Category Archives: Cookery

Cheap and cheerful orange soup

Strictly the soup isn’t cheerful and it isn’t orange soup. It’s orange-coloured soup. There is a big difference.

However, it is cheap.

I bought a bag of ready chopped vegetables, added a stock cube and water, threw in a couple of sliced leeks from the garden and seasoned with black pepper and dried thyme.

Total ingredient cost: less than £1 for 6 mugs of soup. To make the soup even cheaper I could have used a pan and a £5 stick blender.

Effort required: minimal – I just loaded the soup maker and went back 21 minutes later.

Taste: very good even though I say so myself. Everybody drank their mug.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Lessons for next time: buy the right vegetables – I should have selected the pack for soup (with leek or onion) rather than the pack for mash.

It was just what we wanted with the outside temperature close to freezing.

A kitchen experiment

11 Replies

There’s still no picture of shepherd’s pie (see yesterday’s post) because it wasn’t fit to photograph by the time I’d finished. It tasted fine, it even looked good in an anaemic sort of way,but it needed a little extra finish, and that was where the trouble started. I could have put it under the grill, but I had another idea.

I have often looked at cook’s blow torches in the cash and carry, and always decided I can’t justify the expense, as I’m not sufficiently adventurous to get a lot of use out of it. However, I’ve often felt an urge to try one on the topping of a shepherd’s pie.

So this evening, after putting the pie together I withdrew to the garden shed and pulled out my faithful old flame wand, which is normally used for weed control. After all, it produces flame from gas, so why couldn’t it produce an artfully browned top on my potato topping? The only difference I could see was that you had to stand further away with the flame wand, as it’s designed to reach the ground while you stand.

The theory still seems sound.

When I use the grill, after using the fork to make a pattern on top, I tend to wish it would work more quickly, though it does eventually produce a nicely browned effect that looks quite appetising. Brown is a good colour for food.

Now, moving to the blow torch. That doesn’t seem to produce such an appetising effect. Instead of brown it tends more towards the black end of the cookery spectrum. The pattern was far starker – charred on the edges of the fork marks but with white channels in between. It’s difficult to explain, but it wasn’t pretty.

It may be that in years to come my shepherd’s pie with industrial blow torching may be seen as a pioneering dish of post-apocalyptic culinary style. Tonight, however, whilst the flavour was fine, the quality of the finish was remarked on, and suggestions were made that the term “garden tool” should be taken as a sign that it shouldn’t be used in cookery.

I bet Heston Blumenthal never has to put up with comments like that.

Silly Sunday 2

9 Replies

Number 1 son offered to make lunch, and without thinking I said “Yes please.”

He’s in his 20s, he’s been away for 3 years, he hasn’t starved to death, it was beans on toast. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, first of all, he decided to add scrambled eggs. Second, without telling me what he was doing, he left the eggs on the stove and went to do something else. The first I knew about it was when the smoke started to catch in my throat.

Strange I thought, burning food doesn’t usually – then I was grasped by another coughing fit.

Our traditional egg dish for breakfast and brunch type meals can best be described as a form of scrambled eggs in which the eggs are bashed about a bit and things like vegetables and bacon are mixed in.

In this case he added onion and chilli. I may have mentioned last week that he is a in a chilli phase. Much the same as I am in a milk drinking phase.

When you burn chilli it appears to produce a throat grasping acrid smoke that makes your eyes water.

The thing about child rearing is that you have to encourage them, even when it means eating burnt eggs with too much chilli in them.

The erst of the day, quite frankly, was an anticlimax after that, so that’s where I’ll end – a smoky kitchen, tears in my eyes, a rasp in my throat and a deep-seated desire to see him finish his Masters, get a job and bugger off before he destroys my kitchen or my taste buds.

Infamous delay

7 Replies

At thirty, man suspects himself a fool;
Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan;
At fifty chides his infamous delay,
Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve;
In all the magnanimity of thought
Resolves, and re-resolves; then dies the same.

Night Thoughts, by Edward Young 1683-1765

You’ll know by now that I love a good quote, and whilst searching for one, I found this instead. I’m somewhat past 50 now but am definitely chiding my infamous delay, particularly at this soul-searching time of year. It’s nice to know that I’m not on my own in this, and that there have been others doing it through history.

I’ve reached that time of life when I’m starting to notice that a lot of people younger than me are falling off the perch, though I’m trying to balance this with the fact my family tends to live into their mid-8os. There have been a few exceptions, with several living into their 90s and another group (young men born in the 1890s) who died young, though that was more to do with Germans rather than genetics. I’m not that bothered about living to be 90 (though I reserve the right to change my mind at the age of 89) and I’m already too old to die young.

Anyway, on to things that I can change, rather than things I can’t.

I’m going to give up procrastinating. I have given up many things over the years, including smoking and biting my nails so how difficult can it be to give up procrastination?

Well, as I have just written 250 words getting to this point, and used a quote I found whilst looking for Young’s more famous quote “Procrastination is the thief of time” it could be tricky.

I’ve also spent time this morning making tea, answering emails and registering for the Big Farmland Bird Count next month, and drifted off for ten minutes on ParrotNet checking sightings of the Ring-Necked Parakeet in this area. We had one that used to visit regularly in 2014, though it could have been a local escapee rather than one of the general population.

Before going (I have tools to sort for tomorrow and a shopping list to write) I’ll leave you with this list “22 Foods to Avoid with Diabetes”

I’d say they were 22 foods to eat sparingly at any point in your life. Chips, pies, pastries, pizzas – they are not health foods by any stretch of the imagination. Home made pizza appears to be OK, which is good, as it allows me to use one of my stock of food photographs.

That’s pumpkin soup with chilli and ginger, a foraged salad of garden weeds and edible flowers and home made vegetarian pizza.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Vinegar, ginger and flies

3 Replies

You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar, according to the old saying.

I’ve never actually noticed a cloud of flies hanging round my breakfast honey, but I’ll go along with it, as it makes sense that you’ll get better results by being nice to people. In theory, anyway.

In practice you can also get pretty good results by scaring the hell out of people. History has plenty of examples of dictators who ruled with an iron fist but not many who used a troop of comedians as enforcers. When the Romans spoke of “bread and circuses” they weren’t talking about clowns – although a dictator backed up by a gang of clowns could be quite scary.

However, I digress.

I have just been looking at the cider vinegar jars.

As you can probably see, all the liquid is looking pretty much the same and, although you can’t tell, they are all smelling pretty much the same. They also have a fine selection of flies floating on top.

So, to summarise, cider vinegar production seems to be going well, but next time I want something to cover jars I will use something with a smaller mesh. I used some bandage from an old first aid kit, which seemed like a good idea at the time, and cheaper than muslin, but it hasn’t really worked.

I’ve also been testing the ginger.

Two weeks ago it was more fibrous than the shop-bought variety, and tasted a little earthy. At the time I thought I’d probably boil the ginger more and change the water, as recommended in some of the recipes. However, two weeks later the earthiness has disappeared. It’s still a bit fibrous, but I’m not bothered about that. It tastes good, it’s got a good degree of heat to it and the syrup has taken on a good colour.

I think we’ll call this one a success, though there is one problem remaining – I made it to give away at Christmas, but now I want it all for myself.

I can’t remember quantities

7 Replies

I made soup for the bread group on Thursday and for Men in Sheds on Friday. Both lunches were very enjoyable for me and people ate all their soup so they probably enjoyed it too. I was just thinking, though, that I don’t actually have a recipe for soup.

Men in Sheds

I have a range of ingredients, and a size of pan, but no measurements or fixed ingredients. Normally it doesn’t matter, but at times like now, when I’d like to write down a recipe, I can’t.

Basically, for Spicy Pumpkin you want some potatoes, garlic and onions lightly fried till soft, then you add some pumpkin you’ve roasted in the oven, half a biggish red chilli and a a chunk of ginger slightly smaller than one of my thumbs. Add ground cumin if you have any (I didn’t so I decided to use nutmeg but I’ve lost the grater so I ended up using thyme). Boil it up with a couple of litres of water and two stock cubes, check the seasoning, blitz it and you’re done.

Spicy Pumpkin

If you think that’s vague you won’t like the Leek and Potato soup, which has fewer ingredients and features a few onions, some potatoes (enough to justify their place as a main ingredient) and some leeks (ditto). Ignore where books say “white parts only” as that is pathetically short on most bought leeks, and the green still tastes good. Stock etc, blitz, done.

Leek and Potato

Not sure what sort of cook this makes me but I do know it makes me a lousy cookery writer.

Today I made soup for the shoot, but that was easy, I just opened cans. They had canned soup (supermarket), bread roll (local baker), sausage roll (local butcher), fruit pie (supermarket) and cream – all for under £1 per person for 28 people. I’m not saying it’s good food, but it isn’t that bad either, and it’s cheap; i couldn’t feed them for that.

The soups I just made run out at around 50p per person when you press the supermarket button on recipe websites.

I’m going to pause now and remind myself why I make home-made soups.

Apples and apple matters

2 Replies

We’ve been drying apples ready for the weekend. The intention was to bag them up and sell them but we’ve just hit a snag (apart from the one where we eat loads of them) – they just don’t weigh much!

At the current rate, which includes using the group and the Applemaster, we will have about £6- £8 worth of apple rings by the weekend.

It’s not going to make much of a dent in the funds. On the other hand it will be easier to store than the apple juice, which is beginning to make the shelves bend under the weight of bottles.

I’m still thinking about storage for the next lot – which is going to include 50 small bottles of Lord Derby as single variety.

We have a plan to sell Apple Punch kits at Christmas in an attempt to reduce stocks. We’ve mastered the art of producing apple juice, we just need to sell more than the four to six bottles we get through every Saturday. As they always used to say when I attended sales conferences – Nothing happens until somebody sells something.

Ginger, jars and jam

8 Replies

We’ve cleaned our polytunnel, taken a few final cuttings, caught up with some jobs that have been hanging around and done a final collection in the farm tunnel. I also took the opportunity to make ginger in syrup and wash around 50 recycled jars and bottles.

Obviously when I say “around 50” I mean 43, but it sounds better.

I’ve also made ginger in syrup.

The recipe is from the October issue of Home Farmer. I don’t smoke, I don’t drink, I don’t chase women. (That’s not really a choice, as I’m too slow to catch any, but I thought I may as well include it.) The one vice I do admit to is buying magazines on the strength of their glossy front covers. They are often a disappointment but they don’t leave me out of breath or lying in the gutter, which is more than can be said for some of my former activities…

I’m not sure what the copyright situation is regarding recipes, but I’ll stick it up on my recipe page, add my comments and see what happens. It’s quite a simple recipe compared to some on the internet, and the results look quite respectable.

This post was over 800 words with the recipe and words of wisdom on how not to burn your hand with molten jam; it’s now a more manageable length (around 240) and people who want a ginger recipe or a discourse on jam burns can go to the recipe page.

Light Rye Bread that lives up to its name

1 Reply

I’ve often found that Light Rye Bread isn’t, so if you detect a slightly cynical tone here please excuse me.

I have managed to cook decent rye bread in the past, but I have to admit that I’ve also managed to use exactly the same recipe to make bricks only a week or two later. There’s something about me and rye that doesn’t mix.

So I wasn’t sure what to expect when I found the bread group doing light rye this morning.

Oat and Raisin cookies.

Could be a new TV cooking double act. The Bread Lady and her sidekick.

Recipe

Nicely floured and oven ready

When shall we three meet again? Sorry, couldn’t resist.

Different styles of loaf showing the grading from hand made to artisan and rustic. There are two more grades – “interesting” and “brave effort” but we avoided them.

As you can see, it all turned out well. Next lesson (in a fortnight) is going to be about making bread to hollow out and use as soup bowls for soup we will also be making. Usually I just lurk about and eat the free biscuits but for this one I may actually participate. I like soup.

Looking forward a little, In January, when many of them will be in India, it looks like I will be leading the session.

For a truly sophisticated bread making experience with the finest ingredients, technical hints and artisan skills you might be just as well waiting till February.

Bees, butterflies, toast and jam

2 Replies

The Speckled Wood was still in the polytunnel this morning so we were able to show it to the group. Although I’ve seen a few about earlier in the year they were down at the other end of the farm and the count, strictly speaking, is only butterflies we’ve seen in the butterfly garden area.

There were no butterflies outside, though there were some pollinators working the ice plants.

It’s not a bad butterfly list this year – seventeen species of butterfly and eight of moths though it could also include “Greyish-brownish moth” as a ninth entry (my ID skills are totally inadequate when it comes to moths).

Speckled Wood

Last year was fourteen butterfly and three moth.

I think the rise in species is down to spending more time looking and improved ID skills rather than an actual increase, but it’s nice to see it go up.

We’re hoping to start moth trapping before Christmas so we will certainly see a few more species added to the list.

The jam is looking good, and doesn’t taste too bad either. I’m being less ambitious this year – no big batches of chutney and no jellies.

Toast with Damson Jam

We’re all set for the show, or near enough, though I’m a little nervous about the apple supply; I don’t think we have enough if a lot of schools want a go. However, after the Centigrade./Fahrenheit debacle of a couple of years ago where I turned up to find the mobile oven was raked out and “ready” for me well before reaching temperature, I can pretty much blag anything.

Apple pressing may turn into apple juice tasting and, if I can persuade them to use the spittoons like a proper tasting, I can recycle the contents for the next group…

…OK, perhaps not, but it’s an idea with a certain economic charm about it.

The problem was that the thermometer on the “new” mobile oven we had bought was in Fahrenheit, where we all work to Centigrade these days. Nobody thought to double check, they just raked it out at 350ish.

At 350 degrees C a wood-fired oven will take the hair off your arm when you stick it through the door and will cook pizzas in minutes. At 350 degrees Fahrenheit it gently caresses the hairs on your arm like a tropical breeze and pizzas take twenty minutes or more.

That day we ended up baking bread rolls and, as the heat died completely in the afternoon we merely practised our dough plaiting techniques. It wasn’t my finest hour, but I kept the schools busy, which is what we’re there for.

quercuscommunity

Life after the Care Farm