Now, given that I have no photos of my most marvellous pheasant meal (for Boxing Day), I’ll just hand over the duck I cooked instead. It was quite tasty. Even if it was overcooked.

You will need:

Duck
Potatoes
Carrots
Porcini mushrooms
Red wine
Beef stock
Onion
Five spice
Ginger
Seasoning for potatoes
Goose fat

Par boil the potatoes and heat the fat.

Put potatoes in to roast and par boil the carrots. Add them to the roasting tray.

Soak the porcini mushrooms for 30 mins. After ten mins begin to cook the duck by searing quickly and then placing in the oven for 20 mins.

Fry onion and add some five spice and ginger and a dash of orange.
Pour red wine and stock in and reduce to sticky consistency.

After the hour is up, plate the roast potatoes, carrots and carved duck. Add the porcini mushrooms on top and spoon over the sauce.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.

Nothing beats mince pies after a big Christmas dinner!

Christmas without mince pies is like Cannon without Ball, Paul without Debbie – it just doesn’t work. You could always pop down the supermarket and buy in your mincers but where’s the fun in that?! The recipe below, spotted in a Sainsbury’s magazine and tweaked ever so slightly, is supposed to make 24 mince pies – trust me, whilst the pastry is enough for 24 the mince meat will probably make in excess of 36! It’s also worth bearing in mind they calculate the 24 based on cutter sizes of 7.5cm and 6cm. So stick on some cheesey Christmas music, pour yourself some booze and get stuck in…

Brown Sugar Pastry
350g Plain flour
75g Brown sugar
125g Cold butter, diced
1 Large egg yolk
Vanilla extract

Begin by preheating the oven to 200˚, fan 180˚, gas mark 6.

Now, sift the flour into your mixing bowl and add in the brown sugar.

Next rub in the butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Making a well in the centre, add the egg yolk, a few drops of vanilla extract and 4-5 tablespoons of cold water.

Now for the messy bit, get your hands in there and start to combine the ingredients until they form a soft dough.

Tip it out onto a lightly floured work top and knead briefly until the dough becomes smooth.

Divide your pastry up into 2 or 3 smaller balls, wrap them in cling-film and place in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.

Whilst waiting for the pastry to chill it’s time to make the mincemeat.

All you need for your own mince meat

Your mincemeat should be a nice thick, sticky consistency

Mincemeat
25g Blanched almonds
50g Ready-to-eat Dried figs
50g Ready-to-eat Stoned dates
50g Ready-to-eat Pitted prunes
50g Dried cranberries
50g Cut mixed peel
50g Regular or Vegetarian suet
1/2 tsp Ground mixed spice
1/2 tsp Ground cinnamon
Grated zest & juice of 1 tangerine
75g Dark soft brown sugar
1 Small Bramley cooking apple, unpeeled & grated (and it really does need to be small!)
2 tbsp Dark rum or Brandy (or Whisky or Orange Liqueur or any other alcohol really, not sure why they only suggest those two)
Demerara sugar for sprinkling

For some reason when you say to most people why don’t you make your own mincemeat they give you a look of both mild contemplation and utter despair, usually responding with “Oh it takes far too long” or “It’s too much faffing and arsing about, you might as well buy it”. Now, it may come as a surprise to learn that from weighing out the ingredients to spooning it into your pastry it will take you around 15 minutes. Yes. 15 whole minutes. Ages isn’t it? Admittedly it may work out costing a little more than buying a jar readymade but I can guarantee it will taste a whole lot better!

Firstly if your almonds aren’t already, blanch them by covering with boiling water for no more than 1 minute. Drain off the hot water and immediately rinse with cold water. Drain again and pat dry to remove excess water. Now holding the almonds between your thumb and index finger, squeeze gently and the skins should slip off.

Put the blanched almonds, figs, dates, prunes and depending on their size, cranberries into a food processor and pulse until roughly chopped.

Transfer to a mixing bowl and add in the remaining ingredients stirring until well mixed.

At this point the recipe states to add 2 tablespoons of your alcohol, personally I felt this was woefully inadequate, you could barely taste the brandy in the first batch I made. If you follow my lead you will stir in a good 4 tablespoons (more if you are so inclined) and leave the mix to stand whilst you turn your attention back to the pastry.

Nothing beats mince pies after a big Christmas dinner!

Having chilled for 30 minutes remove your pastry from the fridge.

Lightly flour your work surface and roll the pastry out thinly.

Using the larger cutter, cut out 24 pie bases and push them into your bun trays.

Add a spoonful of your mincemeat, careful not to add too much as it will bubble over.

Roll out the remaining pastry and cut out the 24 tops with the smaller cutter.

Brush the underside of each top with milk and place on each pie, pinching the edges together to seal them.

Brush your pies with milk, sprinkle generously with demerara sugar and make 2 small cuts in the centre with a knife.

Lastly, bake in your preheated oven for 20-25 minutes.

The best thing about making your own mincemeat is that if you make too much simply put it in an airtight jar and store it in a cool dry place until next year. Alternatively, festively label and decorate your jars and give them out as stocking fillers!

Time for a nice warm mince pie, smothered in cream – enjoy.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.

Steak and Ale pie is one of my favourites. Like all one pot dishes it is simple to prepare and, if you are familiar with the process, almost an unthinking act. You should be spending no more than 20 minutes cooking it and then that’s it, your job is to let the oven melt it into submission over the course of two and a half hours.

So, get preparing:

600g braising steak

2 red onions, diced

2 or 3 cloves of garlic

4 medium carrots, sliced generously

1 punnet of chestnut mushrooms, quartered

1 bottle of Guinness or Superbock

1 beef stock cube

Ready prepared puff pastry

1 egg, beaten

Rosemary

Flour

Heat the oven to 190C.

Dice the onion and get that slowly softening over a medium heat. Then chop then garlic, carrots and mushrooms and, when the onion is soft – add to the pan.

Chop the meat into bite sized chunks and throw that into the pan along with a good two tablespoons of chopped rosemary, crushed beef stock cube (you can go mad here and add chilli, worcestershire sauce – anything that takes your fancy. Then add a tablespoon of flour. This will help thicken the sauce. A pie with a runny sauce is like a child with a runny nose – not a good thing at all.

Give it all a stir and let it fry for a few minutes before adding the Guinness. Add boiling water so the stock just covers the meat and then bring everything up to the simmer point.

Cover and slam into the oven for 1½ hours. Check the mix after that and give it a good stir and then continue cooking for another hour. Keep checking though because you don’t want the sauce to dry up.

When you are happy that everything is tender, spoon out the mix into individual pie dishes and then cover with some rolled out flaky pastry. Bung it all back in the oven for about 30 minutes or until the pastry is golden and then eat with some green vegetables.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.

But today we’re making pizza and you don’t need to know shit for that.

All you do need is some idea of what you like to eat. For me I tend to switch between something meaty and something green – but not in a bad way.

Today we will be serving up spinach, ricotta, goat cheese, mushroom, egg and mozzerella pizza. And that there is pretty much your shopping list. Throw in some flour, yeast, salt, passata and sun dried tomato paste and you have yourself a feast in the buff.

The first thing to “learn” is how to make pizza dough (mound some plain flour on a board, add a teaspoon of salt, a sachet of yeast, a tablespoon of sugar and a very good glug of olive oil then add lukewarm water bit by bit and mixe it all in to form the dough – you’ll feel when the dough is ready because it will be soft and kneadable). When this is done, roll it out.

The second thing is the tomato topping. I just mix passata with sun dried tomato paste and add oregano. As long as it is all nice and thick you can vary that as you like. Spread it on the pizza base.

Decoration is the fun bit. For this pizza I added sliced tomatoes, sliced mushrooms, a huge handful of spinach (and I mean huge – it shrinks a lot in the cooking so look up the word “mound”). Then I added ricotta and goat cheese and mozzerella before slamming it all in the oven.

About five minutes before it is due to finish cooking I dropped two eggs on the top of the pizza. That should leave the eggs soft in the centre so it all oozes out when sliced.

It really is all about using ingredients to please yourself. I’ll leave you with a photo session of the making of my pizza.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.

A scoop of spanish joy

If you enjoyed my red pepper and prawn risotto then you will love this paella. Unless you are vegetarian in which case you must either 1) shut your eyes or 2) adapt. This is a rough guide to making paella. I’ve found that using anything to hand varies the flavour and the experience. And speaking of experience my only other bit of advice here is to share it. I have made this for two people only and as nice as it is, it feels like it ought to be served up to far more. Make it in a big pan, invite friends, neighbours and homeless people over and just let people scoop it out into bowls by the steaming handful. Leave thick scraps of crusty bread lying around for them to dip in to the deep sauce and keep pouring the wine – alcoholic or non-alcoholic – the experience will be intoxicating enough.

After that build up I’d better get on and deliver. In fact I had probably best come to your house and start cooking, right? Let’s start with the ingredients.

Stock (chicken or veg stock – about a pint depending on how big a portion you are making)

Chicken thighs (or any chicken on the bone – it helps deepen the sauce)

Pancetta

Chorizo

Uncooked prawns

Paella rice

Saffron

Paprika

Chilli

Onion

Parsley

Seafood – I haven’t added much seafood other than prawns because I’ve only done this for two but the experience will be heightened if you chuck in squid, octopus, mussels – you name it. It’s all about allowing people to pick and discover the hidden joys of the paella. Ideally you should be hearing your guests shout things like “mmm, squid” or “ooo, I just found a model deep sea diver and a treasure chest”.

The method: you could take your time and brown your chicken and reserve but I ended up just throwing things in. I started with stock. Get it mixed and add a pinch of saffron. DO NOT SKIP THE SAFFRON. People are watching. Then go for the onion. Dice it roughly and let it soften down. Colour wouldn’t hurt it but it’s not necessary. Thrown in the chicken at the same time and let it get a bit sunburnt on the glorious beach of your pan. Then throw in the pancetta and chorizo. Your oil should begin turning red as the chorizo releases its unction. Bless this cooking lark.  Add some paprika and chilli and give it all a good meaty mix.

As the pancetta begins to crisp you know you are ready to throw in some paella rice. Scatter it liberally and give it a good mix around to absorp the oils. The chicken thighs will be nicely browned by now. And this is where you will be surprised if you are used to making risotto. Normally you are a slave to the spoon. Stirring away and slowly adding stock. Not with paella. Well, not with this one anyway. Add the stock now. That’s right. All of it. Just splash it in and cry a little at the hiss of beautiful steam hits your nostrils. Stir and just keep an eye on things.

You’ll be wanting to fry off the prawns separately. Salt and pepper them. If they are in the shells then you can either remove these or add them in and just let people pick them apart themselves. When they have just turned pink throw them into the paella. You should do this a few minutes before you are ready to serve.

The rest of the seafood can also be added at various intervals. Squid might be best added early on and I have no idea about octopus. Just look up some recipies and adapt the cooking time. As for the mussels, well they need very little cooking time so I’d probably murder the buggers before the prawns. they will add to the richness and mix in beautifully.

Then serve. Sprinkle parsley all over in order to retain the freshness of the parsley taste and get the bread on the table.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.

Risotto rice
White wine (a glass of)
Stock (about a pint – one cube of veg and one of chicken)
1 white onion
Red pepper (roasted – either made yourself or a jar of ready roasted red peppers)
Chilli flakes
Prawns (raw)
Peas
Coriander

Get your stock on the bubble and keep it on a low boil
Use some of the oil from the jar of red peppers (tablespoon should be fine) and drop it into a hot heavy based saucepan.
Give that a minute or so and then get your onion in. Let it soften in the oil – you don’t want colour on it. Add some chilli flakes as it cooks. They are powerful hot so trial and error on this. I use what is commonly referred to as a “bit” sprinkled over the onion.
Stir in the red pepper.
Add the risotto rice and stir it about so that it soaks in the oil.
Turn up the heat. You need the pan nice and hot but you don’t want anything burning.
Once you’ve given the rice a good stir for maybe 30 seconds then it’s time to start making the risotto. So pour in the wine and begin stirring.
The wine should boil down quite quickly. Keep stirring.
Once it becomes fairly thick then add a ladle of the stock from your bubbling pan of joy.
Let this reduce down and add another ladle-full.
Keep doing this until the rice becomes softish. It’s nearly cooked so you’ll want to add the peas and begin frying your prawns.
Keep an eye on the risotto – don’t let it dry up (you may add a couple of ladles now which will warm the peas through and you can turn down the heat so it will continue to reduce and soften the rice but won’t over cook.
Fry off your prawns. Nice hot pan, bit of oil. Dry the prawns if they seem overly wet and give them a blast of ground pepper and maybe more chilli flakes.
Once they turn pink then they are cooked. Tip them into the risotto which should be pretty much ready.
Taste the risotto. Your stock should be almost gone anyway. If the rice tastes nice then you are ready to serve.
Ladle into warmed bowls. Sprinkle over some chopped coriander and scoff until you are happy.

©2012 HEAD BLOG. All Rights Reserved.