Month: July 2019

How to deal with the courgette tsunami? The best defence is a good offence – get your punches in early. Pick the courgettes when first flowering (no fruit) or when the courgettes are still little babies. Then deep fry them. In beer batter. That will teach them who’s the boss. Seriously, the most divine way to eat courgettes and to reduce your chances of drowning in the courgette tsunami.

It’s easy and you don’t need a deep fryer. You have to be prepared to fry in 2 or 3 inches of hot oil though and have a deep heavy fry pan. The secret to these is to cook them and then eat them as soon as they are cool enough to handle.

Recipe

Ingredients

Stuffing & courgettes

• 12 blossoms (with or without mini-courgettes)
• 250 grams fresh ricotta
• 80 grams freshly grated Parmesan
• salt
• pepper
• nutmeg

Batter

• 125 grams of plain flour
• Pinch of sea salt
• 1 egg yolk
• 175 mls ice cold beer (a good use for lager)

Method

1. Carefully clean the blossoms, check for insects and remove the pistil (hard bit) from the inside of the flowers.
2. Spoon stuffing into each flower. Don’t overfill. They will only be cooking for 2 minutes. You want to be able to pinch the top together and twirl it to seal the filling inside. Lay gently on some kitchen towl.
3. Heat the oil while you’re preparing the batter. Combine the flour and sea salt with a fork in a bowl big enough roll your courgette blossoms in. Then beat in the egg yolk and beer.
4. Check you oil – either use a thermometer (180C) or drop a cube of white bread in. If it goes brown in under a minute, you’re all set.
5. Using a slotted spoon, gently lower the flowers into the oil. 2 to 4 at a time depending on the size of your pan. Cook for two minutes, turning them over half way through.
6. Drain on kitchen towel, sprinkle with some flaky sea salt and serve with lemon wedges.
7. If you have any leftover filling – lovely on toast.

Celebrating English summer, the Wimbledon men’s final and the Cricket World Cup.

This recipe is for a good friend of mine who insists ‘I can’t cook’. This banana bread recipe is made with whole wheat flour and walnuts and has a lovely depth of flavour. And if you can’t cook – your five year old should be able to make this bread (with appropriate adult supervision). It’s a great introduction to the joy of whole grain baking.

We’re back to my retirement quest – cooking every recipe in the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking cookbook. As a quest, it’s completely lacking in organisation and I’m randomly skipping through the book and baking what looks good. Today I was inspired by a request for ‘recipes for someone who doesn’t cook’ and the Davinator’s excess banana purchases. This banana bread recipe is best with the ultra-ripe about to be thrown away bananas – you know that icky black mottled soft to the touch banana. If your bananas aren’t ripe enough, put them in a brown paper back with an apple. Fold the top of the bag closed and leave it overnight. This should convert a ripe banana to an ultra-ripe one.

Basically, the spotty banana to the left is just about ripe enough but if you can bear it – ripen it until more black than yellow. (I forgot to take pictures of the ultra-ripe bananas before I peeled and mashed them). Enough musings on bananas – on to the recipe.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 60 grams (2 ounces) chopped walnuts
• 110 grams (4 ounces) unsalted butter
• 105 grams (3.75 ounces) brown sugar (light or dark)
• 3/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking SODA not baking powder)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 340 – 350 grams (12 ounces) ripe mashed banana (4 or 5 normal sized European bananas – 3 or 4 normal sized American ones)
• 85 grams (3 ounces) honey
• 2 large eggs
• 230 grams (8 ounces) whole wheat flour

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 170C (160C fan) or 350F. Prep your loaf pan or pans. I use two small (450 gram) (1 pound) loaf pans and line them with paper. If you’re using a single loaf pan it needs to be a genuine 9 x 5 or 900 gram (2 pound) pan. I prefer to line with paper but you can also lightly grease with butter.
2. Microwave the butter for about 45 seconds in a microwave safe bowl. Set it to one side.
3. Chop the walnuts. I go back and forth on chopping nuts. This is a small quantity and both taste and texture say ‘chop by hand’. Leave ready in a small bowl.
4. Peel the bananas and mash with a fork or a potato masher.
5. Combine the butter, sugar, soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. Beat well by hand.
6. Add the bananas, honey and eggs, stir well to incorporate into a smooth batter.
7. Add the flour and the chopped nuts and again stir until smooth.
8. Divide between the loaf pans. If using two – you want about 480 to 490 grams of batter in each pan.
9. Two loaves – bake for 40 minutes. At about 30 minutes check the loaves and if they seem too brown on the top, cover loosely with foil. Using your trusty thermometer – the internal temperature should be around 85C.
10. One loaf – bake for 50 minutes. At about 35 minutes check the loaf and cover with foil if the top is looking brown and dry.

This bread smells absolutely delicious when cooking. Try and let it cool before cutting. Enjoy and bake on!

Not everyone loves fish cakes. Making ‘potted fish’ is a different and yummy way to use it up. It’s hard to call it healthy, no matter what fish you start with. The addition of copious amounts of butter and salt may well neutralise the health benefits of the fish. But it’s oh so yummy. The first time I made this I got the salt proportions wrong and the Davinator has not dared to try it again. My cunning plan has worked and I get to eat the potted fish.

What is potting anyway? Potting is making a simple pate or spread with cooked meat, fish or vegetables and butter. Potted food keeps well for a week or longer in the refrigerator and the potting preserves the taste and texture much better than simple refrigeration. Potting transforms leftovers into a lovely light meal or snack. It’s worth a try, if only to save money and the planet.

Most of us are prepared to take steps to help the environment, provided it doesn’t inconvenience us too much (speaking frankly here). We carry reusable bags, we shun plastic straws, we recycle. Not throwing away food is one of the best things you can do for the environment. All food that makes it’s way to your home has a carbon cost and if the food is not eaten, all that carbon is for nothing. I’m not saying eat the scraps but we work hard at not throwing food into the bin.

The recipe below does not include directions for cooking the fish. My assumption is that if you’re reading this blog, you have leftover fish. If you’re staring at an uncooked fish this moment – here’s my blog on baking fish in foil.

I used sea trout in my potted fish, but it will work well all kinds of fish and sea food. It’s traditionally used for what are called ‘brown shrimp’ in the UK, teeny tiny prawns. Any fish that can be flaked or very small crustaceans will go well in this recipe. You may want to experiment with seasonings – the wild sea trout I used had a lovely flavour so I did not want to over season. You know what you like – go for it.

Potted fish, a hunk of sourdough bread and a green salad makes for a lovely lunch or a light dinner. The potted fish also can be used as a sort of ‘stir in’ sauce for pasta. Enjoy.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 2oz/50g butter
• About 4oz/110g cooked sea trout, flaked
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 bay leaf (optional)
• Grind of fresh black pepper (optional)

Method

1. Sterilise a jar for your potted fish. If you just broke into a cold sweat and are about to abandon the recipe, fear not. Watch this video from the BBC on sterilising of jars. Or follow your usual method.
2. Combine all of the ingredients in a heat resistant bowl and mix well.
3. Heat the butter until it fizzes and the milk solids appear as white flecks in the foam. When the milk solids start to go golden brown, remove from the heat and strain the butter through a sieve lined with kitchen towel.
4. Pour most of the clarified butter over the fish mixture, holding back a teaspoon or so for finishing. Pack into your sterilised jar, making sure the mixture is covered with butter. Pour the last teaspoon or so onto the top and close up your jar.

Makes a nice snack for two people and will keep for a week in the refrigerator.

This is the third in a three part series on cooking wild sea trout. And I promise the blog will be less ‘fishy’ for the new few weeks.