I have been making these cider baked pork chops by the king of comfort food – Nigel Slater for a few years now. Very quick to prepare, easy to bung in the oven and just what I needed now that the weather is turning Autumnal. These chops are not at all dry or tough after being roasted in the cider, just make sure you use a good dry cider so that the sauce isn’t too sweet. Having been struggling with the change of light quality these last few weeks but think I have finally cracked the secret…shoot earlier in the day!
It’s starting to smell a lot like Christmas……….. cake….
So yes it’s that time of year again. My fruit had been soaking in booze for a good few days so I took my cue from the wet and grey Sunday afternoon to get baking the first of 6 Christmas cakes.
I’m not sure what the blog etiquette is for annual posts but here are the links to my previous posts for Christmas cake and the boozy fruit that goes in it.
Beef Rendang
I’m not going to lie, this curry takes time but is well worth the investment. This was my second curry from scratch and I am very proud of my first foray into Malaysian curries.
Rendang is a dry curry, the rich spiced coconut sauce caramelising and getting darker as it cooks so be careful to stir it more often towards the end of the cooking time so that the sauce doesn’t burn.
Just don’t think about licking sauce from the lime leaves once you’ve removed them from the pot……after 3 hours of simmering, the sauce is hot and I may now have a scar from the burn on my chin inflicted by lava like sauce dripping from the leaf.
Steak and Ale Pies
I didn’t get chance to enjoy the dish that inspired this steak and ale pie recipe while I was in Edinburgh this summer so upon my return set about making the next best thing. A few years back I ordered a steak and ale pie made with Edinburgh’s Innis and Gunn beer and it was stunning. Luckily London supermarkets sell the stuff so I have never made steak and guinness stew or pie since. You can substitute the Innis and Gunn with another golden beer or Guinness.
Summers Harvest
I shot this over a month ago as I thought the beans were too beautiful to just eat and then didn’t know what to do with the image. These last few weeks have been very busy and stressful with the Olympus photography comp and my birthday celebrations so I’m having a lazy weekend in blog land and will be back with recipes again shortly.
A Real Cuban Mojito
On Friday night I was lucky enough to win tickets to Havana Club’s ‘Nothing Compares to Havana’ rum tasting evening at Kettners in Soho where we learnt about the history of rum, made mojitos in a cocktail making workshop and sipped aged single barrel rum paired with Cuban chocolate. Sadly, I didn’t have my camera with me and to be honest by the end of the evening there was no hope of controlling manual DSLR settings!
It dawned on me on my way home that these were the first really good bar made mojitos since my trip to Cuba back in 2011. Following that trip, I become a massive fan of Havana Club rums and a mojito snob. I rarely order them in London now as they usually taste sour or too much like washing up liquid and I ineviatably end up sending them back, preferring to make them myself at home. Most bars serve them with crushed ice which dilutes the flavour too much so be sure to use ice cubes as they do in Cuba. Sparkling water is also more authentic than soda but either is fine.
I’m sure you have already noticed my ‘make everything mojito favoured’ obsession in my previous posts for mojito ice cream and cupcakes so thought it was about time I shared the recipe for the correct way to make my favourite, and the most popular cocktail in the world.
Fig Frangipane Tarts
My favourite bakery in my hometown does an excellent line in fruit frangipane tarts and vary their filing from raspberries, blackberries, peach and pear so thought I would try a variation using fresh figs seeing as they are so beautiful and in abundance right now.
Please excuse my use of ready-rolled pastry, you can of course make your own, but I have been struggling with toothache this week so feeling grotty and on antibiotics again. When I saw the ready-rolled pastry in the reduced section of my local convenience store last night I saw it as a sign and decided to cheat at the first stage of this recipe.
Chocolate Macarons
My workmate Selwyn recently wowed everyone in the office with her amazing chocolate macarons; a surprise raspberry hidden in the centre amongst the chocolate ganache. I immediately demanded her recipe and have spent a good few weeks tearing my hair out every time I removed batch upon batch of wrinkly chocolate biscuits from the oven but finally my tenacity paid off and I seem to have cracked it! I’m not entirely sure what ‘it’ is in the mastering of macarons but it seems my oven is uneven in its distribution of heat and so a few crinkles are still evident on the biscuits at far flung corners of the baking trays but they all taste the same.
In my research I found some very useful templates courtesy of http://www.puregourmandise.com to place under your baking parchment to get uniform piped circles. Click here for small 3.5cm templates and here for medium 5cm templates. I discovered these saved time drawing round a shot glass and you can just slip the template out after piping and reuse.
Shortbread
In my quest for the perfect shortbread I discovered the gold standard seems to be a 3-2-1 formula for quantities of flour-butter-sugar and Claire Clark’s family recipe is held highly as one of the best so in honour of my annual trip to Edinburgh for the Fringe Festival I thought I would bake up the most Scottish thing I could think of. While this was lovely vanilla-y shortbread I have to say I prefer mine buttery with a hint of salt so probably wouldn’t add the vanilla seeds again but take your pick between vanilla or salt.
Shortbread
Ingredients
225g spelt or plain flour, sifted
150g unsalted butter, softened
75g caster sugar
1 vanilla pod, seeds removed or a pinch of salt
50g granulated sugar for dusting
Preheat the oven to 180c or gas mark 5 and line a baking sheet with baking parchment.
Sift the flour into the bowl of a stand mixer and add the sugar and vanilla seeds or salt.
Chop the butter roughly over the dry ingredients and then set the mixer on low with the k beater until a dough forms.
Transfer the dough to a floured surface and gently roll out until approximately 1cm thick and cut into 15 fingers.
Move the fingers carefully to the lined baking sheet leaving some space between each biscuit as they will spread slightly and cook for 15 minutes.
Turn the tray around and cook for a further 10 minutes until the shortbread are a pale golden colour then remove from the oven and lightly dust with granulated sugar before leaving to cool on the tray.
A short interruption in normal transmission…
I have ummed and ahhed about this post all morning. Your usual weekly recipe post was thwarted by defective chocolate macarons which emerged from the oven not once but twice this weekend looking more like a cats bum than the perfectly smooth, shiny offerings at Ladurée.
I had intended to keep my audience eye view gig photography away from Fork and Pixel but I’m going to need to call on your help shortly as I found out this morning that I have been shortlisted as one of three potential finalists in the Olympus Protégé competition in the music category.
I entered my shot of live favourites We Are Scientists taken at XOYO last summer and will be up against the other entrants in a public vote shortly. As soon as I have more details and more importantly the link for voting, I will share it with you.
Fork and Pixel 