Following on from the grow your own post thought I'd kick off a recipe post with one of my all time favourite drinks. (Its a winter stand by when I feel bereft of fresh produce to "make somit" with)
Ginger Beer
1. Buy 6 bottles of Grolsch or Bernard dark (depending on preference, it's the bottle with the swing top wire openy thing you want so the beer flavour doesn't matter)
2. Purchase some ground ginger and some sugar, pinch a teaspoon of yeist from someone who makes their own bread (if you keep making the beer this is the only teaspoon you will ever need, so pointless buying any)
3. Day 1: In an old jam jar mix about half a pint of water, a tablespoon of sugar, the teaspoon of yeast and a teaspoon of ground ginger. Drink a bottle of beer, save the bottle.
4. Day 2: Drink a bottle of beer,save the bottle, and add a teaspoon of ground ginger and a teaspoon of sugar to the jar
5. Day 3: as day 2
6. Days 4,5 and 6 as day 2
7. Day 7. Take empty beer bottles and wash well. Dissolve 1 lb of sugar in 2 pints of warm water and add the juice of a lemon. Add another 3 pints of water. Then sieve the gingery gloop from the jam jar through a clean tea towel into the sugary water.
Tip the residue from the cloth back into the jam jar, add another half pint of water and go back to stage 3 (day1)
8. Poor the gingery sugary water into the bottles and seal up. Leave the bottles at room temperature for two days, then move to the fridge.
9. Once the bottle of beer is cool open CAREFULLY, they have been known to froth over. I would not keep the ginger beer in the bottles for more than a couple of weeks because I am afraid the pressure will become to much and they may explode. The ginger beer will be mildly alcoholic, and the longer you keep it the stronger it will become.
NB. Once you have about 12 bottles you can re use them so dont need to keep purchasing beer. and if you keep the ginger "plant" going it will get bigger and bigger so you can start to split it and share it with friends after the sieve stage.
:cheers:
Recipe:
Finger + Dial = Pizza
lp
can this thread now be linked to the bum-slapping thread?
lp
Hmmmm... the recipe for my infamous Foxhangers Farm camp spicy chicken a la rpm
Only a shag will illicit the precise ingredients of my culinary master piece :twisted:
Curried fruit chutney
Chutney needs to be at least a month old before you eat it, and at this time of year there is nothing in the garden to chutneyfy. My first WI comp of the year is in two months time and I gave all of last years away as presents over Christmas! So, have fiddled around with something out of the 1952 eddition GHK and come up with this. (think it is safe to share the recipe with SH as I dont think any of my fellow WI members will think to look here for a winning recipe
:boo:
Slice up a 500g bag of ready to eat dried apricots and put in a large pan (do not use an aluminium pan as the vinegar will eat into it)
Add 250g of green sultanas if you can get them, or use normal ones if that's what you have in stock. (I like the green ones because they make the chutney have a more uniform colour)
Tip over a 568ml bottle of distilled vinegar (the clear one)
Fill the empty bottle with water and tip that over the fruit as well.
Cover and leave overnight.
Boil up the fruit for 45 mins then add the following.
250g (about three regular sized) finely chopped onions
three to four crushed cloves of garlic
half a teaspoon salt
two heaped teaspoons of hot curry powder
one teaspoon cinnamon
170g of light soft brown sugar
Bring the whole lot back to the boil siring until the sugar dissolves. Then and over a low gas reduce the chutney for about an hour. Stir it about every ten minutes to stop it sticking.
While the mess is reducing wash out four jars (1lb or 340g sized) and vinegar proof lids then put the jars in a low oven to dry,(worth placing them all on a baking sheet so you can lift them out together) and put the lids in a bowl of boiling water to sterilise.
Once the chutney has reduced pack it into the jars and screw on the lids while everything is still hot.
Once cool label up as curried fruit chutney and put to the back of the cupboard and forget for at least a month.
Apple Cake
Went to make Carrot Cake and had run out of Carrots, so used a couple of Apples instead. It's worked realy well!
150g light muscovado sugar (can use white)
150g dark muscovado sugar (can use soft dark brown)
300ml cooking oil
6 eggs
2 cooking apples, peeled, cored and grated
a couple of handfulls of raisins
300g self rasing flour
tsp baking powder
tsp cinamon
half tsp all spice
Heat Oven to Gas 4/180degC Line a 9" square cake tin
Mix the oil, sugar and eggs together, add the apple and rasins. Mix in the flour, spice and baking powder.
Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for an hour to an hour and a half.
When you stab the cake in the middle, and comes out clean (no mixture, condensation/slight sheen is ok) take the cake out of the oven, take it out of the tin (but still in the baking paper) and place on a cooling rack to cool.
Cut into squares and freeze in individual greesproof wraps. Pull out one each morning to put in kids lunch box, will be defrosted by lunch time, and sneak some extra fruit into them :angel:
I've copied this from a website as we tend just to take some fruit, stick in some sugar and see how it goes.
600g (21 oz) Blackberries (Bramble to us north of the border)
300g (10oz) Raw Cane Sugar
1 litre of Scotch Whisky
Best with the cheapest supermarmarket whisky as anything else will be wasted!
Raw cane sugar is best because it contains no chemicals and has a natural flavour. The recipe can be scaled up or down according to the amount of whisky available. If you picked too much fruit, buy more whisky!
Method
The method is the same as for sloe gin:
Wash and dry the blackberries. ( Nah, just stick them in the freezer, then when frozen, stick them straight in the bottle!)
Put the blackberries, whisky and sugar into a large jar or demijohn.
Shake until the sugar has dissolved or until your arms start to ache.
Put the lid back on the whisky bottle and keep it to one side - there's no need to wash it out.
Keep the container in a cool place out of direct sunlight.
Shake once or twice a day for the first two weeks then once a week for six to eight weeks in total.
You can then decant the liquid back into the original bottle - it is best to strain it through a piece of muslin cloth or kitchen towel using a funnel.
Blooming marvellous....also try with different combinations of....strawberries, cranberries, blueberries, vodka, gin, whisky.
I am making marmalade this weekend. Anyone else?
Spaghetti, Meatballs and home made garlic bread:
First empty both cans of tomatoes into a large saucepan. Add a small can of tomato puree or half a tube. 2 diced cloves of garlic, 2 diced carrot and half a diced onion. Mushrooms optional, if yes, thinly slice to absorb flavor. Cook on slow heat grinding pepper and rock salt in and a tea spoon on oregano.
Leave slowly cooking while we make the meatballs.
Get the packs of minced pork and minced steak out. Put in a large mixing bowl, add egg, 200g of chedder (grated). Tiny diced onion, and i mean tiny. 2 cloves of garlic, tea spoon of oregano, rea spoon of chilli, salt pepper. grate the bread crust piece in or use breadcrumbs. Mush up and roll meatballs out. make sure you have properly mixed all mixture. Lightly dust with flour. Heat sauce pan up with a knob of butter or table spoon of olive oil. Not sunflower oil. Seal all meatballs, add to sauce and simmer for a few hours!!!!!
Garlic breads easy, cut open a few barm cakes, tea cakes what ever. heat some olive oil up in a small egg frying pan, add crushed garlic, dont over heat, drizzle on bread!! or just use garlic butter and toast...
Vodka
Rum
2 kinds of Bbq sauce (smoked etc)
Seasoning
Pepper
Best marinade i had whilst on holiday in Barbados
Very very easy and quick brownie. (As well really because it all goes as soon as I make any)
Brownie
4oz marge
2oz sifted coco
2 lightly beaten eggs
8oz sugar
half teaspoon vanila essence
2oz sifted self rasing flour
2oz chocolate chips (I use half dark, half white)
Topping
3oz milk or plain chocolate
2oz golden syrup
line and grease a 7"x7" square tin
Pre heat the oven at gas4, 350F 180C
Melt the marge in a pan, then stir in the other brownie ingredients, one at a time.
Spoon the mixture into the tin then level the top and bake in the middle shelf for 30 mins.
Cool the cake in the tin!
Once the cake is cool: heat the topping ingredients until the chocolate is melted. Poor the topping over the cake base and leave to set.
Lift the cake out of the tin using the lining paper, then peel it off the edges.
Cut the cake into a minimum of 9 pieces (it is very rich). Enjoy with coffee and friends!
Jackson Pollack Wall Cake
2 kg Self raising flour
6 eggs
500 gm Goats cheese
500 ml Virgin olive oil
500 gm Lard
250 gm caster sugar
Small box polyfiller
3 Bay leaves
Small tins of red,yellow, blue, green,white,black household paint.
2 bottles of vodka.
Bunch of violets, roses petals.
4 Blue Posts
1) Mix some of the lard into the flour.
2) Beat in the eggs to the mixture.
3) Heat some of the olive oil and melt the goats cheese.
4) when the cheese has melted stir in the polyfiller.
5) Add caster sugar and bay leaves.
Eat the flour/egg mixture and the goats cheese and remaining lard.
Then consume the tins of paint and egg shells.
Wash down with the remaining olive oil and vodka.
Eat the Blue Posts.
Stand on top of a step ladder near the ceiling.
Wait for multi coloured yawn to decorate wall.