Recipes

Steak and Ale Pie

- Alex Leave a comment

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One of the things I miss about England is the monthly magazine that almost every supermarket produces. Mostly, these magazines are free (although the ones you pay for are usually well worth it – quite a few Waitrose Food Illustrateds and Sainsbury magazines are still in my collection): they consist of a lot of advertising in various guises but almost always have a good selection of recipes.

This recipe for steak and ale pie is based on one that originally appeared in such a magazine, produced by the now defunct supermarket, Safeway. It’s really easy (so don’t be frightened if you’ve never made a pie before!) but very tasty – make extra and any that doesn’t fit in pie dishes works just as well with some mash as a stew.

The only thing you can’t do here is rush. You want to simmer the mixture for at least an hour and a half so you may prefer to make the filling one day and construct the pie the next …

This take on things produces enough filling to make two (generous) one person pies as well as a more normal sized two person pie.

Start with 750g of diced beef (I used blade), toss it in seasoned flour and brown, in batches, in olive oil over a moderate to high heat. Set the beef to one side, reduce the heat and then add two onions cut into wedges, two peeled, sliced carrots and some whole, but peeled, garlic cloves. I say ‘some’ because you know how much garlic you do or don’t like. Because it’s braised along with the beef it’s not a super strong flavour.

Allow this mix to soften for a few minutes, before adding 375mL of real ale (I used Black Sheep, bought at vast expense from a local bottle shop – but you do need to use a good quality beer with plenty of flavour), 200mL water and 2 tbsp of tomato paste. Bring this to the boil, then add some thyme and bayleaves before covering and simmering for at least 1 &func12; hours. After this time, when the meat is tender, you may wish to increase the heat and remove the lid to thicken up the sauce.

And that, with just a handful of ingredients and hardly any effort, is your pie filling.

Allow the filling to cool and, if necessary, reserve some of the gravy. If you like lots of pastry (and yes, we do!), grease your pie dish(es) and line with shortcrust pastry. Brush the edges of the pastry with egg, add the filling and top with puff pastry, sealing the edges well. Finish by ensuring there’s an air vent (if you have a pie funnel, even better) and glaze with beaten egg.

Bake at 200°C (non-fan) for a good 45 mins (longer if you’ve made one massive pie), until the pie is golden and you can’t wait any longer.

You may wish to serve with vegetables or salad on the side or you may wish to just scoff the rich, warm, pastry goodness!

Lemon and Thyme Cake

- Alex 3 Comments

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I have just ended up with a pile of lemons and a surfeit of eggs. I’m working my way through both … slowly.

I spotted this recipe for a lemon and thyme cake about a month ago and I invariably find Nigel Slater’s cake recipes flawless (his chocolate brownie recipe is fantastic). I am also a sucker for cakes using ground almonds and cakes dredged in syrup when they come out of the oven … Of course, being a lemon and thyme cake … I now have an excess of thyme hanging around the house.

As I was using my trusty Magimix I took some short cuts with Slater’s method … but if you don’t bake a lot or you’re doing the hard work by hand, I’d defer to his recipe rather than what follows …

Preheat oven to 160°C. Slater doesn’t specify if this is normal or fan forced but, as I opted for normal bake and had to cook the cake for a lot longer than suggested, I think it’s fan forced. Grease a 1lb loaf tin and line with baking paper (yes, actually do this!).

Cream 200g butter with 200g caster sugar, and then add 100g plain flour, ½ tsp baking powder and 100g ground almonds. I always mix between each addition. Then add 4 large eggs. Finish by adding the finely grated zest of one large lemon (depending on how much you like lemon) and approximately 1 tsp of finely chopped fresh thyme leaves (you really can’t go the dried route here).

This makes a really thick batter so you’re going to have to spoon it in to the tin, rather than pour. Don’t be alarmed.

Slater says to bake for 45 mins. At 160°C, no fan, this wasn’t long enough and I ended up baking for just over an hour. If you can, opt for 160°C fan forced, or try 180°C in a normal oven.

Just before the cake finishes baking, make the syrup. In a pan over a moderate heat, dissolve 4 tbsp of caster sugar in the juice of 2 large lemons, adding in ½ tsp of thyme leaves. Make sure the sugar dissolves but don’t bring the mix to the boil. This did make a generous amount of syrup (not that it worried the cake) so don’t be too fussed about sourcing huge lemons!

When the cake comes out of the oven, take a long skewer and poke holes all over the cake, all the way to the bottom and then drizzle the syrup over the cake evenly, before allowing to cool in the tin.

Because you did use the baking paper to line the tin, when the cake is cool simply pull it out of the tin and cut in generous slices. Slater suggests serving with thick yoghurt but you don’t even need that.

Absolutely delicious – and I think it took me longer to do the dishes than put the cake together!

Pasta Presto

- Alex 6 Comments

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We eat pasta at least once a week and, often, it is an emergency meal.  We get home late from something and throw some frozen filled pasta in boiling water and mix through some bought pesto.  Proper lazy food.

But then there are occasions (all the time, really) where there is no excuse for such laziness.  As Susan, at the Well Seasoned Cook, is hosting Pasta Presto Nights this week I took this as an opportunity to NOT crack open a jar but instead use up what was in the fridge.

Fortunately, the fridge was well stocked for pasta making.  We had half a jar of passata – absolutely essential for a fast pasta sauce, as well as half a small pot of tomato paste.  An excellent start.

If you’re using dried pasta, start cooking it before you start on the sauce.

I started by heating some olive oil in a pan, and crisping up a couple of rashers of bacon, chopped up.  Then I added a roughly chopped leek and 3 minced cloves (large!) of garlic.  Once the leek had softened, in went the passata, and I rinsed out the jar with some of the red wine that was open.  Then I mixed through the tomato paste, and added a teaspoon of oregano and a tiny scotch bonnet chilli (the first of what is looking like a very large harvest), very finely chopped.

And I just let that all very gently simmer while the pasta cooked.  Shortly before the pasta was ready I stirred through the remnants of some mascarpone (probably about 75g worth).

Mix the pasta through the sauce, and serve, topped with plenty of parmesan and black pepper.

From start to finish, this took less than half an hour (in fact, the sauce was finished before the pasta had finished cooking) and it was absolutely delicious.  The tiny chilli added a lovely background heat that built up as we ate and the mascarpone and tomato paste both enriched the sauce and made it fabulously creamy.

The only problem?  We don’t always have a fridge so conveniently stocked for pasta sauce making!