, melted
Apple sauce (apples cooked with sugar and some spices and pureed)
1 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
To serve:
Red jam
Whipped cream

Preheat oven to 180°C. Place flour, bicarbonate of soda, cardamom, sugar, salt, egg  yolks and buttermilk in one bowl and the egg whites in another. Using electric beaters whip the egg whites until they hold soft peaks. Then mix the ingredients in the other bowl using the same beaters.There’s no need to wash them, but it’s important to do the whites first, while they are clean. Fold whites into batter.

Brush each hole in the baking tin with melted butter. Spoon a tablespoonful of pancake mixture into each, then about half a teaspoon or so of apple sauce, then another tablespoon of pancake mix. Bake for 10 minutes or until puffed and golden.

Coat each pancake with a mixture of sugar and cinnamon.

Serve warm as they are or with jam and cream.

Makes about 20

Beef Stroganoff L’Or du Rhone

Posted on by
Reply

Everyone has a favourite recipe for beef stroganoff, but if yours doesn’t use brandy to flambé the meat, give this recipe a try. It makes all the difference.

It comes from a restaurant just outside Geneva which we frequented in the 1970s. I had a look on Google but it’s no longer there. Beef Stroganoff was one of the dishes you could order and watch them make on a trolley they brought to the table. Another one was Crêpes Suzette. As I watched the performance I wrote down the recipe, to which I have added the mushrooms. I’ve also halved the amount of cream they used.

1 kg fillet of beef, cut into strips
Or 750g beef and 250g button mushrooms
Dry English mustard and oregano
Salt and Pepper
60g butter
250g chopped shallots or spring onions
1/3 cup brandy
Few drops Tabasco sauce
4 tsp paprika
1 cup sour cream
4 Tbs chopped parsley

Prepare meat then season with some dry mustard powder, oregano, salt and pepper and put aside. Quantities to suit your taste. Leave mushrooms whole if small, or cut into halves or quarters, according to their size.

In a large frying pan heat half the butter and fry onions gently until soft. Add mushrooms and continue to cook, stirring, for 5 minutes or until softened. Remove from the pan. Turn up the heat and add remaining butter, then the meat, stirring and cooking for 2-3 minutes or until browned all over. Return the onions and mushrooms to the pan and cook, stirring for another couple of minutes. Add brandy and set alight, stirring until flames subside. Turn off extractor fan while you do this. Add Tabasco, paprika and sour cream and cook, stirring, for a minute or two until thickened.

Garnish with parsley and serve with pasta or rice and a green vegetable.

Serves 4

Substitutions: use fresh cream instead of sour cream.

 

Feta and Spring Onion Bouikos

Posted on by
2

The Middle East’s answer to cheese straws, these feta and spring onion bouikos are delicious. The recipe, slightly tweaked, came from a UK restaurant called Honey & Co.

Bouikos can be prepared ahead and left in the fridge until just before guests are due to arrive. They are at their best served warm, not quite so good at room temperature and should definitely be eaten on the day they are made. I doubt very much that you will have any leftover, but if you do please send them round here.

I’ve made them twice and used feta and cheddar both times, but I plan to try using other cheeses, such as a blue cheese and ricotta. You could even try adding some finely diced bacon.

2 spring onions
50g cold butter cut into four
40g grated sharp cheddar (about ¼ cup)
40g feta (about ¼ cup)
¾ cup plain flour
Good pinch salt
¼ cup sour cream
Nigella or Poppy seeds (optional)

Preheat oven to 180°C unless you are making these ahead and planning to refrigerate them till serving time. Line a baking tray with baking paper.

Place spring onions in a food processor and process to chop. Add remaining ingredients and process until mixture forms a ball, then stop the motor. Tip out onto a lightly floured surface then pat out or roll out to a rectangle with a thickness of about 1 cm. If using, sprinkle with Nigella or poppy seeds. Cut into 12 squares, then cut each square into two triangles. Arrange slightly apart on baking sheet then bake for about 15 minutes, turning the tray halfway through to ensure even colouring.

Makes about 24

Chocolate Brownie

Posted on by
Reply

Delicious as a snack with a cup of tea or coffee, or as a dessert with cream and berries, everyone needs a good chocolate brownie recipe. The last time I made this with my granddaughter Natalia, we swapped the chocolate chips for M and Ms, at her suggestion. She rushed off on her bike to buy a packet.

½ cup butter (125g)
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
1¾ cups self raising flour (or plain flour and 2 tsp BP)
Pinch salt
1 tsp vanilla
½ cup cocoa
1 cup chocolate chips or chopped nuts (e.g. walnuts, macadamias, pecans) or a mixture

Preheat oven to 180°C. Butter a 9 inch or 22cm square tin and line with baking paper. Or use a silicone pan which doesn’t need greasing.

Place butter and sugar in food processor and mix well, scraping down the sides halfway through. Or use electric beaters in a bowl. Add eggs, mix, then gradually add the sifted flour, salt, vanilla and cocoa, scraping down the sides again halfway through.  Add chocolate chips or nuts and process very briefly, just enough to mix them in.

Scrape into tin and smooth the top. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Don’t overcook as it’s better undercooked than overcooked.

Cut into 16 squares

Roasted Peas with Brown Butter & Garlic

Posted on by
Reply

Yotam Ottolenghi has taught me that all vegetables taste better roasted rather than boiled in water, the way our mother’s and grandmothers cooked them. Maybe not yours, but certainly mine. They knew how to roast potatoes, parsnips and pumpkin, but anything green went into boiling water. Roasting Brussels sprouts, asparagus and cauliflower takes them to a whole new level.

This recipe didn’t come from Mr Ottolenghi but from Pinterest, where you can find quite a few versions. I’m not going to give exact quantities. I used less butter than the recipes called for, so I’ll leave it up to you. Don’t be put off by the amount of garlic because the roasting makes it soft and sweet.

I served the peas with salmon topped with a mixture of finely chopped ginger and Thai sweet chilli sauce, baked in the oven on a tray lined with baking paper for for 8-10 minutes at 200°C.

Frozen Peas
Butter
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Peeled cloves of garlic (about a dozen?)

Preheat oven to 200°C. Place the peas in a sieve and run hot water from the tap over them, drain and put in a bowl. Heat a large knob of butter in a saucepan until it turns golden brown. How much butter is up to you and depends on how many peas you are doing.

Add the butter, garlic cloves and seasoning to the peas. Line a baking tray with baking paper and tip the peas onto it, spreading them out into one layer. Bake for 10-20 minutes, turning once or twice. Time will depend on the size of the peas.

Variations: add some finely diced bacon or frozen corn kernels.

Kaiserschmarm

Posted on by
Reply

This torn apple pancake is an Austrian speciality. The name translates as “Emperor’s mess”  after the Emperor Franz Josef, who apparently liked it so much he ate his wife’s serving too.

I first tried this on a skiing holiday in Kitzbuhel in Austria, many moons ago. I couldn’t remember the name, so it’s taken me until now to find a recipe. My first attempt was out of balance, with too much pancake and not enough apple for my taste, so I’ve adjusted the proportions. After a bit more research I found some recipes include raisins soaked in rum and so I’ve added them to the recipe as an optional extra.

75g butter
4 apples, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
3 large eggs, separated into two large bowls
2 Tbs sugar (to taste)
1 cup plain flour
Pinch salt
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla essence
4 Tbs raisins soaked for an hour in 3 Tbs Rum (optional)
Icing sugar to serve

Heat 25g butter in a medium to large non-stick frying pan (25-30cm) and cook the apples, stirring, until softening and starting to colour. Add the soaked raisins, if using, then tip out into a bowl and wipe out the pan. With electric beaters, whip egg whites until soft peaks form, then add the sugar and continue to whip until you have a thick, glossy meringue.

Using the electric beaters, gradually add the sifted flour, salt, milk and vanilla to the bowl containing the egg yolks. The beaters need to be clean for the egg whites, but  there’s no need to wash them before you do the egg yolk mixture. Using a spatula, gradually fold the meringue into the egg yolk mixture.

Heat 25g butter in the frying pan. Tip in the pancake mixture and cook for 3 minutes, or until the base is golden, then turn over and cook the other side. It’s not easy to turn a large pancake, so an easy solution is to cut it into four while it’s in the pan and turn each quarter separately. Don’t worry if it breaks a bit.

When golden on both sides, tip pancake onto a plate and using two forks tear it into bite-size pieces. Wipe out the pan and put it back on the heat with the remaining 25g butter. Add the pancake pieces. Cook, stirring, until golden, then add the apples and raisins and cook for another 2 minutes, stirring. Divide between 4 serving plates and dust with sifted icing sugar.

Serves 4

 

Brussels Sprouts with Black Garlic & Pasta

Posted on by
Reply

Black garlic is sweet and pungent. Ottolenghi calls it “licorice meets balsamic meets essence of garlic.” I have heard it called  Poor Man’s Truffles.

Like all vegetables, Brussels sprouts, which our mothers and grandmothers loved to boil to death, are completely transformed by roasting in a hot oven. This is a delicious recipe from Yotam Ottolenghi which I have adapted with the addition of pasta and a couple of tweaks to turn it from a vegetable side dish into a vegetarian main course for four. By the way, I used Orecchiette pasta shapes which look a bit like mushrooms in the photo!

A friend lent us a black garlic-making machine. It looks a bit like a rice cooker and you just put the garlic heads in for 270 hours on a very low heat. We had to banish it to the garage because it was stinking the house out, but now we have plenty of black garlic. You should be able to find black garlic at your local farmer’s market.

500g brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved lengthways
3 Tbs olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste
1 tsp cumin seeds
12 black garlic cloves
2 Tbs fresh thyme leaves or 1 Tbs dried
30g butter
2 Tbs pumpkin seeds
1 Tbs lemon juice
1 Tbs Tahini
250g pasta of your choice, cooked al dente
Sesame seeds, toasted, to garnish

Preheat oven to 200°C and put the water on to boil for the pasta.

Place sprouts in a bowl with 1 Tbs of the oil and salt and pepper to taste. Mix well then spread out in one layer on a baking sheet lined with baking paper. Bake for 10-15 mins until golden brown but still crunchy.

Meanwhile lightly crush the cumin seeds in a pestle and mortar, then place in food processor with the black garlic, thyme and the remaining 2 Tbs of olive oil. Blitz to form a paste.

Cook pasta according to package instructions. In a large wok or frying pan heat the butter until it turns a nutty brown. Add the black garlic paste, sprouts, pumpkin seeds, lemon juice and tahini. Cook, stirring, for 2-3 mins, then add the cooked pasta and a little of the cooking liquid. Check seasoning.

Serve in 4 individual bowls sprinkled with the sesame seeds.

Serves 4