Canapes and Cake

A little while ago, I paid a visit to BBC Radio Oxford to talk to the charming Bill Buckley about vinegars on his Sunday lunchtime show. It was a funny feeling: a mere, ahem, 30 or so years earlier, I went to Summer Fields prep school on the opposite side of Banbury Road. Little could I have predicted that I'd be in a radio studio across the road years later...
For this visit, I thought it would be good to show Bill a couple of ways you can use fruit vinegars and so produced a savoury and a sweet canape and a Gluten Free drizzle cake with a twist. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Urvashi Roe for the inspiration for the canapes and Simon Blackwell for the cake: both British Bake Off Greats.

 

Smoked salmon with fresh herb salad,

Womersley Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender vinegar dressing

Use a quality smoked salmon for this dish.

Mixed garden herbs (chives, parsely, thyme) dressed with a little virgin oil

Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender vinegar to taste

Slice the smoked salmon thinly, sprinkle over the herbs and drizzle over the vinegar

Leave to stand at room temperature for about half an hour before serving

Blinis/Pastry cases with Mascarpone and Blackberries macerated in Womersley Blackberry Vinegar

Ingredients:

6 Blinis or Pastry cases

A 250g tub of Mascarpone

Womersley Blackberry Vinegar

Blackberries

Method:

Place 6 blackberries in a smal bowl with a couple of teaspoons of Blackberry Vinegar and leave to macerate for a quarter of an hour

Blend a teaspoon of the Blackberry Vinegar into 100g Mascarpone

Level fill your pastry cases with the blended mixture and top with a juicy Blackberry

Serve

Urvashi Roe did these when we were exhibiting at BBC Good Food last November at the NEC. She made them look really pretty with the addition of edible flowers; sadly my photo does not do them justice, though:

   

Gluten free Lemon Drizzle Cake

 with Womersley Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender Vinegar Drizzle

Ingredients for the cake:

125g unsalted butter

75g caster sugar

2 large eggs

Zest of one lemon

175g gluten free self raising flour (we used Doves Farm)

Pinch of salt

4 tablespoons milk

Ingredients for the Drizzle:

Juice of 1½ lemons

100g icing sugar

2 tbsp Womersley Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender vinegar

Method:

- Pre-heat oven to 180°C/ gas mark 4

- Butter and line a loaf or cake tin (make sure the lining goes well up the sides of the tin)

- Cream together butter and sugar, add eggs and lemon zest and beat well

- Add flour and salt, folding gently until mixed

- Add milk and mix in

- Spoon cake mix into prepared tin

- Cook for 45 minutes until golden and skewer comes out clean

For the Drizzle:

(Make just before the cake is due out of the oven)

 -    Put icing sugar, lemon juice and Womersley Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender Vinegar into a small saucepan

-    Heat gently until the sugar is dissolved and the vinegar has reduced the mixture to a viscous drizzle

-  When cake is ready, take out of the oven and pierce it all over with a skewer. Pour the drizzle all over. Make sure the cake is totally cooled before taking out of the loaf tin or it will crumble.

Jamie Oliver on Vinegar

Many thanks to Sabrina Ghayour for drawing my attention to this nicely written article by Jamie Oliver in the Daily Mail online (published in Femail on 9th March).
And, if you don't want to make your own Raspberry Vinegar, you know where to buy the best!

And here are a few lovely Raspberry Vinegar ideas and a recipe for you:

• Blend with a fine Rapeseed Oil for a smooth and fruity salad dressing
• Splash into a glass of fizz or mineral water
• Drizzle over your Roast Beef and Yorkshire Puddings
• Swirl into a hot toddy

SUGGESTED RECIPE

CHICKEN BREASTS WITH RASPBERRY SAUCE

(Serves 4)

1. Pan-fry 4 boneless chicken breasts in sunflower oil; remove chicken from pan and set aside.
2. Pour off excess fat from pan and add 150ml raspberry vinegar and bring to boil; reduce quickly until sauce is half original volume.
3. Add 250ml of whipping cream and bring to the boil; simmer until slightly thickened.
4. Season with salt and pepper; add some freshly chopped herbs e.g. parsley, thyme, chervil, basil, coriander, tarragon.
5. Pour sauce over chicken; sprinkle with extra fresh herb. Serve immediately.

Pigeon!

Our little town of Chipping Norton is blessed with an abundance of bird life. We have the most amazing variety of finches, tits, songbirds and blackbirds. Mind you, this should not be such a great surprise, since the good people of Chipping Norton feed them well and there are plenty of trees and hedgerows for cover and nesting.
The Winter months have been unusually dry and mild this year, particularly compared to last year, so the birds have been able to come and have a bath in our pond all through the Winter. We are particularly fortunate to have a lot of blackbirds in our area since their song is so beautiful to wake up to. Our neighbours have a tall, spindly silver birch tree which acts as a good lookout perch for one particular blackbird to sing his little heart out and check that the way is clear down to the pond.
Our friendly blackbird's exalted position has obviously been noticed, though.... This morning, as I looked out, he was chased off his branch by the biggest, fattest pigeon you ever saw. However, he was in for a surprise since his considerable weight caused the treetop to bend swiftly and alarmingly....he held on....the branch swayed some more....he would not be beaten....until he was virtually upside down, when he made an unceremonious dismount and, in a flurry of down he gave up (presumably hoping nobody had noticed).

And all of this reminded me that it is about time I posted a pigeon recipe!

Last year, at the CLA Gamefair, I was fortunate enough to meet Chef Ralph Skripek of The Butler's Pantry, Derby. Ralph specialises in excellent Game recipes and has recently published a book on Game recipes called "Wild Chef" in which we are featured. Ralph is particularly good at challenging conventions so was delighted to taste our wares and see how they can "add a whole new angle to a dish." He was good enough to use a couple of our bottles in his demonstrations at Blenheim Palace last Summer and has now come up with a tasty Pigeon recipe for us using our Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper. So, the next time you find a tasty wood pigeon who has fallen off his last twig and could do with a good marinade, here is the recipe for you:

Marinated wood pigeon pan fried with smoked bacon on a croute

Marinated wood pigeon pan fried with smoked bacon on a croute, finished with a tossed spring saladette, fresh asparagus and finished with a zesty dressing

(serves two)

4 x pigeon breasts

Sprig of fresh rosemary

4 rashers of smoked streaky bacon

2 slices of thick cut seeded wholemeal bread

Assorted salad leaves (rocket, ruby reds & lambs ears)

8 x fresh asparagus

2 small cooked beetroots (cut into strips)

Little olive oil

Salt & pepper mill

WOMERSLEY Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper

For a fuller flavour, marinate the pigeon breasts with a drizzling of the Womersley dressing, the day before (preferably) and proceed with recipe as per below

1. For a quicker dish, season the pigeon breast with salt & pepper & place on one side

2. Prepare asparagus by trimming the end and peeling the outer bark layer from half way up the asparagus

3. Place in a pan of boiling water, cook until tender, remove and refresh under running cold water

4. Add a little olive oil to a frying pan with the Womersley dressing & a few sprigs of fresh rosemary

5. Remove the fillet from under the pigeon breast, add to the pan (once hot), top side of breast down

6. Pan fry for 3 minutes on each side and remove ‘to rest’

7. Add a little more olive oil & dressing to the same pan

8. Cut two croutes from the seeded bread using a medium sized pastry cutter

9. Chop the smoked bacon into small diced pieces, add to the frying pan with the croutes

10. Cook until croutes are nicely browned on each side and the bacon is crispy

11. Remove bread & bacon from the pan and place the bacon on top of the croute

12. In the middle of a plate, place the croute with the bacon & layer the asparagus on top

13. Add a handful of leaves to a bowl with some strips of beetroot, drizzle over some Womersley dressing & a little olive oil with a few twists of the pepper mill

14. Mix the leaves to coat & place on top of the asparagus

15. Slice the pigeon breast around the leaves

Guest post from Simon Jury

After some months of Tweeting to each other, I was delighted to receive this guest piece from Chef Simon Jury recently and hope you will enjoy reading it, too:

"Duck and cherry, two of my favourite flavours. I love that gamey meat flavour of the cherry and fresh fruity freshness of the duck...... no, hold on, I think I may have got something mixed up there. I'm also a fan of flavoured vinegars but have found that many cherry vinegars are often lacking or are a bit sharp and, much of the time, too vinegary. Yes I know that sounds a bit odd saying they are a bit vinegary, there are just a lot of flavoured vinegars that really don't offer more than, well, vinegar.

"A few weeks ago, I happened to be talking on the subject of vinegars and dressings and Rupert from Womersley Foods joined in asking if I have tried their vinegars. To my shame I had to admit I hadn't. Shame because I've spoken to Rupert on Twitter for a while now and hadn't really looked at the products that Womersley do. So when Rupert offered a bottle to try, I jumped at the chance. Well I jumped after deliberating over which flavour to choose. I was allowed any bottle I wanted so I had to choose wisely. I saw the cherry flavour straight away and looking back, I'm not sure why it took me so long to decide.

"The package arrived and like an excited child on Christmas morning I tore it open and didn't wait to taste it, I tipped a bit out, dipped my finger in and couldn't taste a thing. This is no sleight to the vinegar, I had a stinking cold and hadn't been able to taste anything for days. A course of antibiotics later and the taste buds were back. I had another tasting session with a ciabatta loaf and dipping bowls with unrefined olive oil and the vinegar. The vinegar is great: fresh, full of cherry flavour and not the usual harshness of vinegar. You could get away with the vinegar on its own as a dressing as it is that smooth. Also it is the first cherry vinegar I've tasted for a while that actually tastes of cherry.

"Finally I got to match the vinegar to duck which I had been waiting for during my cold filled weeks. (Please note I did not have man flu, I really was ill!) I kept the duck salad very simple as the star here was to be the vinegar. I pan-fried two duck breasts, skin side down until the fat was rendered and the skin was crispy. I then turned the duck breasts over and took off the heat to continue cooking through while I made the salad.

"I made a quick red onion salad by peeling, halving & slicing one large red onion, added some chopped cucumber , quartered cherry tomatoes and a few sliced spring onions. I made a dressing using half and half of the vinegar and unrefined olive oil and a pinch of salt. That's all you need for the dressing as there is so much flavour and sweetness in the cherry vinegar. I put half of the dressing in with the red onion salad and mixed this to coat.

"To serve, I made a bed of peppery salad, rocket, watercress & baby spinach and piled the onions salad on top. The duck, now nicely rested, was sliced and placed on top. The remaining dressing was then drizzled over to flavour the duck breast and drip through the salad. Cherry and duck is always a winner and maybe a little bit predictable, but when it tastes this good, who cares?

"Many thanks for the vinegar, it really is great and found out a friend of mine is a big fan too..."

You can follow Simon on Twitter @Simonlovesfood 

Simon also has a lovely blog title: saidsimontothepieman.com

Valentine Supper

As wonderful as it is to go out for dinner on Valentine's Day, I can't help feeling a little sorry for all those restaurants having to cope with rooms full of tables for two. And, is it just me, but there is something of an air of blokes putting in a minimum amount of effort to treat the one they love so much....
Of course, it is not always like that and many ladies will tell you they love being taken out for Valentine's dinner; also, and particular these days, many restaurants would far rather a full list of covers than a quiet Tuesday night.
Me? Well, I am a very lucky man. I'm married to a beautiful Kiwi who does nearly all the cooking at home. So, this year I decided that it would mean more to her if I put in the effort to make her a romantic dinner (albeit with our 11 year old son very much in evidence).

We both prefer unfussy food done well, so I decided to keep it fairly simple:

Smoked Mackerel Pâté

Warm Duck Salad with Blackberry Vinegar Dressing

Raspberry Yoghurt with Raspberries and Shortbread

Should you fancy giving them a go, here are the recipes:

Smoked Mackerel Pâté
Mum gave me her "Smackerel Pâté" recipe recently, so this was a good opportunity to try it out. It is so simple that the most tricky part was removing the bones from the fish!

Ingredients:
2 Smoked Mackerel Fillets, boned and flaked
3oz Cream Cheese
1 tsp Horseradish Sauce
2 tsp Womersley Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper dressing
Black Pepper

Method:
Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until achieving a smooth consistency. You may need to add a little more Horseradish or Lemon Dressing to get the taste to your liking.

Serve with warm french stick or Water Table biscuits.

Warm Gressingham Duck Salad with Flaked Almonds, Pine Nuts and Blackberry Vinegar Dressing

I have the lovely Xanthe Clay to thank for this one. On January 26th, page 3 of The Daily Telegraph featured news on The Duchess of Cornwall's challenge for school children to devise a Diamond Jubilee dish. Next to this was a "Royal Recipe" from Xanthe Clay which featured our Blackberry Vinegar: that was a delightful surprise! I adapted it a little for last night's dinner (exchanging Mangetout for Fine Beans and adding Pine Nuts).

Ingredients:

A bag of rocket salad leaves
2 Gressingham Duck Breasts
100g Fine Beans
40g Flaked Almonds and Pine Nuts
3 tbsp Womersley Blackberry Vinegar
2 tsp Wholegrain Mustard (I used Black Sheep's Riggwelter)
9 tbsp Cotswold Gold Rapeseed Oil
Salt crystals

Method:

• Spread a handful of rocket onto two plates
• Roast the nuts in the oven for around 2 minutes at 200°C until golden
• Steam or boil the beans so they remain just firm. Drain.
• Put 1 tbsp Rapeseed Oil in a large non-stick frying pan and fry the duck breasts face-down for around 10 minutes then turn and continue to cook on a high heat for a further 4 minutes. A pan with a lid is handy- it spits a lot! Check that the meat is cooked so still pink in the middle then remove from the pan and leave to rest
• Whisk 2 tbsp of the Blackberry Vinegar with the mustard and a good pinch of salt then add the remaining 8 tbsp of Rapeseed Oil
• Slice the duck and arrange on the rocket. Add the beans and sprinkle over the roasted nuts. Drizzle over the dressing.
• Pour off the oil from the pan, add the final 1 tbsp of Blackberry Vinegar and, over a high heat, reduce the remainder and keep rubbing the pan with a spatula to retain all those lovely flavours. Drizzle the reduced glaze over the dish and serve.

 

Ok, I admit it, I cheated a bit for pudding: some good quality Raspberry yoghurt and fresh raspberries in a glass with a heart shaped Raspberry Shortbread. But it did round off the meal quite well.

♥ Happy Valentine ♥

Key Lime Pie

My father enjoyed most vices in his youth and these caught up with him eventually, as he had a heart attack when still quite young. This did, though, have the effect of making him reconsider his smoking habit (which went from around 40 a day to zero!) and he barely touched another Gin after that scare.However, this event also resulted in him acquiring something of a sweet tooth.
As a family, we never really did puddings but, with my father's new tastebuds starting to quiver, he became interested in an area of our local farm shop which had previously gone almost unnoticed: the sweet section. Sadly, it is no longer there, but the next village to us, Darrington, sported an excellent butcher's which expanded to a popular farm shop employing a few locals. One of these locals was  a specialist in making Key Lime Pies and so we thought we would give one a go...fatal! From then on, the weekly shop always included at least one of these delights, always modestly decorated with a little twist of lime zest.
And so it was, many years later, that my wife and I found ourselves in an American diner in Boston with Key Lime Pie on the menu. I couldn't resist the idea. However, when it arrived, I sure could resist the amount: it was a VAST portion. The flavour did not quite evoke those childhood memories (how often do we find that happening) and so I assigned the Key Lime Pie to my memories.
And then, a couple of weeks ago, we offered to make the pudding for a friend's 40th birthday party and, in going through recipes, we found one for Key Lime Pie without eggs. We had a little play with it and wanted to introduce an element of sourness to counteract the rich sweetness which can overpower. So we tried using some of our Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender Vinegar to the recipe and reduced the amount of lime juice. It was pretty good....not the same as those childhood ones, but a whole new fantastic experience.

Key Lime Pie

Serves 8
Takes just over 1 hour to make

Ingredients

Base:
250g Basics Digestive biscuits
100g butter, melted

Filling:
405g Can Condensed Milk
Finely grated zest and Juice of 4 limes
1 tbsp Womersley Lime, Black Pepper & Lavender Dressing
300ml Double Cream

To decorate:
30g Bitter chocolate, grated
Grated zest of 1 lime


Method

1. To make the base, crush and crumb the biscuits until they are like fine crumbs. Then combine this with the melted butter in a bowl. Press the mixture into the base and 4cms up the side of a 20cm (8") loose-based, greased cake tin.
2. Place Lime juice and Womersley dressing into a large bowl. Add the cream and condensed milk and whisk until thick and creamy, approx. 1-2 minutes. Add the lime zest and lightly stir in. Spoon over the biscuit base and chill for at least an hour.
3. Remove the pie from the tin and place on a serving plate. Decorate the top with the chocolate and Lime Zest.

Tip
Do try varying the balance of Lime juice to our Lime Dressing

Ben's Canteen

One of the best parts of making a key food ingredient is the opportunity to meet chefs and compare notes on their menus to see how our delights can help make their dishes even more special whilst retaining their unique personality. Fortunately, our fruit vinegars have such "extraordinary depths of flavour" (thank you to Bill King for that quote) that a little goes a long way and they allow for real creativity in the kitchen. Over the past couple of years that I have been sailing the good ship Womersley, I have been lucky enough to welcome aboard many chefs who have shared their enthusiasm with us all. Many have provided recipes on our Trecipe page (Luke Mackay even suggest bathing in Raspberry Vinegar!) and others have also contributed longer recipes on these pages.

Dave Aherne at Real Food Festival

Certainly, one of the most entertaining chefs you could hope to meet is the lovable Irishman, Dave Aherne. On a trip to London the other day, my wife and I caught up with Dave for the first time in a while, at his current "home" of Ben's Canteen in SW11. Don't be fooled by his bluff, sweary exterior, he is a gentle giant whose piercing blue eyes can spot good food ingredients a mile off! 

I first met Dave at the Real Food Festival last year, when he came to our stand and got all ecstatic at our "feckin amazing" vinegars. We have kept in touch ever since...

But he didn't even get into cheffing until he was in his mid 30s! Dave told me he came to London hoping to do Event Management, but found himself working at the popular The Ship at Wandsworth (a job found through exchanging tweets with owner, Oisin Rogers). He had a great time there, but eventually moved on to a couple of other places before arriving at this buzzing little place near Wandsworth Bridge: Ben's Canteen.

So we decided to go and have a look and were joined by our good friend, Daphine, too. The three of us tucked in to these fabulous dishes. They were followed by a sublime carrot cake with coffee, but it just about arrived at the table and was gone, hence no photo!

The tenderest cod cheeks and home made Pesto

All day Breakfast Scotch Egg with the perfect soft yolk, mushroom and bacon breadcrumb coating and black pudding.
Very good for you....

Brisket and Bone Marrow Mayo in a bap

Dave works on many other projects including last year's successful Kaiwecare fund raiser for the victims of the Christchurch earthquake. He worked with Mat Follas and many others to raise a staggering £65,000. His next major project is the "Chefs for CALM dinner." CALM stands for the Campaign Against Living Miserably, a charity working exclusively with men who suffer from depression. This is a cause close to Dave's heart, following the sad death recently of promising young chef, Kevin Boyle. Dave will be joined once more by a host of great chefs and others to create a special evening catering for 200 guests in London on 30th April. If you would like to read more about this, do read his blog where you will also find details on how to help out, if you are able.

But, if you find yourself in the Wandsworth/Clapham area at any time, don't miss a chance to visit Ben's Canteen and get a "feckin' good feed."

BBC Radio Northampton show

Vanessa Kimbell

The Winter months can be a bit quiet for many of us Artisan Food producers, so this is a good time to try to generate a bit of publicity. So I was delighted when Vanessa Kimbell invited me to join her and presenter Kevin Saddington for their live radio show, "Kitchen Garden" on BBC Radio Northampton on Sunday morning.

We had a jolly good discussion all about the history of Womersley, the making of our fruit vinegars and a couple of recipes too, below. I "met" Vanessa on Twitter and have corresponded with her for many months, finally meeting her properly at the Real Food Festival at Earl's Court last year. I can still picture her first approach to our stand, beaming smile and enjoying all the food treats in the hall. Sure enough, we had a jolly good chat and I discovered Vanessa was once a grower of lavender but, as can happen when handling plants with strong essential oils, she suddenly became so sensitive to it that she can no longer use any at all....which is a shame, since my favourite vinegar dressing is our Lime, Black Pepper and Lavender! The Orange & Mace proved a real winner with Vanessa, though, as you can hear on our soundcloud widget, here:

During the show, Kevin played some appropriate Sunday morning tracks (and Abba's Dancing Queen!) while we all had a taste of our sausage casserole recipe (using our Blackcurrant and Rosemary) which we'd had at home for supper the night before as well as our own Lemon Drizzle cake recipe using our Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper to make it really moist and delicious...

Sausage Casserole with

Womersley Blackcurrant & Rosemary Dressing

SERVES 4

Takes 25 minutes approx.

Ingredients:

·         1 tbsp Vegetable Oil

·         8 Thick Pork Sausages

·         1 Medium Red Onion, cut into thick slices

·         2 Braeburn or other eating apple with the skin left on, cored and each cut into wedges

·         1 ½ tbsp Womersley Rosemary Jelly

·         300ml/ ½ Pint Chicken Stock (can be made using a stock cube)

·         1 ½ tbsp Grainy Mustard

·         2 tbsp Womersley Blackcurrant & Rosemary Dressing

Method:

·         Heat the oil in a large frying pan, add the pork sausages and fry for about five minutes, turning them so they brown all over. Add the onion slices and continue to fry until the onion and sausages have turned a dark gold, stirring occasionally.

Turn up the heat, add the apple wedges and stir them in carefully until they have glazed in the pan juices.

·         Stir the Rosemary Jelly into the chicken stock until it is dissolved, then add the Blackcurrant & Rosemary Dressing and mustard. Pour this in to the pan and cook on a high heat for 5 minutes.

·         Reduce the heat and leave to simmer, uncovered, for 10 minutes until the sausages are cooked and the liquid has reduced to a syrupy gravy.

Serve with your choice of rice or potatoes and veg

Sausage Casserole with Womersley Blackcurrant & Rosemary Dressing

Lemon Drizzle Cake

 with Womersley Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper Vinegar Drizzle

Ingredients for the cake:

125g butter

75g caster sugar

2 large eggs

Zest of one lemon

175g self raising flour

Pinch of salt

4 tablespoons milk

Ingredients for the Drizzle:

2 tbsp lemon juice

100g icing sugar

2 tbsp Womersley Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper Vinegar

Method:

- Pre-heat oven to 180°C/ gas mark 4

- Butter and line a loaf or cake tin (make sure the lining goes well up the sides   of the tin)

- Cream together butter and sugar, add eggs and lemon zest and beat well

- Add flour and salt, folding gently until mixed

- Add milk and mix in

- Spoon cake mix into prepared tin

- Cook for 45 minutes until golden and skewer comes out clean

For the Drizzle:

(Make just before the cake is due out of the oven)

-    Put icing sugar, lemon juice and Womersley Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper Vinegar into a small saucepan

-    Heat gently until the sugar is dissolved and the vinegar has reduced the mixture to a viscous drizzle

-          When cake is ready, take out of the oven and pierce it all over with a skewer. Pour the drizzle all over. Make sure the cake is totally cooled before taking out of the loaf tin or it will crumble.

Note: For a Gluten free cake, use Gluten Free flour and add extra milk.

Lemon Drizzle Cake (right) with the rest of the day's baking

A lovely Winter Warmer from Andrew Pern

Andrew Pern with a bottle
of our Raspberry Vinegar

Tucked away in the beautiful Yorkshire village of Harome, near Helmsley, is the thatched cottage of the Star Inn, home to one of Yorkshire's top chefs, Andrew Pern. The Star Inn has won many plaudits over the years since Andrew moved there in 1996, not least by Jasper Gerard, who wrote in The Telegraph in 2008 that "The Star is for jaded explorers on the verge of giving up the quest for the perfect rural pub."
Roux-trained, Andrew has won numerous awards including many years of a Michelin star and, last year being voted 19th in the National Restaurant Awards. He enjoys a great write up in the Egon Ronay Guide which states that "His and his team's cooking is quite exceptional..." and was a successful participant in last year's flagship BBC programme, Great British Menu. Andrew has also written a beautiful recipe book, "Loose Birds and Game" which features this exciting recipe, made with our Raspberry Vinegar...

Fallow Deer Pie with Liquorice Gravy, Scottish Girolles, Womersley Raspberry Vinegar and Curly Kale ‘Colcannon’

(Serves four)

I was sitting at home one night ‘in charge’ of the kids, there was a knock on the door. Standing there was Steve Smith, my Head Chef and a pie. We’d been talking about putting a Pie of the Day on the blackboard to keep The Star more ‘pubby’ and Steve conjured up this creation – combining deer and liquorice! In Yorkshire?! Somewhat dubiously, I tasted it, breaking open the shortcrust topping, to the steaming hot inside… and, I must say it is one of the nicest things I’ve ever eaten. I can still taste it now, a beautiful, deep flavour with a slight edge of fruit coming from the vinegar, and the vibrant mash to mop up those lovely, liquorice juices. Who’d have ever thought you’d hear me saying that? A must-try-it!

Ingredients

For the Pie:                                                                 For the shortcrust pastry:

1kg venison, diced                                                      50g plain flour

A little oil for frying                                                    30g butter

16 baby onions                                                            Pinch of salt                            

½ bottle of red wine                                                  Cold water                             

1 ltr game stock                                                         

2 cloves garlic, crushed                                              For the Colcannon:

8 Pontefract Cakes                                                     4 Maris Piper potatoes, peeled and diced

2 tbsp cornflour                                                          80g butter

1 sprig of tarragon                                                      20ml whipping cream

Seasoning                                                                    Seasoning

                                                                                    80g curly kale

100g girolle mushrooms

50ml Womersley Raspberry Vinegar

Deer Pie with Liquorice Gravy, taken from Andrew Pern's Book "Loose Birds & Game"

Method

Colour off the diced venison meat in a little oil with the baby onions. Fry off until nicely browned, then add the red wine, raspberry vinegar, stock, garlic and Pontefract Cakes. Simmer for approximately 1½ hours or until tender. Thicken with cornflour, add mushrooms, tarragon and seasoning, then allow to cool. Place in a suitable pot or pots, and set aside.

For the pastry, rub the plain flour and butter together with a pinch of salt, until ‘breadcrumb-like’, add the water and combine together into a smooth paste. Do NOT over-knead, as it will make the pastry tough. Chill for 30 minutes.

For the Colcannon, first boil the potatoes until soft. Drain through a sieve and mash with a little butter, cream, white pepper and salt. Add the sliced curly kale, which will wilt with the heat of the potatoes and keep warm.

Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4. Roll out the pastry with a rolling pin and using a little flour for dusting to a thickness of 3mm. Place over the pots of venison meat mixture and trim so that the rim is covered. ‘Crimp’ the edges to stick the pastry down and make a little hole in the middle (or use a pot Blackbird!) to let out the steam. Brush the pastry with the remaining egg yolk and bake for approximately 30 minutes until golden brown. Warm the Colcannon and place on the plate with the pie alongside. Eat to your heart’s content!

Follow Andrew's Tweets on Twitter

If you would like to try more of Andrew's menu, do contact The Star Inn on 01439 770397 reservations@thestarinnatharome.co.uk  www.thestaratharome.co.uk/ 

Christmas and New Year, Food and Family

Happy New Year!

Well, Christmas is well and truly over, now, and we even have some frost on the ground, at last. The Yorkshire forced rhubarb growers will be pleased with this, since the rhubarb needs that cold ground temperature to make it grow.
Our Christmas tree was decorated very tastefully, of course, and enhanced no end by a beautiful flower arrangement a friend sent us (thank you Katie!)

Following her emigration to Brisbane, this year was the first time for ages that the aforementioned Katie had not joined us on Christmas Day, so we had to find an alternative to the joint of ham she would traditionally bring with her. We found a honey glazed Gammon and, after some excellent ideas from a few Tweets, I decided to stick a few cloves in it and make up a glaze of more honey and some of our Orange & Mace vinegar. I'm delighted to say that it turned out really well! The ham was really succulent and the mixture of the Orange, honey and spices added well to the flavour of the meat.

Honey with Orange & Mace vinegar glazed Gammon

We also opted for a Turkey Butt(erfly) joint for our Christmas dinner again this year. Turkey can be dry if you don't take good care about the way it is cooked, so I decided to wrap it in foil until 30 minutes from the end of the cooking time, and I also glazed it with a liberal helping of our Lemon, Basil, Bay & Juniper before putting it in the oven. WOW! Amazingly, the flavour and texture was perfect; so much so, that even the frozen slices are still making for delicious sandwich fillings.

I have to admit we are not great ones for going overboard on decoration at Christmas time, but these twig reindeer adorn our kitchen windowsill. These are very special to us, being a farewell gift from Katie and her husband, Stephen.

 

Some tasty treats we got for Christmas included these divine chocolates from Stow-on-the-Wold chocolatiers, Miette. They are made by Katherine Abel in a shop which used to be the baker's on Digbeth Street, just off the Market Place. Last year, Silvana de Soissons visited and wrote a lovely article on her beautiful blog site, The Foodie Bugle.

Miette chocolates

Of course, NO Christmas would be complete without my fix of Kiwi goodies, so many thanks to my darling mother-in-law and father-in-law for these two staples. Peanut slabs may be shrinking over the years, but they still taste as good as ever. Want to try for yourself? You can buy them from SANZA online, along with lots of other tasty Antipodean treats.

Lastly, my darling wife, Jani, does make a really good Christmas cake (laced with Brandy) and this year our daughter, Laura, did the festive decoration: it has all gone now!