Lancashire leek and cheese pie, tots and hot ketchup

Leek and onion pie in  a grainy mustard casing

I have decided to revive this blog as I love cooking but forget too easily what I have made.  Also, now that I am on the Cabinet and have gone half-time at work, my life seems to have gotten even busier and I rely on a few old staple recipes to see me through - most of which involve copious amounts of cheese.  They are thought up on the drive home from County with only speed in mind.

It took a while to track down this blog as I couldn't remember what I had called it or what email address it was tethered to.  In the process I found a two post blog that I had started even earlier!

Looking back three plus years ago, I was interested to see that I had talked about hives which at the time I linked to the house renovations I was doing and the loss of my mother.  I now know that the hives were the symptom of peri-menopause and worse things to come, but more of that later.....

Lancashire cheese volcano.  Though I am veggie mainly I do eat cheese with rennet which is not purist...sorry!

So at the plot we have an abundance of leeks and a few weeks ago, on a trip back home, I bought a Lancashire cheese volcano which needed using.  The husband likes a pie and there is nothing more Lancastrian than a cheese and onion pie (except perhaps a butter pie...again later....or perhaps hotpot, which isn't veggie.)

So tonight I made a pie containing four sliced and fried leeks mixed with crumbled cheese and an egg to bind the mixture.  This was decanted into a short crusted pastry casing with grainy mustard mixed in.  It was egg glazed and had the message "I love you", cut out of scraps, embellished on it. 

To accompany the pie I made tots.  I had never heard of tots until the other week when I saw them being made on "Drive-in, Diners and Dives" (American food porn.)  As the pie already had vertiginously cholesterol-raising levels of cheese in it I went for a basic recipe:

http://www.chow.com/recipes/29271-basic-potato-tots

They seemed quite dough-y and plastic when I tried to mould them.  I wondered if grating them in the food processor made them so as opposed to a hand grater.

They were pleasant enough, but not that crunchy on the outside and I wondered how they differed from Pommes Duchesa.

With them, for dipping I made a hot ketchup sauce from fried shallot and passata with  a splash of sherry, balsamic vinegar and a pinch of salt and sugar.

La grande bouffe

Well, yesterday was our ninth wedding anniversary. Hubs sadly had to work and I had some council duties to do in the morning.

I had chosen the pudding - a torte of pancakes featured in the current edition of Good Food magazine. Our neighbours at Red Brick have been invited round for Shrove Tuesday and C is a chocoholic, so I wanted to make something that blows him away. Hubs was my practice run guinea pig.

Hubs was allowed to choose the main course and I thought he would go for something light, but he chose a Brie and cranberry parcel with filo pastry.

I had tried to buy all the ingredients in ASDA Barnsley the day before, but could not get chilled filo pastry or green peppercorns. So after visiting Matlock, I went to three supermarkets in Chesterfield. Morrisons didn't have either ingredients, but I did pick up a bottle of Alpha Montes Cabernet Sauvignon for £12 (which is about as much as we ever pay for wine, as we're not millionaires.)

Sainsbo's yielded the filo pastry and the big Tesco had the peppercorns.

The pancake recipe was easy. Make a caramel, add blanched hazelnuts - cook and spread out to cool on an oiled baking tray. When it is cool, blitz it in a chopper to make little sprinkles.

The chocolate sauce for the layers involved 250g of 80% Fairtrade chocolate, 50g of butter, 50 mg of demerara sugar, 300ml of half milk, half double cream melted in a bowl suspended over a simmering pan. A good slosh of rum was added at the end.

After making 10 pancakes, the torte is assembled in a sringform cake tin. Each pancake has a layer of chocolate smeared on it, then a sprinkle of the hazelnut mixture. Nothing goes on top of the final pancake. It can then be left. Keep aside the leftover chocolate sauce and sprinkles.

When you want to eat it, it is put in to a preheated oven (180 celcius), covered by foil and heated through for 20 mins. It is then served with chocolate sauce, and whipped cream with a sprinkle of sprinkles and some shaved chocolate.

It was the most cardiac inducing dessert that I have ever had, thoroughly delicious, but so calorific. Particularly after we had it after the main.

The main was a whole brie, with a cranberry and green pepper sauce, wrapped in filo pastry with a butter and ground almond layering. To add to the cholestrol count I also made individual Pommes Dauphinoise with red onion and garlic grated in between the layers. It was served with roasted asparagus.

It was all lovely, but this morning I still felt full, and am craving slightly healthier food! For when C comes I intend to serve the pancakes with a Galliano icecream! Bring it on!

Sunday 20th February 2011

Butternut squash roulade with a spinach and Gorgonzola filling, with (failed) pommes soufflees and mulled red cabbage

ROULADE

Steamed half a butternut squash indice. Mashed it and added mustard powder and nutmeg. Separated four eggs. Mixed the yolks with the squash, salt, pepper and 100g of Gruyere. Whisked the egg whites to soft peaks. Folded in to the yolks and spooned into a lined Swiss roll tin. baked on 180 c (fan) for twenty minutes.

Filling was 250g baby spinach steamed in the bag in the microwave (2 mins), then cooled, squeezed and chopped. Added nutmeg, chopped Gorgonzola and 4 tbsp cream. Mixed up.

Spread on baked roulade and out back in oven for 5 minutes with grated Parmezan on top.

MULLED RED CABBAGE

Cooked half a red cabbage in butter in covered pan. Added a chopped red onion for five minutes and then add a mulled wine spice sachet, three chopped small apples, two tbsp demerara sugar, 100g red wine vinegar and 4 tbsp of quince jelly. Bring to boil and then simmer for an hour.

Courgette and gorgonzola tagliatelle

The courgettes have started and the main thing preoccupying me at the moment is how to use them up. Each year I seem to fight a losing battle.

With about ten already in the veg rack, tonight I decided to make a quick dish as we had a meeting of the village hall committee.

We took Baby JB and she chewed my hand throughout the whole of the meeting. On the way home we popped in to the 'Oss for a quick drink. Much to hubs consternation the real ale was off.

So, it was meant to be a courgette, walnut and gorgonzola sauce but I couldn't find the walnuts I had purchased earlier. (I found them this morning in the fridge!)

It was fine. A bit to much pasta but the chucks will like the leftovers. Had withe some french bread and a tomato side salad with home grown leaves.

Broad bean and roquefort risotto

It's been a long time.

This year I lost my mother and also set off on a major remodel of the house. With one thing and another I ahven't done that much cooking. In the last two weeks, I've held a couple of dinner parties as we finally have something like a dining room back.

Particularly during the rewire the house was so bad that we upped sticks and went to the pub. Today the decorators are in.

So, normality slowly returning, it's time to start the blog again.

Hubs and I haven't been to the plot much and the garden is a jungle but we have grown some broad beans so last night I made a broadbean and roquefort risooto.. Frankly it was very salty but we sat on the patio and ate it. The Squire joined us for a Speckled Hen whilst our new puppy, Baby JB, ran round the garden with Bo and Jet.

We had one of next doors hens broody under a bush in our garden, but they have taken her away.

Monday 22nd February 2010 Goat's cheese in filo parcels with cranberry sauce

By request fron Hubs.

Wow, they have fresh filo pastry in Tesco Clowne! As I want to encourage them to stock it, I changed from the puff pastry case I was going to make.

This is a really easy meal, and as I was home later than usual it is ideal. It is basically mashed goat's cheese in a filo "money bag" parcel, on a sauce of port, cranberry jelly, butter and lemon. I roasted some asparagus with it, and had curly fries (a wicked treat!). This is a recipe adapted from a little Sainsbury's cookbook I have. When I first made it when I lived at the Croft in Morley I thought it was so sophisticated!! Now it's a staple.

Cooking was interupted by a family phone call (no 2 niece), but was aided by one of Hub's wicked Martini Cocktails. (Chilled glass, Bombay sapphire, Noilly Prat, black olive)

Had a couple of bottles of Cote de Ventoux between us. BAD! Watched series 3 "Gavin and Stacey" GOOD!

Sunday 21 February 2010 Vegetable stifado

Hubs told me not to bother getting up as it was snowing heavily outside.

We walked to Creswell to buy some food for dinner. I wanted to do Paul Gayler's Veggie Stifado with spinach keftedes. Well, Creswell isn't exactly Clowne - so that doesn't say much. But it is walkable, mainly off road, along old railway tracks.

So, what couldn't we buy? Spinach, Sun Blush tomatoes, haricot beansspring onions for starters. Managed to buy a cauli from Spar. So it wasn't quite Gayler's recipe. Plus some extras went in: pepper, baby sweetcorn and Quorn pieces (!!!) It is quite a thin stew and not as nice as the Veggie Bourgignon I make. Next time I'll thicken it, and follow the recipe exactly.

Catch up Feb 2010

This is just a catch up. With Mother going in to hospital things haven't been that normal. It also says something for my photography that I'm not sure what some of these dishes are?

9th February - this looks like tri-colour fusilli with veggies left over from the Chilean meal

11th February

This must be a lasagna with spinach.

Valentine's Day 14th February

Heart shaped fried eggs.

The dining room - just repainted!

Heart shaped veggie Toad in the Hole with cauliflower cheese, roat parsnips and potatoes and raost asparagus. Yum!

Thursday 18th February 2010 Celeriac and Macaroni Souffle with Emmentaler fondue

I have been struggling to blog over the last two weeks as my mother fell down the stairs and is in hospital. We've been over twice and every night has been taken up with conversations with siblings or my Dad. These things are more important.

Still I did cook last night. A Paul Gayler recipe but I didn't do it justice. I love both souffle and fondue and this recipe also includes old favourite Celeriac as well as Roquefort cheese and macaroni.

Thankfully Hubs did the shopping for me. Just as I was about to leave work, the boss decided he wanted to have a meeting. This put me half an hour back, and straight in to the rush hour. I couldn't get on to the motorway because of a problem on the northbound M1, and then it started snowing. I don't like driving in snow. I then remembered that I had broken my big souffle dish, and also that I had failed to buy some medium sized souffle dishes before Xmas. I rusherd to the local kitchen shop, but it was shut.

Back at home there was some paperwork to clear and recycle and then I had to return a couple of phone calls. One involved feuding neighbours - my favourite (not) and another a home adaptation issue. Dad seemed brighter when I spoke to him, but it is hard for him.

On to the souffle. Hubs prepped the celeriac whilst I was on the phone. I notice that I was having an allergic reaction to something, as I was itching and was coming up in blotches on my arms chest and tummy. Took anti-histamines washed down with a raspberyy Martini. Never a good idea!

Decided to make souffle in a cake tin. It is quite simple to make, though the egg white seems to fly everywhere when I whisk it with the turbo blender. I had to guess how long to cook it as the recipe was for individual souffles. Decided not to twice bake it.

It was a shame. The souffle rose fine, but it would just collapse on the plate. I must try this agaion with the proper kit. Couldn't really taste the celeriac either. Nice bottle of Crozes-Hermitage though,

Tonight was a lot chaotic. I had other things on my mind, the kitchen was a mess and the dishwasher was already full when I started to cook. Having the right souffle dishes would have helped too!

Sunday 7th February 2010 Creamed spinach and aubergine & butternut squash a la Milanesa

Saturday 6th February 2010 Pebre and corn bread, plantain empanadas

Tuesday 2 February 2010 Aubergine cannelloni

There was no cooking on Monday as hubs and I had a party meeting about housing.

On Tuesday night I was late home so I called ahead and asked what Hubs would like. He called back with an old favourite - one that he has even made occasionally.

Coming out of the Co-op the snow was beginning to settle so I took the long way round in to the village. The recipe involves tomato sauce and pesto, but to speed thing up I bought a tub of tomato and basil sauce from the chill cabinet and an organic pesto from the shelves.

The meal is simple. Heat up the oven to 180 celcius. Slice a large aubergine thinly and brush each side with olive oil. Put these on the oven until they show signs of softening - the miraculous transformation that aubergine undergoes to become edible. Take out of oven, smear one side of the aubergine with pesto sauce and then roll up around a piece of Mozzarella. Place each slice of aubergine in an oiled dish, seam side down. Pour over the hot tomato sauce, top with grated Cheddar or Parmezan (but don't over do the cheese) as well as some torn basil and pop back in the oven until it bubbles. Serve with bread.

I love this dish. It is fresh tasting (even with the bought sauce) and isn't too rich.

kitchen

I have cleaned today for several hours with a toothbrush and a metal scrub. There will be no cooking tonight for fear of dirtying my happy, shiney kitchen!

Saturday 30th January 2010 Curried Parsnip Pie

Saturday is traditionally a lie-in day in our household. But as there is a by-election in the neighbouring District, we went out leafleting with Comrade K.

On our return we decided to have a chip butty and a drink down the Oss. We used to go down the Oss a lot - perhaps too much. It was always a busy, friendly village pub.

But over the last few months it has declined. K is a big fan of real ale, but increasingly the real ale is not on. Traditional beer has been replaced by super-chilled pump. I drink red wine, but prefer a decent glass. Sometimes there's none on at all - and recently there has been a French Merlot that I'm not keen on. We have mentioned this a few times... Inevitably, our visits to the pub have declined.

However yesterday we were dismayed to see that they had now put a pool table in the centre of the main room of the pub, where most people like to sit. It dominates the room, and seemingly on Friday night some regulars were unable to take their favourite spots.

Usually if we go for a chip butty we might stay for two, three drinks, but yesterday I think we were so depressed about the way the pub was going that we had our chips (reduced portions)and went home after one. It's a shame. It could be a brilliant pub with a bit of enthusiasm.

Back at home, it was a sorting out day. We're still not straight from the holiday. We put some of the photos on a USB stick to drive one of the two digital frames which people have bought us.

For dinner, it was Parsnip pie - mainly because I boughta bag of parsnips reduced from the Co-op on Thursday. There is a recipe for Curried Parsnip Pie in Roz Denny's Ultimate Vegetarian Cookbook which I've made before.

But is it a pie? Frankly the recipe is more like a stew with a crust on top, though in this recipe the filling is part cooked under the pie. I prefer my pies to be a bit more solid and have a bottom crust as well as a top. So the recipe was modified. I also left out the curry as hubs isn't good with trigeminal flavours. Instead I subbed coriander, cumin and paprika which are spicy without being hot.

I was quite pleased how it turned out. I'm getting more confident with pastry. My photos are all in the same style though. Hubs received a book about photography at Xmans. Perhaps I had better have a look!!!!

Friday 29th January 2010 Aubergine and ricotta cannelloni

Today started off early with a trip up to Middlesborough. I picked up DJP at Meadowhall Park and Ride and headed north. As it was dark, I had difficulty not falling asleep.

As we approached Teesport there was a flurry of snow in the air.

DJP's car was not working and he had been trying to call me the night before to get a lift from his house. Unfortunately we had left the phone off the hook and did not get the message. So he had had to get up early without breakfast to meet me at the other end of the city from where he lives. On arriving at destination, he therefore wanted breakfast. We bumped in to two Rotherham colleagues, also in search of sustenance and headed across the road to ASDA - which seemed to be the only option around.

There was no cafe in the ASDA but we were directed to a cafe in the complex next door. It was shut. My Rotherham comrade spotted someone inside who tried to ignore us but eventually came to the door. She told us the cafe wasn't open but she would make us a cup of tea.

The cafe was a bit basic and the floors and tables hadn't been cleaned from the previous day. We looked for the least messy table and sat down. Eventually she brought cups of lukewarm tea as "the boiler had not got going yet." It was all a bit grim, but funny in a perverse sort of way.

Anyway, enough said about that.

DJP and I made it back home earlier than expected. The A1 was clear and Sheffield wasn't too busy. So I bit the bullet and got out my pasta roller. I do this approximately every second year.

I'd chosen a Jamie Oliver recipe which required 16 sheets of fresh pasta, but decided it to make it myself. What made the difference from the times before is that I shaped the pasta into an oblong before I rolled it, and also lightly floured it before rolling. Three out of four sheets worked and I managed to get them quite thin.

Ja
Jamie recommends that you use the crumbly ricotta that you can buy in Italian delis. There aren't many Italian delis around here. The recipe wasn't that clear but I think we got there. (It seemed to miss out a crucial step.) Also I'm not keen on his habit of saying a handful of this, or a good glug of that. I like precision.

Still it tased good and encourages me to make pasta a bit more often.

Thursday 28th January 2010 Leek and stilton bread pudding

A fairly full on day at work. Though I was home by six, I could not face the pasta maker. Patience is not one of my virtues!

Kevin had stopped off at our allotment on the way home. Our leeks are looking thin, so he took a couple from his father's plot (with prior permission, of course.) The white bit wasn't very big, so I added some red onion to the dish.

I sed mini baguettes for the bread, smeared with grainy mustard. The rest was a custard with pepper and ntmeg. Perhaps next time I'll add Bayleaf or cloves. The cheese was Stilton, crumbled over the top. I did individual portions and probably (definitely) overcooked the dish. Still it tasted good.

The sprouts are ours as well. Also picked from the plot.

Wednesday 27th January 2010 Spinach pancakes and mushrooms

Spinach and nutmeg. What is it that they are made so much for one another.

I love nutmeg. I suppose when I was little the only time I had nutmeg was on egg custard or maybe rice pudding. Nowadays if its cheese sauce, aubergine or spinach, nutmeg has to be involved.

Up until about six years ago I would grate nutmeg with my finest grater. Then I visited Rheged!

Rheged - just off the M1 on my way to Allerdale or Copeland.

I was planning a St george's Day dinner and needed some unusual English cheeses. I had raided the local farm shops for real sage Derby, tasty Lancashire, even a bit of Dorset Blue Vinney. However I was working in the West lakes and I had driven up with two of the lads from work. We'd finished our meeting and the buffet had failed to arrive. Wanting to be back home, we decided to stopp off at this Rheged place we had seen on the way up. Someone had said they did good food.

I can't recall precisely, but we might have paid £8 for a parsnip soup and a roll. But then came the food shop attached. There were more obscure English cheeses than you could shake the proverbial stick at. The best was a deliciously gooey specimen called Stinking Bishop. With a name like that how could one not buy it? Plus there were English wines a dozen and other delicacies. Maybe I'll write about the St George's dinner another time. What this is really about is my nutmeg grater.

Peugeot designed!! For a Formula One fan, this was a must. A perspex gobe with the grinding mechanism in the centre and designed so you could show off your whole nutmegs in the upper hemisphere. The price was ridiculous - on the potato masher scale - but it was duly purchased and has been a source of joy ever since. Even when it clogs up. You can see my pride and joy to the right of the mushroom and spinach pancakes I made tonight.

Sunday 24th January 2010 Mushroom & nut wellington

Sunday started late as I had spent most of the day either sleeping or reading in bed. Hubs even brought me breakfast in bed and stated it wasn't worth getting up as the weather was poor.


About four I got up, and asked husband what he wanted for dinner. He had looked through one of my scrapbooks of recipes and chose a nut and mushroom wellington that had appeared in the Co-operative members' mag last year.

As most of the supermarkets were shut we head to the Co-op at Creswell for the bits we needed. What we couldn't buy there, we bought at Spar. However I had to substitute cream sherry for the Marsala - I don't know anywhere nearby that would sell that.

The recipe is quite long as it involves slow cooking onions and also the mushrooms. But it is simple to make and tastes nice.

I made an accompanying sauce from shallots, red wine, stock, cranberry jelly and Henderson's Relish, as well as huge Yorkies!

On the plate, everything just looks kind of brown. It was served with roast parsnips that were postively caramelly, roast potatoes, carrots, swede and sprouts. But we liked it. A traditional veggie Sunday lunch at none o'clock at night.


Just for the record, I also made a celery and celeriac soup from the slightly sad vegg left over from last week. It will go in our lunchboxes next week.

On Monday I had a meeting, so we just ate a McSween's Haggis, and on Tuesday, time caught up with me so we had the Wellington again.

We also ordered some chickens!

Saturday 23rd January Beans and tomatoes with a Brie topping

No cooking for four days. Tuesday I was working in London late and so bought some pumpkin npasta from Waitrose. It was awful as the filling fell out when it was cooked. Also - they let me down - they do not sell cornmeal.

Wednesday was the branch AGM, so we got something out of the freezer. Thursday I was away at the King's Arms in Abergavenny, and Friday I was travelling back from Wales, so it was another meal out the freezer.

On Saturday, it was mild so we spent the time sorting out the leak on our roof and starting to clear the front garden of ivy and coniferous trees. Red Brick gave us some egss from their hens and said they would be down the Oss later. We thought we might go along, so I made a quick supper of beans and tomatoes topped with a Brie crust with homemade garlic bread. It was really easy to make - it took about five minutes preparation, and was sweet and juicy.

Went down the Oss - the neighbours didn't turn up, but others did. Usuall situation. We had decided to go home only to be told there was a drink in.......... disaster!

Monday 18th January 2010 Mushroom risotto

Spent the morning at Matlock and the afternoon in Stoke. I called hubs on the way back home. He's still poorly but said he would try to eat something, so I made a mushroom risotto as rice is easy on the stomach.

This was not a delicate risotto, like the ones that look and taste like baby food. This had big chunks of mushrooms, made robust with ceps and Henderson's Relish and made creamy with brie. He managed a few mouthfuls which I was pleased about.

Retired to lounge and found out Hustle was on. I guessed the con, and do not think this programme is as good as it was with Marc Warren.