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A Game Of Thrones: Pork and Lentil Stew

TBP – This episode was a bit of a nothing episode. Notice that there was no Joffery though, a plus, but it also meant they didn’t include any boobs to balance the Joffery out. I still enjoyed it though, just not as much as previous episodes.

Poking around on Food 52 the other day, I ran accross a recipe for ‘Fugly Lentils and Drunken Pig’ and was entranced by the mental image of the idealistic world where tables are made from whole trees, and wine is quaffed, not sipped. It sounded like something GRRM would dream up, albeit with more murders. Unfortunately I don’t know anywhere I can get Plantagenet Pork hocks, and I typically don’t have three hours to boil them for stock before we even get started. This recipe is inspired by that ethos and the magic combination of pork and lentils, but it is definitely the lazy version.

Menu
Crusty fresh bread, chicken and cognac pate (not even slightly ethical, which is why I was offloading it), blue cheese and free range salame from Smoult’s Continental Deli to tide us over
Pork and Lentil Stew
Roast Chestnuts

Pork and Lentil Stew
Ingredients:
Pork shoulder roast
optional – ground bay leaf, fresh garlic, salt, pepper, thyme powder, sage powder
2c Puy lentils
Soup vegetables – turnip, swede, onions, celery, carrots and parsnip, adjusting the quantities to suit your tastes. We grabbed a pre-assembled soup pack because I was feeling lazy, and parsnips are still $10/kg at my IGA which I think is daylight robbery and a soup pack made good financial sense.
1.5 Bottles of white wine
500ml Chicken stock by the Stock Merchant
oil for frying

Method:
I bought the shoulder roast pre-seasoned from my butcher, who used a mix of salt, pepper, garlic, bay leaf, thyme and sage. It added a lot of easy flavour to this dish, which you could do at home by rubbing the meat with a home-made version and leaving in the fridge overnight to marinate. Shoulder roasts will normally come rolled up with some bonus crackling, which once you’ve cut the butchers twine off, you can normally just roll off and put aside for later.

Pre-heat the oven to 180c.

I was aiming for the meat to break into large, tender chunks. What we got was more threads of pork strewn through a lentil stew, but I suspect that was mostly because I got a bit vigorous with my stirring. Either way, you want to leave the meat in pieces big enough to give them a fighting chance of staying together, but small enough to cook all the way through. Falling apart rather than fallen apart. Once my shoulder piece was unrolled, I cut it into four sections about 5cm by 5cm and the length of the roast. I then scored them fairly deeply to help get the heat and the liquid into the centre of the pieces. I browned them in a heavy-based, ovenproof saucepan, while I chopped the vegetables into rough dice.

Once the meat is browned, put it aside and fry the vegetables until they get a bit of colour and just start to soften. Add the meat back to the pan, and pour the wine and stock over the top. Top up with water if needed to make sure everything is submerged.

Bring the pot to the boil then cover and place in the oven. Cook for about two hours, checking periodically to see how tender the meat has become. To cook the lentils, either return the pot to the stove and boil for ~30 minutes, or add the lentils and leave in the oven for about an hour.

We crisped up the crackling by salting it and putting it in a hot oven. Wet skin (like if your shoulder roast was wrapped up with a marinade, woops) tends to crackle poorly if you don’t have time to dry it out properly. Ours was my first dud batch in ages, which was a bit of a downer, but it was still fun to dunk in the stew.

Warning: chesnuts can be deadly. They can be cooked in the oven, a skillet, on coals, or boiled, but no matter which way you cook them, you need to cut a slit into the outer skin (and preferably inner too, to make them easier to peel) otherwise they explode. Sometimes they explode anyway, even when you cut a slit in not only the chestnuts but also your finger. I have cooked them successfully a number of times though, and I can’t rule out that the sheer power of TBP’s oven was to blame. Nevertheless, chestnut at your peril.

- TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 29 May, 2012 | Categories: A Game of Thrones, Food, Pork, Recipe, Themed Food | Tags: bread, carrot, celery, cheese, chicken stock, garlic, onion, parsnip, pork, turnip | Leave A Comment »

Long Live The (True) King

TBP – Joffrey should just die. I do love eating these meals though. This was probably my favourite yet (but I really liked that cherry stuffing). If you agree with me (about Joffrey) you should check out this gif. You’re welcome.

This is a recurring favourite from last years Game of Thrones cookery. It’s as savoury and warming as you’d expect, hailing from the Wall.

Last year the Swansea Street Butcher was closed due to a fire and refurbishment and didn’t re-open until Christmas. I drove to four butchers looking for mutton, to no avail, and eventually settled on some fatty, boney chump chops figuring they’d have the most flavour. I was pretty excited this year to finally get my hands on some mutton so I could make this properly. Swansea Street have all sorts of exciting goodies, from the legendary ‘curry meat’ to sheep’s testicles and just about any other offal you care to name. I spotted some black pudding and decided to push my fellow diners buttons by adding that to the menu. Luckily they all rose to the challenge. Next time I’ll deep fry it.

Menu
Black pudding, crumbly cheddar and bread
Mutton cooked in a thick broth of ale and onions
Greens dressed with apples and pine nuts
Stewed quince with honey yoghurt

Mutton and Ale Stew
Ingredients (serves 6-8):
Leg of mutton
~12 375ml bottles of your favourite ale or equivalent volume (I like James Squire Nine Tales Amber Ale, and we buy a carton. To be on the safe side.)
~6 large onions
2c barley (or more to taste)
oil for frying
flour for dusting
optional: actual vegetables. This has worked well on various occasions with some combination of diced carrot, swede, turnip and parsnip.

Method:
Break the leg of mutton down into similarly sized chunks with a very sharp knife. You can either include the bone in the pot or save it for making stock later. Toss the chunks of mutton with some flour, heat some oil in a heavy saucepan, and brown the mutton in batches.

While the mutton is browning, roughly chop the onions. I leave mine in hefty wedges, I think if you cut them any smaller you’d barely notice them after a long cooking time. Remove the last batch of mutton and fry the onions until they start to soften. Place the mutton back to the pan and add about two thirds of the ale, and top up with water until the meat is all submerged. Bring to a boil, stirring, to avoid the pot foaming over. Reduce the heat somewhat and cook at a medium-high heat for two and a half to three hours, topping up with the remaining ale if the liquid gets too low, and diluting with water if the taste is too strong.

About 45 minutes before you want to eat, add the barley and stir through. Make sure there is a little more liquid than you think you need at this point as the barley will absorb some of it.

Serve with a hunk of bread to soak up the leftover broth.

Stewed Quince
Ingredients:
3 Quinces
Sugar to taste (ballpark 200g, allow far more than you would for most other fruits)
Water
Vanilla pod and/or a lemon (either a squeeze of juice or some sliced rind, without the pith), if you like

Method:
Peel and slice the quinces. You’ll need very sharp tools and getting the core out can be a real challenge, so watch your fingers. Place sliced quince in a saucepan, add the sugar (and any other extras) and cover with water. Bring to the boil to dissolve the sugar and reduce the heat down as far as it can go. Simmer, uncovered, until the fruit is done to your liking. I never really pay attention to how long this takes as it seems to vary greatly between quinces, so check every 10 minutes or so and allow 45 minutes or so.
When the fruit is tender, remove it from the liquid with a slotted spoon and put aside. Boil the syrup aggressively until it reduces somewhat to make a sauce. We served it with honey yoghurt, but it makes a great filling for a crumble, or a cereal topping for breakfast.

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 25 May, 2012 | Categories: A Game of Thrones, Dessert, Food, Recipe, Sheep, Themed Food | Tags: ale, apple, barley, beer, black pudding, bread, cheese, food, greek, onion, pine nuts, quince, recipe, rocket, stew, yogurt | Leave A Comment »

There’s a cold, easy glow dancing over our street

TBP – I have a little confession to make; I have a soft spot for cherry pie because it features heavily in Twin Peaks, which I absolutely adore to death. In fact, once I’ve finished with this semester I plan on having a Twin Peaks themed party! Which I will get TBC to cook for (she doesn’t have a say in it ).

TBC – The reason I don’t get a say is because I gave up on Twin Peaks since it drove me to distraction. David Lynch is a bit of an acquired taste. I do quite enjoy this though.

We had a spare jar of cherries from the delicious cherry stuffed chicken and I’d heard a rumor you could turn them into cherry pie without much effort. Cherries are quite possibly the best fruit and one of my favourite things about summer. You know how when you are in school and the teacher asks what you want to do when you grow up and you are supposed to say doctors and teachers? I said cherry picker. Ask my Mum, she has the evidence to prove it. But this is Australia, you never have dessert pie when it’s hot and cherries are in season, and I doubt anyone is going to convince me that a cooked cherry is going to taste better than a fresh raw one in the height of summer. Now it’s cooling down though… I’ll take my fix where I can get it.

After watching all of Pushing Daisies back to back about a dozen times some years ago my sister (hereby known as the Brazen Assistant for her uncanny ability to appear under your elbow with a spatula 3 seconds before you knew you needed one) went on a pie craze and came across this pie crust recipe. It’s not too temperamental, and the end result is thick and soft. It’s one of my favourite sweet pie crust recipes (the other coming from the Bourke Street Bakery).

Cherry Pie
Ingredients:
for the Brazen Assistant’s pie crust:
2.5 c flour
1c butter
¼ c sugar
1 tsp salt (omit if you use salted butter)
vanilla essence
approx 5 TB iced water

for the filling:
1-2 jars of pitted cherries, drained (depending on how big your pie tin is)
2TB sugar, or to taste
3-4TB plain flour
sprinkle of cinnamon

Method:
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.
Place the flour and sugar in a food processor and pulse until combined. chop the butter into same-sized pieces, add to the bowl, and pulse until mixture resembles breadcrumbs. add the vanilla essence and the iced water, a spoon at a time, until mixture comes together. It’s safer to stop and work it with your hands a bit before you think it’s done, rather than let it get too wet. Divide the mix into two balls, flatten into disks, wrap with clingwrap and leave to sit for an hour or so. At this point you can keep the dough in the fridge for a few days, but you’ll need to sit it on the counter for a while before rolling (or have very good muscles).

When the dough has rested, roll the disks out into two round sheets, about 5mm thick. I find it easiest to do this between two sheets of clingwrap.

Combine the drained cherries in a bowl with the flour, sugar, and cinnamon and stir so the cherries are covered with a very light, but even coat.

Line the tin with one of the disks of pastry. This is where the clingwrap comes in handy. Fill the case with the cherry mix and gently shake the tin around a bit so the contents is roughly levelled off. Top with the other round of pastry. I prefer a solid top where I want the filling to reduce down and thicken a bit, but you could do a lattice top if you prefer. Trim the edges and seal by pressing down lightly with your fingers. Make a little slit or two with a sharp knife in the centre of the pie to allow steam to escape.

Bake for 30-45 minutes, until golden, checking frequently. The edges will colour quicker than the centre, so wrap those with foil if you feel they are getting close to the danger zone.

Serve with a generous dollop of Bannister Downs thickened cream, whipped cream, and/or ice cream, thickened cream obviously being the superior choice.

All you need, honestly, is a little piece of cherry pie hot from the oven.

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 20 May, 2012 | Categories: Dessert, Food, Recipe, Sweets & Treats | Tags: Brazen Assistant, cherry, cream, in-jokes, pie | 2 Comments »

Mujaddara

TBP – I ate this for breakfast. 100% no regrets.

Mujaddara in it’s most basic form is my ultimate poor and lazy food. It’s a pretty safe bet that no matter what else I’ve run out of, there are likely to be some onions, rice and lentils kicking around. The fresh herbs and the yoghurt transform it into a relaxed meal with something vaguely resembling nutritional value that I’m happy to serve my friends. It tastes even better the next day and it would also make an excellent side dish for some slow-cooked or grilled meat that needs bulking out. In short: Uni students of the world, unite behind mujaddara.

Mujaddara (from Food 52)
Ingredients (serves 4 as side dish or 2 as main):
¾c puy lentils
1c jasmine rice
~3 large onions
3TB olive oil
Butter
1tsp salt (1/2 tsp for lentils, ½ tsp for rice)
½ c greek yoghurt (I love this stuff and often double the recipe in comparison to the mujaddara)
equal parts (~ ½ tsp or to taste) cinnamon, cumin, ground coriander, paprika
fresh mint and coriander
additional pinch of salt
juice and zest of half a lemon, or one or two limes
optional, if you are feeling especially healthy: some cauliflower

Method:
Preheat your oven to 200C. If you know your oven can’t actually hold the temperature it’s set to, consider using another method of cooking the rice. If you want to eat this quickly, use separate pots for the rice and lentils and cook them simultaneously. On the other hand if you favour less cleaning up, just take turns using the same pot as the original recipe suggests.

Top and tail the onions, cut in half and then thinly slice so you have half-rings. Heat the butter and oil (butter to taste, the more the tastier) in a heavy frying pan and caramelise the onions over a low heat. This could take a solid half hour, so do this first. Covering the pan with a lid, if you have one that fits, will help soften the onions to start with. When they are approaching done, crank the heat up to high, stop stirring and keep a close eye on the pan. Ideally, you want a nice layer of crunchy (but not burnt) onions to provide a bit of textural contrast.

Once the onions are happily frying away, put the lentils in a medium sized pot (oven proof, if the pot is doing double duty) with a ½ tsp of salt and 4 cups of water. Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer and cook until the lentils are tender but not mushy (around 20 minutes).

To cook the rice, place the remaining ½ tsp of salt, 1 and a ½ cups of water and the rice to an oven proof saucepan. Bring to the boil, cover and cook in the preheated oven for exactly 17 minutes. Fluff the grains up with a fork, and it’s finished. It’s AMAZING. The day we learned to cook rice in school our teacher managed to set the example she was doing in the microwave ON FIRE which has stuck with me for years and consequently blotted out every other method of cooking rice. So this is a bit of a godsend for me.

If you’d like to add another vegie, we found that some cauliflower chopped into florets, tossed with olive oil and roasted in the oven while we prepared everything else went with the caramelised onion quite nicely.

Combine the yoghurt, spices, salt and citrus juice in a small bowl and stir to combine.

Drain the lentils and combine with the cooked rice. Add the fried onions (and any remaining oil or melted butter from the pan) and stir through. Serve with a hefty spoonful of yoghurt and some fresh mint and coriander.

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 14 May, 2012 | Categories: Food, Vegetarian | Tags: butter, coriander, lentils, lime, mint, onion, paprika, rice, yogurt | Leave A Comment »

Apple Caramel Crumble

I’m not a chocolate person. Sorry.

We didn’t eat a lot of dessert when we were kids. Thinking back, we had the odd bowl of ice cream, and once or twice a winter Mum’s rice pudding or apple crumble. If we went to visit our Grandparents in Perth there would always be stewed fruit or crumble, and after our family dinners on Friday Nights (highlight of the week) there would be one of my Nanna’s desserts – usually tiramisu, cheesecake, or… crumble. I hope you’re sensing a theme here.

Maybe because dessert was so rare and special, or maybe because they were so good when I got them, I have a soft spot for fruit desserts, and especially crumbles. Since I discovered I also really like caramel, I was pretty stoked to see Citrus and Candy’s Caramel Apple Crumble recipe. It is seriously good. Having so much crumble in the family I went my own way with the topping, but all credit to her for the filling.

Ingredients
(serves 4ish)
Filling:
120ml cream
1 small cinnamon stick (I omitted this, since we didn’t have any)
240g caster sugar
120ml water
20g butter
pinch of sea salt
8 apples, peeled, cored and chopped into 2cm chunks (if you’re doing individual serves you want around an apple a person and one for the pot, as it were)

Topping:
3/4 c wholemeal flour
3/4 c white flour
handful of slivered almonds
two handfuls of rolled oats
softened butter – to taste. Realistically I used probably 200g.
sugar – ideally brown, but this time we used white
Being a family recipe, I’ve never seen anyone weigh or measure any of this – it just depends on what you feel like eating on the day. All quantities are very, very approximate.

Method
Preheat oven to 180°C
If you’re using a cinnamon stick, heat it with the cream then remove from the heat and let sit for 10-20 minutes. Remove the stick before making the caramel.
Make the crumble before you make the caramel – it can sit quite happily at room temperature or in the fridge if you make it in advance. Roughly chop the butter, sprinkle over the flours and sugar and rub together. Mix in the oats and almonds. You can do this in a food processor, but I would still add the oats by hand or before the very last pulse, otherwise they get all ground up.
Heat the water and sugar over a low heat until the mixture reaches a golden caramel. If anything, stop slightly on the light side, as the mix will stay on the heat a while longer and then go into the oven and you don’t want to take it to perfect and then push it over the edge later.
Add the cream, from a safe distance, followed by the butter and salt. Once the butter has melted, add the chopped apple, toss them through the caramel and lightly cook. I found that with their time in the oven, even a few minutes in the pan was enough to make the final product very soft. If you like your apples with a bit more texture, I’d fry them for only a minute, or less.
Spoon the apples into your ramekins (as we used) or a baking dish. Drizzle a little of the caramel sauce over the apples if they look too plain and lonely.
Top with the crumble mixture and bake for 15-25 minutes, until the crumble is coloured up to your liking.
We couldn’t find the Bannister Downs thickened cream (the cream that will ruin you for all other creams) at my local IGA, so we had these with just a spoonful of extra caramel drizzled over the top. I’m sure they’d also be delicious with ice cream, but it’s Bannister Downs or bust as far as I’m concerned.

Enjoy!

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 10 May, 2012 | Categories: Dessert, Food, Sweets & Treats | Tags: apple, butter, caramel, crumble, dessert, food, sugar | Leave A Comment »

A Clash of Food

Being fussy about the meat I eat and having been impressed by their attitude on a previous occasion (more on this when I actually have some of their beef to cook), I was planning to get out to The Beef Shop in Maddington to buy the roast for this meal. Unfortunately, fate and a truck load of rocks on the Narrows intervened and I only made it as far as Claytons Quality Meats in South Perth, which turned out to be a bit of a gem. They are a tiny little butcher with only two small cabinets on display but are very happy to break something up for you, an attitude I really appreciate. They also had a couple of more unusual meats like rabbit, so if you’re into that, go and say hello. They were very good about me swinging in and asking for something ridiculous right before they closed up, so I’m sure they’ll treat you well. Would you believe they actually had an even bigger version of what I bought in the cabinet? And ours was already a serious piece of cow.

Menu
Roast beef with a red wine reduction
Mushroom Barley
Spinach
Bread (Abhi’s sourdough)

The beef, spinach, and red wine reduction don’t really deserve recipes.
Salt and pepper the beef and brown it, fat side first, in your very biggest frying pan. You’ll probably want two sets of tongs and a spotter to pull this off if your roast is as big as ours. Place it in a baking tray and roast in a moderate oven for about an hour a kilo. I can count the number of times I’ve eaten roast beef on my fingers so I’m no whizz at this and asked the butcher’s advice – if you have a favourite family method, use that instead. Next time I’d favour a hotter oven for a short period of time so the finished product is a bit rarer. Rinse and drain the spinach and add it to the roasting tray in the last few minutes of cooking so it wilts in the juices.
Set the roast aside to rest for a few minutes before carving.

The red wine reduction was a bit of a lazy job – half a medium onion, finely chopped (shallots were not to be had), two bay leaves, two star anise, a couple of peppercorns, and a bottle of red wine, simmered until syrupy and thick. I stirred through a bit of pan juices in lieu of the more traditional knob of butter, so it wasn’t exactly restaurant quality, but it was delicious.
Strain the solids out and serve.

Recipe - Mushroom Barley
Ingredients
200g shiitake mushrooms
50g dried forest mushrooms
1 star anise
1 c barley
500ml beef stock (I used the Stock Merchant – a great brand which supports small farms and uses free-range, hormone free animals, and consequently isn’t cheap)
2 egg yolks

Method
This is an interpretation of the Barley recipe from Pleyn Delit – I’ll spare you the original wording, but you can check it out here if you choose.

Place the beef stock, star anise and dried mushrooms in a medium saucepan and bring to the boil. Remove from the heat and set aside to rehydrate for half an hour.
Cut the mushrooms into quarters, or otherwise into meaty chunks if they are small.
About an hour before you want to eat, bring the stock back up to the boil and add the barley. Turn down to a simmer and allow it to bubble away for half an hour or forty minutes. Check that there is still plenty of liquid (if not, top up with some water) and stir through the shiitake mushrooms. Continue to simmer until the barley has been cooking for around an hour total and check for tenderness. If the mixture is very soupy, pour off a little of the liquid (add it to the wine reduction if you don’t want to waste it).
Remove from the heat and quickly stir through the two egg yolks until the mixture is creamy.

TBP – Yes you can see my toes. DealWithItNerd.

Don’t panic, we cut that in half after TBP took the photo. It was still too big for me to finish though. I’m pretty sure eating vegetarian most of the time shrinks your stomach (NB probably not actual science).

Enjoy!

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 7 May, 2012 | Categories: A Game of Thrones, Beef, Food, Recipe, Themed Food | Tags: A Clash of Kings, A Game of Thrones, AGoT, barley, feast, mushroom, red wine, Spinach | Leave A Comment »

Dinner is Coming

TBP – I got a complaint earlier about including too many photos! So today you don’t get as many ingredient shots as I took (you only get two! *gasp*). But this meal was amazing, and our friend said he had never tasted chicken so tender. I, on the other hand, fell in love with the stuffing. CHERRIES IN STUFFING, it’s like having TWO desserts!

Sorry this took so long to get up, I’ve been horribly busy with assignments and stuff and I was feeling pretty out of it that day. But we have three more posts on their way to you very soon.

A couple of weeks ago I discovered the food history section of our University Library. Somehow, amazingly, I’d never run across it at work and as TBP and the Breeze can attest, I got a bit excited. Showing great restraint I borrowed a mere seven titles and am currently plugging through them under the justification of it being ‘practically study’. Pleyn Delit by Constance B Hieatt and Sharon Butler gives a recipe in the original language (if that language bears a vague resemblance to modern English, and otherwise translated) with a reference to the text it was drawn from, followed by a version of the recipe translated for modern readers and their tastes. While they go to great lengths to explain that medieval cookery was not all heavily spiced sauces on boiled chickens, there is still a fair bit of that going on. Fabulous Feasts by Madeleine Pelner Cosman on the other hand (and granted I haven’t finished reading this one yet) features more recipes that seem accessible for modern tastes and comes recommended by Julia Child, so what more could you want? This menu draws from both of them. As it was, yet again, a public holiday rounding up the (fairly standard) ingredients was somewhat of a trial, made no easier by the fact I had my clumsiest day so far this year and managed to knock something off the shelf in every store we went in to as well as ruin a caramel, nearly ruin a thermometer, drop a mug and cause two boxes of plastic cups to fall on my foot. Ladies and Gentlemen, I am all class.

Menu

Chicken with oats, ricotta, cherry stuffing & a bread sauce
Frumenty/barley
Braised Spinach
Bread

Farsed Chicken from Fabulous Feasts
(recipe is verbatim except for my comments in parantheses and quantities/temperatures were translated to metric)
Ingredients:
1 large roasting chicken, 2-2.5kg
½ c dry lentils
1 ½ c ale
1 c chicken broth
200-300g cherries (we used jarred)
200g ricotta cheese
2/3c oats
½ tsp salt
½ tsp sweet basil
2 TB butter
Sauce:
⅔ c white wine
¾ slices of white bread, crumbled
¼ tsp salt

Method:
Soak lentils in ale overnight (or skip this step if you’re disorganised). Boil lentils in residual ale plus broth for 15 minutes. Drain lentils and reserve 1 cup of fluid.
Remove pits from cherries (we used jarred so this was already done) and cut each in half, or if very large, in quarters.
Mix lentils, cherries, ricotta, and oats. Sprinkle on salt and basil (which I replaced with thyme).
Stuff the bird, rub the skin with butter (or dot if you’re lazy) and bake at 180 degrees celsius for about 2 hours or until flesh is tender and skin crisp. Prepare a ‘gravy’ with 1 cup of reserved lentil fluid, wine, bread and salt, gently simmering all for 10 minutes.

I admit I was a bit skeptical about the ‘gravy’ as I’d never had a bread sauce before, but it did all come together passably smooth. Just keep stirring, it works even though it looks unlikely.

L: “gravy” at the point where I started to panic. R: barley just before the eggs are added.

Frumenty from Pleyn Delit
(recipe is verbatim except for my comments in parantheses)
Aym clene Wete and bray it in a morter wel that the holys gon al of and seyth yt til brete and nym yt up, and lat it kele and nym fayre fresch broth and swete milk of Almandys or swete mylk of kyne and temper yt al, and nym the yolkys of eyryn; boyle it a ltyl and set yt adon and messe yt forthe wyth fat venyson and fresh moton.

Cracked Wheat (Barley Variation)
1 c pearl barley
3 c meat stock or bouillion, or use half milk (can be almond milk)
optional: pinch of saffron, 1 or 2 egg yolks (both highly recommended by the book)

Method:
Bring the stock to a boil and stir in the barley and saffron (if you have time, heat the stock and saffron and let them sit a while first). Cover the pan and turn the heat very low; let the frumenty cook for about 45 minutes (or a little longer for barley). It may be served as it is, or you can remove it from the heat, stir in beaten egg yolk, then return to very low heat and stir for a few minutes before serving.

I added some extra liquid so I could safely leave it on the stove while I did something else and had to strain some of it off so it wasn’t soupy. Depending on how high you have the heat, you may have to do this even if you use the correct quantity.

Spynoch Yfryed from Pleyn Delit
(recipe is verbatim except for my comments in parantheses and quantities/temperatures were translated to metric)
Take spynoches; parboile hem in sepying water. Take hem up and presse out he water and hewe in two. Frye hem in oile clene, & do her-to powder & serve forth.

Braised Spinach
1 kilo fresh spinach, washed, picked over for withered leaves, and trimmed
salted water for parboiling
2-3TB olive oil
14tsp salt
pinch each of ginger and allspice

Method:
parboil spinach in a large pot of water for about 4 minutes; drain, press out excess water with your hands, and chop the spinach; put in a saucepan or small casserole with oil and seasonings. Stir and leave to cook over very low heat for another 15 minutes or so; or put in covered casserole in a low oven for about 20 minutes

This spinach was not amazing. Spinach is my go-to lazy vegetable for Game of Thrones dinners but I normally wilt it in the pan juices. Maybe I didn’t fry it long enough? I only gave it about five minutes because I was pretty convinced there’d be nothing left after fifteen. It’s probably worth giving this one more go with something a bit hardier like cavolo nero.

We went down south last winter and road-tripped home again via the Blackwood Meadery near Karridale (and the Venison Farm and everything else delicious we passed). They don’t have a website but if you’re in the South-West you should consider going to check them out. One of my favourites was the plum and mead liqueur, which we had a nip of in keeping with the stone fruit theme. On the hot tip that it would be a good match for roast chicken we challenged my irrational fear of Chardonnay and tried a lightly oaked specimen from Margaret River that did indeed go quite nicely.

Verdict: all round delicious. I would definitely make the chicken again for a non-themed dinner as the flavours were modern and although it sounds odd, unusual but not unfamiliar. The barley was a bit of a dark horse and may become a staple at Game of Thrones night in the future. I’m going back to my usual spinach method in the future though.

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 3 May, 2012 | Categories: A Game of Thrones, Chicken, Food, Recipe, Themed Food | Tags: A Game of Thrones, AGoT, barley, books, bread, cherry, Chicken, food, oats, recipe, Spinach, Winter is Coming | 3 Comments »

Apple Cider Caramels

TBP – Do you remember the Caramello Koala ads? “They call me mellow yellllowwww”. Basically this is the adults version (and it’s BYO chocolate).

Perth people have broken ‘winter’ sensors. We don’t even have a real winter, as I learned after an Italian autumn, more like three months where it’s slightly less hot and rains occasionally. By the end of February we are excitedly eyeing off our scarves in anticipation every time the temperatures dips below 30. When it gets to 25 it’s long pants and jumpers. This leads to some confusion when it comes to food – if you don’t live in even vaguely the right climate for apple trees, can cider still be one of those things that makes you think winter is on it’s way? Given I made these at Christmas (granted, another site of blatant food/weather confusion) I have to say, not so much. They are absolutely delicious though, tangy and complex, and I eat them by a pool or a fireplace as weather permits.

The recipe comes from Sugarpunk, a blog I read from start to finish during Corporations Law lectures last year (sorry Mum). The author ran her own business by using a professional kitchen in the wee hours when it was empty, making cakes, chocolates and caramels. Quite an inspiration. Much more so than Corporations law, sadly. So rather than repeating everything she has to say, if you want to be really thorough, have a read of Sugarpunk’s post first. Baking and confectionary are the only things I really use recipes for and I like a lot of information, but if you find too much information overwhelming then just stick with this.

Because there are only a few ingredients in this and you (try to) only eat a small piece at a time, using high quality ingredients makes a noticeably high quality product. But, even if you supermarket cream and black and gold butter, you’ll still get something worth eating. At the moment I favour Three Oaks cider (although I’ve used Bulmer’s when I’m feeling skint and it’s fine), Bannister Downs cream, and whatever ludicrous butter is on special at Fresh Provisions. Corn syrup, on the other hand, is always trashy. It’s the most absurdly American thing you can find in an Australian supermarket. I challenge you to name even one recipe using corn syrup that doesn’t give you an instant fear of diabetes when you read it (sorry).

Apple Cider Caramels

Ingredients:

2c Apple Cider
2/3 c of cream
85g unsalted butter (by the way, I love that a butter converter exists. so useful.)
1 ½ c sugar
¼ c corn syrup
¼ c water
optional: cinnamon

Method:

Reduce the cider down to ⅓ c and put aside. You can ignore it to start with, but keep a close eye on it towards the end because it’s easy to overshoot the mark.
Heat the cream and butter to boiling point in a saucepan and put aside to infuse with the cinnamon, if you like. I think I prefer them without.
Place the sugar, corn syrup and water in a moderately large saucepan, maybe the next size down from your soup or pasta pot. When you add the cream the mix will triple or quadruple briefly as it boils and you don’t want the pot to overflow, but nor do you want to be struggling to comfortably reach the mixture with your thermometer when it settles down. Cook the mixture until it reaches a ‘light brown’ or ‘amber’ colour.

For reference, what you don’t want is this. It took about three minutes for this mix to go from just starting to bubble to almost black, which is incidentally how long I spent watching Louis Theroux documentaries over TBP’s shoulder. Keep it over a low heat and keep an eye on it.

When the syrup is nearly there, bring the cream and butter back to the boil. Pour it (carefully, from a safe distance) into the syrup, and add the reduced cider. When it’s safe, start stirring. Cook it to 121 degrees celsius.

Pour into a pan lined with baking paper (as Sugarpunk says, if you use two pieces, one going each way it will be easier to remove later) and chill in the fridge. I haven’t found that covering the pan with gladwrap makes much of a difference in our climate. If you want to cut them into sticks or batons, use a square 20cm pan. If you prefer thicker squares, use a loaf pan.

The caramels will technically last in the fridge until the expiry date of the cream. I don’t think this has ever happened. It is virtually impossible to only eat one. TBP keeps hers in the freezer to make her pace herself. You have been warned.

(lovely pictures of the finished product will be up shortly)

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 1 May, 2012 | Categories: Food, Recipe, Sweets & Treats | Tags: butter, caramels, cider, cream, food, gifts, sugar, sweets, treats, winter | 1 Comment »

A Song of Food and Fire

Okay, so the titles are really terrible. They’re all my fault. – TBP

In hindsight, working until 5 then trying to scrounge up the ingredients for a feast on a public holiday was probably an ambitious move. I had been thinking seafood but after noticing The Inn At The Crossroads (an ASOIAF food themed site you should check out) had done a seafood stew recently and not wanting to be a copycat I fell back on the Westeros equivalent of an easy weeknight dinner.

The Menu
Roast honeyed chicken on trenchers
Sweet pickled baby beetroots
Caramelised onions & parnsips with thyme
Spinach in pan juices
Gravy
Soft & crumbly cheddar

The very first dinner I cooked for our AGOT role playing game back in 2010 was trenchers with individual roast cornish hens so I felt I was on pretty safe ground here. Last time, I bought some excellent thick crusted bread days before we wanted to eat it and let it go authentically stale. Coming off the end of an extra-long-weekend, I was lucky to find two loaves even barely big enough, and paradoxically unlucky in that they’d been baked that day! By that point it must have been just about the only fresh bread left in Perth. I toasted them on both sides on the bottom shelf of the oven and we served them on top of plates in case they weren’t strong enough.

For a public holiday I really lucked out with my ingredients – I managed to get two Mt Barker Free Range chickens from a local IGA and had stockpiled some new baby beetroots and parsnips from the farmers markets at Clontarf (as of yesterday they are now on winter hours) on Saturday. The crumbly cheddar was from Cape Naturaliste via said IGA and the spinach and onions were all I could get at that time of day.

Ingredients
1 Free Range (& preferably organic) chicken per 4 people
1 TB honey per chicken
1 very large loaf of rustic bread per 2 or 3 people
1 bunch of baby beetroots
¼ c balsamic vinegar
¼ c brown sugar
1 bag of young parsnips
a few sprigs of thyme
1 bunch of spinach
1 pickling onion per person (or more if you’re keen)
100g butter (or more to taste)
a litre of chicken stock (organic, or homemade, or from vegetarian powder)
a few tablespoons of plain flour
Salt & Pepper

Method
Pre-heat the oven to 180.

Unwrap the chicken, rinse it clean (including inside the cavity), drain and pat dry with paper towel. Wiggle it’s limbs around a bit to limber things up (especially if you’ve defrosted it) and check for broken bones. If you find any, do the world a favour and take it back to where you bought it from and make a stink. Rub the skin around a bit to loosen it up.

Cut a few thin slices of butter and put them to one side. Place the chicken breast side up on a board and starting at the cavity, ease the skin away from the flesh with your fingers. Push a few pieces of butter under the skin (if you have access to duck or goose fat, use that instead). Crack some salt and pepper over the skin and place chicken on the top shelf in the oven. Roast until done (82c if you have a thermometer, or until the juices run clear, or an hour a kilo) then remove from the oven, drizzle lightly with honey and put aside (under a little alfoil tent if you are so inclined) to rest. Pop it back into the oven 5 minutes before you’re ready to eat so the honey gives it a bit of a glaze.

Peel and trim the beetroots, avoiding any sort of porous surface in the process. Place in a small saucepan with an equal quantities of brown sugar and balsamic vinegar – not your best vinegar, as you’ll want around a quarter cup according to taste. Cover with water until all the beetroots are submerged and bring to the boil. Simmer until beetroots are tender enough that you can spear them with a fork without too much resistance.

Trim and wash the parsnips. Cut them into quarters, longwise. Simmer or steam them until almost tender.

Meanwhile, skin, trim and cut the onions in half from root end to root end. Melt the remaining butter in a heavy frying pan, add the onions, cover and start to slowly fry. Once the parsnips are tender and the onions look softened, add the parsnips to the pan and increase the heat to medium. Strip the thyme leaves from the stalk and add to the pan. Fry, turning occasionally, until the onions are caramelised and the parsnips have picked up a bit of crunch.

15 minutes before you want to eat, place the baking tray, sans chickens, on the stove top on a low heat (if your tray is not flame-proof, carefully scrape it into a small saucepan). Add the spinach and heat gently in the juices until wilted. Put the spinach to one side and use the remaining juices to make a gravy.

Cut the chicken into quarters using sharp kitchen shears. You could leave them intact and carve them at the table, but I find you get less wastage this way and I wanted to get the same vibe as that first time where we had a whole cornish hen each. Slices are way less visceral and way less fun. The chicken here is done, even though the juices are red – they ran clear until I cut through the bone and we checked with a thermometer to be sure.

Place everything on to the table and let everyone serve pile up their own trenchers. Cutlery was strictly forbidden.

- TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 15 April, 2012 | Categories: A Game of Thrones, Chicken, Food, Themed Food | Tags: A Game of Thrones, A Song of Ice and Fire, Beetroot, Chicken, Gravy, Onions, Parsnips, Recipie, Roast, Spinach, Trenchers | Leave A Comment »

Review: El Publico

Mexican and fun times with friends are inextricably linked for me, so I was pretty excited to hear a fresh new Mexican joint had recently opened up on Beaufort st. They are, in fact, so new that when we went on the Thursday before Easter their website had only an address, mobile number and email. Being a bit hesitant to ring a mobile number I fired off an email enquiring about their opening hours, bookings and produce and had a response an impressive fifteen minutes later. Their opening hours are now available on their website, and they only take 4 bookings a night for tables of 6+ for their ‘Feed Me’ menu, which as we learned, means you’ll need to be on the ball. I was also pretty stoked with their responses to my questions about their ingredients – this is a thing I feel ridiculous and nosy asking, and often get poorly informed or rude responses so the staff at El Publico earned some serious points. They use organic where possible, and local always – if it’s not in season, they won’t have it on the menu (so don’t be surprised not to find avocadoes right now, for example). Their pork is Free-Range Linley Valley, their chicken is Organic Free-Range Inglewood Farms, and their beef is from Harvey. They’ve even got some local growers producing ingredients you can’t otherwise get in Perth. Learning they had ties to Cantina 663 was icing on the cake.

We rocked up around 7.30 to find El Publico absolutely cranking, tables filled, bar packed and a line up to the doorway. Not to be deterred R sallied forth to the counter, got our name on the list and received an estimate of 40 minutes. We ducked across the road to the Beaufort st Merchant for a drink to pass the time, as the line was by now out the door and it didn’t seem like we’d be able to make it to El Publico’s bar without losing an eye. A jug of Ultimate Pimms ($35) and a jug of Imperial Sangria ($35) later we were ready to go back and do battle again.

We were seated by 9 and warned there might be another long wait for the food so we knuckled down and ordered as quickly as we could, starting with a bottle of dos equis XXX for me ($9) and a bottle of el presidente private bin red ($39) for everyone else to share. On our waiter’s advice we ordered the fried chickpeas with burnt tortilla salt ($5) from the Botana (snack) section to tide us over. These arrived super fast and were amazing – soft and fluffy on the inside and crisp and salty on the outside. We ended up ordering three serves.

Salmon aquachile jalapeno coriander ($17) from Primeros (first course)

Unless you speak spanish, you might find the menu a bit intimidating at first glance but luckily on further investigation there is a quick guide on the back of the menu to help you decipher what you’re ordering. However, if you are rushing to get your order to the kitchen like we were you may find establishing the major ingredients and leaving the rest as a surprise is a fun way to go. Aquachile (or aguachile, depending on who you ask), is a very lightly cured kind of ceviche. I am a huge fan of cured, smoked or salted anything but usually not so keen on salmon. This was light, fresh and punchy with lime, coriander, chilli and radish, and no hint of that oily off-putting flavour.

Organic chicken sikil pak black bean pickled squash ($19) from Ensalada (salad)

We got this dish through a mix-up but once we made sure everything we wanted was still on it’s way we were happy to keep it. The chicken was very moist and tender, and the sikil pak (prehispanic pumpkin seed dip) gave it an interesting and unusual flavour. Even though there was no lettuce, it still gave us the distinct impression of A Salad, and in the end, we aren’t the sort of people to order a salad when there is pork belly on the menu and the aquachile was a pretty hard act to follow.

Huarache house green chorizo queso fresco ($16) from Antojitos (street snacks)

Again, we didn’t bother to read the translation until afterwards, but huarache means a toasted masa base in the shape of a sandal and once you know that this dish does look rather humorously like a delicious, savoury flip flop. The chorizo itself seemed mid-way between mince and pate in texture and had a charred and smoky flavour from the grill. Without the follow through paprika flavour from your standard chorizo the taste was fresh and interesting. And I love the taste of masa so I was pretty happy with this dish.

“WARNING: don’t fool around with Sam’s hot sauce… it’s hot! really hot!”

Pig tongue bitter orange pickled onions taco (2) ($14) from Antojitos

Each taco had three disks of (I’m thinking pressed?) tongue each. The flavour was piggy but not overwhelming, and the texture was still quite muscular so it wasn’t too unfamiliar – even L, who had previously declared he’d never eat tongue and was accidentally none the wiser at the time, said he would be happy to eat them again. The sweet pickled onions were quite juicy, but the tortillas were thick enough to keep everything together and made the masa flavour a component rather than an afterthought. The downside to the menu’s loose descriptions is that you’re never quite sure what form the ingredients are going to take – I couldn’t detect any bitter orange but it was equally possible that it was part of the cooking process as with carnitas and never meant to be a perceptible part of the final presentation.

Esquites ($9) from Antojitos

The mexican street corn with chilli mayonnaise lime and cheese was a real stand out. Served cut off the cob and piled in a bowl it was sweet, tangy and creamy with a hint of warmth from the chilli. I would happily eat two bowls of this for dinner any time. Coming back to it after something more savoury like the beans, I was surpised to notice how sweet it really was.

‘Cowboy beans’ ($8) from Antojitos

While the cowboy beans were perfectly cooked, tender and holding their shape, we couldn’t really taste the pork or tomato very strongly. R liked these when combined with the corn, but I think that was just an excuse to make the corn last longer.

Slow cooked pork belly piloncillo chilli oaxacan chocolate ($24) from Grande Placa (big plates)

All we knew about this dish was pork belly and chocolate, which we figured meant it had something for everyone. It was pretty delicious, but maybe not quite outstanding since we can already do a pretty good pork belly at home. The sauce was mild and well balanced, not as rich as you’d expect from the description (let’s face it, probably a good thing). On it’s own it was like a very sweet (as you’d expect, if you’d bothered to translate piloncillo into ‘refined mexican sugar’) but also very savoury hot chocolate, but when mopped up with the pork everything worked really well together. The pork was tender and soft all the way through, but still had the top layer of fat left intact which TBP wasn’t too keen on and didn’t have quite enough crunch in the crackle to get R and I really excited. We noticed that same intensely porky flavour from the tongue tacos here as well, so if you like your meat bland and deniable, you’re out of luck.

Grilled baby chicken adobo mezcal ($32) from Grande Placa

In case you were panicking that we’d been robbed, the ‘baby’ chicken was much closer to full-sized than a cornish hen. I had a breast piece and was a bit apprehensive since I don’t normally go for white meat but it was very moist. Everyone really enjoyed it but no one could put their finger on the flavour since few of us had tried either adobo or mezcal before. We gave up on the cutlery, finished the bones with our fingers and ordered a side of tortillas to mop up the juices.

Cajeta flan banana peanut butter ice cream ($14) from Postres (desserts)

While we did pass these around, these desserts were probably the one part of the menu that were better suited to just one person. The goat’s milk caramel and peanut butter ice cream were a great sweet and salty combination, but I wasn’t as huge on the custard. Despite the menu saying they don’t allow changes, the staff were happy to arrange one plate without the banana for TBP and really diligent when they brought them to the table to make sure the right people got the right plate. The menu didn’t really have any allergy information on it, but we found the waitstaff so accommodating and attentive that I was have the impression they will steer you right if you tell them what you need to avoid. The attitude of the wait staff was impressive – they were under a lot of pressure but stayed chipper throughout the night and even our ordering mix ups were handled with grace and good humour.

Despite us fearing the worst, the kitchen was so on the pace that at points it nearly overtook us. In hindsight, we really should have relaxed and taken things a bit more slowly – we were out the door in under an hour and a half. The only criticism I have of El Publico was the intense noise levels. We were seated by an open window, which was probably a good spot since the restaurant is mostly flat surfaces, and we could hear the music only rarely and the road noise not at all.

I really enjoyed my night out and would be happy to go back to el Publico again, especially since we didn’t tackle the cocktails and our waiter warned that the food menu will be changing frequently and the copy I took home will soon be out of date. I would recommend it for groups of friends, but I probably wouldn’t recommend it to (for example) my parents or for a date – unless you’re not there for the conversation.

El Publico
511 Beaufort st Highgate
0418 187 708
www.elpublico.com.au (view in Safari or Firefox for best results!)
info@elpublico.com.au

-TBC

Posted by The Brazen Chef | 13 April, 2012 | Categories: Food, Review | Tags: Bar, Beaufort st, Beaufort st Merchant, El Publico, Friends, Mexican, Restaurant | Leave A Comment »

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