Archive for September, 2009
Simple French Omelette Recipe
A simple and satisfying French omelette is a must in any cook’s repertoire. It takes only minutes to make, needs ingredients that you usually have to hand and can be filled with a variety of tasty vegetables or nothing at all according to your own tastes. Served with some salad and crusty white bread you have a fine lunch in minutes, with no trouble at all.
Much has been written about the importance of your omelette pan, which should be kept only for omelettes and never washed out with soap but just wiped clean. I find that a non-stick, all purpose pan of the right size does a perfect job, as long as you get it hot enough before you start.
Recipe for a French Omelette
Ingredients
Per omelette for 1 person
2 eggs
salt and pepper
knob of butter
filling of your choice – see below for suggestions
The ideal size for an omelette pan is about 22cm / 8inches with shallow, slightly curved sides to make it easy to slip out onto your plate when it’s done.
Get your filling ready before you start preparing the omelette. Most simple of all can be chopped fresh herbs including parsley. Grated cheese is next on the list of easy fillings. One of my favourite omelette fillings is mushrooms, sliced and fried in butter with plenty of black pepper. Otherwise your imagination is the limit – chopped ham and leeks, bacon, blue cheese – anything can go in an omelette as long as it is tasty.
When you are ready to eat, turn on the heat under the pan to high. Break the eggs into a bowl, add a grinding of salt and pepper and beat.
Hold your hand over the pan to make sure it is hot. Once it is, drop in the knob of butter, about the size of a walnut. It should sizzle madly and foam. Once the foam subsides and before the butter browns, it is time to pour in the beaten eggs. Immediately start drawing the cooked egg from the outside to the centre of the pan, allowing the liquid uncooked egg to run in and fill its place. Tip the pan slightly to help it. Go round the pan continuing with this until there is no more liquid egg left. Pile the filling in the middle of the omelette and as soon as the egg is cooked through to your liking, switch off the heat and fold the omelette over on itself then out onto a warm plate. Serve immediately
Feel like a more substantial meal than an omelette tonight? Try some delicious French cuisine at Le Mistral restaurant in Nottingham.
Simple and Delicious Recipe for Blueberry Pie
Blueberry pie with its sweet berry filling and rich shortcrust pastry is a glorious dessert for summer and autumn evenings. Served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or crème fraiche on the side, it is a feast to the eyes as well as to taste. Blueberries are now easily available in the UK and are grown in the South of England, so we can adopt this once all-American pie as our own. It can also be made with blackberries harvested from the hedgerows, to make it a true home-grown dish, in which case you will need to add more sugar than the recipe suggests.
Blueberry Pie recipe
Ingredients
250g / 8oz plain flour
125g / 4 oz butter
2 egg yolks
2 teaspoons crème fraiche or yoghurt
600g / 10oz blueberries
120g / 4 oz caster sugar
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon arrowroot or cornflour
To make the rich shortcrust pastry: Put the flour into a bowl and dice the butter into it, then put in the freezer to chill for 10 minutes. Beat the egg yolks with a pinch of salt and the crème fraiche or yoghurt and put into the fridge. Have some iced water ready in case you need it. Put the flour and butter in the processor and blitz for a minute until it looks like breadcrumbs. Add the egg mix and process again. Add a little iced water a teaspoon at a time until the dough starts to clump together, then switch off and form it into two balls, one slightly larger than the other. Wrap them in clingfilm and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Prepare the filling: Put the blueberries into a pan with the sugar and water. Simmer for 2 minutes. Dilute the arrowroot with a little water and add to the blueberries. Simmer for another 2 minutes stirring occasionally. Leave to cool.
Preheat the oven to 220C / 450F.
Roll out the larger ball of pastry on a floured surface to fit a 18-20 cm pie dish. Lift it in. Spoon the blueberries on top, leaving behind most of the juice. Roll out the pastry lid. Dampen the sides of the base, then lift the lid on top and seal by pressing your thumb down all round leaving a fluted edge. Trim the edges if necessary and use the pastry trimmings to decorate. Brush the top with beaten egg white or milk. Pierce the top a few times to allow the steam to escape.
Bake for 10 minutes, on the lower shelf of the oven or over a heated baking sheet, then reduce the heat to 190C / 375F and bake for another 20-25 minutes until the pastry is golden. Rest for 15 minutes before serving a slice of delicious blueberry pie.
Love pies but not making pastry? Try the delicious desserts at Cockliffe House restaurant in Nottingham.
Delicious Apple Pie Recipe Made Easy
Apple pie has a comforting and homely feel about it. It’s the perfect dish to make on a cold and blustery day for the family, so that they feel warm and cared for. Served with a dollop of cream or a pool of custard, its simple goodness will make you wonder why you bother with cooking fancy exotic ingredients when home-grown ones are so satisfying.
Pastry is often the intimidating factor when it comes to delivering a recipe for apple pie. If you really want to make it easy, you can buy ready-made pastry, but making your own pastry is actually very simple, if you remember the two key elements to it: speed and cold. A processor helps with the first and chilling the ingredients before you work them takes care of the second.
Apple Pie Recipe
Ingredients
240g / 8oz plain flour
125g / 4oz butter
pinch salt
iced water
squeeze lemon juice
3-4 medium cooking apples
125g / 4oz white sugar
3 cloves or 1 teaspoon cinnamon according to personal preference
egg white or milk for brushing the top
2 teaspoons caster sugar for sprinkling
To make the pastry: Sift the flour and salt into a small bowl and dice the butter into it. Put it in the freezer for 10 minutes to chill. Then tip it all into the processor and blitz until it looks like fine breadcrumbs. (If you don’t have a processor you can make the pastry by hand: rub the cold butter into the flour as quickly as you can and keep it as cool as possible). Add 3 tablespoons of iced water and the squeeze of lemon juice and process again, adding another tablespoon of water if necessary. When the dough looks like it’s about to come together, but just before it does, switch off and form the pastry into two balls, one slightly bigger than the other. Wrap in clingfilm or freezer bags, then rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
Roll out the larger half of the pastry on a floured surface until it just fits the base and sides of a 20-22 cm round pie dish. Lift it on your rolling pin into the dish and trim the edges if necessary, leaving a little overlap. Roll out the last piece of pastry to make the lid.
Prepare the apples: peel core and slice the apples, then toss with the sugar and spice. If you are using eating apples instead of Bramley cookers, reduce the amount of sugar used. Pile the fruit into the pie dish.
Now dampen the edge of the pastry base with a little cold water and lift the pastry lid on top, pressing down with your thumb all the way round to seal and make a fluted edge. You can use any pastry trimmings to make decorations, such as leaves, to go on top. Dampen each piece with water to help it stick. Pierce the pastry lid a few times to make holes for the steam to escape when cooking. Brush the lid with the beaten egg white, or else with a little milk and sprinkle with a little sugar.
Bake on a low shelf of the oven, or with a heated baking sheet under the pie dish (to help crisp the bottom of the apple pie) at 220C / 425F for 10 minutes then reduce the heat to 190C / 375F for 25-30 more minutes until the pastry is golden and crisp.
Hungry for good English food, but not feeling like cooking today? Why not eat out at Creme restaurant in Stapleford, Nottingham.
Simple and Delicious Recipe for Chicken Soup
Chicken soup has a huge reputation as a cure-all. Comforting and full of nutrients it is the recipe to turn to in winter to banish colds and flu and get invalids back on their feet. Garlic and ginger are great natural cold remedies and add plenty of flavour. Even if you’re not ill, chicken soup makes a great lunchtime or evening meal with some crusty bread and the addition of some noodles.
This chicken soup recipe creates its own chicken stock by starting off with a whole uncooked chicken. If you already have some home-made chicken broth from the Sunday roast, you can make a quick chicken soup by just adding the vegetables and some cooked chicken to your stock and simmering them till tender.
Easy Chicken Soup Recipe
1 whole chicken or equivalent chicken pieces on the bone
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
2cm / 1 inch ginger root, peeled and grated
salt and pepper
bay leaf
sprig thyme
4 large carrots
2 stalks celery
1 tablespoon chopped parsley
To this you can add any of the following vegetables according to taste: leeks, mushrooms, corn, courgettes, potatoes
Put the chicken in a large pot, cover with water and bring up to simmering point over a medium heat. Skim off any foam or fat that rises to the surface. Add the halved onion, garlic, ginger, salt and pepper, thyme and bay leaf.
Simmer for 30-45 minutes until the chicken is tender, continuing to skim off any foam or oil that rises to the top.
Prepare all the vegetables by peeling and dicing them into easy bite-sized pieces.
Take the chicken out of the broth and strip off all the meat, cutting it into bite sized pieces. Strain the broth and return it to the pan.
Bring the broth back to a simmer and add all the vegetables and chopped chicken, cooking for about 30 minutes until they are all tender. Garnish with the chopped parsley and serve hot.
Other things to add to your chicken soup:
Sliced chili peppers added with the vegetables, just enough to give a little heat
Cooked noodles added at the last minute.
A handful of rice added 15 minutes before the end of cooking time
For a cream of chicken soup, liquidize everything and add half a cup of cream.
Don’t fancy staying in to nurse a cold? Get all the health benefits of ginger and garlic by eating out at one of the tasty Thai restaurants in Nottingham.
Simple Mushroom Soup Recipe
Cold autumn and winter evenings demand comforting, feel-good meals that you can make quickly, when you get home feeling chilled. Thick, sustaining soups will warm you right to your toes and are easy to make. Homemade soups taste so much better than tinned soups too. Cream of mushroom soup has the extra comfort factor of its velvety creaminess and tastes great with a hunk of fresh bread slathered with butter or some crunchy, garlicky croutons.
This mushroom soup recipe is made with plain button or field mushrooms, but you can equally well use the fancier sort, or get more depth of flavour by soaking some dried porcini mushrooms and adding them to the rest. As with all soups the taste is improved by using a really good stock. Here the recipe asks for chicken stock, but if you are using porcini mushrooms, the soaking water can be substituted for some of the stock.
Cream of Mushroom Soup Recipe
Ingredients
500g / 1lb mushrooms
90g / 3oz butter
2 medium onions chopped
1 clove garlic
2 tablespoons plain flour
1 litre / 1 ½ pints chicken stock
1 sprig of thyme
1 bay leaf
½ cup cream
salt and pepper
Wipe the mushrooms clean and chop them into rough dice. Chop the onions and crush the garlic. Put the chicken stock to heat in a separate pan.
In a large pan cook the onions, thyme and garlic in the butter over a medium heat, until they are soft and translucent but not browned.
Add the mushrooms, raise the heat and cook, stirring frequently, for about 3 minutes.
Sprinkle the flour over the mushrooms and stir it in so that it coats the mushrooms, then and cook, stirring constantly, for another minute.
Pour the hot chicken stock over the mushrooms and bring back to the boil. Add the bay leaf and reduce the heat to a simmer. Cook for 10 minutes.
Remove the bay leaf and thyme and use either a hand held blender or a food processor to process the soup until smooth.
Return the soup to the pan, season with salt and pepper to taste and reheat. When it is simmering stir in the cream. Allow to warm through. Serve with garlic croutons or fresh bread.
Feel like a quick lunch out rather than making your own mushroom soup? Try the delicious lunch menu at Iberico Tapas restaurant in Nottingham.
Simple Creme Brulee Recipe
Cream, sugar and eggs: the ingredients for crème brulee are so simple and yet many cooks don’t feel confident enough to make it at home. We’ll indulge ourselves at restaurants with the luscious scoops of rich custard, contrasting with the satisfying crunch of crisp caramel, without realizing that it is simple enough to make at home.
Recipes often recommend a mini blowtorch for caramelising the sugar topping, but you can just as easily do it under a hot grill if you don’t have one. These crème brulees can easily be made the night before a dinner party, leaving the caramel topping to be completed just before the meal.
Crème Brulee Recipe
Ingredients
500ml / 2 cups double cream
1 vanilla pod
5 egg yolks
100g / 3 oz sugar
Preheat the oven to 180C / 350F.
In a small pan bring the cream to just on simmering point, then take off the heat, put in the vanilla pod, cover the pan and leave to infuse for 10 minutes.
Put four 175ml ramekins in a deep roasting tin.
Beat the egg yolks with 50g of the sugar in a mixing bowl with an electric beater, until it turns pale in colour and starts to thicken. Reheat the vanilla infused cream but don’t let it boil.
Pour the hot cream over the beaten egg yolks, stirring as you do so. Remove the vanilla pod.
Pour enough hot water from the tap into the roasting tin, so that it comes 1.5 cm up the side of the ramekins. Fill each ramekin with the hot cream mix. Carefully slide the whole tin into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes. The custards should have set at the edges but still be a bit wobbly in the middle. You don’t want them to be too firm.
Take the ramekins out of the tray, cool for a few minutes, then chill in the fridge for at least four hours.
No more than one or two hours before they will be served, finish off the creme brulees. Sprinkle 1 ½ teaspoons of sugar evenly over each ramekin, making sure it completely covers the surface. Either place close under a hot grill for 2-3 minutes, or use a blow torch to caramelize the sugar, by holding it just over the sugar and moving it around and around until done. Give the caramel a few minutes in the fridge to cool and crisp before serving.
Not ready to attempt a crème brulee for yourself yet? Why not indulge yourself with a delicious dessert at Petit Paris restaurant in Nottingham.
Spaghetti Bolognese recipe
Spaghetti Bolognese has become a standard British dish that bears little resemblance to the traditional meat sauce from Bologna, known there as ragu. A true Bolognese sauce has been cooked slowly for hours until the meat is tender and the sauce thick enough to cling to the pasta. It is a rich and unctuous sauce that works well with fresh pasta like tagliatelle too.
A secret learned from Marcella Hazan, to keep the meat tender, is to cook it in a little milk before adding the tomatoes. If you have a slow cooker it would be perfect for this recipe, as the slower it cooks the better. The preparation time isn’t long, so it makes sense to make a big batch of the sauce and freeze part of it, so you can have quick and easy Spaghetti Bolognese another day too.
Spaghetti Bolognese Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
350g / 12 ½ oz lean minced beef
2 tablespoons chopped onion
2 tablespoons chopped celery
2 tablespoons chopped carrot
3 tablespoons olive oil
40g / 1 ½ oz butter
250 ml / 1 cup dry white wine
8 tablespoons / ½ cup milk
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
400g / 14 oz tinned Italian chopped tomatoes
Use a heavy based casserole or a slow cooker for this spaghetti bolognese recipe.
Cook the onion in the oil and butter over a medium heat until just translucent. Add the carrot and celery to the pan and continue to cook gently for two more minutes.
Crumble the minced beef into the pan, add a little salt and stir. Only cook briefly until the meat has lost the raw redness, but it should not have turned completely brown or it will be tough.
Add the wine and raise the heat. Cook stirring now and then until all thewine has evaporated.
Reduce the heat and add the milk and nutmeg. Cook stirring frequently until the milk has evaporated.
Add the tomatoes and stir in well. When they start to bubble turn the heat to minimum, so that just an occasional bubble rises to the surface. Cook ideally for 3-4 hours, checking and stirring occasionally to make sure that it isn’t sticking to the pan.
This recipe makes enough sauce for six generous servings. When you are ready to eat, reheat the sauce while the spaghetti cooks in a large pan of boiling water. Drain the spaghetti, then toss it with most of the sauce. Serve immediately with the rest of the sauce on top and freshly grated parmesan to sprinkle.
Can’t wait for your Bolognese sauce to cook? Try the spaghetti Bolognese at Latino restaurant in Nottingham.
Spaghetti Carbonara Recipe
Quick and simple, spaghetti alla carbonara is the perfect recipe for when you want a delicious and satisfying meal in a hurry. The irresistible scent of bacon and the silken creaminess of eggs make a sophisticated pasta dish that is far removed from the English breakfast feel of the ingredients.
The traditional Roman spaghetti carbonara recipe uses unsmoked pancetta, but some Italian versions do use smoked bacon, so if you prefer the smoky flavour you don’t need to worry about lack of authenticity. What a true spaghetti carbonara recipe doesn’t use is cream, which tends to make the sauce too rich and heavy. It should be light, with the egg just clinging to the pasta, cooked only in the heat of the pasta and no hint of scrambled eggs in sight.
Carbonara Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
225g / 8oz pancetta or smoked bacon
4 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons olive oil
15g / ½ oz butter
4 tablespoons dry white wine
3 eggs
80g / 2 ½ oz freshly grated parmesan or pecorino romano (or a mixture of the two)
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
450g / 1 lb spaghetti
Cut the pancetta or bacon into thin strips. Peel and lightly crush the garlic cloves.
In a small frying pan put the oil, butter and garlic and fry over a medium heat. Remove the garlic when it turns deep gold, then add the pancetta to the pan and cook until it starts to crisp. Add the wine and let it bubble for a couple of minutes then turn off the heat.
Bring a large pan of water to the boil for the spaghetti. Salt it with 2 tablespoons salt to 5 litres of water approx. When the water boils again add the spaghetti.
In a large serving bowl break the three eggs. Beat them together with the grated cheese, freshly ground black pepper and the chopped parsley.
When the spaghetti is cooked, drain it, then immediately toss it in the serving bowl with the eggs, until all the spaghetti is well coated. The eggs will just cook enough in the heat from the hot pasta. Reheat the pancetta mixture briefly over a high heat, as you drain the pasta, then add to the egg coated spaghetti and toss again thoroughly. Serve immediately.
N.B. If you do want to make your spaghetti carbonara with cream, use just one small pot (60ml) of double cream and beat it with the eggs in the serving bowl.
Want to taste how the Italians make spaghetti carbonara? Eat at Vivo restaurant in Stapleford Nottingham.
Quick and Easy Recipe for Mulled Wine
The spicy wafting aroma of mulled wine on a chilly winter’s evening gives a festive air to even the gloomiest of weather. The warming spices of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg and tangy zest of orange brighten up a plain red wine and put you in the mood for celebrating Christmas.
There are hundreds of recipes for mulled wine (or gluhwein) and everyone has their own secret ingredient. Maybe a little dash of cognac, or another spice added. The important thing is to get the amount of sugar right. Too much sugar makes it too sickly and cloying, too little and the tartness loses much of the comfort factor that makes mulled wine so warming and festive. So the golden rule is to add less sugar than you think you’ll need, then taste the wine once it is warmed through and add more sugar just until it tastes right for you. Each wine will be different and individual tastes vary, so bask in the heady warmth of wine and spices and stand over your mulled wine tasting little sips until it is just right!
Choosing a wine to mull is another important consideration. You don’t want to use total plonk, but it is a waste to use a well aged bottle of prize wine. Ideally you should use a red wine that is not too tannic, so avoid wines aged in oak, but it should have enough flavour and body to be drinkable on its own. A medium bodied claret, chianti or merlot works well.
Mulled Wine Recipe
Ingredients
2 bottles of medium-bodied red wine
1 cup sugar and more to taste
6 cinnamon sticks
15 cloves
grated nutmeg
2 oranges
Push the cloves into the skin of the oranges, then cut the oranges in half. Pour the wine into a large stainless steel or enamel saucepan and warm over a medium heat. Add the sugar, spices and clove studded oranges. Keep an eye on the wine and turn the heat to very low as soon as it gets close to simmering. You don’t want it to boil or it will lose its alcohol content! Taste for sugar and add more until it tastes right for you. Keep it steaming over a low heat for an hour or so to allow the spices to infuse. Ladle it into glasses or mugs and breathe in the spicy aroma.
Other things you can add to mulled wine:
Star anise, bay leaves, mace, ginger, cardamom, lemon, lime, brandy.
Feeling like celebrating? Try one of Nottingham’s finest restaurants for a really great evening out.
Simple Strawberry Cheesecake Recipe
Nothing spells summer like strawberries and when you want a great dessert that is quick and easy to make for a barbeque or party, a strawberry cheesecake is the perfect answer. The rich, creamy filling on the biscuit base is lifted by the lively flavour of the juicy fruit and the bright red of the strawberries looks very festive against the cream of the filling.
This is an easy no-cook recipe and just needs to set overnight in the fridge, so is a great dessert to make in advance and just bring out all ready to serve.
Strawberry Cheesecake Recipe
Ingredients
250g / 8oz digestive biscuits
100g / 3oz melted butter
600g / 1 ¼ lb cream cheese
100g / 3 oz icing sugar
275 ml / 1 ¼ cups double cream
1 vanilla pod
400g / 1lb strawberries
25g / 1oz icing sugar
Grease and line a 23cm / 9inch loose bottomed cake tin with baking paper.
Crush the biscuits to fine crumbs and then mix in the melted butter thoroughly. Make sure that all the crumbs are well coated otherwise the base won’t stay together. Press the crumbs well into the base of the tin in an even layer, then chill in the fridge for one hour.
Put the cream cheese and sugar in to a bowl. Scrape the vanilla seeds out of the pod and add, then beat with an electric beater until it is really smooth. Add the cream and beat some more until the mixture is well combined. Spoon the filling onto the biscuit base and smooth the top. Leave in the fridge overnight to set firmly.
Half an hour before you want to serve the cheesecake, remove from the fridge to come to room temperature. Puree half of the strawberries with the extra icing sugar and prepare the rest by slicing or halving them.
Un-mould the cheesecake by slipping a hot knife around the edge, then loosening the sides and slipping off the ring. Slide the cheesecake onto a serving plate, then pile the strawberries on top and drizzle the puree over them.
If you need the cheesecake to set more quickly or more firmly, then you can use 2 sheets of gelatine dissolved in water or lemon juice and mix it into the cream filling. Then the cheesecake should set in just a few hours.
Feel a craving for a luscious dessert and can’t wait for this cheesecake to set? Try the dessert selection at Tonic restaurant in Nottingham.
