Squash or Pumpkin Risotto

This is spun off the River Café Cookbook, with really very little adaptation (more tweaks) so all credit to them.  I did reduce the amount of butter, as what was recommended really was a bit criminal.  I also decided to char the squash (not pumpkin) because it adds a wonderfully rich, caramelised kick to the dish.

Serves 6.  It's very rich, so there's no need to dole out huge portions.

Ingredients:

1kg butternut squash (or similar – I used a special edition one from the local supermarket that smelled like fresh pumpkin and it was amazeballs)
6 garlic cloves
1 brown onion, finely diced
100g butter
300g Arborio risotto rice
1.5 litres chicken stock
50ml vermouth
100g parmesan (freshly grated)
Olive oil

To garnish – 

12 slices of pancetta or thin, streaky bacon
12 sage leaves (optional)

Pre-heat the oven to 220ºC.  First you have to prep the squash / pumpkin.  Peel it and cut it into large-ish chunks.  Toss it into a roasting dish and add four cloves of garlic - unpeeled but cracked with the back of a knife.  Drizzle over plenty of olive oil and toss together before sticking it in the oven.

Remove and toss the squash every so often, keeping an eye on it.  After about 30 minutes the garlic will be soft through and should be removed (otherwise they'll go crispy and solid, which is useless).  Scrape the soft, roasted garlic out of their skins and add it to the squash when it comes out of the oven.

The squash will need the best part of an hour in total and you want to keep cooking it until its properly charring.  No, this wasn't an accident – just go for it.

Next up, you need to make a basic risotto.  Jamie has a fabulous version in his book Cook.  This is a take off of that and is very similar to the River Café version (hardly surprising since Jamie trained there).

Pour a couple of tablespoons of olive oil into a big, deep pan (I actually used my trusty Le Creuset, so tired I was of making this in big frying pans and spilling half of it down the side) and add 75g of the butter.  When the butter is melted, add the onions and, over a low heat, soften them.  As soon as they go in, peel and chop the garlic as finely as you possibly can before adding that as well – you want to do this now (i.e. after the onion has gone in) otherwise it may burn.

When the onion is properly soft, add the rice and stir so that it is coated in the butter and oil.

Now add a couple of ladles of hot stock, stirring constantly until it has absorbed most of the liquid.  Repeat until the rice is cooked – if you need a bit more wet, use boiling water from the kettle; equally, you may not use all the stock before the rice is cooked, so keep tasting after the first litre or so.  You will be left with a very creamy but plain risotto.

Whilst this is going on, fry the pancetta until crispy in a frying pan in the side.  This will only take a couple of minutes, so keep an eye on it.  Remove and place on kitchen paper to catch the extraneous grease.  In the rendered pancetta fat, fry the sage leaves.

Honestly, I think the pancetta is essential – it really adds something to the dish.  I don’t think that the same can be said for the sage leaves.  I think they look pretty, but don’t add too much.  Both were my additions (although the fried sage idea is from my cousin's wife, Average Baker, who uses it to great effect on other stuff) so I'm claiming a 50% success rate.

When the risotto is ready, tip all of the squash in and add the parmesan, the remaining butter (cubed) and the vermouth.  Stir thoroughly, so that the squash (which will be very soft) is thoroughly combined with the rice.  Serve immediately, with the pancetta and sage (if used) on top, together with a scattering of freshly grated parmesan.

 - GrubsterBoy - 

Cow Pie (Expert Level)

I actually did a steak pie recipe not that long ago – actually, a little shy of a year and a half ago.  This is a tweaked – and undoubtedly superior version.  It's also a bit more complex (but not frightfully so) so let's consider the other one my 'simple pie' recipe, and this one my gourmet version.  For the avoidance of doubt, I definitely recommend the additional work of the gourmet version.

I have also made a bone marrow pastry which was pretty epic, albeit probably unnecessary – if you want a quiet life (and who doesn't?) just get a roll of the pre-rolled puff stuff, yeah?

I have adapted this from a number of corners, but most notably the bone marrow pastry idea came from the irreplaceable Hawksmoor at Home.

Serves 4.

Ingredients:

For the gravy - 

500g beef shin (off the bone)
250g ox cheek
2 carrots
150g button mushrooms (chestnut if possible – the smaller the better)
500ml ale (get something a bit sweeter than your average)
5 springs of thyme
2 stalks of rosemary
2 bay leaves
15g bone marrow (more on this below) / 1tbsp sunflower oil
240g lardons (get properly fatty ones, not lean cuts)
250g baby onions / shallots, peeled
25g plain flour
500ml beef stock
1tsbp Worcestershire sauce

For the pastry – 

200g plain flour (plus some for dusting)
1tsp mustard powder (optional)
1tsp baking powder
100g bone marrow / suet
2 egg yolks
100ml cold milk
Iced water

On the subject of the meat, I have gone for two incredible tough cuts of meat.  A great rule of thumb is that the tougher the cut, the more that the muscle has had to work, and the better the flavour.  If you think about regular steaks, this rings true: rump is tougher but full of flavour, whereas fillet (an almost utterly unused muscle) is beautifully tender but less flavoursome. The two cuts I have gone for are shin and cheek.  Get them from any good butcher and you'll find that they tend to be a lot cheaper than the standard cuts (although they are becoming more popular so that might not last).  The downside of these cuts, however, is that they need a lot of cooking time – about 3 to 4 hours, to be honest.  So plan ahead.

Right.  Elephant in the room: Bone marrow.

Not everyone's cup of tea, I grant you.  Although there's really no reason why it shouldn't be, because it's lovely stuff – full of flavour.  This bit's optional, though: I think it's worth the effort but you might not.  If not, you can make the pastry using suet, or just Google a decent puff / shortcrust pastry in its lieu.  Also, it is worth noting that all of this was FREE.  Totally free.  If you have a good butcher and you go in to see them regularly (by which I mean more than once every year to buy the Christmas turkey) they're bound to give you something like this for free.  It's a really, really good idea to get them to chop the bone in half for you, as they have here.  The problem is that no one sells it by the gram – you just get a bone.  The amount that came out of this bone, for reference, was about 235g.  I'll deal with how to get the marrow out and prepping it below.

Right, on to the recipe.

The day before pie day you need to marinate the beef.  First up, trim any extraneous fat and connective tissue from the beef and cut up into bite-size chunks.

Cut up the carrots into quarter roundel lumps.  If the mushrooms need chopping, do this as well – although if you can keep them whole, so much the better – this will turn on how big they were when they were bought. Throw the beef, vegetables, thyme, rosemary and bay leaves, into a large, non-reactive dish.  Pour over all of the beer, cover and put in the fridge overnight.

The other thing to do is to prep the bone marrow.  This is a bit gross, but worth it.

The easiest way to get the bone marrow out of the bones is to dunk them in warm water for a few minutes, then remove them and slide the marrow out.  The marrow is extremely fatty, almost (in parts) with the consistency of butter, so it will melt up a bit in the warm water and come out.  I could not be faffed so I took a dinner knife and scooped it out.

In hindsight, I regret this because it made it fractionally more difficult to deal with later.  It's not totally critical, but just a tip.  Once it's out, you'll find that there are harder parts and softer, buttery parts.  Scrape off about 25g of the buttery part and keep it separate in the fridge.  Wrap the rest it in cling film and stick it in the coldest part of fridge overnight.  It has to be properly cold when you come to use it tomorrow – if you're worried, stick it in the freezer for 15 minutes before you use it.

The next day you're ready to start cooking properly.  Remove the beef from the fridge so that it comes up to room temperature and put it through a colander, making sure to reserve the beer juice.  Seriously, do not throw this away.  Then separate the meat, vegetables and herbs so that you have three bowls of stuff.  You'll see why later.  Place the beef on some kitchen towel and let it dry off.

Also, pre-heat your oven to 160ºC / 150ºC (fan assisted).

First things to cook are the lardons.  Get a great big casserole pot (this is one pot cooking, sort of) and melt the buttery, reserved marrow.  Cook the lardons in this for a few minutes until the fat has started to render.

Then add the onions and brown both, removing them with a slotted spoon when done and setting them aside.

So now you should have three pots of pie stuff: The drained vegetables, the marinated beef and the browned lardons and onions.

Next up, do the beef.  Measure out the flour into a small bowl and season it with salt and pepper.  Then, dredging each piece of beef individually in flour, brown the meat in the pot in batches.  There should be plenty of rendered lardon fat and bone marrow grease remaining to do this.  By  the way, don't cram the pot full of meat – if you do so, you drop the temperature way too much and the meat won’t properly sear.

Once all of the meat is browned you'll need to deglaze.  In fact, you've probably been getting a bit nervous as the process of cooking the lardons / onions and browning the meat will have crusted the base of the pan with something evil looking.  Deglaze this by pouring a couple of ladles of stock into the bottom of the pan and scrapping like hell.  Quite a lot will fizzle up, so make sure there's enough in there to stay liquid (otherwise you'll just end up with a thicker, harder glaze – bad).

When this is done, re-add the beef, lardons and onions to the pot.  Then throw in the beer juice, the rest of the stock, the Worcestershire sauce and the bay leaves.  Strip the leaves of herbs and chop them finely, adding these to the mix as well.  Give the whole thing a stir and turn the heat up until simmering point, before transferring it to the oven.

In the first round of cooking, it will need about 2 ½ hours with the lid on.

Whilst it's cooking you should make the pastry.

Place the flour, baking powder and mustard powder in a bowl and mix together.

Next, grate the bone marrow.  Yes, actually.  I found having a bit extra was a real bonus here, as it melted very quickly and I ended up wasting a fair amount.  (If you're using suet instead, you don’t need to grate it.  You're also a wimp.)  Once grated, add it to the flour and mix together until well combined.

Beat one egg yolk together with the milk and add this to flour slowly, mixing all the time.  Then add as much iced water as is necessary to bring the mix together into a dough.

Now wrap it in cling film and stick it in the fridge for at least an hour to rest.

Back to the pot (when the time is up): remove it from the oven and give it a stir.  It should still be relatively liquid, and the meat still fairly tough.  Therefore, it needs to go back in the oven, but this time with the lid off, so that the gravy reduces and thickens.  Mmmmmmm.  Make sure the bay leaves are submerged, by the way, otherwise you'll get it out and find a charred leaf sitting there – not cool.

Stir it every 20 minutes or so, keeping an eye on the level of gravy.  You should find its done and the beef is falling apart in about an hour.  Make sure you retain enough wet – otherwise it's barely a proper pie.  Remove the stew from the oven when ready – but don’t turn the oven off; turn it up to 190ºC / 180ºC (fan assisted).

Get the pastry out the fridge and, on a properly floured surface, roll it out to about 4mm thickness.  Placing the pie dish upside down on the pastry, cut the pastry to size, leaving a 1.5cm margin all around the edge of the dish.  Reserve any excess pastry – don’t chuck it yet!

Ladle the beef stew into your pie dish, filling it almost, but not quite, to the top.  Beat the remaining egg in a cup and brush the edges of the pie dish before plonking the pastry on top.  Crimp down the edges with your thumb and finger or a fork.  Cut a cross or a whole in the middle (a whole is probably easier before the pastry goes on, come to think of it…) to let the steam out, and then decorate.  As I have explained previously, an undecorated savoury pie is an unlucky pie.  I decorated it in a traditional sense, explaining its contents.  Brush all of the pastry properly, so that every nook and cranny is covered in egg wash.

It needs about 20-30 mins in the oven now, until the crust is golden brown and yummy looking.  Take it out and serve it straightaway, with peas and maple coated parsnips, in this case, or with mash and spring greens, or whatever takes your fancy.  

 - GrubsterBoy - 

Mushroom & Chorizo Risotto

Ever since I was a kid, on a cold, blustery night, I have always found a bowl of risotto a hearty, comforting meal.  There's something about its thick, rich flavours and textures that can always make me feel at home, safe and warm in doors. 

 

This is a recipe that a friend suggested years ago when we were all at university.  A bunch of us had rented a wee cottage up in the Highlands, in a beautiful little town called Portknockie and had spent the time wrapped up warm against the bitter December / January frosts.  I've played around with it a bit since then, but the basic premise – marrying the spicy, Moorish flavours of chorizo with the earthy goodness of mushrooms endures.

 

Ingredients:

 

½ to ¾ of a chorizo (get the real thing, the whole sausage, not sliced spicy salami)

250g chestnut mushrooms (button chestnuts work best)
25g dried mushrooms

1 white onion (I've used shallots only because they needed eating up – normally I'd use an onion)

2 garlic cloves
300g risotto rice
187ml white wine (that's a weird number but it’s conveniently – and by no means coincidentally – exactly one of those little, single serving bottles)
500ml chicken stock (or a bit more if you have it to hand)
50g salted butter
100g parmesan (plus a bit more to sprinkle on top, if that's your thing)

 

1. First, put your dried mushrooms into a jug and pour over plenty of boiling water – at least 300mls – to rehydrate them.  They need at least 10-15 minutes, so do this at the outset.

 

2. Now, chop the onions finely and the garlic very finely.  Slice the mushrooms.  Chop the chorizo into matchsticks, about a half centimetre across – you could also cube it, but I prefer matchsticks. 

 

3. Stick the chorizo in the largest frying pan you have.  It doesn’t need to have a lid.  You really, really don’t need to add any oil – I know this sounds unnatural, but very quickly the fat in the chorizo will melt out, and that's all the oil you're gonna need for this dish.

 

Once the chorizo is browned off, and lots of fat has been rendered out, remove it from the pan with a slotted spoon and put to one side. Resist the temptation to eat it as much as you possibly can. Leave behind all of the fat.

 

4. Soften, but don’t brown, the onions.  When they're almost there, add the garlic too.  The paprika from the sausage will give the whole pan a wonderful orangey hue.

 

 

5. Whilst the onions are softening, it's time to deal with your now somewhat less dry mushrooms.  Now, you want to preserve the liquor they've been in as far as humanly possible because it tastes phenomenal and we're going to use it to cook the risotto.  However, the problem you have is that dried mushrooms are covered in grit, so you want to separate that from the water (and, indeed, the 'shrooms).

 

So, first, strain the mushrooms using muslin or (in a pinch) a coffee filter paper.  I've even known people to put it through a cafetiere, but I'd be worried that (a) the mesh isn’t fine enough and (b) the mushrooms will end up tasting like coffee.  When the liquid has drained give the cloth a really good squeeze to get as much flavour out as possible. 

 

 

Next, stick the mushrooms in a sieve and give them a quick blast with water from the kettle.  You can lose this water – it's there simply to wash off any residual grit.  Put the mushrooms into the rinsed muslin / a new filter and give them another squeeze, this time preserving the water.

 

Once that's done, you should have some rehydrated dried mushrooms and a jug full of mushroom liquor.  Chop the mushrooms up medium finely.

 

 

6. Once the onions and garlic are soft, add the sliced fresh mushrooms and dried mushrooms to the pan and soften, but again try to avoid browning anything.

 

 

7. Reintroduce the chorizo to the pan, and introduce it to new friends mushrooms, garlic and onion (I actually forgot to do it at this stage, but it was far from critical).  Add the risotto rice and stir everything in, so that the rice is covered with fat.  Turn the heat all the way up for a minute or two.

 

 

8. Leaving the heat up at its highest, add the wine – all in one go.  Without stirring or even touching the rice, let the liquid cook off. 

 

9.  Now, the long, boring part.  Turn the heat down to about one-third.  Ladle by ladle (or slightly more if you like) add all of the mushroom liquor, stirring the whole mix up with each addition and cooking off each time.  At its most liquid, you should get tiny, simmering bubbles.  Once the mushroom liquor is used up, start adding the stock.  Taste it from time to time – it should take all the stock, and you may even need more / some boiling water from the kettle – but there's no harm keeping an eye on it all.  You want it just al dente. 

 

 

10. When the risotto is cooked and at your preferred level of bite, turn the heat off completely and add the butter and parmesan.  Season well with pepper, but remember that the saltiness of the stock and the parmesan will have added a lot of salt, so taste before seasoning.  Mix it all up so that the cheese and butter are fully melted and combined. 

 

 

Serve sprinkled more cheese if you like that kind of thing.

 

 

This makes a great dish for four hungry folk, or sits nicely in the fridge for a few days if you want to make something to eat through the week.

 

 - GrubsterBoy -