Flying Spatula

I have been a bit quiet over the past week, but this does not mean I have not been busy in the kitchen.  I have also been busy in the Apple shop (other tech stores containing over-priced gadgetry designed to ensure you live your entire life by the rules set for you by a global empire with a fruit based logo are available).  After struggling through my last few posts by frantically stabbing at my tablet (you can probably guess which one by my comment above but I’m not planning on giving them too many mentions) I decided it was time I bought a proper keyboard with which to commit my thoughts to the blogosphere.  So here I am on my shiny new keyboard – which I can assure you as a third-party, after-market accessory cost me a good deal less than the counterpart offered by the corporation whose shop I was in.  This was actually a very good job as despite the prime objective of my trip to town being acquisition of said keyboard, I seem to have also acquired 3 pairs of shoes, a dress, a coat, a scarf and a necklace.  Good job I am so adept at saving money..!

I was actually very industrious in the kitchen last weekend, if not entirely successful.  However, I feel it important to share both triumph and disaster, so I will begin with the story of my less than successful bread-related experiments.  The first was borne of a desire to make Rye bread using my trusty Panasonic Bread-maker.  I opted for the 100% rye flour option and carefully measured out the ingredients as prescribed in the manual.  Well, apart from the substitution I made when I was unable to obtain poppy seeds in my local supermarket, them having run out.  I decided to substitute Chia seeds on the basis that they were available, trendy, superfoody and also small and black.  Obviously I thought this could possibly be a stroke of genius.  The other potential issue was the use of the rye flour of indeterminate age from my kitchen cupboard.   I honestly could not remember the last time I used rye flour but flour doesn’t get old, right?  After 3 and a half hours of anxiously waiting for the bread-maker to perform it’s magic, I was somewhat disappointed with the overall result which resembled a cross between a wooden clog and a house brick.

Thinking that the issue may have been the decidedly elderly flour, I measured out flour freshly purchased that day (leaving out the dodgy Chia seeds just in case) and repeated the experiment.  As you can see from the picture, there wasn’t a huge amount of difference.  In fact I couldn’t tell you now which one came first.  I wasn’t about to risk any of my knives in trying to cut into either of these “loaves” and I promise that no-one was harmed as a result of these experiments.  Although I have to say that they made a hell of a noise as they hit the bottom of the bin!

My next somewhat dubiously successful endeavour was to make myself a new sourdough starter.  I used to have one before we ripped out the kitchen and built an extension on the house, but having no oven for 2 months meant I neglected the starter.  It ended its days as a sludgy mess topped with a layer of brackish water which I largely ignored for over 2 years.  I guess I had always hoped that I might have been able to revive it, but it was fairly obvious on opening the jar that there had been a death in the family.  So last weekend I decided it was time to start the process again.

As you can see from the picture I assembled the apparatus as given in Paul Hollywood’s book Bread – a clean Kilner Jar, 250g Strong White Bread Flour, 250 ml of water and a few chopped grapes.  I mixed it up, threw it in the jar and clamped on the lid.  In the following days the magic began to happen and the sludgy mess began to bubble and rise.  Three days later, once it had begun to fall back to original level and as per the instructions, I discarded half the mixture and refreshed it with 100g flour and 100ml of water.  But when I got home from work the following day, rushing in eagerly to check on the progress of the anticipated bubbling alien life-form in the jar, it was obvious that something was very wrong.  A layer of fluid was forming on the top and I once again had a sinking feeling myself.  I attempted another refresh with the hope of performing some form of sourdough CPR but it was obvious by this weekend that there was nothing more that could be done.  The offending gloop followed the rye-based building materials into the bin and this afternoon I have started again.  I’ll let you know what happens…

With the aim of finishing on a high, I will move onto the one success of the weekend.  Who doesn’t love a Shepherds Pie on a cold January evening?  It is January, and therefore the month when most of us are frantically trying to adhere to some form of healthy eating resolution, so this one is packed full of veg making it a meal in itself.  Apart from gravy.  My husband is from Yorkshire.

As well as a diced large (or 2 small) onions, 2 diced sticks of celery and a diced large carrot I diced up half a swede (swede is the yellow one in England) and retrieved a 250g pack of minced lamb from the fridge.  I always seem to have small packs of smoked pancetta lardons in the freezer so I added the contents of one of those to a heated dry pan to render the fat down and turn them into gems of bacony loveliness.  Once they were brown, I added the minced lamb in a few batches to fry it and avoid stewing.  Once the meat was all browned, I set it aside whilst ensuring the bacon and lamb fat remained in the pan.  That’s when I threw in the veggies with a few anchovy fillets.  Once the veggies were starting to soften (and the anchovies had melted in), I bunged the meat back in and gave it a good stir.  This is the time to add herbs (I just used mixed herbs – add your favourites) a little garlic (I like the lazy stuff in a tube), a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce and 1-2 tablespoons of tomato ketchup.  Even Michel Roux Jr uses Tommy K in his Shepherds Pie! Then it’s time to add stock to just cover and as this is a dark meat sauce – don’t forget to pop in a Star Anise! And of course don’t forget to fish it out later.

Cook it slowly until the filling is cooked and reduced.  In the meantime, boil up some potatoes add them mash them up with butter and milk (lactose-free of course), salt and pepper and a grating of nutmeg.  When everything’s done, bang the filling in a dish and top with the mash, making sure that you rough up the top so you get plenty of crunchy bits.  Cook it in an oven at about 180C for 30-45 minutes – this will depend on whether the filling and mash are warm when you put it in the oven or whether you made it ahead of time and everything has cooled down.  The filling should be piping hot and the mash golden with dark crunchy tips to the rough bits.

Yummy…. 

Until next time (I promise to try not to kill my sourdough or bake anymore building materials)

MC

Ingredients for your shopping list – for the Shepherds Pie not the other stuff obviously!

• A small pack of pancetta or smoked bacon lardons
• 250g minced lamb
• 1 large (or 2 small) onion
• 2 sticks of celery
• 1 large (or 2 small) carrot
• Half a small swede (the yellow one)
• A few anchovy fillets
• Dried herbs
• Garlic
• A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
• A couple of tablespoons of tomato ketchup
• Lamb stock
• Star Anise
• 3-4 potatoes
• Butter and milk to mash
• Salt and pepper and some freshly grated nutmeg