Cakes o' Fishness.

Bucking the usual trend of roast dinner on a Sunday we decided to use up some bits and bobs obstructing our larder.  A piece of salmon, defrosted yesterday and a can of mackerel looked decisively to me like fishcakes.  We really don't sit down together as often as we should for dinner, so we do try to do this of a Sunday.

The recipe for my way of making fishcakes can be found here http://swlsk.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/fresh-from-capns-table.html 

We also had a fresh and crunchy pointed cabbage - a vegetable that is understandably ubiquitous at the moment left to eat, so this in turn, was made into my quick fire sauerkraut.  The recipe for this you can find here http://swlsk.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/back-to-roots.html 

I made 6 fair-sized fishcakes, coated them in white breadcrumbs and set them on a board to refrigerate for 30 minutes or so.

 

I probably got the potato to fish ration messed up as I attempted to eke out a little fish between 3 people.  Actually you can probably count that as 3.5 people - my 4 year old son eats as much as a horse.

The fishcakes can be taken out the frying pan and placed into the often.  This helps to store them, but it also aids in browning the sides of the cakes too.

Mackerel and Salmon Fishcakes with Quick Sauerkraut and Peas

Jamon or Prosciutto - what's best?

It is an age old question, one that bisects opinion and catalyzes vociferous debate in the Latin part of Europe.  Where does the best ham come from? 

Today I want to talk about Italian prosciutto.  The word prosciutto comes originally, and not unsurprisingly, from the Latin "pro exsuctus" (which sounds a little bit like a spell from a Harry Potter novel).  Pro exsuctus means to suck out, or remove the moisture.  It doesn't take a scientific genius to work out whats going on here.  The leg of ham (or boar) is dry cured in salt to remove all the moisture ( a process that usually takes 2 months or so).

It seems the Italians, indeed the Romans were rather thrifty.  They made dried pasta as a means of storing wheat and they made prosciutto as a means of storing ham, in an age where refrigeration was far from inception.

Prosciutto proliferated out of the Northeast of Italy into Slovenia and the former Yugoslavian countries.  I have eaten pršut in Croatia and can attest to its very high quality indeed (arguably better than some Spanish and Italian hams).

In my opinion I think both jamon (iberico) and prosciutto have their places, and are more compatible with certain ingredients than others.  I would also be happy to use cook prosciutto (like the wrapped asparagus I made recently) but I would not put pata negra in the oven (it's a waste).

Last night I simply served some prosciutto crudo with potato cakes and it was epic.  Simple dinner, but high-rolling taste.

Potato and Cabbage cakes with prosciutto crudo

 

1000 ways to screw up a potato.

What a phenomena Sir Walter Raleigh created when he brought back the humble potato from South America.  I wonder, if at the time he gauged the brevity of his action?  The humble starchy sphere is now, perhaps unfairly, credited for augmenting the girth of millions of fat Westerners in the guise of "french fries" and "potato chips".

Baking a potato, in the oven, is, in my opinion the best way to cook them.  A crunchy outer skin (where most of the flavour is) combined with a fluffy interior, drenched in butter is difficult to beat.  Of course, though, we do try to beat this simplistic utopia with the addition of a multitude of toppings ranging from chile con carne to tuna and sweetcorn.


My experimentation last week with the time honoured "scooping technique" lead me to expand and experiment with this method.  In my fridge I had some smoked mackerel, some soured cream and some really fresh watercress.

Sour Cream and Mackerel Scoops

Here's how you make them:

•   Heat your oven (fan assisted) to 180C.
•   Scrub two large potatoes suitable for baking (floury type).
•   Place the spuds into a baking tray, drizzle with olive oil and season generously with black pepper and sea salt.
•   Place the potatoes in the oven, then immediately turn down to 140C.
•   Leave the potatoes to cook for 1 hour, or until the flesh inside is soft and yielding to a knife.  
•   During this time, remove the skin from 3 smoked mackerel fillet.  Pull the fillets apart into chunks and place in a bowl.
•   Add 1 small tub, 150g of soured cream.
•   Remove the potatoes from the oven.  Cut in half and using a spoon, remove 75% of the flesh from the potato.  Add to the fish and cream.
•   Mix the fish, cream and potato together.  Add some more pepper but no salt (the mackerel is salty enough).
•   Replace the mix into the empty potato skins.
•   Cook on 140C for a further 20-30 minutes, or until the tops are lightly golden in colour.

The watercress works exceptionally well with this dish.  The peppery flavour combines with the fish and in my opinion is definitely the best salad leaf to serve with baked spuds.


I dressed the watercress using a vinaigrette enhanced with Dijon mustard - I thought that if I used English mustard it might be somewhat overpowering.  It was the right choice.

Middle Eastern Spicing.

I am confident that I am at a point in my culinary career where I understand how Indian and sub-Indian spices are used.  Where I am not quite so brazen is with middle eastern spices.  I am not the worlds biggest fan of cinnamon - I don't mind some whole stick used to temper a curry, but I find the powdered stuff too sweet and obnoxious.  I put it down to having had to walk around "Mall of America" some years ago, with a searing hangover and having to smell the onslaught of cinnamon bagels from every angle.

Another frequent component of middle-eastern cooking are pine nuts - an additional ingredient I am not a huge proponent of.  Whenever I eat them their creamy consistency makes me think I am eating insect larvae.


Having said that, I do love the cuisine from this area.  I have eaten a lot of Lebanese food (in London) and we have travelled as a family around Jordan - I adore fuul.  


Two of my favourite cookbooks in the world are "Moro" and "Casa Moro" - the dynamic spread of Iberian and Middle eastern cooking in both of those books have been catalytic in my comprehension and appreciation from this region of the world.

One recipe in particular I come back to time and time again.  It is a recipe that is rather simple to make, but you can use it to show-off with your friends - it's rather theatrical.

Potato cakes stuffed with lamb

•     Boil 700g of peeled potatoes.  When they are soft, remove from the heat and mash.  
•  In a frying pan add some butter and a little oil.  Finely chop an onion and add it to the pan.
•  Casa Moro recipe does not call for garlic, but I think it is essential in this dish.  Add 2 finely chopped garlic cloves.
•  When the onions have softened and browned a little add:
•   3 cloves, ground to powder
•   The ground black seeds of 3 (Moro says green, I prefer black) cardamoms
•   A healthy pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
•   A tiny amount, 1/5 tsp ground cinnamon (Moro says more, but I think it overpowers)
•   Some ground black pepper
•   I add a finely ground hot red chilli - I think it needs it, though this is omitted by Moro

•  Fry the spices in the onions for 1 minute
•  Add 250g minced lamb.  Don't stir fry it, try to get a caramelized crust on the lamb.  This takes 10 minutes or so on a medium heat
•  Add a teaspoon of tomato puree
•  Add one teaspoon of salt (or to taste)
•  Add a bunch of finely chopped fresh parsley
•  Moro requests pine nuts, but I don't like them
•  Stir the mixture and remove from the heat
•  Add a tablespoon of flour to the mashed potatoes and mix.
•  Take a quarter of the potato mixture.  Flatten into a disc about the diameter of the palm of your hand.
•  Take a nice heaped tablespoon of the lamb mixture. Place in the centre of the potato disc.
•  Slowly, by cupping your hands bring the sides of the potato up around the mixture.  You will get to the point where there is just a little hole at the top, where the lamb mixture is.
•  Sometimes I try to cram as much spiced lamb as I can in.  Seal the hole.
•   You should have a hearty-sized potato cake.  Repeat for the other remaining 3 cakes.
•   Add some olive oil to a decent frying pan.  Medium heat.
•   Put the cakes in, 2 at a time and fry.  Do not be tempted to turn them too early.  You need to build up a golden crust.
•   Repeat for the other 2 cakes.

If you look at my picture you will see one perfectly formed, golden-crusted cake, and one that looks a bit "mish-mash".  Last night I cooked 4 at a time, 2 in 2 different pans.  One pan was a well known, orange French manufacturer, the other a cheap frying pan.  It just goes to show how a decent frying pan is such a worthwhile investment.  The cheap pan did not conduct the heat as effectively, and consequently the cakes were a bit mushy.

Home economics.

When I were a lad, all we had to play with was a piece of coal.  We slept under a tarpaulin and we had a candle to keep us warm during the winter.  Seriously though, when I went to school we didn't have "home economics", that was for the girls.  Why would boys need to learn how to cook anyway?  And whilst we're on that point, why was it called "home economics"?  Since when did learning how to boil an egg or make an omelette involve anything that teaches one economics?

Last night I had a retro "home economics" moment.  I baked some potatoes, scooped out the fluffy white stuff, mixed it with some unflavoursome cheddar cheese and then replaced the cheesy spud mixture back into the skins.  They were finished in the oven to give a nice golden sheen.  

Naturally I could not resist spurting my spuds with some bhut jolokia hot chilli sauce.  This provided me with a thrilling opportunity to offset the inane blandness of this dish.

Incidentally, the salad was grated fresh fennel, grated carrot and some lettuce.  I dressed it with the omnipresent English mustard vinaigrette I seem addicted to at the moment. 

pi = 3.14159265

Pie is a staple English food that has been around since medieval times.  English food is often, quite wrongly deemed unadventurous, uninspiring, greasy and boring.  The culinary experts who have credited England with this misguided appraisal of our kitchen have obviously never experienced the delights of the plethora of pies, pasties, stews and desserts we are famous for.

We make 2 kinds of pie:  one with a pastry casing, and the other which is typically topped with some kind of potato - whether it be mashed, or thinly sliced.  I am not the worlds greatest pastry afficionado, though I have dabbled with lard-based short pastries with some success before.  I prefer a nice topping of fluffy potato, crisped on the top in the oven, yielding a tasty, gravy-bound meat filling.  I made a cottage pie (with beef, as opposed to shepherds pie with lamb) 2 nights ago and it has graced our plates for 2 nights running.  We didn't have quite enough to meet our stomachs expectations last night, so I eked it out with a small portion of chips to compliment the side of steamed peas and sweetcorn.

 Cottage Pie

•   Sweat 2 finely diced, medium onions and 3 thinly sliced garlic cloves in a pan with some olive oil until they have softened.
•  During this time, peel 5 medium sized potatoes and 3 carrots.  Slice the carrots and dice the potatoes.  Cook them in salted water until tender.  Then mash and set aside.
•  When the onions are softened, add 500g of decent steak mince.  Cook until it is nicely browned.
•  Add a heaped teaspoon of plain flour.  Stir to mix and cook the gloopy mixture for a minute.
•  Squeeze a heady dollop of tomato puree in, and mix thoroughly.
•  Add 1 bay leaf.
•  Add a slug or 4 of Worcester sauce.  Stir to mix.
•  Add approximately 250ml of stock (beef is best, or chicken) until you have a thick consistency (not a soup).
•  Check the seasoning, usually I add a lot of pepper and not so much salt (especially if you have used a stock cube).
•  Cook for 15-20 minutes.
•  Allow the mixture to cool.  When it has, spoon the mashed potato and carrot over the top.  Fork the top so you have a ridged pattern.  Dot with butter.
•  In an oven preheated to 160C, add the pie and cook until the top is crusty and golden (about 30-40 mins). 

In my opinion, you can happily exchange the beef out and use minced lamb with this recipe to create a shepherds pie.  I would, though, be vigilant during the frying of the lamb mince as it quite often yields surprising amounts of fat.  I would spoon out all but 1 tablespoon of the lamb fat.

De pommes de terre au four avec du thon et du maïs doux.

Yes indeed, ladies and gentlemen, last night I decided to plumb the depths of culinary sophistication with the above mentioned delight.  In layman terms it is the slow cooking of a potato in the oven, combined with an application of mayonnaise and fresh sweetcorn.  Or, as we say in England, "Baked spud with tuna mayo".

I do appreciate a baked potato, but I think I can safely say, not with the same radical affection with which my girlfriend does.  If I am ever out, or as in the past, away on business I could be almost certain that she would be eating a baked potato of some design or another.  Actually, she only will eat two variations:  tuna and sweetcorn, or cheese and beans.  And, by the way, she is very particular about the cheese.  It must be grated and never melted on top, lest you ruin the whole affair.

I can remember a past boss of mine who was never to be found without an anecdote or joke of some kind, telling me about the age old, famous English cook book, "1000 ways of screwing up a potato".  The advent of the microwave can be heralded as the harbinger of death for the humble baked potato.  Anyone that uses one of these beasts to make a baked (that's a paradox) potato is quite surely deranged.  

A baked potato should be coated in a thin film of olive oil, delicately salted and heavily peppered - in my opinion.  The oven should be set to a lowly 140 celcius, and the potato left inside it, left to its own devices for somewhere in the region of 1 and a half hours.  During which time your only occupation is to vigilantly rotate it to ensure it is cooked evenly throughout.

De pommes de terre au four avec du thon et du maïs doux