GORGE

Posted on February 15, 2015 by gorgefood

If you only make this for the sauce you have to try it! I will be making a large batch of this sauce and trying it with everything, I love it!

This recipe was in Olive magazine.

Ingredients

Serves 2. This recipe needs at least 1 hour marinating time but is very easy.

8 Boneless Skinless Chicken Thighs
Cooking oil

For the Marinade

2 tbsp Sriracha chilli sauce (can be found in Chinese supermarkets, substitutes wont work as well)
2 tbsp light or sweet soy sauce
3cm piece of ginger – grated finely
3 tbsp Soft brown sugar
3 tbsp Rice wine vinegar
1 Lime – juiced
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp Ground Tumeric
1 clove of garlic finely chopped

Mix together all the marinade ingredients – EXCEPT the garlic. and set aside half of it for the dipping sauce.

Add the garlic to the remainder and put the chicken thighs in to marinade. Leave for at least 1 hour or covered overnight in the fridge.

Drizzle a little oil on the chicken and cook on a griddle pan and season with salt and pepper.

Serve with the sauce to dip the chicken into.

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Posted on February 15, 2015 by gorgefood

Adapted from a takeaway fave! Tasty and meaty, spicy mushrooms!

Ingredients

serves 2 as a starter or serve with rice and noodles as a main

1 packet of mushrooms – closed cup, button or chestnut.
2 cloves of garlic – chopped finely
1 small onion diced finely
1 small green pepper diced finely
2 red chillis – seeds taken out if you don’t want it too spicy
Cornflour
Salt
Pepper – I used crushed white peppercorns but ground black peppercorns is fine.
1 tsp crushed Szechuan peppercorns ( not essential)
Cooking oil
Spring onion to serve.

Chop your mushrooms into quarters if large, or in half if small.

Put in a bowl with a generous amount of salt and pepper and half the Szechuan peppercorns and cover them in corn flour. shake the bowl around until the mushrooms are coated loosely.

In a frying pan gently fry the onions peppers and chilli on a medium heat until soft then add the garlic, a generous amount of salt and pepper and half a tsp of Szechuan peppercorns and fry for a further 3 minutes. Be careful not to burn.

Then shallow fry the coated mushrooms in 2cm of oil in small batches. If you add them all at once there wont be “muchroom” and they wont get a crispy coating.

Toss the mushrooms in the vegetable mixture and serve with some chopped spring onion!

Also works with prawns.

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Posted on February 15, 2015 by gorgefood

This was a bit of an experiment of just chucking loads of things in so the measurements may not be exact – just play around with it but keep the basic principles of the recipe. It looks like a lot of ingredients but its a simple soup to make and ready in 20 minutes.

To make vegetarian – replace meat and fish with Tofu slices and change your stock..

Ingredients – serves 2 as a main or 4 as a starter

2 pints chicken or veg stock
1/4 teaspoon dried crushed chillies ( or half a fresh chilli if you you don’t have dried)
1 dessert spoon light soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, crushed
3 slices fresh root ginger
Handful of bamboo shoots
Handful of sliced fresh mushroom
1 small chicken skinless chicken thigh or pork cut into small strips (optional)
1 tsp sesame oil
2 spring onions, chopped
Handful chopped fresh coriander (optional)
3 tablespoons white wine vinegar
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp tomato puree
Juice of 1 lime
Cornflour starch – made from 1 table spoon of cornflour and 2 tsp water. More if you want a thicker consistency.
1 egg, beaten
4 king prawns per person (I use raw)

you could also use some slices of tofu if you want to make this a vegetarian soup or add noddles to pad it out into a main meal.

Method

In a saucepan, combine the chicken stock, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, root ginger, garlic, soy sauce and crushed chillies. Bring to the boil, then simmer.

Increase the heat to medium, add the chicken, white wine vinegar, lime juice, sugar, tomato puree and sesame oil. Return to the boil and then drizzle in the egg while stirring slowly.

Simmer on medium heat until the chicken is cooked through and the stock has thickened.

Add the prawns at the end, until they go pink ( for raw prawns) or until they are warmed through ( for cooked prawns)

Check the seasoning and add more soy sauce and lime juice if required.

Garnish with chopped spring onion and coriander.

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Posted on January 29, 2015 by gorgefood

Not really sure if I should part with this one but I have just been asked if I have a recipe for carrot cake!.. DO I!!

This is my “go to” cake, its very hard to get wrong and people say that they love it. There are a few variations though which I will give below.. If you have had my carrot cake before please let people know that this recipe works in the comments below!

The key to this cake is keeping it moist – a dry carrot cake to me is a sin and its not even worth eating if you have to drown it in cream!

Carrot Cake

or.. Courgette Cake..

or Carrot and Courgette cake..

I have not gone crazy, you can really make a lovely cake with courgettes.

Ingredients

Serves 8.
Sometimes I make double and make 2 cakes and sandwich them together with frosting to make a mega carrot cake.

150g Plain Flour
1 tsp Baking powder
1 tsp Bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tbsp raisins – optional
2 tbsp chopped walnuts – optional
250g grated carrot OR 125g Carrot and 125g Courgette, OR 250g courgette!
2 eggs
150ml oil – olive or Vegetable
150g Golden caster sugar
1tsp Vanilla essence

Topping

( Double if you are making a sandwich cake)

50g Butter at room temperature
75g full fat soft cream ( Philadelphia) or you could use Marscapone.
1tsp Vanilla essence
100g Icing sugar.
Optional – Orange Zest

This cake is really easy and you really can just chuck it all in.

Preheat the oven to 180C/gas 4. Grease and line an 18cm diameter round cake tin.

Add the sugar, flour, soda, baking powder, cinnamon, raisins, walnuts, vanilla into a bowl and mix.

Grate the Carrot/Courgette and squeeze some of the excess water out of the vegetables in a clean tea towel or your cake can be too soggy. Add the the bowl.

In a measuring jug add 2 eggs to 150 oil and beat until mixed then add to the rest of the cake mixture.

Beat well and put in your cake tin and cook for up to 45 minutes.

I am never very good at timing how long to cook a cake and with this one I really think you just have to check it quite often to see if it is done. I take mine out when it seems ALMOST done as the heat will carry on cooking it a bit after you take it out. Start to check on it after 20 minutes. Press gently on the top of the cake to judge if it is ready, it should still be quite springy.

Whilst your cake is cooking, mix the butter and cheese together in a mixing bowl with a teaspoon of vanilla, when fully mixed together start adding the icing sugar slowly. If the mixture is too runny just add more icing sugar until it is thick enough to spread on a cake without running down the side.

When your cake has completely cooled, take out of the tin and spread the topping on, decorate with chopped walnuts and you can also grate a small amount of orange zest on top.

You could serve with cream or ice cream but I personally don’t think it needs it!

There we go… my secret is out. I blame Charlie Bird.

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Posted on January 28, 2015 by gorgefood

Having been full of a cold last week I needed something nice and stodgy to help me to feel sorry for myself and beef stew was what I needed! Dumplings would have made it even better but I couldn’t bring myself to ruin the diet THAT much!

Below are the basic principles, you choose what vegetables you like and adjust accordingly! Mushrooms haters just leave them out!

Beef and Red wine Stew

Serves 3 or 4 with some mash!
Preheat oven to around 160.

1 Large pack of casserole beef
2 sticks of celery chopped finely
1 large Onion roughly chopped
2 large cloves of garlic – chopped
4 Shallots – Peeled and halved – optional
A Small bowl full of root vegetables cut into cubes – I used Swede, Carrot Sweet Potato and some potato. You could even just get a stew pack from the supermarket that’s ready cut.
10 Mushrooms peeled and halved
Half a bottle of Red wine ( don’t use your good stuff though!) or you could use a can of stout which also makes a great stew.
1 tbsp Tomato Puree
1 tin chopped tomatoes
1 Beef stock pot – or oxo cube
1 tbsp Fresh rosemary or 2 tsp dried if you don’t have fresh.
1 tbsp Flour
Salt and Pepper.

Fry your beef chunks in hot oil in small batches and set aside. You just want to brown the edges, not cook it though so only about 1 minute. If you add too much at once the beef will stew and become tough and no one wants tough beef in a stew unless you are a dog.

Fry the onions, celery and shallots until going soft then add the garlic and fry for a few more minutes.

Add the chopped root vegetables and keep moving around the casserole dish until they start going soft.

Add the beef back into the pot and a heaped tablespoon of flour and salt and pepper and stir until the mixture is coated in flour.

add a beef stock pot, a tablespoon of tomato puree and half a bottle of red wine and give it a good stir making sure you scrape all the goodness off the bottom of the pan. Cook for a few minutes on a high heat then add the tinned tomatoes.

Add your fresh herbs and cook slowly in the oven until the beef is falling apart. If you sauce is not thick enough at the end take a table spoon of sauce and mix with a tablespoon of cornflour in a cup and then re add to the casserole and cook for another 10 mins. DON’T just put the cornflour in dry or it will just turn into bug lumps.

Add salt and pepper if needed

Serve in a big bowl with big wedges of bread covered in REAL salted butter ( non of this utterly butterly stuff)! or dumplings.. or with creamy mash.. or all 3 if you can handle the carbs! and eat it on your knee in front of the tv.

If you have any leftovers it tastes even better on day 2.

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Posted on January 23, 2015 by gorgefood

I spent a weekend at Ribby Hall last weekend with friends and LOTS of children. Before we went I thought that we should pre order a meal at the restaurant on site. With there being 17 of us it could have easily descended into chaos. We chose from a set menu that was £19 for 2 courses or £23 for 3 and at that price you don’t really have massive expectations.

Ribby Hall is a Holiday Village which caters mainly for kids, you really wouldn’t expect to find high quality dining there, well I wouldn’t!

I was wrong!

We were given a pretty private corner of the restaurant which was great for us and also good for the other diners, and our starters appeared almost immediately. With hindsight I would have pre ordered some drinks too!

I ordered the Goats cheese which was very nice, it came with a beetroot chutney and beetroot sauce and crusty strips of bread. A very nicely presented and tasty dish and quite light too which was good for the “January Diet” The cocktail that I washed it down with was not so good for the diet!

“kookaburra”

Sailor jerry, gingerbread syrup, brown sugar, angostura, lemon, Lemonade.

Whipped Goats cheese, Beetroot gel and salsa, ciabatta crisp and garden leaves.

Next were the main courses, I had originally ordreded a slow cooked shin of beef but changed my mid due to “the diet” so was getting serious food envy as I saw people being presented with beef that looked like it would just fall apart if you looked at it on creamy mashed potato, unfortunately I did not get a photo of this dish but I tasted it.. It tasted as good as it sounds!

So, back to the cod, after my intial dissapointment of seeing the beef dish I was presented with;

Pan Fried Cod Loin with Tomato, chorizo and bean stew, baby spinach, parmentier potatoes and I cheered right back up again! A lovely looking plate of food again with a fat piece of cod with crispy skin sat on top of a tasty looking stew. The cod was cooked perfectly with the flakes just sliding away when you put in your fork, crispy and well seasoned skin on top (and I don’t usually eat fish skin!) and a smoky tasting stew of beans with chorizo underneath. I was very happy with my decision in the end.

When I made the order I omitted a dessert for myself.. for the reasons previoulsy stated 😉 but quickly changed my mind after seeing the quality of food that was being presented. I am not a chocolately dessert person really and although I love a good sticky toffee pudding, which it was as I tasted someone elses! I prefer something fruity and light at the end of a large meal. I chose the Coconut Pannacotta with Caramelised rum pineapple, pina colada sorbet. My dessert arrived amongst a sea of sticky toffee puddings and I knew I had made the right choice once again!

I washed this down with another cocktail..

Manhattan -Scotch, rye or bourbon whiskey, angostura bitters, sweet vermouth,orange

and by then thoughts of diets were out of the window.

The bill came to around 60 pounds (food only) for a family of 4 with 2 kids. Which for this quality of food is not bad at all. The kids meals were also very good, my daughter had the best mashed potato I have ever tasted on her bangers and mash.

Meal was quick, no mistakes on the food front and the kids stayed in their seats the whole time!

Then it was time to tackle the family disco….

This is not just a restaurant to visit if you are staying at Ribby Hall, if you live near enough you should make the trip because I don’t think you will be dissapointed.

Oh and I forgot to mention that it was also happy hour 😉

Click to access market-menu.pdf

Click to access cocktail-menu.pdf

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Posted on January 21, 2015 by gorgefood

Lemon and Thyme cake

I made this cake last week to take with me to our weekend away at Ribby Hall with friends..(restaurant review to follow!) Unfortunately I didn’t get a decent photograph of it before I served it on paper plates with plastic cutlery as I’d have “a few” wines by the time we got round to cake, in fact I almost forgot about it.

I think this was a great cake and it stays really moist and judging by the empty paper plates the others did too. ( post your comments if you are reading this.. you know who you are!)

I saw this cake made on one of the Saturday morning cookery shows so looked up the recipe, this is a recipe adapted from Nigel Slater on BBC Food website. It really is worth the effort.

Lemon and Thyme Cake

Serves 8.

200g Butter

200g Golden Caster Sugar

1 tsp Baking Powder

100g Ground almonds
100g plain flour

4 Eggs

Zest of 1 lemon (2 lemons needed altogether)

1 tsp Fresh Thyme leaves

Topping

4 tbsp sugar

Juice of 2 large lemons

1/2 tsp of thyme.

I bought a full pack of thyme for this recipe but you only need a tiny amount as it can be overpowering, it would be better to pinch some off a neighbours bush or accidentally get one strand caught on your shopping trolley….

Don’t use dried thyme as it will be too bitter, you would be better leaving the thyme out altogether.Pre-heat your oven to 160C/Gas 3 and grease a loaf tin or cake tin.

Mix the butter with the sugar until pale and in a separate bowl sift together the flour and baking powder and mix with the almonds.

Lightly beat the eggs then fold them into the butter mixture gradually. Add a little flour if it looks like it is going to curdle.

Add grated zest from 1 lemon and 1 tsp of thyme leaves.

Gradually mix in the flour, baking powder and almonds.

pour into into the tin and bake for around 45 minutes. Keep your eye on it though as you don’t want it to dry out, if it looks almost done.. get it out! It will carry on cooking for a while while it is hot. Nowt worse than a dry cake.

For the topping, dissolve the sugar in lemon juice and stir in the thyme leaves.

When the cake comes out poke holes all over the surface with a skewer and then pour the liquid over the top so that the sugar lemony moisture runs throughout the cake!

I served with Vanilla Ice cream.. on paper plates!

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Posted on January 14, 2015 by gorgefood

If you like a bit of fine dining but can’t bring yourself to stump up around £100 a head for an evening meal at The French (Not including drinks!) then this might be of interest to you.

I have received an e mail this morning about a new lunch menu at the French which is;

Three Course Tasting Menu

Includes
Glass of Champagne
half bottle of wine (Sommelier’s Choice)
& bottle of water

£50.00 per person

Available Wednesday to Friday

12.00 – 1.30pm

http://www.the-french.co.uk/reservations/

Might be nice to take a Friday afternoon off work and check it out!

My experience at The French

I tried The French last October, having eaten there before a few years before Simon Rogan arrived and being served a “medium” Pork chop I thought I had been put off for life! it was like chewing on raw flesh. After watching restaurant wars however and having already tried Manchester House for both lunch and the taster menu we decided to save up and blow some hard earned cash on tiny plates of food 😉

It was an enjoyable experience and most of the food was great although there weree a few courses that just were not to my taste including EEL! urgh. The waitress did admit that not many people like every course and if they say they are do they are probably just being polite! With 10 courses though you can afford not to like one.

The menu when we went was as follows;

£84

Trotter, ham fat cream, sage,
Celeriac with apple,
Potato and cheese,
Squid cracker, goats milk, shrimp and fennel.

Macerated tomatoes, crab, anchovy and celery

Salt baked swede, truffle, ardrahan, fried bread

Smoked eel and sweetcorn with a lovage broth

Ox in coal oil, pumpkin seed, kohlrabi and sunflower shoots

Breaded oyster, butternut squash with bacon buttermilk and mint

Autumn offerings with lovage salt, cresses, herbs and flowers

Butter poached hake with carrots, asters and smoked marrow

Reg’s duck, roast parsnip, barbecued broccoli with port preserved cherries

Berries with woodruff and cake crumbs

Plums in Cheshire honey, rye, crab apple and marigold

* thanks to Mrs Mulherin for staying relatively sober and remembering to photograph each course!

On seeing the menu 2 of our party actually decided not to come, I was dubious myself as I have always sworn I would never eat an oyster and had tried eel before at Manchester House and hated it! I am not a great fish lover so I sometimes struggle with taster menus as I just cannot enjoy anything that tastes too fishy. I am glad that I took the chance though as it is an experience that I am glad I have enjoyed. The atmosphere at The French is a bit stuffy, that is not because of the staff though as they put you at ease straight away, there are no airs and graces – although my friend asked at one point ” I am terribly sorry but may I have access to my coat!” I think it is to do with the decor and other diners that make it feel a bit pretentious.

I really did not like the Macerated tomatoes, crab, anchovy and celery, it just was not my taste but the rest of our party enjoyed it, I gave the eel a go – it wasn’t the worst but I wouldn’t choose to eat it ever again! I found the swede to be one of my favourite dishes though, who would have thought that a veg I usually just mash up with carrots could taste so amazing! I tried the oyster, I think because it was breaded and fried I could forget about what I was eating and it was actually quite nice – I wouldn’t be in a hurry to have one again but it didn’t make me heave!

The star of the night was the signature dish, Ox in coal oil, which I seriously doubted could taste so good as it just looked like raw meat on a plate, how wrong I was! It has to be tried to be believed! The salad, although it looks like a plate of leaves was also a seriously tasty dish and a very big surprise, it looked like a bit of a cop out course at first but how they make salad leaves taste that good is a mystery and probably took months of perfecting.

The desserts were a bit of a let down if I am honest, I think they were too similar and the fruit was very sharp, there needed to be a contrast dish of something sweet so I was left a bit disappointed at the end with literally a sour taste in my mouth.

The portions are small and some people don’t like paying a lot of money for this BUT there are 10 courses, you would be sick if they were all the size of a normal meal! The amount of work that obviously goes into each of the dishes is phenomenal and this is what you are paying for.

I am not sure if I would go for a full taster menu again at The French as I prefer Manchester House much more and if I am forking out almost £250 for a meal for 2 it has to be the best! I am glad that I went and had the experience though and do think that if you are serious about your food you need to give it a go!

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Posted on January 12, 2015 by gorgefood

I am giving this 5.2 diet a go for a few weeks to see if it makes any difference, so needed something very low calorie for lunch. Managed to make something that is around 175 Calories! (according to the My Fitness Pal” app.)

Obviously it would be better with more eggs and some chopped chorizo but my aim was low cal so adjust as necessary!

Huevos Rancheros! (for one)

1 tin of Tomatoes
half a green pepper
half an onion
1 green chilli
1 clove of garlic
i egg
Olive oil spray
Chopped parsley
Smoked Paprika
Salt and Pepper
Squeeze of lemon juice

Spray a small frying pan with olive oil, and fry the onions, peppers, garlic and chilli until soft, (chorizo would be good here too). Add paprika, salt and pepper then a tin of tomatoes. Warn the tomatoes the crack an egg onto the top ( more eggs if you are not bothered about calories!)

Cover the pan for a few minutes until the egg goes white, sprinkle with fresh parsley, squeeze of lemon and black pepper.

If you are being naughty a handful of cheese on top…

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Posted on January 8, 2015 by gorgefood

I have had a request for my King Prawn Linguine recipe so here it is!

This recipe won a competition to appear in Lakeland’s 50th Anniversary cookbook, something which I am very proud of. I am on the page next to Heston Blumenthal, followed by Michel Roux jr!

I get my prawns from the Chinese cash and carry, they are raw frozen prawns and are much better than anything you can get in the supermarkets. I would highly recommend getting some of these as they make a world of difference.

King Prawn Linguine with Garlic , Chilli and Asparagus.

Prep – 2 hours.

Serves 2

1 packet of large King Prawns (around 8 -10 prawns per person)

1 bundle of asparagus

3 large cloves of garlic

2 green birds eye chillis

2 dried red chillis

Half a packet of dried linguine or Spaghetti

5 tbsp Olive Oil.

Salt and Black Pepper

Parmasan cheese to serve.

A couple of hours before you want to serve chop half the garlic into thin slices and crush the other half. Chop the birds eye chillis leaving in the seeds if you want the dish to be very hot.

gently fry the garlic and chilli and dried chilli in 5 tablespoons of olive oil for around 2 minutes taking care not to burn the garlic, then take off the heat and leave for a couple of hours to infuse.

When you are ready to eat;

Prepare a bowl of cold water and ice.

Prepare the tips of the asparagus by snapping in half to get rid of the woody ends. Place the asparagus tips in a pan of salted boiling water and cook for 2 minutes.

After 2 minutes remove from the boiling water using a slotted spoon and place immediately into the ice water bath, This will stop the cooking process and ensure that the asparagus stays bright green and crisp.

Place the asparagus on a paper towel to remove all excess water.

Season the prawns with salt and pepper.

Add more water to your pan, bring to the boil and add salt. Add half a packet of dried spaghetti and a drop of oil to prevent sticking. Boil the pasta without a lid for around 10 minutes until the pasta is al dente, (Not too hard but not too soft).

When the pasta is almost done warm your oil and gently fry your king prawns and asparagus for a few minutes in the garlic and chilli oil until the prawns are warmed through. ( If using raw prawns add before the asparagus and cook until pink), then remove your dried chilli’s.

Take your pasta from the pan and drain well then add to the frying pan with your prawns and asparagus and toss until the pasta is coated thoroughly in the oil and the prawns are distributed evenly.

Salt to taste

Serve in a large bowl with freshly ground black pepper and a touch of parmesan cheese.

I would recommend this book though as there are lots of good recipes in it and all proceeds go to Children in Need.

http://www.lakeland.co.uk/19741/Lakeland-50th-Anniversary-Recipe-Book