Lamb leftovers are the best: lamb pittas with Harissa yoghurt sauce

I love lamb, especially when it is slow cooked. You can’t really have Easter Sunday roast dinner without it. As we had to leave the house at 6am for our sunrise service at church, we put the 3kg lamb shoulder in the oven with garlic and rosemary and set the timer.

It slow cooked for 4 hours and was ready when we returned home. We had a great afternoon eating with our church family.

And added bonus: LEFTOVERS!!

Here’s what I rustled up to use up the shredded lamb

Shredded lamb
Salad leaves
Pitta breads

Harissa yoghurt sauce:

mix together
1/2 cup of fat free yoghurt
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 tsp Harissa paste
Juice of half lemon
1 garlic clove crushes

Heat this pitta bread under the grill for a couple of minutes
Open up the pitta and layer with the warmed shredded lamb and salad leaves
Drizzle over some Harissa yoghurt sauce and enjoy

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Sundried tomato and chorizo soda bread

I love soda bread, it’s quick and easy to make, it smells amazing and most of all it reminds me of home. I had some leftover bits from antipasti in the fridge so I decided to experiment this afternoon and here is the result.

450g plain flour
1 teaspoon each of sugar and salt
1 1/2 teaspoons of bicarbonate of soda
1/4 tsp dried chilli
80g chorizo cubed
5 sundried tomatoes chopped
300ml tub buttermilk
100ml milk
1 tbsp lemon juice

Preheat a baking tray in the oven a 180c

Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl

then add the chorizo, chilli and sundried tomatoes

Add the buttermilk milk and lemon juice and mix until the dough starts to come together
On a floured surface knead lightly and shape it into a round loaf
Place it on the hot oven tray and score a cross in the top

Bake for about 40-45 minutes ( until golden and it sounds hollow when you tap the bottom of it)

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L’Enclume photo blog

I love Simon Rogan’s food. Our first experience of it was at L’Enclume in 2012. We have since visited The French a couple of times and Fera and always come away excited and amazed at the creative way he uses ingredients and especially those foraged and lesser known. Here is an outline of that meal on 28th October 2012. I still remember key elements of the meal like it were yesterday. A memorable meal!

Oyster pebbles

Cockles and cucumber

Smoked eel with ham fat (no photograph but I can still remember the taste! Amazing!)

Squid and chicken

Crispy potato and coddled eggs

Cod ‘yolk’ , sage cream, radish, salt and vinegar (Cod made into a mousse and set like a yolk. Salt and vinegar through the puffed rice)

Westcombe dumplings, beetroots and watercress
Valley venison, charcoal oil, mustard and fennel

Jerusalem artichoke, lovage, English truffles, ragstone

Sea scallop with sweet corn, buckwheat and meadowsweet

Heritage tomatoes in rosehip, smoked narrow and borage

Turbot with sea asters, mussels and onions

Cumbrian Galloway beef and grilled carrots with brassicas and Cowmire cider

Chestnut cream, apple, woodruff

Cumbrian slate, quince, lemon verbena, and hazelnut (‘slate’ made from sloes)

Blackberry with plum, malt and stout

Pear, sweet cheese and apple marigold cones (cones made from elderberry)

Petit fours of Kendal mint cake aerated ice cream and chocolate

Raspberry and pear cake

More gifts from the garden today led to an afternoon baking a cake.

I used this recipe from Rachel Allen’s ‘Bake’. It’s a variation of her Dutch apple cake

2 eggs
175g caster sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
85g butter
75ml milk
125g plain flour
Zest of an orange
2 1/4 tsp baking powder
100g raspberries
2 pears thinly sliced

Preheat the oven to 200c
Whisk the eggs, caster sugar and vanilla in a bowl until the mixture is thick and looks like mousse ( this takes a few minutes)

Melt the butter and milk in a pan and then pour onto the eggs whilst whisking.
Fold the dry ingredients and orange zest into the egg mix and then pour into a square cake tin.

Arrange the pear and raspberries over the cake mix ( some will sink)
Bake for 10 minutes then reduce the oven to 180 and bake for a further 25 minutes.

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Autumn fruit and marzipan muffins

Our garden has certainly been fruitful this autumn. Plenty of pears, plums and raspberries to enjoy. The danger with baking is it is all too easy to make the same cakes over and over again as you know they work. So, I decided to spend an afternoon searching my many recipe books for new ideas that I could adapt. Here is one I adapted from my Ottolenghi recipe book.

480g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp cinnamon
200g caster sugar
2 eggs
110g melted unsalted butter
280ml milk
Zest of 2 oranges
100g marzipan

Autumn fruit compote
500g plums stoned and cut into chunks
250g raspberries
60g caster sugar
1 stick of cinnamon

To make the compote, put the fruit, sugar and cinnamon mixed together in an oven dish and bake for 15 mins at 170c. When it has softened and its lovely and juicy and sticky, take it out of the oven and set outside to cool.

Put the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and cinnamon in a bowl. In a separate bowl whisk the sugar and eggs together then add the milk and butter and combine it. Grate the marzipan into the mix and add the orange zest. Add 100g of the compote and mix.

Fold in the dry ingredients and spoon the mix into muffin cases.
Bake at 170c for 25-30 mins
Serve with the remaining compote

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Sara Danesin supper club photo blog

We visited Sara’s supper club for the first time in 2012. It’s a fantastic experience eating great Italian food with a small number of people you have never met before and be able to watch Sara work and explain her food with such passion.

15th September 2012 (not the best photos)

Amuse Bouche of quail egg on rye with truffle butter

Starter of red pepper and parma ham bake with a warm pearl barley salad

Main course of confit aromatic belly pork, lentils, micro-apples and vanilla mash

Pudding of butternut squash bavorois, bitter chocolate sorbet, hazelnut praline, fig caramel

Torta di Susine (Plum Cake)

I may have mentioned before that I have a bit of an obsession with cookery books, there is nothing I enjoy more than an evening reading through various books and planning what I might make. One of my favourite food writers is Tessa Kiros. I discovered her books when I went to Florence on a school trip! I was wandering around Sienna and buying as much food as I thought I could squeeze into my suitcase to bring back. In one little eaterie was a copy of ‘Twelve’ a Tuscan cookbook Tessa Kiros. The thing I love most about her books is their simplicity. I’ve since bought ‘Apples for Jam’ and ‘Falling Cloudberries’

Anyway, today I made a simple plum cake from Twelve. I’m not going to print out the full recipe as I really want you to buy the book ( it’s on page 212).
But you put plums in the bottom of the tin

you whisk the sugar, vanilla and eggs together until they are pale and fluffy

You add the flour, baking powder, melted butter and milk and mix to make a batter which you pour over the plums before adding the rest of the plums on top and sprinkling with sugar

And after an hour this is what you get

Not pretty and perfect but really rather delicious

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Plum crumble

I LOVE crumble. There is something very comforting about it, especially when it’s in a big bowl with some custard ( and I often give myself permission to cheat and buy ambrosia ready to heat custard) My favourite crumble is Plum crumble.

You will need
For the filling:
A punnet ( or two) of plums
A little butter and some soft brown sugar
Halve and stone the plums and arrange them in a large fairly shallow dish. Dot a little butter over the plums and sprinkle over some soft brown sugar to taste

Put in the oven at 180c for 20 minutes to soften

For the crumble topping:
100g hazelnuts
75g butter
175g flour
110g Demerara sugar
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
Put all the topping ingredients in a food processor or mini chopper and blitz

Put the topping on the softened plums and return to the oven until the topping is golden brown and the plums bubbling underneath.

Serve with custard

Apple crumble

I use a mix of about 5/6 cooking apples and 4 eating apples ( usually cox or braeburns) peeled and sliced
I add 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves and 1 teaspoon cinnamon to the apples and about 25-30g brown sugar and mix well.

I make the same crumble mix as above but often replace the hazelnuts for almonds and add a little more cinnamon to the mix

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Lemon(ish) meringue cupcakes

A few weeks ago we went to the Chatsworth farm shop suppliers fayre and I bought ALOT of curd. So the experimenting begins…..

For the cupcake
80g softened unsalted butter
280g golden caster sugar
240g plain flour
1tbsp baking powder
Zest of a lemon
2 large eggs
240ml milk
Lemon curd ( I used Chatsworth lemon lime and mandarin curd for a twist)
Preheat the oven to 190c GM5 and line a muffin tin with paper cases
Beat together the butter, sugar, flour, baking powder and lemon zest to make fine breadcrumbs ( I used a hand mixer)
Whisk the eggs and milk together
Pour the milk and egg mix into the dry ingredients and combine to make a smooth batter
Spoon into the paper cases ( I usually fill about two thirds full ) and bake for 20 minutes or until springy to the touch
When completely cooled cut out a bit from the middle of each cupcake and spoon in some curd before putting the bit of cake back in
Making the meringue topping
2 egg whites
150g caster sugar
Whisk the egg whites and caster sugar in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water for approximately 5 minutes (this is until the sugar has dissolved – when you rub some of the mixture between your fingertips it won’t feel grainy). Take the bowl of the heat and using a hand mixer mix until stiff peaks form and the mixture is thick and glossy.
Pipe this on top of the cupcakes and use a cooks blowtorch to brown the topping ( you could put them under the grill briefly if you don’t have a cooks torch)
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Guinness and rye bread, rhubarb chutney

I’ve enjoyed reading my new cookery books recently. I was bought a book by Irish food blogger Lilly Higgins called Make, Bake, Love. The first recipe that caught my eye was the Guinness and rye bread. It’s a fantastic and quick recipe. The bread was great with some strong Wensleydale cheese and homemade chutney.

I highly recommend you buy the book and make the bread. I’m going
to play around with the recipe to make the bread in my bread pot. I’ll post my variation when I do. In the meantime here is my rhubarb chutney recipe

About 900g rhubarb cut into small pieces
15g garlic
25g root ginger crushed
Peel of 2 lemons
25g salt
15g cayenne pepper
450g sultanas
900g demerara sugar
600ml vinegar

Put the ginger and lemon peel in muslin.
Put the rest if the ingredients in the pan, add the muslin and simmer gently ( stirring regularly) until the chutney thickens.
Remove the muslin and pot in jars.
It works best if you leave it at least a couple of months to mature.

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