Cocktails and baking

First things first: the most important recipe for this week was clearly tonight's Vodka Gimlets. Yummy. I'm coming over all Mad Men! Shame we didn't have Martini glasses - clearly something for the shopping list.



I don't know what's got into me lately, but I'm really enjoying trying out new bread methods. The freezer's now completely chock full of bready things, so I must stop baking. Afterall, I have enough in store to last me many many weeks!

Having made Bialys the other week, I used up some of the yeast I had leftover from last weekend's baking-fest to try out bagels. Dan Lepard's column in The Guardian gave me the recipes for bagels and bialys. I also tried out the Light Rye Flatbread from his book The Handmade Loaf (bought on impulse when browsing in Foyles last week).



So the verdict? Well clearly I need to make larger holes in my bagels next time! But other than that they were lovely and chewy on the inside with a good crunchy crust. The flatbreads were well-flavoured from the rye flour, and good with soup or houmous.



Flushed with the success of my first bagel batch I tried a second lot - this time my favourite cinnamon and raisin flavour. I should have checked how much white flour I had left! I ended up using 2/3 white to 1/3 wholemeal, which worked out OK, but they didn't have quite that same chewy texture. White flour's clearly the way to go in future. But, as you can see, I did do better on the holes.

Bready baking

Oh yuuummmmy. I really struggled to only eat one of these lovely fruity spiced buns. I could have happily gobbled the lot in one go. I made a hot cross bun dough, but since it isn't even Lent yet, let alone Easter, I didn't put the crosses on the top.

They were beautifully soft, slightly sticky from a bit of honey brushed on the top, and properly fruity from all the dried fruit.

Delicious.

Daring Cooks February Challenge

This month's Daring Cooks Challenge got me excited - it was a Japanese recipe. Perfect as I have a Japanese cook book which I rarely use, and that makes me feel a little guilty. The challenge was to make a cold soba noodle salad and some kind of tempura. Tempura has been on my wishlist for quite some time, so it was great to have the push to finally attempt it.

So as to assuage my cookbook guilt I tried a recipe from my own book rather than taking up one of the suggestions given by Daring Cooks, but I kept in the spirit of the challenge. I made soba noodles with a dipping sauce made from shoyu (japanese soy), mirin, water and bonito powder, and served them garnished with nori (crisp seaweed), with spring onions and wasabi paste on the side. For my tempura I chose a mix of green beans, prawns, and baby corn. It all made a fantastic lunch.



I had been confident that Dan would like the tempura (its deep fried - a no brainer!), but I was surprised and pleased by how much he enjoyed the noodle dish too. Definitely one to do again. Although, I made a massive mess in the kitchen!



The February 2011 Daring Cooks’ challenge was hosted by Lisa of Blueberry Girl. She challenged Daring Cooks to make Hiyashi Soba and Tempura. She has various sources for her challenge including japanesefood.about.com, pinkbites.com, and itsybitsyfoodies.com

Bialys

Continuing my exploration of bread-baking, I made bialys for breakfast. There's nothing quite like fresh bread for breakfast. MMmmmmmmmm.

I came across bialys for the first time when investigating how to make bagels. They're alot like bagels in that they have a lovely cispy crust and a chewy doughy interior. The best thing about bialys though is how low effort they are! I mixed up a batch of dough on friday night and left in the fridge until sunday morning. Then I shaped it, let it rise for an hour while I had coffee and read a magazine. Then it was a matter of 12 minutes in the oven for lovely fresh breakfast bread.

I haven't made bagels yet, so that's for another time.

The recipe was adapted from Dan Lepard's recipe published in The Guardian. I left out the black olives to make them a bit more breakfasty. I wasn't sure about the onion top for breakfast, but I tried it anyway and it was tasty. It may not be the point, but these would be good without the topping too - just warm with jam or honey.

Here's the recipe.

Pad Thai

The BBC is a marvellous thing. I had half a pack of scallops and half a bag of prawns, as well as some red curry paste left over from a thai curry I made last week. Hmmmm...what to make? I didn't have any bright ideas. But then I typed those three ingredients into the BBC food website, and it delivered up Queen scallop Pad Thai.

Here's the work in progress:



It was the perfect quick dinner - I cooked the noodles and chopped most of the vegetables the night before and then it was a matter of 15 minutes to throw it altogether when I got back from my run. I did cheat my using bought curry paste, and I substituted beansprouts for green beans.

It was yummy. Here's the recipe.

Sweet or sour?

Over the last week I have made it my mission to discover if I do actually like Sweet 'n' Sour. For the last 31 years I have always thought I didn't, but I'd only ever had it out of a jar or from a dodgy takeaway. It seemed like time to discover if the real thing was more palatable.

I started out with a Thai sweet and sour recipe. It was subtle - basically just pineapple added to a prawn stirfry - and a good introduction to the concept for someone like me (ie someone who doesn't like gloopy sauces or pineapple very much!).
It was manageable, didn't put me off, but I wouldn't bother to make it again. It was just a little unexciting.

So, next up I thought I'd best go for the real deal - a Chinese version, complete with more pineapple (still not that keen), ketchup (don't like it), sugar and vinegar. It wasn't boding well, but I couldn't give up now! The trusty BBC came up with a recipe I thought I could handle; Simon Rimmer's Sweet and Sour Chicken Balls (find the recipe here).

The verdict? Definitely edible, but just not really my bag. I really liked the chicken meatballs, so I'll make those again, but sweet and sour sauce is not going to become a fixture in my life.

So there you have it. I tried it, and my Mum always said as long as I tried something I didn't have to eat it again if I really didn't like it.

And thinking of childhood things, I also made proper, baked in the oven Rice Pudding at the weekend. Such a childhood favourite for me - served with a spoon of homemade rasberry jam of course! Dan had never had the real deal. His rice pudding had always come out of a tin, which is frankly a horrible travesty of the concept!