Pum-pum-pumpkin.

Well. What a long time. Again. So straight onto the pumpkin in a can. Bought last year with the view to making a pumpkin pie that never materialised. I decided it needed using this year despite the 2013 use by date (I know, the wonders of modern technology) mainly because it was taking up my limited cupboard space.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies This was my first time using measuring cups and it was, actually, quite liberating. Truly. Thank you my American colleague Veggie K of The Famous Potato Party for the lending of the cups. I will return them, promise.

I am assured by VKofTFPP that even real American chefs use canned pumpkin and I have to say if definitely cut my post work snoozy baking time quite nicely.

I've never used so much spice in a recipe. Multiple tablespoons of ground cloves, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg (my addition) went into this recipe so opening the oven during cooking made my eyes water. Ouchy.

I really really enjoying baking these and it was nothing to do with the gin martini with extra olives. Easy to make, pleasing to bake and fun to assemble! I absolutely hate butter icing (oily sweet bleurgh) so my whoopie pies were filled with mascarpone sweetened with icing sugar and a little cinnamon.

I only took one not so good picture of a finished pie but should have taken more before they went to work.

TA-DA!

Say hello to the gob, the bob or the BFO.

More to come. Defo.

Battered quince.

I have been patiently watching and waiting for the right moment to pick the fruit from the big old quince tree that hangs over the wall near my flat. When I got home from work yesterday evening it looked like someone had decided to give it a helping hand. All the fruit from our side of the wall was now lying on the ground with a few artistically piled up on a low wall. Hm. So this morning, in my pajamas and slightly manic bed hair, I gathered up the least battered, intent on jam.



Look at the quince and it's textured paving slab bruise. Poor quince.

Quince facts. Related to apples and pears, you don't see the quince around very much now. There is an ornamental version with very pretty coral coloured flowers which much more popular. Like the medlar, it's a traditional fruit used mostly for jams, jellies and for stewing. Bright yellow when ripe, the fruit gives off a sweet, slightly tar-like perfume. Sounds odd but actually rather nice.

Having hoarded empty jars (sorry Dr W) for most of the year it was probably best that I continued the jam theme.

1 kg jam sugar
About 8 fist sized quince (or equivalent)
2 lemons
Water

Zest and juice the lemons. Pour the lemon juice into the bottom of the pan that you intend to use. Peel, core and chop the quince into small pieces putting them in the pan with the lemon juice as you go. This stops them discolouring. Bleurgh. Pour in just enough water to cover, add the zest and boil until soft which doesn't take long.

When soft, mash the fruit with a potato masher (yes!), add the sugar, bring to the boil and stir to dissolve the sugar. Turn down the heat and stir often until the jam thickens and turns pinkish. Pour into hot sterilised jars (wash well then in the oven for 10mins at 200°C) and seal with lids then leave to cool. PLEASE BE CAREFUL OF HOT JARS! Ouchy. Made one big pickle jar and two normal sized jars. Good for toast and pheasant.

So, back to the carrots.

Once again it's been a little while since my last post. And again, sorry about that. It's been a summer of full weekends and rather tired, easy, cheap, not particularly bloggable weekday suppers. We've eaten a lot of chickpeas. A lot of pasta. And a lot of Quorn. *yawn*

But with Autumn pretty much upon us and Winter ominously looming I promise, PROMISE, pies, stews, soups and baked goods various.

Anyway, spurred on by my jam making success earlier in the year I thought I'd give it another go. And in the spirit of the blog I chose carrot jam. Yes. Carrot jam. Why? Well, post jam making I'm not sure it was my best choice but it's not unpleasant. Just, um, unusual. See Hugh for the recipe.

Now for the justification. Try and get through this bit. Carrot jam may sound unusual but the carrot was massively important during the rationing of WW2. Really, it's a jam of necessity but as vintage is very popular these days I figure that carrot jam is cool. Yes.

A few words of warning. Only make this jam if you have a food processor. Or over-developed arm muscles for grating. Do not just use granulated sugar. Use jam sugar with added pectin to help it set. I trusted Hugh and used granulated and I was there for a loooooong time. I only got it to set (ish) by adding more sugar when I had finally got bored of waiting.

So the final product, with it's cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, is like the jam equivalent of carrot cake. Miss Hurley Burley at work suggested a good piece of tangy, crumbly wensleydale cheese to accompany it. I think she's right. Think chilli jam not strawberry and it's not so weird. Well...

Tart.

Gypsy tart. It's mostly sugar. It will give you a headache. It is delicious. Make it. Niffa makes a good one.

Only from Kent.

Good Morning Alfie Cat.

Simple things.

Pretty garden.
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Sunshine, morning coffee.
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And a very friendly puss cat.
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Love.

These are a few of my favourite things.

Hi there. It's been a while. Which is ridiculous as there has been lots of nice food over the past two months. Sorry about that.

It's been holiday time so Dr W & I have been to East Sussex, Cambridgeshire, Kent, London, Hampshire and back to Somerset. Wowza.

We were totally spoilt by friends and family and we were, of course, very well fed.

I will tell you about all this but first the table that greeted us on arrival at D&R's in lovely Faversham.

That is a table of tasty favourite things. Cheeses, salami, chorizo, salad, pickles, bread, WINE. Super.

Yak Yeti Yak Yeti Yak Yeti Yak

Birthday treats for Dr W. A visit to Nepalese Restaurant Yak Yeti Yak. Having never eaten Nepalese food, I had absolutely no idea what to expect. My geography is also unreliable so I did have to familiarise myself to exactly where Nepal was. It's here. By the way. Just in case.

So, drinks. A banana lassi for Dr W (pudding in a glass) and a limey iced-tea for me. Virtuous. Gin tonight.

We started with poppadoms and spiced pork momo, the Nepalese dumpling. Delicious steamed dough with a filling of cumin spiced minced pork. Slightly spicy but with the type of warm heat that you get from lots of pepper rather than chilli. I could (but should not) eat a lot of these!

For our mains we chose Yak Yeti Yak chicken and pork bhutuwa (see menu) served with bhat (rice) and musurko dal (lentils).

All in all pretty awesome food! Recognisably Indian spices but with cleaner flavours and less of the ghee rich sauces. Also served on hot, shiny brass plates called thali. Very pretty yes please.



A really lovely meal. Well made food, friendly service and cosy restaurant.


Finished! When can we go back?

Q. What did the cheese say when looking in the mirror?

A. Halloumi!

Crispy halloumi with cous-cous, salad and caper dressing.

Prepare the cous-cous and salad, dust the halloumi with flour and fry until golden and crispy.

Put walnut oil (I ran out of olive oil), lime juice (no lemons), capers, salt, pepper and sugar to taste in a clean jam jar and shake! This is fun.

Oh, and there's some roasted butternut squash in there too. Yum.

Kweetch.

End of veg box quiche.

Courgette, leeks and mushrooms cooked in a little butter until soft. Put veg in a blind baked pastry case and pour over whisked eggs, whole grain mustard, cream cheese (cake leftover) and grated cheese.

Garnish with tomato. First use of the word "garnish" in the blog. I think. May there be many more.

Bake until golden and firm.

Birfday.

Dr W's birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAYZ! Crank's carrot cake.

150 g grated carrot
2 eggs (from happy chickens)
100g brown sugar
5 tbsp rape seed oil (sold as common-or-garden vegetable oil, check the label!)
100g self-raising flour
1tsp ground cinnamon & 1tsp ground nutmeg
50g desiccated coconut & 50g sultanas


Whisk the eggs and sugar until fluffy and whisk in oil gradually. Fold in all the other ingredients and bake until golden and it passes the skewer test. Proper simple.

Piped (oh yes) with sweetened, lemony cream cheese and decorated with orange and lemon jelly slices. Retro fun!

This cake is the carrot cake my mum makes. And it's the reason why I dislike most other spongy, oily, overly cinnamony carrot cake.

Like all Crank's veggie recipes, it's well considered and packed with flavour. Buy a Crank's book. It's pretty easy to find original 1980s copies in charity shops for not much money. You do have to be a BIG fan of cheese, nuts and pastry though... Oh hang on!

(p.s. hello again)

Pie Love You.

Winter food. In May. And why not.

Beef, carrots, onions and garlic cooked slowly with bay, red wine and stock until soft and melty which will take about 3 hours. Worth it!

Cook thick slices of fat field mushrooms in butter and mix with the beef.

Put in dish of choice and top with pastry of choice. In my case, puff.

Brush with beaten egg (for the shiny), bake and think of snow.

Falafel fun times.

Falafel. Did you just think doner? Avoiding or joining (dirty) the kebab queue 2am Sunday morning? No. Well yes. But don't rule out this quick and tasty street food. Street food's very on trend... Yup.

Yes I cheated. It is very easy to make falafels from scratch (as Nigel will show you) but I like this mix. It's probably as close as I get to putting a plastic container of spaghetti carbonara in the microwave. It's also very cheap which is awesome.

Served with parsley and tomato cous-cous (not "coos-coos" Delia), cucumber, yoghurt and lemon.

Season dry cous-cous, just cover with boiling water and leave to stand until the water is absorbed. When cool (-er/-ish) fluff with a fork, add chopped parsley, fresh tomato and a little olive oil.

Make your falafels a la Nigel or as per the box. Add lemon juice and S&P to taste to plain yoghurt and use for dipping.

Falafel goodness. Not just for the early hours of the morning.

The Elephant Garlic.

As well as our venison sausages, the farmers market also provided us with THE BIGGEST CLOVE OF GARLIC I'VE EVER SEEN. A whole 60p bought me one clove of elephant garlic from the Isle of Wight.

Fancy food for a fancy clove of garlic. Lemon and garlic baked chicken on gnocchi with leeks and cheese. Odd? Well yes. But good.

The chicken thighs were baked with a quartered lemon, the whole MASSIVE garlic clove, S&P and olive oil.

Cook sliced leeks and two (normal sized) garlic cloves with a little olive oil and a splash of water until soft. When the chicken is pretty much cooked (juices running clear), boil the gnocchi for 2 mins (they will float to the top of the water) and mix with the soft leeks and (optional) strong cheese of your choice. Season to taste and serve.

Ok so it was quite garlicky.

Actually very garlicky.

Which was fine for me but poor Dr W did struggle a bit with the garlic burn so omit the garlic from the leeks if you think it might be too much for you. Chicken.

Dr W can cook.

I have been treated this week. Dr W, who works about an hour away from home compared to my ten minutes, has managed to get home before me and start cooking.

I realise that I do take over in the kitchen. I am aware of this. And it's a bit silly because Dr W is a very good cook but for practical reasons I generally cook because I get home first.

But this week has been lovely. When Dr W and I were first together and when I used to work irregular late shifts he would cook me toad in the hole for when I got home. Nice man.

Dr W's Toad. Cook the sausages with a little oil and make a batter using the following- 110g plain flour, 290ml milk, 2 eggs, salt and mustard powder.  Chill the batter for as long as possible and when the sausages are starting to brown, turn the oven up and pour the batter over them and cook until risen and crispy. We use a deep dish so that you get a crispy Yorkshire pudding top and a nice doughy underneath. Use a wide, shallow dish if you want crispy all over!

We've also had pork meatballs (minced pork, egg, breadcrumbs, Worcestershire sauce, S&P) with fried mushrooms and potatoes cooked in a delicious veg stock (made with end of veg box onion, carrots & leeks).

Meat and three veg. Excellent venison sausages (same as the toad, 2 packs for £5!) with savoy cabbage, very carrotty carrots and mashed swede. With red onion gravy.

Cook the sausages in the oven, boil and mash the swede with butter, S&P, steam/boil the carrots & cabbage. Cook the thickly sliced onion in olive oil until soft then add water from the carrots, a good stock cube, a splash of sherry vinegar and a sprinkle of mustard powder.

We had eaten very well this week. All thanks to Dr W.

AmSam misses...

...Lyon's Maid Zoom ice lollies.

This is not a Zoom. This is a generic rocket lolly. Very different in all but shape and not a patch on the original.

The original had layers of blackcurrant and raspberry ice with a curious love-it-or-hate-it creamy banana layer. All in suitably luminous colours of course.

For me, a Zoom lolly is school holidays in the Channel Islands, rockpools, blow up dinghys and slightly sandy salad cream egg sandwiches. Bring the Zoom back please. Colourings, additives, sugar and all.

Dancing disco primrose.

I have finally got round to using my Secret Santa presents. Disco Primrose edible glitter and blue and white polkadot cupcake cases.

The cupcakes were based on Nigella's recipe with, of course, a few variations!

Beat 200g caster sugar with 175g good marg (butter is richer but heavier) then add 2 eggs. Mix in 200g self-raising flour, 40g cocoa and 150ml sour cream.

Keep an eye on them while they bake and test with a skewer when they have risen. A few minutes makes the difference between moist (sorry to use that word) and just too dry.

Topped when warm with a syrup made from sugar, cocoa and water (nothing fancy) and sprinkled with the glitter.

I have never made anything so garish in my entire life. The pictures don't really do them justice. They disappeared pretty quick at work though! 

Macaroni winning.

Macaroni cheese divides opinion. It does. A dish with so much potential for variation that can absolutely delicious or truly awful.

My university halls only had basic kitchens. Fridge, kettle and microwave. One day I decided to buy a tin of Heinz Macaroni Cheese. I remember unpleasantly soft pasta, a slightly powdery sauce and a taste like 1980s pre-grated Parmesan. Vom. I covered the bowl with a tea towel, put it in the corner of my room and my best friend had to remove it for me. Bleurgh.


It doesn't have to be like this. Neither should it be bland, stodgy or dull.

Cook the macaroni in salted water until just done. There should still be a little bite. Make a white sauce like you would for a cauliflower cheese. I added strong grated cheese, a finely chopped garlic clove, grated nutmeg, mushroom ketchup for spice and seasoned with lots of black pepper and a little salt to taste.

Remember a white sauce is just a base so experiment. Add cooked onions, mustard (grainy, strong etc), bacon, ham, chorizo, different types of cheese, a little cream or mascarpone for richness, mushrooms, spring onions or try using different spices and herbs. Taste it as you go.

All you need to do then is pour the sauce over the macaroni, top as desired (cheese, breadcrumbs etc) and grill or bake until crispy.

A whole world away from the Heinz of the early noughties.

Tastes like a health food shop...

Last night was kale night. The big smooshy (it's a word) bag of kale. Also good for playing kale Jenga. See picture.

Stir-fried kale with marinated tofu and egg-fried rice. AmSam style. Totally non-authentic.

By the time decided what we were going to eat the shops were shut. Rubbish Sunday shopping. Is it like this in other countries?! So Dr W headed off to McColls for rice/noodles and came back with Uncle Ben's boil in the bag rice. I am uncomfortable about admitting to the use of BITB rice. It's just not right.

The rice was boiled. In it's bag. Hm. Scrambled an egg, added the cooked rice and chopped fresh tomato (Ching told me to). It should have been finished with spring onions, soy sauce and sesame oil. But, due to bad planning and lack of supermarkets, in my case onion, soy and toasted sesame seeds. Not quite the same.

The kale was stir fried with ginger, garlic, chilli (slightly too much. hah. hot.) and soy sauce with, as requested by Dr W, matchstick carrots.The tofu was fried until coloured and slightly crispy.

A bit of of a mish-mash but good. Except the tofu which tasted like a health food shop. I will marinate my own in future.

Real life spoiler.

Dr W being served at the Euston Tap by Tim Andersøn from Masterchef 2011 currently airing on the BBC. 


Guess he didn't win then.


...
 
Good pub with a brilliant selection of beers. Well worth a visit.

Purple sprouting...

Veg Box Wednesday! Beetroot, courgettes, curly kale, vine tomatoes, red pepper and the usual potatoes, onions and carrots. Roll on summer veg please.

I do like how Abel & Cole have presented their kale like a bag of candy floss at a fairground (on a stick would be a little hopeful). A big pillow of kale. I'm not a big kale fan and this makes me want to eat it! Or cuddle it... Hm.

Anyway. Supper tonight was treat supper for tired people. Purple sprouting broccoli (last weeks box) pasta bake with anchovies. Will serve four hungry people or two hungry people with plenty left over!

Cook one onion, three fat garlic cloves and a tin of anchovies in olive oil until soft. Add two tins of tomatoes and a small pot of double cream (treats). Simmer and season to taste with salt (remember the anchovies) and black pepper.

In a wide, deep dish put the dried pasta and broccoli. Pour the sauce over the pasta and top up with vegetable stock (not too strong) until the pasta is just covered with liquid. Bake at 200°C until the liquid is absorbed and the top is crunchy which is about 45mins. I put mozzarella on the top about 15mins before I took it out the oven.

It's rich. And good for sleepy people.

Green beer and other stories.

Check out my Alien Veg: Part II. A celeriac bulb the size of my head. Like a swirly, celery-scented Saturn.

My parents came to stay this weekend just gone and treated us to a big bit of Hampshire pork. So I roasted it. I wanted crackling.

Turn the oven to 240°C. Dry and score the skin then rub generously with salt. Cook at the high heat for about 25 mins and this will get the skin bubbling. Turn the oven down to 200°C then cook for 25 mins per pound. Always make sure that pork is cooked all the way through.

The roast pork was served with celeriac and potato boulangère, red cabbage, parsley carrots and stuffing balls cooked around the pork. I choose Paxo. There is delicious, freshly made stuffing out there but this is savoury, comforting and ever so slightly doughy. Oh, and butter your veg. It's Sunday.

For the gravy, if you have a metal roasting pan remove the meat and place the pan on the hob. To the juices from the roasting pan, add the water from the carrots, a good stock cube and cider then sprinkle a little bit of plain flour and whisk over the heat until it looks and tastes like you want it to.

On Saturday night Dr W had drunk a green pint. After the pub he came home looking slightly concerned and was rather relieved after some Internet searching that the beer was in fact meant to be green. Not just a pub with algae affected lines. Phew. He did still drink the green beer even though he wasn't sure it was meant to be green... Hm.

So we took the parents back for a pint of Stonehenge Ales Sign of Spring. Nothing to do with St Patrick's Day. It was lovely. And it was green. Why? We don't know.

A. Food colouring
B. Seaweed
C. Magic

Answer on a postcard please.

Pancake Tuesday!

I take back everything mean that I said about Delia's pancake recipe at work today. They were delicious.

As previously discussed I'm a pancake maverick. I wing it. And always end up with an edible result. But sometimes I have to concede to the weights and measures side of cooking.

Ok, I didn't stick exactly to the recipe but I only changed it slightly.

110g plain flour
2 eggs
200ml milk (add this gradually, you may not need it all)
A melted knob (hehe) of butter
A little caster sugar (in place of Delia's salt)

Whisk all ingredients, except the butter, together until smooth. Melt the butter in the frying pan you intend to use, pour into the batter and whisk again.

Heat a non-stick frying pan and ladle in enough batter to thinly coat the bottom of the pan. Pick up the pan and gently tilt & swirl the batter around the edges until there is no runny batter left. Leave for a minute or so and flip in whichever way you choose.

AmSam's Pancake Tips

1. Don't listen to Delia when she says "I admit it can be a hazardous affair if you don't know the ropes". This is rubbish and why, Delia, cooking scares people.
2. Use a non-stick frying pan. This makes for easy flipping and you won't need to use any extra butter for frying unless you want to.
3. Use a small frying pan. 20cm in my case. Easier to flip and more pancakes to play with.
4. Eat more pancakes.

Final Shrove Tuesday Fact- I was born on Pancake Day. Resulting in a lifelong affinity with said food. Yes. Good excuse.