bacon jam, the eight wonder of the world...

This intriguing concoction first came to my attention earlier this year. I couldn't wait to find out what it was... a paté, a chutney, potted meat or jelly? But try as I might I could not get my little paws on a jar. I stalked @edhick  (the maker) on Twitter, I badgered stockists, all to no avail. There was nothing left to do but make some. I donned my recipe sleuth hat and trawled the web and historical recipes for information. After extensive research I am pleased to announce that I am now the world's leading authority on 'bacon jam' and I shall be choosing it as my specialist subject on Mastermind. Here's what I did...

Ingredients

500g good quality smoked bacon, diced

A large onion (200g approx.) cut into a rough dice


2 garlic cloves minced


220g brewed coffee (the good stuff, strong)


30g apple cider vinegar 

1 tbsp. worcestershire sauce


30g brown sugar

2 tbsp maple syrup

1 tbsp. cocoa powder 

Cook the bacon over a high heat in a large heavy bottomed pan, stirring occasionally until the fat is rendered and the bacon is lightly browned (approximately 20 minutes). With a slotted spoon, remove the bacon onto a paper towel lined plate and let it drain.

Pour off all but 1 tablespoon of the bacon fat from the pan. Add the onions, and cook until they are translucent. Add the minced garlic, fry until fragrant. Add the vinegar, sugar, maple syrup, worcestershire sauce, cocoa powder and coffee, bring to the boil, stirring and scraping up the bacon bits from the bottom of the pan. After 2 minutes, add the bacon, and stir to combine. Simmer until dark and syrupy (about two hours), adding a couple of tablespoons of water at a time if your mixture starts to look dry.

Let the 'jam' cool, then pulse it in a food processor for 2-3 seconds. It's better to leave some texture to it, preferably a bit rustic with chunks. Then refrigerate in an airtight container. 

It will keep in the refrigerator for up to 4 weeks, but believe me there is no way it will last that long! In fact I wish I had doubled the recipe...

Like chutney, with equal notes of sweet and salty, it's perfect with cheese... 

... and with eggs and all manner of cooked breakfast dishes. You can use it as a condiment on a burger or baked potato, stirred into stews and other slow cooked dishes to give a deeper flavour. It is truly multi-talented and no one can ever have too much 'bacon jam'.

a summer salad...

It was 'Cookalong' time again last week and this time the August theme was Summer Salads. 'Try and get inventive, give us something different with them' they said. 'Parma and Melon Salad' I thought.

That's a bit old hat really, isnt it? The terrible cliché that haunted the Irish wedding reception menu for nigh on two decades, along with the inevitable cream of vegetable soup. Well I think it deserves another chance, it just needs a bit of a make-over. So this is what I did…

Parma, Feta & Melon Salad

Serves 2

Ingredients:

4 slices of Parma ham

1 galia or honeydew melon

Feta cheese

Handful of rocket

Squeeze of lemon to taste

Method:

Peel, halve and de-seed the melon, cut the flesh into cubes. Cube the feta to roughly the same size. Give the rocket a quick rinse. Put two slices of ham in a deep bowl, place alternative squares of melon and feta on top… in a sort of chequerboard pattern . Mix the oil & lemon juice and season with black pepper. Scatter a few leaves of the rocket on top and drizzle with the dressing.  

There's no need to add any salt to the dressing as the feta and parma are quite salty enough.

Serve very well chilled with some good bread for a more substantial lunch, or without the bread for a pretty starter that's easy to make ahead.

The sweet and juicy melon, the deeply savory Parma ham and the dry, salty feta are three flavours that work really well together. 

Now what shall we choose for the main, the beef or the salmon?

apricot coffee cake...

Apricots cannot be trusted. They lie! The sooner I accept this fact of life the sooner I can move on and not spend my summers in a haze of disappointment and regrets. They look so ripe and inviting, but how often do they deliver on their promise?

I still buy them in expectation of this punnet having the perfect apricot. But because I have been fooled so many times I now buy an extra bag of sugar as well, so I can at least make some jam from the punnet of falsehood.

Here is a nice way of using some of the under-sweet apricots that cheat their way into your home. This is a 'Coffee Cake', a rather old fashioned notion of a cake served with a mid-morning cup of coffee, but usually with no actual coffee in it. How quaint! The bottom of the cake is nicely dense, its sweetness works nicely against the tart apricots, and the top of the cake is deliciously moist, from the fruit and the jammy topping. It can also be made with other kinds of tart, not overly juicy fruit, such as halved plums, pink rhubarb chunks or apple slices... It is wonderfully versatile.

Ingredients

190 g plain flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
150 g white sugar
1 egg
30 g butter
160 ml buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract
310 g pitted and diced fresh apricots
1/2 tsp mixed spice, or to taste
2 tbsp white sugar

Apricot glaze and a drizzle of icing to serve.

Method

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 C). Sift the flour, salt, and baking powder into a large bowl. In a separate bowl, cream together the sugar, egg, and butter until smooth. Stir the buttermilk and vanilla into the batter. Pour the batter into the flour and beat until smooth.

Spread the batter into a greased 8 inch square pan, and sprinkle the diced apricots evenly over the top. Dust with spice and sugar. I made mine in a ring tin because it amuses the children and put the fruit at the bottom of the sponge mixture, it is a very forgiving mixture and will work either way.

Bake in the preheated oven approximately 45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.

I make a jam from any apricots left over (and the aforementioned extra bag of sugar). Stone the fruit and weigh, then boil with the same quantity of sugar. Sieve the resulting jam and glaze the top of your cake with it. You will most likely have extra apricot jam so pot it up in a sterilised jar and store in the fridge. You can use it to glaze fruit tarts and cupcakes, etc. or just spread on buttery toast or a scone. Drizzle your cake with a little icing sugar mixed with a drop of water or lemon juice and serve.

chicken-liver paté

I'd like to report a crime. Someone has taken all the giblets from the chickens and I really don't understand why. They were the best part! It's like having the bang stolen from your Christmas cracker. Sure, you still have the hat and joke and gift. But something small and important is missing and I for one want my giblets back!

Up until a few years ago they lived in a little plastic bag inside the cavity, but now they have even gone from there. My questioning of butchers has been unsuccessful in tracking them down - but really - if you spend a lot of money on a free-range organic chicken - should you not at least have the option of finding that little bag inside and deciding  - "Oh! great, I'll roast that and make a lovely deep, chickeny gravy" or "OMG! That is sooo gross, into the bin straight away, offensive article".

Now at least the chicken liver drought is finally over, I have found a reliable source of all things poultry, The Friendly Farmer. Through the magic of Twitter, my freezer runneth over with some lovely chickens for roasting, for stock, for hot wings and for casseroles. They all lived a happy life running around the fields of Athenry and their livers are not pumped full of all the nasty chemicals that the cheap supermarket birds are full of.

So, now for some seriously good paté - American bistro-style. This is adapted from a Laurent Tourondel recipe from his cookbook on American bistro cooking. Cooking the livers in duck fat is the secret to the rich luxuriant 'foie gras' quality of this pate.

Ingredients



1 bay leaf
7/8 sprigs fresh thyme


1 cup ruby port 

1 shallot, thinly sliced

1 garlic clove, thinly sliced

1 shallot, thinly sliced, plus 2 tablespoons chopped shallots


1 garlic clove, thinly sliced, plus 2 teaspoons chopped garlic


1 pound chicken livers, trimmed


1¼ teaspoons sea salt (& a little for sprinkling on top)

Freshly ground black pepper to taste

2 tablespoons duck fat


3 tablespoons Maderia wine


2 tablespoons butter, softened

2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil

6 thick slices sourdough, toasted


Cornichons or pickled vegetables for garnish



Make the port reduction:



In a small, heavy-bottomed saucepan, bring the port, herbs, sliced shallot, and sliced garlic to a simmer. Cook until the port is reduced to the consistency of a thick syrup. Remove the herbs and vegetables.

Cook the chicken livers:



Season the chicken livers with the salt and pepper. Heat a generous tablespoon of the duck fat in a large frying pan on a high heat. When the fat is nearly smoking, add half the livers and brown on one side, about two minutes. Turn and cook on the other side until golden brown but still pink in the center, about a minute more. Frying the livers in two batches is important as it will avoid the pan being overcrowded and the livers steaming instead of frying, which we really don't want to happen. Make sure not to overcook your offal, overcooked livers means the spread will be dry. Stir in half of the chopped shallots and chopped garlic. Pour in half the Madeira to deglaze. Scrape the mixture into a bowl. Repeat with the remaining ingredients.

Blend the mixture:



In a food processor, whizz up the livers and port syrup. Process until smooth. Blend in the butter. Season with salt and pepper. Scrape the mixture into a bowl. (The paté can be made ahead and covered for up to 3 days in the fridge or put in the freezer as soon as cool enough, for a few months.)

To serve:



Remove the leaves from the remaining thyme sprigs. Garnish the paté with the thyme leaves, a sprinkling of salt, and the extra virgin olive oil. Serve at room temperature with sourdough bread and cornichons.

peas and cookies...

I had some extra children at the weekend. Some fabulous little cousins had landed and when you have extra little hands you may as well take advantage of them. 

There are two culinary tasks that children excel at. One is to mash bananas and the other is to shell peas. With the first of the pea crop crying out to be picked - they were duly packed off down the garden to gather and prepare some peas and new potatoes for our evening meal, and excited they were to do it.  

A lot of people have that childhood memory of popping freshly shelled peas into their mouths and I would have had more peas for my tea if I had done the podding. But that would have robbed them of a fun-filled afternoon and that memory for themselves. And I did pay them... with rather nice bikkies fresh from the oven, for which they all thanked me with lovely manners and a gratifyingly empty plate.

This is a simple raisin and oat biscuit, moist, chewy, not too thin and not too thick. The little touches to this bake make all the difference. Soaking the raisins for an hour while letting the butter soften naturally, will give you a nicer biscuit. The raisins will not be overly dried out from the heat of the oven, as can happen easily in this style of cookie. I also like them just a tiny bit on the 'underdone' side, perfect with a glass of milk. Makes about 30 - 36 biscuits.

Ingredients

3 eggs, beaten

200 g raisins

5 ml vanilla extract

225 g butter

220 g brown sugar

200 g white sugar

310 g all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoons baking soda

160 g rolled oats (porridge oats)

Directions

1. Combine eggs, vanilla and raisins in a small bowl; cover and let stand for 1 hour.

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

3. In a large bowl, cream the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar together. Sift together the flour, cinnamon, and baking soda; stir into the creamed mixture. Then stir in the raisin mixture and rolled oats.

At this stage you can drop teaspoonfuls of the mix onto a greased cookie tray. Bake for 10 minutes, or until lightly browned. Let set on the cookie sheets for a few minutes before removing to a wire rack.

Alternatively, If you like your biscuits picture perfect (and I do) roll the dough into logs, in plastic wrap and pop them in the freezer for a while, then slice and baked on greased or parchment covered cookie sheets. Bake as many as you require from cold for about 15 mins, or until lightly browned. Leave for a few minutes to set before removing to a wire rack. Return any unused, sliced dough to the freezer and use at a later date.

berry, berry nice...

We have pancakes nearly every weekend without fail. They are something of a ritual in our house, ever since the girls were big enough to hold a whisk. I don't make them, they are in fact The Editor's speciality and he takes his responsibilities very seriously indeed. Once a year there is the crepe-style pancake on Shrove Tuesday - served with sugar and a generous squeeze of lemon juice. Most weekends the silver dollar American style pancake make an appearance, served with lashings of maple syrup and whatever fruit looks nice in the market or some very crispy bacon. But today was the day that the ricotta pancake was taste driven, and it was good!

This recipe was from one of my favourite cookbooks, the lovely Rose Bakery's 'Breakfast, Lunch, Tea.' We had breakfast at the Rose Bakery in Paris once before, I had the Oeuf a la coque avec 'toast marmite'(boiled eggs and marmite soilders, yum!). It's a lovely book for bakes and scones but be warned, the serving quantities can be misleading. This recipe was to serve eight - it fed two adults and two toddlers just about, maybe the French are not as hungry as us!

Ingredients

200g ricotta cheese

190ml milk

4 eggs, separated

150g plain flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

50g melted butter

A little butter for cooking

Syrup and/or fruit

Method

1. Beat together the ricotta, milk & egg yolks until smooth. Then add the melted butter.

2. In another bowl, sift the dry ingredients together. Add the ricotta mixture to the dry ingredients and stir very lightly. 

3. Beat the egg whites until they are stiff and fold them into the batter. (Careful now - don't over mix and knock out all the fluffiness)

4. Melt a little butter in a large frying pan, pour in 3-4 tablespoons of the batter and cook over a medium heat until the pancakes are golden underneath. Flip to the other side and cook for about another minute until the pancakes are cooked through. Continue until all the batter is used up, adding more butter to the pan as needed.

Serve hot with fresh seasonal fruit and maple syrup or a dollop of creme fraiche. The Rose Bakery recommends a red-fruit compote, but we had some lovely blueberries, raspberries and strawberries so we used those. 

We also used ricotta cheese from a tub instead of fresh Italian ricotta, as they use at the Rose Bakery. The pancakes did not seem to suffer from this slight change as these were still so very light, mallowy in the centre without being undercooked, and crispy on the outside. 

making strawberry whoopie...

Tired of the cupcake? Macaroons too much work? Try a Whoopie Pie, a cross between strawberry shortcake and a muffin. The cake bit of these whoopie pies is soft and chewy. Most of the sweetness comes from the filling. The iconic chocolate ones with the marshmallowy filling are great, but during strawberry season, these are even better.

Makes 9 large or 24 mini pies.

Cakes:

100g hulled strawberries

300 g plain flour 

1 1/2 tsp bicarb of soda 

1/2 tsp baking powder 

1/2 tsp salt

200g light brown sugar 

75ml corn or vegetable oil 

65ml buttermilk

1 egg

Icing sugar for dusting

Method:

Preheat oven to 180C. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. In a small bowl mash the strawberries into small pieces (not pureed) and set aside. In a medium bowl sift together the flour, baking powder, soda and salt, set aside. In a large bowl, combine brown sugar and oil. Mix well, breaking up any lumps in the sugar. Mix in the chopped strawberries and buttermilk until combined, beat in the egg until combined. Fold in the flour mixture in two parts, being careful not to overwork the batter. Cover and chill for 30 minutes.

Drop 18 large or 48 small scoops of batter onto the prepared baking sheets, about 2-inches apart (I made the big ones). Bake for 10 to 12 minutes for large, or 8 to 10 mins for mini-whoopies until the tops feel firm.

Remove from the oven and cool on the baking sheets for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Strawberry buttercream filling:

50ml unstrained strawberry puree (about 80g unhulled berries)

90 g soft butter

500 g icing sugar

1/2 tsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

To make the filling, press the strawberries through a sieve and put the resulting puree in a large bowl. Add the butter, powdered sugar, lemon and vanilla extract and beat until everything is well combined.

To assemble the whoopie pies, place a generous dollop of buttercream on the flat side of a cookie and gently press it together with the flat side of a second cookie. Repeat until they are all filled and dust the tops with a little sprinkling of icing sugar. Any leftover buttercream will keep for a week or so in a covered container in the fridge.