Two ways with beetroot

Leafing through my Riverford Farm cookbook the other day it struck me that I don't think I've ever eaten a beetroot. The strong smell and psychadelic colour of the pickled variety have always put me off, and I'd never really considered it as a stand-alone vegetable. Still, I'm all for trying to challenge my taste buds these days, so I resolved to cook beetroot next time I found it for sale. Funny how as soon as I decided that, I spotted it in the farmshop.

The recipe I chose was a beetroot gratin, from the Riverford cookbook. I wasn't sure I was ready for cooking the beetroot and eating it whole and unadulterated, so a slight dilution with cream, garlic and summer savoury from the garden seemed a good beginners beetroot choice. I did also cheat a little by using 350g beetroot and 200g potato rather than all beetroot.

I have to say, I was worried. The thought of dinner potentially being disgusting when you are really hungry is not funny. I should have trusted in Riverford though. Afterall, they haven't let me down before.

Despite the dish coming out of the oven looking distinctly alarming:


And staining both the smoked haddock and cabbage which I served with it a vibrant shade of pink:


It was actually a really lovely dish. Subtle flavoured, creamy, and a lighter and less stodgy version of a dauphinoise. If I feel like staining the kitchen and my fingers bright pink again I'll make this for dinner. Very tasty.

As the beetroot was sold by the bunch I was left with a couple of beetroot globes to use up. I keep reading how good beetroot is in cake - like carrots it helps fruit or chocolate cakes stay wonderfully moist. Further on in the Riverford book I discovered a recipe for a carrot/beetroot cake. Dan had requested cake for work as he's leaving for a new job, so I figured I had to live up to my reputation for providing unusual foodstuffs. No standard Victoria sponge for the office then: they were going to get a beetroot and carrot cake. And if they decided it was too wierd to eat then all the more for me!

The batter was a truly alarming bright pink colour, but I'm pleased to say that once it was baked it had only a subtle pink tinge, which was much more appealing!



Apparently some people did turn their noses up at the cake. Wierd how the thought of beetroot in a cake is repulsive to some people, but eating food stuffed full of chemicals is just fine with them! Those that did try the cake did like it, and Dan even had a request for the recipe.

My assessment of the recipe is that it either needs the addition of some spices, like nutmeg or cinnamon, or it needs a cream cheese icing. So, some tweaking required, but a fairly decent cake.

The recipe can be found here.

Blackberry and apple season

Its harvest time of year, and around our village there is plenty of evidence of an abundant year for apples. Lots of houses have big boxes of bramleys and assorted eating apples outside with 'please help yourself' signs. And if they're offering...well, it would be rude to turn them down!

I've noticed blackberries have been less successful this year. I've managed a couple of tubs full, but not the quantities that are normally easily found at this time of year. Still, for this week's recipe apples were the key ingredient, blackberries just the finishing flourish. A classic combination, and one I never get tired of, but this time I used them in a different way (normally the pudding at this time of year is Blackberry and apple crumble). There was finally space in the freezer, so I decided to try making Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's recipe for Bramley yoghurt Ice with Blackberry sauce swirl.

I stewed the apples with sugar, purreed them, added a little honey (things seem less sweet when frozen so a little extra sweetness seemed appropriate - Hugh suggests icing sugar but I prefered the idea of honey) and left them to cool while I went out blackberry picking.



Fresh blackberries acquired I set about making a blackberry sauce by stewing them with a little sugar and cinnamon, then sieving them to leave just a thick blackberry juice.



While this cooled I mixed the apple puree with a little yoghurt and churned it in the icecream maker:



When it had finished I drizzled the blackberry sauce over the top and transfered it to the freezer for a few hours.


(sorry - not focused, but this was the only snap I took!)

Mine actually ended up sitting in the freezer for a few days before we got round to eating some of it, so it needed to sit at room temperature for 10 minutes to soften a little before eating. I loved this. Its one of my favourite flavour combinations anyway, and a healthy, creamy, frozen pudding is a beautiful thing.

Lobster - at last!

Week 52 of this project seemed to call for something extraordinary. Who'd have thought it would last a year?
And so, given that Lobster Thermidor was the first recipe onto the list it was time to finally cross it off.

Lobster is not a meal that you can just throw together easily - it required planning and skiving off work early to make it to the fishmonger before they closed. (I didn't think my colleagues would appreciate live lobsters crawling round the communal fridge all afternoon if I bought them at lunch time!)

So lobsters procured, I headed home to start the preparation.
Fortunately Dan had been away for a few days, so he wasn't there while I was preparing the lobsters. Which saved me from enduring him laughing himself silly when I jumped about 6 foot from shock when one of the lobsters wriggled as I picked it up. I'd put them in the freezer for an hour and expected them to be alot more lethargic than they were!

I decided to go with the Hugh F-W version of Lobster Thermidor, which uses bechemal sauce instead of double cream. I made a good thick sauce, then fried some shallots in a little butter until they were softened and added a glass of white wine. Once the wine had mostly reduced I added the bechemal and some tarragon, stirred everything together and allowed it to bubble for a minute or so. After that I seasoned it, added a pinch of cayenne pepper, and a small handful of grated gruyere. This can be set aside until needed.

So to the lobster.....I plunged it straight into a pot of rapidly boiling, heavily salted water, slammed the lid on and felt like a murderer.



It died fairly fast though, so I wasn't too badly traumatised. I don't imagine the lobster appreciated it much though. 12 -15 minutes later...voila...cooked lobster.



Then I had to dismember it - twist off the claws, crack them, and haul out the meat; cut the lobster in half, fish out the inedible bits; Mix the edible parts (including the claw meat) with the sauce made earlier, then pile it back into the lobster shells. Grate a little more gruyere over the top then whack it under a hot grill for 5 minutes.

I served it with crunchy bread and salad.



The occasion seemed to demand a fire in the room and a glass of champagne...




And then a treat for pudding. I have to confess that I didn't make it, but it was all the better for that. Passionfruit mousse cake from Patisserie Blanc.



Yum.

brown is the new black

This week's theme is brown, which doesn't sound all that appetising I admit.

Over the May bank holiday weekend we went out for the morning to Kingham, where the Kingham Plough was holding a lovely mini-farmers' market. Homemade ice cream was one of the delights on offer, and as its the 2nd time I've seen it recently I had to try a scoop of brown bread ice cream.


(The first time I'd ever seen it was on a day trip to Lower Slaughter in the Cotswolds a few weeks back. Awful name, lovely place.)





Anyway, back to the icecream. It tasted as if the brown bread crumbs had been mixed with demerera sugar and toasted. They still tasted a bit crunchy and crumble-like in the icecream which gave it a nice texture. Tasty.

Also procurred at the farmers market was some fresh brown trout. A very pretty fish with a speckled skin and tender sweet meat.



I've not eaten brown trout before, so since I've had little or no opportunity for cooking this madly busy week I'm counting brown trout as my recipe of the week. I'm sort of cheating and sort of not! I haven't ever cooked brown trout before, and I served it with toasted hazlenuts as suggested in a recipe book, so I think I can bend the rules a little and count this as a recipe: At least its something new! We ate it with aspargus since we're making the most of the super-short period that its in-season.
Our trout was from here.

Also, I couldn't sign off without mentioning the slices of cheesecake we bought at the same event. It was from a stall by the Windrush Valley Goat Dairy, and was light, creamy and not over-sweet. I've bought milk from the same farm before but never the cheesecake. It had a lovely hint of ginger biscuits in the base and was great with some berries on the side.

I have to acknowledge that this was a rather glutinous bank holiday weekend, but I did run over 9 miles on sunday so I think I can justify the food!

Cooking with yoghurt

Dairy products and me do not get along well.

Particularly cheese, cream, and yoghurt. Not a fan, and they always seem to make my stomach hurt. (Although occasionally its worth the risk for a nice bowl of icecream or a slice of cheesecake!)

However, I have been gradually trying to introduce small quantities of milk based products into my diet. With the amount of running I do each week I think my bones probably need a little extra help from the increased calcium.

I've found that goat and sheep products don't give me the same problems as cows' milk, so have been using small amounts of sheeps yoghurt, goats milk, and sheep and goat cheeses.

Although I still wouldn't eat a bowl of yoghurt, not being keen on the taste, I do find it a very good cooking ingredient, particularly with fish. I've been using this fairly regularly of late:



This week I came over all ambitious with a smoked fish lasagne from my 'Nearly Vegetarian' cook book (really old-fashioned but fantastic recipes) - using yoghurt, milk AND cheese in the sauce. Goodness me. Tempting fate.

But hurrah - no tummy ache!

I aquired the cheese at the Chipping Norton Farmers Market a couple of weeks ago - a lovely smooth and creamy cheese. Not too strong flavoured for a cheese novice like me, but nonetheless not mass-produced and flavourless.

I followed this minor miracle with an improvised fish pie along the same lines a few days later (we still had the pot of yoghurt & it needed using!). Again, no problem...

The yoghurt gave the pie a nice tang, and it was lighter than using a traditional white sauce or cream. The cauliflower is in there because we had a load in our vegetable box, but it was a good addition.

Prawn and Cauliflower Pie
enough for 2 fairly generous portions

250g raw king prawns
50g smoked salmon (Dan filched some fom his parents' fridge when he went home for a visit so I threw it in)
100g chopped leek
175g cauliflower
2 cloves garlic - crushed
150g yogurt
25g hard sheeps cheese - grated or finely sliced
Small handful chopped parsley
Sprinkle of chopped dill
Squeeze of lemon
Salt and pepper
300g potatoes

Peel the potatoes. Cook in salted water then mash. Use a little of the yoghurt sauce from the fish mix (see below) to moisten the mash so that it binds together rather than adding extra butter. (You can use butter & milk if you prefer, but this makes it slightly lighter on the calories.)
Chop the cauliflower into bite-sized pieces and cook in salted boiling water. Drain and put to one side to cool slightly.
Chop the leeks and poach for a few minutes in boiling water until softened. Drain and put to one side.
Chop the smoked salmon into strips.
Mix the yoghurt, garlic, herbs, raw prawns, smoked salmon together in a bowl. Add the leek, cauliflower and a squeeze of lemon. Mix again, then add the cheese, season and stir.
Put the fish mixture in the bottom of an oven proof dish. Top with an even coating of mashed potato.
Bake in a preheated oven 180C for half an hour.

I served it with green beans, but peas would be nice too.