Pomegranate tabbouleh, An amazing taboulation celebration!

 No not to do with guitar tabulation! This is a quick post about a great Moroccan style recipe I stumbled across when looking for something to do with pomegranates.

 Now I love pomegranates but have as of only recently tried to do something other than munch them in front of telly. Pomegranates are a little like pistachios (which also feature in this recipe) as they require a certain level of effort and fiddling to eat. Avoid the bitter yellow pith and you are rewarded by lovely little sweet nuggets and very sticky hands. As this recipe has both 'stachios and pom poms the prep does take a little while but it is really worth it.

Recipe taken from BBC website album including the hit single - Welsh lamb in hay with Tabbouleh salad by James Martin

INGWEDEANTS

250g/9oz bulgur wheat, soaked in cold water for 3-4 hours

1-2 tbsp harissa paste

100g/3½oz shelled almonds

4 apricots, stone removed and chopped

100g/3½oz shelled pistachios

1 large bunch fresh mint, chopped

1 large bunch fresh flatleaf parsley, chopped

1 pomegranate, seeds removed

1 lemon, juice only

salt and black pepper

50ml/2fl oz olive oil

 

Now I didn't have any fresh apricots, almonds, harissa or mint so I replaced the apricocks with some fresh figs, the mint with dried mint and the harissa with some hot Mexican chilli sauce. Not quite the same but I couldn't justify a trip to the supermarket and expenses involved.

 

Method

 

Drain the bulgur wheat then just cover with boiling water and soak for 10 mins. Prepare all the other ingredients then mix with the bulgur wheat and mix with olive oil to loosen.

 

I served it with a squash and chick pea stew from River Cottage veg.

 

yum 

 

 

Whisky pairings to make your life better

 Whisky is a drink which is not often thought of as a pairing partner. The world of wine, possibly because of the cultures of the wine producing countries tends to go hand in hand with food. Wines are made to go with food, food is made to go with wine. But whisky tends to be revered as a lonely solitary drink. An end to a meal, a treat in front of a log fire, breakfast. I have experienced first hand the reaction of an old traditional malt lover when my wife stated how much a sherried Bunnahabhian would go with a sticky toffee pudding, he was ready to ring the Daily Mail. I could go on stroking my chin about the reason some drinks are treated differently to others and the issues surrounding British drinking culture, but no lets get on and have a drink!

Whisky and chocolate

  Now I have seen several tasting events advertised for whisky and chocolate, the Whiski Rooms in Edinburgh had some single estate chocolates paired with some Dalmore's. In my experience, deep sherried malts like GlenDronach, Aberlour etc. go beautifully with rich, high cocoa, quality chocolates. I think the secret lies in the sweetness balance. Some whiskies are actually quite sweet so work well with the chocolate's bitterness. The warm spices found in sherry matured whisky also enhances the bitter vegetal note in good chocolate. Also don't rule out a peaty one either. I love Lagavulin 16yo with chocolate and I have a bottle of Port Charlotte 10yo (again with a large amount of sherry maturation) which is great with a choco treat too. Damn, this is making my mouth water!

Whisky and cheese

Now this is something I was introduced to by the Compass Box tasting notes. A good salty pungent blue cheese works a treat with a peaty, salty, smoky Islay malt such as Lagavulin or Bowmore. Unlike port's sweetness and spicy fruity warmth working with the sour, salty savoury notes of say Stilton, a smoky whisky lifts a blue cheese. The spirit high notes sing on top of the saltiness which is shared by both. Seriously, try it. I also think that a bourbon matured malt goes well a lighter hard cheese, such as a good cheddar. I'd really like to try matching a Clynelish with some cheese as I'm sure there will be some magic.

Whisky and seafood

Once on holiday in the delightful Robin Hood's Bay I treated myself to some local kippers which  went beautifully with the new Port Charlotte 10yo. Whisky for breakfast! Well I was on holiday...
Again the key was matching the similar elements. Bruichladdich produce whisky with a lovely brininess and coastal vibe, couple that with the sweet peat smoke and slightly tarry element of the Port Charlotte, the whisky itself is quite kipper like (in a nice way).
 I had a great smoked haddock chowder which was only made better by a dram of peated Bunnahabhian Toiteach. It was a slightly younger and cereally spicy malt which work well with the creamy sauce and sweetness of the potatoes and of course the smokiness of the fish was accentuated with the peatiness of the whisky.
I'd like to try Caol Ila with Oysters too. Bet that'd work.

Whisky and rich puddings

 I once almost had a male orgasm whilst eating a sticky toffee pudding with a big sherried Aberlour. Don't order your malt after desert, order it at the same time!


So go on, experiment!

Found these websites too with further suggestions
 http://my.entertainment.yahoo.com/news/5-scottish-whiskey-seafood-pairings-092558463.html
http://www.matchingfoodandwine.com/news/pairings/20070419/?tag=drink:spirits (and) cocktails

A positive mushroom post and a tasty stir fry

 Here's some proof you can go on a lovely walk and also end up with a tasty dinner too!

Glen Ure, Argyll

The other week I went on a little family stroll up the picturesque Glen Creran to Glen Ure in Argyle. The glorious October sun was shining and low and behold so was the mushroom god too. Beside an old farmhouse was a couple of large decaying felled trees growing on which were a nice amount Oyster Mushrooms. Now I like oyster mushrooms, they are easy enough to diagnose, tasty and usually clean and not full of nasty wriggling things. I usually take a sneaky carrier bag with me in my pocket on such jaunts but this time I didn't so I carefully stuffed as many as I could in my pockets on the way back home. Fresh oyster mushrooms have a very distinct smell, very clean and slightly perfumed. My jacket now permanently smells like oyster mushrooms.

 So what to do with them!

 Wild mushroom stirfry - with extra violent kung foo cooking methods and a Szechuan twist
Serves two-ish

About 250g of oyster mushrooms or shitake (not orange birch bolete as they are shit) roughly chopped
A nest of egg noodles - not chopped
1 x onion sliced with a machete
2 x cloves of garlic beaten with a hammer
Half a packet of mange tout that were left over (whole as you will need some rest for the next ingredient to be processed)
Small red chilli - head-butted until finely minced (avoid eye contact)
A thumb sized piece of ginger finely chopped or smashed with a baseball bat
Light soy sauce
Shoaxing cooking wine
10 or so Szechuan pepper corns
Sweet chilli sauce
Sesame oil

Method
 First prepare all the veg so they are at hand and ready to go for when you cook, remember stir fries need to be hot and quick! Have a sit down if need be. Get a pan of salted water on to boil and then cook the noodles until done, drain and add a glug of sesame oil to keep them separate and add a nice whack of flavour, I drain them in the pan then put the lid back on to keep them warm. Get your wok nice and smoking hot. PUT THE EXTRACTOR FAN ON AND CLOSE THE KITCHEN DOOR AS YOU WILL SET OFF THE BLOODY SMOKE ALARM AGAIN. Add a good glug of oil and then quickly fry the garlic, ginger and chilli plus the Szechuan pepper corns, the oil carries the flavour through the dish. After about 30 seconds pop in the onions and keep everything moving, next add the mushrooms. A lot of water may come off them so keep the heat up and possibly pour a bit of liquid off and reduce in another pan if need be. Add the mange tout and a good slug of the soy sauce, the shaoxing wine and the sweet chilli sauce. Stir in the noodles and mix everything right up. Cook for a minute or so then dish up. I like to top with fresh coriander and pickled ginger. Goes beautifully with an off dry aromatic white like a Vouvray or Gerwurztraminer.

The myths of hunting wild mushrooms

 I am mildly obsessive. There are two books in my possession which act as a kind of hyper obsession catalysts, one being Jim Murray's Whisky Bible and the other being a similar sized pocket reference book on wild mushrooms by Shelley Evans and Geoffrey Kibby (Dorling Kindersly Pocket Nature series). I sit and read these books from cover to cover, I flick through their pages when I can't sleep, I read facts on rare beasts that I may never see, pick or drink. They are small, not too wordy and fact based in a clear alpha numeric order with a logical structure of classifications and sub species. They sooth my brain with geeky goodness and lull my listlessness with lists and lots more lists to boot. Of course the actual point of these books is to provide an easy and informative reference source for navigating an area with a vast amount of variation and some possible danger (less so in whisky). But what is most important is not the facts that they contain, it is the navigational help along your personal journey and experiences they facilitate. The confidence in having someone else to run your choices against, the shared expertise to make informed decisions, the realisation of possibility. This blog is not about whisky but about a recent experience picking mushrooms.



View over Loch Lomond from the slopes of Beinn Eich

  Last week was a bad week, I mean properly shit. I haven't had much work since graduating from the Royal Clown School so have spent a lot of time at home, on my own watching repeats of Top Gear. On Thursday I found out that an interview was unsuccessful for a job which would have been perfect for me. I was properly down in the dumper trucks. To break the cycle I took myself for a walk up Beinn Dubh near Luss on the bonny banks of Loch Lomond. It would have been a glorious walk in clear weather but the rain came in so I couldn't make the summit. I broke off track to head down hill... literally. The first thing to remember about Scottish Highlands is that main reason why it is wild and sparsely populated is because it is bloody hard work to do anything there. Unlike the pastoral lowlands there are no pleasant meadows, instead mile after mile of steeply inclined, bleak, boggy, midge infested wilderness where the weather could turn on you in an instant and ticks and cleggs want to suck your blood and eat your brains.



The low cloud and rain we all love

After a long tough ramble down the side of the glen I reached a small track leading back to the dryness of my parked car on Glen Luss. Wringing wet and probably covered in deer ticks (I saw several large stags in their magnificence and heard many more roaring across the hills, in fact I used deer tracks to make my way back down to the road). I was feeling a little more alive, the point of this jaunt. Then I saw one. The first rule of wild mushrooms is that they always turn up when you least expect them, therefore if you are a true mushroom hunter you should always be looking for them out the corner of your eye.



 The narrow lane was lined by steep banks and birch forest. The steep banks exposed the root mass of the birch trees and there for all to see were some lovely examples of orange birch boletes or possibly Foxy Boletes which live symbiotically with the trees. From my experience public roads and paths often yield more results for the mushroom hunter than the wilder depths of the wood, mushrooms although in the grey area between plant and animal aren't as shy as the furry types with legs. A quick reassurance from my trusty reference book gave me good reason to pick a few for the pot.

And here was my haul! A mixture of boletus mainly the orange birch/foxy ones, a couple of brown birch boletes and some grey coloured slate boletes. There was one rogue one with a slight red hue to the stem which I disposed of quickly. Always cross reference mushrooms and if in any form of doubt at all do not eat! So with a lovely lot of wild foods to cook with I set about dinner, I had some simple fajitas and refried beans planned so thought I could use the mushrooms in the main fajita mix, frying them quickly in a hot wok so not to stew them in their own juices as they were very wet from the conditions of picking.

 And here was our feast. Ooh it could be taken from an article in the weekend Guardian or from Hugh Fearnley-Whittenstall's latest book, River Cottage Smug. But here is the reality; the mushrooms were SHIT. No seriously, they cooked down to a nasty bland slimy mush in a matter of seconds and were genuinely a bit unpleasant to eat. Now I have found many other species which were great to eat such as Ceps/Penny buns/Porcini, Chanterelles, Fairy ring champignons, horse mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, hedgehog fungus and field mushrooms. But these bolete's despite being described as edible and tasty in my field guide were not. It could well have been because they were older specimens, they were not decomposing or maggot infested but were very wet and saturated with water. So possibly in better condition they could have been good, maybe. But here is the lesson, wild foods are unpredictable and as fashionable and twee as the idea of eating from the wild and foraging ones way back to the good life may sound in reality you may well end up slightly disappointed. So here's my advice, read your guide books, fill your head with knowledge and keep your eye out when walking in the countryside or anywhere in actual fact but don't expect that massive haul of beautiful porcini. Just know that they are out there and if you are lucky enough to stumble their way you could spot them from the mushroom majority.





What to cook your loved one on a wednesday?

 So it's Wednesday, it's probably raining, it's the middle of the month and you have no money. What do you do?

 That's right! Cook something great for a little mid week treat! But then you have the next problem, what to cook? Of course there are recipe books and online resources full of suggestions for you but with a world of choices at you disposal but a limited fridge full of stuff, you may well feel a little.. um.. limited. But don't panic as I'd like to share with you some of my tried and tested methods for creating just the right meal to lift a sullen midweek soul.

First address what you are hungry for; is it spicy, rich, light, salad based, pasta, meaty, non meaty?
Then stare at your fridge until you realise that you don't quite have all of the ingredients.

The key is to have some special little store cupboard treats lined up for just such a time and a portfolio of tasty little recipes to use them in. Here are some suggestions for one such item and how they can be used to save oneself from midweek melancholia.

Dried porcini mushrooms

 These little bastards are perfect for adding savoury depth to a pasta, sauces or mixing with the regular mushrooms you may have knocking about to add a little richness and sparkle. Soak them in boiling water until soft to create a lovely stock which is perfect for a mushroom risotto or creamy sauces to go with white meats or even steaks. Here is one such example;

PS. I'm confusingly listing options in the ingredients list, not because Jamie Oliver does but because sometimes another option may be on offer in the supermarket or you have something left that needs using up. Certain foods share common characteristics and therefore a recipe can work just as well by swapping ingredients within these groups (as long as the basic principles are stuck too). I will blog about in this in greater detail in the near future.

Pork schnitzels with creamy mushroom sauce (a bit of a bastardised version of jaeger schnitzel)
Serves 2 (1 man and 1 beautiful woman)

Ingredients
2 x pork chops, or pork fillet, or chicken or turkey breasts as you need to cook them quickly, perhaps some meaty white fish such as cod (mushrooms and fish are quite common in Italian cooking)
2 x cloves of garlic all bashed and chopped up
A handful of dried porcini mushrooms soaked in a cup with boiling water
1 x small brown onion finely diced, or a couple of shallots
1 x cupful of stock, if serving with pork use veg or chicken
Dijon or wholegrain mustard (another useful store cupboard essential)
1 x tsp of paprika
1/2 x small pot of crème fraiche, or single or double cream but a little sharpness may need adding by means of a squeeze of lemon or white wine
1 x lemon
A bit of plain flour seasoned with salt and pepper on a wide plate
1 x some fresh parsley will be nice as will thyme or even sage (think classic pork accompaniments) but only if you have some.
oil and butter for frying

Method
Preheat your oven to 50C
Get out a nice large heavy bottomed frying or sauté pan, a plate and some tinfoil.
First use a meat hammer or a rolling pin to bash the meat on a hard surface such as a chopping board, the aim is to slightly flatten the meat out to speed up cooking and to tenderise it by breaking down the muscle fibres. If using pork chops you could take the bone out or skip this step completely. Do not bash fish with a mallet as this will make a mess.
 Once the meat is bashed up you can lightly coat it with the seasoned flour on the wide plate.
Get the rest of the ingredients ready as you will need to crack on with the sauce as soon as the meat is cooked. Get the pan nice and hot but not too smoky as you'll burn the flour, put in a good glug of oil and a knob of butter. Fry the meat until nicely browned and cooked through (check with a knife after about 8mins). I like to cook the pork so it is still nice and juicy, if you like to cook meat until it is tough and dry you will never know how what meat should taste like. You probably read the daily mail too. Once cooked put on a tray or plate, cover with tin foil and leave to rest in the warm oven.
If the pan has a lot of burnt on stuff, give it a scrape before starting the next step but leave a little as it will help flavour and thicken the sauce. ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION?!! (just checking)
Pop in a bit more butter/oil in the same pan so that the onions and garlic have something to fry in. Recently I've started adding the onions first when I create sauce bases like this as I find the smaller cut garlic with it's higher sugar content can burn and go bitter before the onions have softened nicely. Soften the onions and garlic nicely and add the paprika and some herbs if you have some (pop out into your beautiful kitchen garden perfectly manicured by a bunch of smiley eco-volunteers). Next step is to add some liquid, so go on pour in the stock, the mushrooms and their juice (cut them up if they are too big) a dollop of mustard and last but not least the crème fraiche (but do not go boiling crazy once this is in). Be flexible with the liquid as you want a nice consistency. Before you serve, check for seasoning.
Gently drizzle the mushroomy goodness of the sauce all over the succulent mass that is the meat and serve with some good veg and mash. Or potato croquettes and spaghetti hoops, it's your life.

Options:
If you fancy cider then a good glug in the sauce will go reet lovely with the pork and the rest can be drunk whilst cooking or to serve. Try something slightly oaky like Weston's vintage cider as the oakiness goes well with the slight smokiness of the mushrooms and paprika.

 Wine will add a nice sharp twang to the sauce and like wise is a good excuse to do a Keith Floyd. A nice medium bodied white goes well with the slight sweetness of the cream.

STOP PRESS!!

LIDL (the cut price German concentration camp of the supermarket world) has some lovely German Spatzle in at the mo which is lovely cooked for a little longer than the suggested 15mins and coated in the above sauce.

Why an egg roll is no bad thing to have four days on the trot.

Food is fashionable. There's no doubting this fact. Food is also universal, everyone needs it to survive but some people strive to eat organic, to consume responsibly and to buy local, some people strive to eat more cheaply and therefore tend to do the opposite, some people want to eat less and to lose weight, some people should eat a bit more and put some weight on, and while some people strive to eat more greens, some people strive to eat no greens at all. There's a lot of voices out there telling us what we should do with regards to food, some for the good of us, some for the good of the protagonist's wallets. That is why I have created the LIDL luncheon club. My Blog will be about my adventures with food and the pleasure it can give, it will also be about the places food can take a hungry adventurer and the realities of day to day eating. Life is full of contradictions and compromises, I for example love single malt whisky, yet cannot afford to drink it very often, so I watch videos of people drinking it online.....
Bon apetit!