Birthday goodness

Two books The River Cottage Fish Book and Ottolenghi: The Cookbook. Both look absolutely awesome and I can tell will get a lot of use. I have found my River Cottage Meat Book indispensable over the past year, and with eight weeks off this summer am looking forward to catching as much with my fishing rod as possible!

Also, last night we went out to have dinner at Ottolenghi in Islington with my Dad and Aunty Stella - it was so good, I highly recommend it. The food was delicious, (washed down with a particularly fine Sancerre I might add) and I also loved the fact that the atmosphere was relaxed: it made for a very lovely meal had by all. I did actually take my camera, but like all good meals when it came down to taking pics I thought "Sod that, I'm eating!"

There you go, one very good reason why I am no good at restaurant reviews: too gushy by far. And so, looking forward to the continuation of birthday goodness this evening amongst friends at the Royal Oak. Hurrah.

'tis the season... to eat pie

For someone who enjoys cooking, and lives in hope that England does have the odd dish or two we should remain proud of, it is with some embarrassment that I admit to you that before today I had never cooked a Shepherd's Pie. It's not that I've not wanted to, I've just never found the right recipe, had enough time or ingredients. I could offer more excuses but you get the point - it's just not happened. Anyway, so to cut a long story short, today I finally did - and it was so worth it!

I feel slightly self-conscious that a lot of my recipes seem to endorse the River Cottage - it's not intentional, however it did seem to make sense that the recipe came from The River Cottage Meat Book. I have to say I was very pleased, and felt the need to share - so here you go. As I may have mentioned before with other recipes, the quality of ingredients will obviously affect the final result, and for me the addition of homemade lamb stock in place of water was an absolute winner.

Enjoy!

500g leftover roast lamb (I used fresh mince here, which was fine)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1-2 onions, chopped
1-2 carrots, finely diced
1 garlic clove, chopped
Any juices or gravy saved from the joint, and/or concentrated lamb stock, made from the bone
1/2 glass red wine
1 tablespoon tomato ketchup
1-2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
Up to 1kg creamy mashed potato (enough to cover your dish)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Roughly chop the meat into pea-sized pieces. Use a food processor if you like but be careful to stop whizzing before you turn it into paté. Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan or wide saucepan that will accommodate everything. Sweat the onions, carrots and garlic in the oil until the carrots have softened slightly. You can let the onions brown just a little.

Add the meat and fry gently until nicely browned. Add the gravy or stock, plus the wine, kethup and Worcestershire sauce, then season with salt and pepper. Simmer gently for a few minutes, add a little water if the mixture looks dry. Taste for seasoning and add a little more ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, salt or pepper, as you see fit. Simmer gently for another 20-30 minutes, until the meat is tender and the flavours well blended. Do a final taste for seasoning and adjust as necessary. Again, add a little more water, or wine (or, as I did, stock) to loosen the mixture if you think it needs it. Whilst you want your pie to be juicy, clearly too runny is not good.

Put the meat in a pie dish and pile the mash on top (it's worth noting here that I made my mash quite dry, using just butter, and no milk or cream. The result was a brilliant crispy topping which I can heartily recommend.) Cover the meat completely and rough up with a fork (you can chill or freeze the pie at this point, for reheating later). Bake in a fairly hot oven (200 degrees C/Gas Mark 6) for 25-45 minutes - depending on whether the pie is warm or chilled when it goes in - until the mash is nicely browned on top and the sauce is bubbling up around the edges. Serve at once, ideally with minted peas.

** Warning, although this is supposed to feed 4-6 people (plus I did actually use slightly less ingredients) it didn't go quite that far. In fact, David and I pretty much almost polished this off in one sitting, but I will definitely be making it again, very soon.

A pie fit for a king

There are a certain few foods that gleam like the light at the end of a bad hangover: a good pork pie is one of them. Sadly, it is also one that is now usually comprised of the worst ingredients. If I tell you that I left Poke this week, and therefore suffered extraordinarily bad hangovers (one of which was yesterday), then I’m sure you’ll understand the excitement I felt when David returned from Broadway Market bearing this little fella.

Sadly the only picture I can offer is that of the label; we scoffed it down that greedily! Still, it prompted me to begin to wonder about making one of my own, and would you know it – I have a recipe for just such a thing in my copy of ‘The River Cottage Meat Book’ by Mr Hugh F-W. It looks like a pie fit for kings, but also like quite a project, so I shall have to come back to this one when I get back from Cornwall.

In the meantime, if you fancy getting one of your own, you may order them here. Apparently a good pork pie will keep in the fridge for up to two weeks!

Hugh's Raspberry Fridge Jam

Even more on the subject of jam... I thought it would be good to include this recipe of Hugh's Raspberry Fridge Jam as I've tasted it and it's absolutely delicious. My only excuse for not following this recipe when I made mine was that my local supermarket doesn't stock Preserving Sugar, which has added pectin meaning you can get away with less sugar. It's worth it if you can get it, as you get a real taste of the fruit - it's very fresh and tangy. It's also worth noting that this jam will be loser than a normal one, and not be as set.

Makes about 2kg (around 5-6 jars)

1.5kg fresh raspberries
750g preserving sugar with added pectin

Pick over the raspberries carefully, discarding any leaves and stalks. Put half the fruit in a large bowl and roughly crush the berries, then transfer them to a preserving pan or large, heavy stainless steel pan. Add the remaining fruit and the sugar.

Stir the mixture over a low heat to dissolve the sugar, then bring up to the boil and boil hard for exactly five minutes. Remove from heat, leave to cool a little (this stops the pips rushing to the top of the jar when poured) and pot and seal immediately.

If you want a firmer, more traditional set, boil the jam for 7 minutes and the test for setting point.

Because this jam contains a relatively low proportion of sugar, it will not keep as long as a traditional jam. Once opened refrigerate and use within a few days.

The raspberry jam factory

As previously mentioned I visited The River Cottage recently for the full WI experience (that's Women's Institute). Following that I literally had a jam-making dream for at least 5 nights after - so decided to make some of my very own Raspberry Jam!



To make jam you need to first slowly melt the sugar, being careful not to burn it (as no liquid is added to the fruit and sugar), then quickly get a 'rolling boil' for about 5 minutes (this may vary, depending on what you are actually making). Generally I'm quite pleased with the result, although next time I think would be more careful to get a set with a lower sugar content, as it's a tad on the sweet side. Still all in all, I'd say I felt pretty pleased with myself when I'd finished!

Here's the recipe I used:

Traditional Raspberry Jam
Makes about 2.2kg (5 lb)

1.3kg (3lb) raspberries, washed and drained (it's really important that the fruit is dry!)
1.3kg (3lb) granulated sugar (again, I'd use less next time, and go for Golden Granulated, caster us too fine and is more prone to burning)

Cover the raspberries with sugar and leave over night in a Jam pan (Maslin pan) overnight if possible. This seems to really draw out the juices of the fruit, and is preferable to chucking all in right before putting on the stove.

Put a saucer or two in the freezer - these will be needed later on to test the set.

Cook over a gentle heat for about 10 minutes, taking care not to burn the sugar, but making sure that all is dissolved. No liquid needs to be added, it should just be fruit juice. A tip worth baring in mind here is that it's recommended you try to stir in the same direction, to try and reduce the amount of scum you get.

Once all sugar is dissolved, turn the heat up, stirring all the while to bring the jam up to a full rolling boil. A really big pan is needed, at least twice the size of your volume of ingredients, to ensure that you can get a full rolling boil without worrying about it boiling over. Boil rapidly for 5 minutes and test for a set. This can either be done by placing a teaspoon on one of the saucers from the freezer. Put in the fridge for five minutes. Once it's cooled the surface of the jam should wrinkle when touched, if this is the case it has reached setting point. Another way is to use a thermometer - once the jam has reached 105 degrees C it has generally reached setting point.

Allow the jam to cool for a minute or so - this will prevent the seeds from rising to the top of the jar as it cools down. Pour into sterilised jars and then seal immediately.

For a cheaper version of this you could try substituting half the raspberries with rhubarb or peaches.

Pick your own

Since my trip to the River Cottage last week I have honestly dreamt about making jam every single night, so was pleased to see this little tip in today's Weekend magazine from The Guardian.

Pick Your Own lists out all pick your own farms across the UK, giving you a run down of what each one grows, where you can find them and even recommends what's in season.

River Cottage - continued

As mentioned earlier, I spent Monday at River Cottage HQ. Now in it's third incarnation, River Cottage resides at Park Farm, which can be found in the Axe Valley in Devon (and very beautiful it is too). Although no one lives there at the moment they are renovating the farmhouse, where the livestock chap will live, and are perhaps looking to build an annex ready for people to stay on for holidays.

It's hard to pick from the selection, but inspired by my Elderflower Cordial earlier in the year I decided to go with the 'Preserved' class and learn about the dark arts of jam and chutney. Hugh wasn't actually there, but so much the better, as I found myself in the more-than-capable hands of Pam Corbin and Liz Neville. Pam Corbin is co-founder of 'Thursday Cottage', now owned by Tiptree, whilst Liz Neville is exactly the kind of West Country woman you'd expect to meet at a farmer's market.

Unfortunately we didn't actually get much in the way of hands-on experience, but no matter, as the day was absolutely packed full of demonstrations, recipes, tips and hilarious banter. My cupboards can expect to soon be home to:

- Strawberry and Rhubarb Jam
- Gooseberry Cheese
- Berrybena (A summer berry cordial)
- Bramley Apple Curd (absolutely delicious!)
- Gooseberry and Mint Jelly
- Hugh's Raspberry Fridge Jam (again, delicious)
- Beetroot Chutney
- Salted Lemons (great for Moroccan cooking)

It really was a top, top day - so many thanks to the lovely Pokers! I'm hoping to bring in something for you to sample soon.

The River Cottage

Last year from Christmas I received from Poke the most fantastic pressie of a day out at The River Cottage on one of their courses - which I did on Monday. More to follow on this later, but wanted to post a pic first.

* apologies for the picture quality, I left my camera at home, so had to make do with my phone!