Brains S.A. Gold Chutney

We all run away from the sadness in our lives. Good things come to an end. We're not always ready to face the truth and it can be a bitter shock, discovering that the joys we've held so close to our hearts are no more.

Readers: I have finished the last of the Brains S.A. Gold chutney.

....

Please don't worry. All you need to know is that in time I will heal.

The good news is that, even though I have never mentioned the chutney to you before (despite having made it three times), you can get the recipe in this book.

I can tell you two things. #1 is that I am not going to give any away next time. #2 is that you don't need to use Brains S.A. Gold ale, but that's my local and it's delicious.

Pam says make the chutney in October time, but frankly, you can make it whenever. It's not like swede is seasonal.

Seville Orange Marmalade

I know that the shreds of orange peel have floated to the top of my jars, but I have taken the decision not to allow myself to spend even a moment worrying about it. Feel free to on my behalf.

I never thought I would become a marmalade maker. It doesn't seem like the sort of thing a man my age should be doing. In fact, I probably wouldn't even be doing it this year if it weren't for the fact that my mother in law really enjoyed the pink grapefruit stuff I made a while back when we opened a jar at Christmas, and well, you know... Anything to keep in the good books!

I feel the same about one of my other newly rediscovered passions. Knitting. They are both very much stay-at-home-to-avoid-the-cold, cozily antiquated activities. Not manly in any sense. Then I read this. (Well, actually I read about it somewhere else, but this was the first result that Google gave me just now...)

Amazing. I'm not alone. Ryan Gosling does it too.

Ryan Gosling.

Which got me wondering. Is he a marmalade maker as well? I mean, isn't that a lovely idea? Just the absolute loveliest.

Imagine. He could come over to my little house in Cardiff and we could admire the Sevilles I'd bought that morning (which if you're quick, and live in Cardiff, you'll still be able to get from the greengrocer on Albany Rd).

A Seville orange. There is not much else to say. It is sliced in two.

After I'd sliced and juiced the fruit ('Quite a dry orange, the Seville, isn't it, Ryan?'), he could de-pith and shred the rind finely ('It sure is. And full of pips.'), keeping the pulp, seeds and discarded pith to tie up in a square of muslin.

  

For the sake of clarity, I did this myself. Ryan Gosling is obviously more than capable of making marmalade, and probably would come over to do so if I asked him, but this particular batch is all my own work.

We'd laugh about the word 'pith bag' and, clutching warm mugs of freshly ground coffee, put the citrus rinds on a low heat to simmer slowly and soften.

The conversation would draw to a close, leading to a short silence...

Ryan: (looks at Mr. P with questioning eyes) Well, that's going to need to simmer for about two and a half hours. What are we going to do with ourselves for that long?

Mr. P: (knowing glance and deliberate pause) You know exactly what we're going to do, Ryan.

Clutching our yarn bags, we'd run to the sofa and armchair, snuggle up against the cushions and cast on stitches for matching cabled afghans in luxurious, hand spun alpaca. 

Of course, this perfect idyll would no doubt sour when Ryan realises that it's his turn to sterilise the jars, but still... *sigh* The beauty of yarn and needles. It makes me want to pack everything in, move to Amsterdam and become one of Stephen West's free-spirited dancer friends.

  

Meanwhile, since that is never going to happen, here's how to get Sevilley while the season lasts...

Enjoy.

Seville Orange Marmalade

You will need:

 750g Seville oranges (see above if you're a local!)

1.5 kg granulated sugar
juice of 2 lemons

1. Half the oranges. Juice them, and then scrape out the pulp, pips and as much white pith as possible. Reserve this pulpy mess, and tie it up in a piece of muslin. That there is your pith bag. Slice the orange rinds as thinly or thickly as you like. I think very thinly is better, but will allow you the freedom to choose.
2. Put the juice, rinds, pith bag and 1.9 litres of water into a large (LARGE!) pan, and cook gently for a few hours until the rind is soft. The liquid will have reduced by about a third.
3. Add the sugar and lemon juice. Stir until the sugar has dissolved. Then boil rapidly until the setting point (* see note) has been reached. This took about 20 minutes for me, though start checking at 10.
4. Turn off the heat. Stir gently for a few minutes, to disperse any bubbles, and pour into hot, sterilised jars (* see note). Seal immediately with new lids. Use within 2 years.

NB: To check for setting point: when you start boiling the marmalade, put a saucer in the freezer to chill. After boiling for the required time, drop small dribbles of the marmalade onto the saucer and wait a moment. If, when you poke the puddle of marmalade with your finger the surface forms a wrinkle, the setting point has been reached.

I re-use jars. This recipe will fill 5-6 regular sized ones. To sterilise them, wash the jars (remove any labels) in hot soapy water, then rinse them. Place right side up on a baking sheet and dry them off in a 100°C oven. I leave them in there at that temperature until I'm ready to fill them. I also sterilise the lids by boiling them for 10 minutes. I buy my lids new. Get them from your local kitchen supply store.

Pink Grapefruit Marmalade

There's a lot of Christmassy stuff happening on the Internet right now. Hoardes of people are posting on Facebook about what they are buying for who, and some of the blogs I follow have posted gift buying guides for the greedy gourmets in your lives.

I'm not dismissing their efforts (who wouldn't want one of these?), and I am NOT deliberately being a bore, but I can't help feeling the need to point out that it does not mean that you have to spend money on over-priced tat to show someone that you love them at this time of year.

Make them something instead.

There's been a rule in my family since time immemorial that we don't buy gifts for everybody. It's a complicated system based on age (as opposed to merit), and since I am now thirty, I don't qualify as a child by any means. Historically, we've never bought gifts for extended family (aunts, uncles etc.), so that puts me in a pickle as an adult, because I'd like to. Cooking is my way of getting around the ban.

I haven't always been successful at making things people actually want. The first batch of chutney I ever made was completely un-delicious (although my family ate it). But I got better. And there are things I've made that some people actually get in touch with me about in early December to see if I'll be doing them again. I might round them up later this week actually, since some of the recipes are on the blog.

That's pain poilâne, btw, and I have a terrible OCD relating to its consumption. 

The curved, top crust has to be facing my right and the flat bottom, my left. 

This way I can nibble from the top of the loaf to the bottom. Am I making myself at all clear?

This marmalade is a new addition to the hamper hit-parade. I wanted to make some in January with Seville oranges, and add dried cranberries to it, but it never happened. So this is my pink grapefruit version. It's delightfully bitter (Campari Soda alone cannot keep me in this perpetual bad mood), and can be personalised easily. You say you'd prefer thicker shreds? Slice accordingly. Don't like the idea of grapefruit? Use limes (maybe add some ginger!), lemons, oranges or even clementines. Or a mixture.

A pot of marmalade and a loaf of gingerbread is the perfect way to say Happy Christmas. Especially to the people who hated your chutney and ate it anyway.

Pink Grapefruit Marmalade

You will need:

750g pink grapefruit (2 of them)
1.5 kg granulated sugar
juice of 2 lemons

1. Half the grapefruits. Juice them, and then slice the rinds (literally, the whole thing - everything that's left after juicing) as thinly or thickly as you like. I think very thinly is better, but will allow you the freedom to choose.
2. Put the juice, rinds and 1.9 litres of water into a large bowl, and leave to soak overnight.
3. Transfer the grapefruit, water and juice to a large (LARGE!) pan, and cook gently for a few hours until the rind is soft. The liquid will have reduced by about a third.
4. Add the sugar and lemon juice. Stir until the sugar has dissolved. Then boil rapidly until the setting point (* see note) has been reached. This took about 30 minutes for me, though start checking at 15.
5. Turn off the heat. Stir gently for a few minutes, to disperse any bubbles, and pour into hot, sterilised jars (* see note). Seal immediately with new lids. Use within 2 years.

NB: To check for setting point: when you start boiling the marmalade, put a saucer in the freezer to chill. After boiling for the required time, drop small dribbles of the marmalade onto the saucer and wait a moment. If, when you poke the puddle of marmalade with your finger the surface forms a wrinkle, the setting point has been reached.

I re-use jars. This recipe will fill 6-7 regular sized ones. To sterilise them, wash the jars (remove any labels) in hot soapy water, then rinse them. Place right side up on a baking sheet and dry them off in a 100°C oven. I leave them in there at that temperature until I'm ready to fill them. I also sterilise the lids by boiling them for 10 minutes. I buy my lids new. Get them from your local kitchen supply store.

Nectarine Butter

3 jars of nectarine butter on my garden wall. Yes: I was too busy to take a nice picture!

Time to get that cake down off of the front page, it's been tempting me each and every time I log on here and there's not a single crumb of it left.

We're putting up again today folks. He's caught the bug, and you are going to be reading about it.

A bit of background detail before we begin. Last year, when we got married, we didn't really want to have a wedding list. I don't like the idea very much (in principle; in practice, it's wonderful, because as a guest, you don't need to put any thought into what you give), and was really at a loss as to what to put on one. How did I know how much people would want to spend?

 

12 chopped nectarines! 12 chopped nectarines!

Sometimes, when confronted with a gift registry card, I go daringly 'off list' and buy something else. It makes me feel coolly rebellious and quite, quite edgy. Some people did that to us, and all of them chose wonderful surprises that we never would have expected: a warm rug-blanket thing, a tea chest and hand made cake stands for instance. Percy's team (do I always have to call him Mr. Other P? My name is down the bottom there for all to see after all!) of colleagues even bought us a slow cooker.

I was elated. Or as elated as one can be with an appliance. I thought of all the amazing things we could make it it, with zero effort and no time spent in the kitchen. And then promptly did very little other than put it in the cupboard.

You see, I adore spending time in the kitchen. My job takes me away all the time, so whenever I can, I love to be at the stove. Perce slow cooks regularly, but I had, until recently, begun to feel increasingly disconnected from the little crock.

I decided it was time to do something about it.

Having decided to treat myself, in the middle of one wakeful night, to a copy of Marisa McClellan's book Food in Jars, from the blog of the same name (and to which I am hopelessly addicted - she makes me want to move to Philly and can my body weight in tomatoes and dilly beans), I noticed that she advocates the use of slow cookers when making fruit butters. They're like jam, only better. We've made fruit butter here before though, remember?


(God, I hated that old kitchen!!)

You see: even a man, can can! Or bottle: we're British here after all.

Anyway, I was in! Out came the pot, and away we went. And you know what? It was fantastic. I spent the whole day pottering around doing chores, even being able to run out to the shops, and the whole time, my slow cooker was silently and efficiently doing what I could not (i.e. spend two hours stirring a hot pan). In the evening, I filled and processed my jars (more on that below), and at the end of the day I had 3 500ml jars of beautiful nectarine butter to stash away for when the days are cold and I need to taste the Summer.

I thoroughly recommend the method, and the book. It does involve using a water bath and proper Kilner jars, but this is far less scary than it sounds. Have a go.

Do you make fruit butters or jams already? What's your favourite?

Nectarine Butter (method works for plums, peaches, apples, pears: you name it!)

You will need:

12 nectarines (to make 1.7kg of chopped fruit)
1 lemon
2 1/2 cups sugar (500g)

1. Chop your nectarines, or whatever you have chosen to make butter with, and put them into your slow cooker. Cook on the 'low' setting for one hour.
2. Stir the fruit, and carry on cooking. You can use a wooden spoon to prop open the slow cooker's lid to help speed the process of cooking down (more water will be able to evaporate), if you wish.
3. Cook for a further 6 hours, checking the fruit every couple of hours or so. When the fruit is soft, push it though a sieve or, even better, use a stick blender to purée it directly in the slow cooker, which is what I did. You can also then switch to 'high' if you like.
4. When the butter is thick and spreadable (bear in mind it will thicken as it cools), add the sugar, zest and juice of the lemon, stir well, and cook for one final hour.
5. Now get your water bath ready: wash your jars (the kind with a lid and ring: in the UK we call these Kilner jars, and you can get them in any kitchen supply shop)  and place them in a tall stockpot with a tea towel in the bottom (my make-shift trivet!). Cover with cold water and bring to the boil.
6. Place the lids in a small pan of cold water, bring to the boil and remove from the heat. Leave the lids in the hot water until ready to use.
7. Remove the hot jars from the water, and fill them with the fruit butter, leaving 2cm of airspace at the top of the jar. This recipe should fill three 500ml jars exactly.
8. Wipe the jar rims, apply the lids and screw bands, and lower the jars back into the hot water. Boil hard for 15 minutes.
9. Remove the jars and place on a wooden board or folded newspaper (cold surfaces could cause the hot jars to crack). You should hear the lids 'pop' pretty soon afterwards (meaning they have sealed). Marisa's book explains this process much more thoroughly, should you have any questions.
10. Use within 8 months.

Rumtopf

The sugar has yet to dissolve, but you get the idea...

OK, you know how when someone has a church wedding, the priest or minister or whoever might say 'Speak now or forever hold your peace'? Well, in essence, what I am saying to you now is, 'Make this now, or forever be without' (until next year at least), because it's literally your last chance to get domestically grown Summer fruits and berries, and it would be pointless to make this with those long-haul imports that taste of acidulated water.

So, ja, everybody, Ich habe ein Rumtopf gemacht.

I'm going to stop right there, because I haven't really spoken German since I was at school, and that was half my lifetime ago. But I am going to tell you what a Rumtopf is, because it's going to rock your world. Knock your socks off. Blow you away.

It's a German preserve. Rather than bottle their excess fruit, or make a jam out of them, those clever deutsche Volk steep them in sweetened rum (in a pot - the Rumtopf) to enjoy in Winter time. At Christmas, say. Or in January when the New Year blues get to you and all you want to do is kill yourself. Or is that just me?

Upon learning about this marvellous practice, I had but one thought:

What. A. Fantastic. Idea. Boozy blueberries to fight the blues!

I'll be honest: I have myself already done something a little similar before with red berries and Cointreau (quite possibly the most fashionably underrated of all the liqueur cabinet dollies), but never on this scale, and I do know people will say that this is just fancied up sloe gin, but... I...

Truly - this excites me.

If you too are excited by the thought of making 'liqueur pickles', gather together a jar, rum, granulated sugar and as many different fruits as you can muster. Mr. Other P and I got a deal on raspberries, strawberries, blackberries and blueberries at the market; the cherries were expensive and therefore not a bargain as such, but I thought they would taste good. You could also use plums, apricots, peaches, nectarines or pears. In short: whatever you fancy.

Here's what you do. Layer the fruit - Mr. Other P started with strawberries as you can see - in the jar, weighing as you go. Top each layer with half the fruit's weight of granulated sugar. I think this was something like 180g of strawberries, so 90g of sugar went in the jar next. 

After that, keep layering the fruits and adding sugar until the jar is full. Cover everything with rum, and if the fruit floats (our blackberries refused, point blank, to stay submerged. Selfish little gits.), use a small saucer or such like to weigh it down. We used a small ceramic soy sauce dish, though you can't see it in the photo.

Seal the jar, stash away in the cupboard and start counting the days until Christmas.

Note: We used really, really cheap rum. Have no shame. We don't. Also, we had leftover fruit and rum so decided to make small jam jar Rumtopfs as well. They are very cute and would make great presents, so don't feel you have to make a great big one if you'd rather not.

Peach Jam

My fear of botulism.

Note: Clean jars are required for jam making. Follow the instructions here, only don't worry about putting the lids in the oven to dry off. I always just drain and use them straight away now. A quick invert and re-invert of the jars immediately after sealing means the hot jam will kill any bacteria on the inside of the lid.

From time to time, I develop obsessive compulsions and for the last few years, around this time, I have been struck by this huge, unstoppable urge to start making preserves. It is all consuming and I have to fight hard not to spend my entire take home pay at the markets buying fruit and what not.

I know if I were a better person, I'd grow my own produce and do it organically to boot. But then, if I were a better person, I wouldn't have lost my cool and started yelling at the housemaid who ignored the 'Do Not Disturb' sign on my hotel room door the other day and came in without knocking. A better person would have laughed that off.

(I was naked, btw, so don't start thinking that Mr. P is the kind of guy who just flies off the handle over nothing. Although he is, as it happens.)

Anyway: jam. Two of my favourite Summer treats are peaches and nectarines. The fact that these now come shaped like doughnuts is, as far as this boy is concerned, only further reason to enjoy them. Although I've not had one decent nectarine this year, they've all been woody and sour, so I might have to fly out to Spain and have a word with the farmers four our mutual benefit next year. I thought some of these white doughnut peaches would make a lovely jam, and I was right. But then I scared the Scheiße out of myself when I read that white peaches need to be acidulated in order to prevent the growth of botulism in the finished bottled goods.

WHAT?

And also:

What to do?

Well, I haven't died eating my jam, so I am assuming it is OK to do nothing. I did have a read around the USDA information online, which to be honest, was terrifying. I do think that there's a HUGE fear of food preparation techniques in America (worrying about what could happen to your pickles if you don't heat the vinegar sufficiently etc) that we just don't have in the UK. I'm sure it's well researched. But to reassure myself I asked the NHS how many cases of botulism we've had in the UK recently. That calmed me down considerably.

However, since I don't want you lot to fall ill, I'm going to say to add the juice of two lemons to this recipe. Let's stay safe. Doughnut peaches are lovely, but not worth dying for.

White Peach Jam

You will need:

1kg chopped white peaches
1kg sugar (use jam sugar for an assured set)
2 lemons, juiced

1. Put the chopped peaches and sugar into a large pan, stir well, and set aside for a few hours if you have time. This will encourage the fruit to release juice, which will help keep the peach pieces whole during cooking, but it isn't essential.
2. Bring to the boil over a medium heat, stirring all the time until the sugar dissolves. Then turn up the heat, add the lemon juice, bring to a full rolling boil and boil hard for 3 minutes or so.
3. Test for setting point: pour a little jam onto a chilled saucer and wait for half a minute or so. If it forms a gel and wrinkles when you poke it with your finger, it's done. If not, boil for a few more minutes and try again.
4. Remove from heat, pour into warm, sterilised jars and seal with clean lids. I got the four jars you see above; I'd say it'd be three regular sized jam jars if you didn't have the small size.

Honey-Cinnamon Peanut Butter

My condiment addiction.

I feel as though I live my life trying to catch up with myself. I spend my time away at work making lists of urgent things that I'll need to do when I get home and then never have the time to do them. It is a race to get everything done on the last of my days off.

I am never up to date with the laundry. This makes me feel especially inadequate because I am the son of a woman who always has an empty wash basket and freshly ironed clothes. Even raising three children never stopped her from getting it all done on time. How ashamed she must be.

I can't even watch television programmes on time. Thank God for that ugly digital box thing that sits under the TV set and means that I can watch 'The Killing' after everybody else has already seen it. You know, when it was actually broadcast. (We don't get BBC4 at 33, 000ft, and even if we did I can't imagine the passengers would be too impressed if I sat down to watch Sarah Lund get thrown off of another case. I feel for her. I really do. Though quite frankly, I feel for myself too.)

I'm playing catch up with the blog today as well. In two ways! We're making peanut butter - people have been doing that for years, I'm hardly being original - and also, posting this recipe and video was number one on my list of things to do this week. I can tick that off now. Or would if I could find my Sharpie. It's a start at least.

I know making peanut butter seems crazy when you can buy it in the shops. But you can't buy Cinnamon-Honey Peanut Butter (at least, not in Cardiff...), and I had to use my Allure 3-in-1 Hand Blender. Do me a favour and try this out. But get help shelling the nuts. Hell. On. Earth.

Cinnamon-Honey Peanut Butter

You will need:

325g roasted peanuts
2 tbsp oil
1 tsp salt
honey
cinnamon

1. Basically, chuck the lot in the processor and set it to work. For more detail, watch the video!

Crab Apple Jelly

Hey everyone! Do you want to make crab apple jelly? Brilliant, me too. Let's get started.



You'll need a big bag of crab apples. Good luck with that; they are a bit of a pain to harvest. If you don't live near a tree, you can just use cooking apples from the greengrocer, but your jelly won't be the same beautiful claret-y pink colour. I know that sounds unfair, but it's best you're prepared for the shattering truth.



Wash your crabbies well. Outside is not as clean as we like to think.

I got my apples from my friend Rowanne's garden by the way. I've said I was going to make crab apple jelly with her under appreciated pommes for the past two years and this year I finally got around to it. Someone somewhere is applauding me, I just know it.



Chop the apples up roughly and put them in a large pan with a few cloves. Just barely cover them with water and turn on the heat.



Cook them gently until the fruit is pulpy. I warn you that this takes about 40 minutes. Having expected it to take 10, I was rather annoyed at this point. That's half an hour I'll never get back.



Now everything gets rather busy. You need to strain the pulpy fruit through a jelly bag for about 4 hours. Or through muslin. Or, if you're me, an old Ikea tea towel. Before using it, boil it in a pot of water for a minute or so. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, after all.


Look at the beautiful pink juice! Can you bear how pretty it is? (I can't.)

It all gets a bit exciting at this point, and I didn't have time to take pictures. But basically, you need to sterilise some jars. I used regular old jam ones, and did it the simple way: washed them in hot, soapy water, rinsed them and dried them off in a low oven.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, measure the juice you collected. For every 600ml, weigh out 450g granulated sugar. Heat the juice in a large pan, and when it boils, add the sugar, stirring until it dissolves. Then boil rapidly for about 8 minutes without stirring, until setting point is reached.



I hear you thinking, 'Wha..?'. Don't worry. This is easy. Pop a saucer in the fridge to chill before you begin, and when the 8 minutes are up, drip a little jelly onto it. If it gels (and it surely will, because crab apples are Pectin Kings. If the fruit garden had a fitness scene, the crap apples would be the guys working out on Muscle Beach), you've reached the setting point. Pour the hot jelly into a jug, then into your waiting (still warm) jars. Seal immediately with clean lids, which you can sterilise by boiling in water for 10 minutes.

Serve with cheese or roast meats.

That was free deliciousness I just showed you how to make there. Hope you liked it.

Chilli Pepper Relish

And so, dear reader, as I sit here, glass of whisky and soda very much in hand, I feel like a very bad man indeed. I seem to remember promising more baking in a recent post. I am going to have to break that promise. But look, I'll give it to you straight - you look like the kind of person who can handle the truth - it isn't that I haven't been thinking about it; there just hasn't been time for any.

OK, OK, that is also a little lie. There has been a coffee cake, which is part of a (hopefully) quite lengthy post that I am mid-way through preparing, but I just haven't had a chance to do anything else. Another lie. I actually made something like twenty cakes over the last week, but none of them were eaten by, or for, me, and they all went elsewhere. I have a 'If-I-don't-eat-at-least-a-little-bit-of-it-then-it-doesn't-go-on-the-blog' policy that I try very hard to adhere to.

And yes. It is absolutely devastating knowing that you have made twenty cakes and not eaten even a crumb of any of them.

The whisky has given me the munchies and now I want this!

I did consider baking something small to post before I go off on my next jaunt (which is for pleasure this time, not work), but I got carried away cleaning the kitchen and didn't have time. You know, I pride myself on keeping a fairly clean house, and whenever I suggest a tidy up, Him Indoors always groans and says we have a cleaner place than most people (Whatever, Mr. Other P - get that Hoover out). But you would not believe how filthy my kitchen was. How does dirt hide itself so well?

A brief aside: we had a new kitchen fitted about a year ago, and I really want to tell anyone who is reading and considering a re-fit not to choose high-gloss cabinets. Keeping them streak free will give you gray hairs.

Anyhow, you don't get cake today. You get my chilli pepper jam that was supposed to be posted in December. It is adapted from a recipe in Preserves: River Cottage Handbook No.2, which as regular readers will know is one of my favourites.

I made loads of this to give as gifts. It was one of my preserving successes. There's no reason to make it only in Winter time though, since it takes any cheese board to another, better, and infinitely more pleasurable realm. And it's not as if cheese is a seasonal indulgence. Is it?

Chilli Pepper Relish

You will need:

750g red peppers
100g red chillies
50g fresh ginger, peeled and grated
350ml cider vinegar
1kg pectin added jam sugar
50ml lime juice
1tsp salt

1. De-seed and finely chop the peppers and chillies.
2. Put the chillies, ginger and vinegar into a large pan and bring to the boil. Add everything else, stir until the sugar dissolves and the mixture comes back to the boil.
3. Boil for 4 minutes exactly, and remove from the heat. Cool for 5 minutes and then pour into sterilised jars and seal.

Pie of the Month - September

Ugly tarts need love too.

I know, I know. There was no pie in September. I'm not going to patronise you and say that I feel bad about it, because frankly, I had a fabulous September on holiday in Italy and was too busy having a good time to worry about pastry.

It is now the latter half of October and I still don't feel bad about having not made a pie last month, because all this cooler weather we seem to be having makes me feel fine about making two this month. Hurrah for cold, dry days - the sort of weather that makes you feel good about turning out a dozen frangipane tarts and eating them all in one go.

You have read correctly: eating them all in one go. Whilst I do not advise snaffling them down if it's just you, for three or four of you, it's fine.



Enough pie, time for a little provenance: I have a bit of an anti-Jamie Oliver thing. It's complicated, long-standing and deep rooted (all the best things in life are, dear), and I am not going to go into it here because I do have admiration for the chap (School Dinner Champion! Where was he when I was in school?), and am not into public mud slinging. Come over for an ale sometime, I'll tell you all about it.

Anyway, his new series and book has made me look at him in a new way. The man makes whole 4 course meals in 30 minutes! It is amazing; I am in awe.

I figured he might me able to help me out with my pie difficulties, and wasn't disappointed - there is plenty of pastry in this book. I made my own tart cases but he suggests buying them in. Whatever; these are 30 minute frangipane tarts: don't get het up.


I should tell you though, just so you do not think we are returning to the days of bin tarts... I made two piles of the tartlets when I had cooled them. One was the beauteous four or five that would grace the pages of Delicious Delicious Delicious, the other were the uglies that could be scoffed immediately. You can see that I scoffed the wrong pile. But I'm not sorry.

Frangipane Tarts
adapted from Jamie's 30-Minute Meals

You will need:

250g plain flour
125g butter, cold and cut into cubes
1 egg

100g ground almonds
100g butter, room temperature
100g caster sugar
1 egg

jam - enough to fill your tarts

1. First make your pastry: rub the cold butter into the flour. Work quickly, because you don't want the butter to melt. But don't worry about it - I managed, so it isn't hard. When you have a crumby looking mixture, add the egg. Work it through with your hand, and gather the pastry together to form a ball. Wrap this in cling film, flatten slightly and chill for at least 30 minutes.
   
2. Roll out the pastry on a floured surface; you want it thin. Cut rounds and use to line a muffin tray. You should have more than enough for 12, so keep the rest in the freezer. Unless you want to make more than 12.
3. Line the pastry filled muffin indentations with foil, fill with beans, and bake at 200°C for about 15 minutes.
4. Add a generous teaspoon of jam - I used raspberry and lemon and vanilla - to each tart case, then cover with a mound of frangipane. This is easy to make - using a spoon, beat together the egg, butter, almonds and sugar. That's it.
5. Bake for around 20 minutes at 180­°C. Done.
   

Blackberry Jam

If I were a real food blogger, I'd have made these. But I'm a faker!

Not all that long ago, I had an email from Tate and Lyle rep asking me if I wanted to try some of their range of sugars, which are all now Fair Trade, in the dishes I create for this blog.

I get a lot of junk email sent to the blog's inbox. If it's not Mr. Ogbonna in Nigeria telling me that stand to inherit 500 USD (yippee!), it's someone who wants to sell me cheap Viagra, or even better, cheap and natural Viagra. Sorry guys; I am just not interested.

Free sugar however, I'll take. Even though I pretty much exclusively use Tate and Lyle branded stuff anyway, since that's what my local supermarket stocks. So I agreed to do the trial, and the next day at 7:00am, 5kg of assorted sugar arrived on my doorstep. You must admit that that's a rather amazing start to the morning; beats court summons and phone bills any day of the week!



I didn't really know what to do with it all, but since there was a bag of jam sugar in there, I decided to go with that for a first try. This necessitated a trip to the allotments to pick the blackberries that grow on the scrub land at the edges, and I roped in my friend Lucy to help. I even made her wash and sterilise the jars that had been building up in the shed - Tate and Lyle may trade fairly, but I don't. (Don't worry, I've promised her a share of the finished jam!)

Last time I made jam, I used a different brand of jam sugar, which had completely different usage instructions and a lighter grain than Tate and Lyle's. I thought I'd just wing it and do what I'd done before, which turned out to be a mistake - I had to reboil the jam to make it set properly. The lesson to take away from this, my friends, is not to cut corners just because the sugar is free.


You've already seen that I made crostata with this jam. I recommend you do exactly the same thing, but I was recently in a used book shop and read something that made me want to try something a little unusual (or which seemed so to me). I always seek out the children's section in old book stores, on the hunt for Enid Blytons. I don't actually collect them, but loved her books so much as a child that I like trying to find first editions now. Flicking through a copy of one of the Secret Sevens I found a scene that I remember reading as a child, in which the Seven, holed up in a secret meeting in the Peter's garden shed, drink blackcurrant tea made with hot water and leftover jam from a pot in the larder. Figuring that since I've had yuzu cha before, and liked it, there was no reason not to try my own home-spun version; it was quite nice. Much better than the last time I was influenced by food in a children's book - Mum thought I was crazy when I asked for bread and margarine for my after school snack as a child (having read Roald Dahl's Matilda), and after having tasted it myself, so did I. I was straight back onto the scones after that, let me tell you.

Blackberry tea.

If you want to be an expert jam maker, which I am not, you would do well to buy a copy of Preserves: River Cottage Handbook No.2. It is an amazing book, and lists recipes and methods seasonally, so you could do a different jam, relish or chutney every month for several years and never make the same things twice.

Blackberry Jam

You will need:

Blackberries
Jam sugar

1. Pick over the berries and discard any bad ones. Pour all the fruit into a large bowl and cover with water. Add 1 tbsp salt and leave to soak for an hour. Then drain and pick over the fruit again. You will find a horrifying amount of bugs. Don't worry about it now, just be thankful that you didn't skip this step.
2. Wash your jars and dry them off in a cool oven to sterilise. Boil the lids in clean water for 10 minutes, and dry them off in the oven as well. Put a saucer in the freezer.
   
3. Weigh your fruit, and put it into a large pan with an equal quantity of jam sugar.
4. Over a medium heat, stir and mash the fruit and sugar until the sugar has dissolved. Resist the urge to add water as you'll have to boil the jam for longer.
5. Bring the mixture to the boil, and stop stirring. It will rise in the pan and spit; be careful.
6. After 6 minutes, test for setting point. This means drizzling a small amount onto the saucer you put in the freezer earlier and poking it with your little finger. If the surface wrinkles, setting point has been reached.
7. Pour the jam into the jars and seal immediately.
   

Jam

'Where've you been?'

'Slacker.'

I hear your taunts. I can only apologise. I had a week off last week, and even though I thought there would be countless opportunities to cook and blog, there just weren't.



I could, I suppose, have cooked something wonderful for the two friends that came to stay for a few days, and put the recipe up here. But we were too busy sunbathing at the beach during the day and talking and laughing at Nighty Night in the evenings for me to even think about slaving in the kitchen. I even went as far as to offer up Japanese curry rice from a packet as dinner. (Sorry Luce and Rish, and thank you for the pink Champagne. Next time, I'll cook properly).

I say we were too busy to think about slaving in the kitchen, and that is true. It isn't true though that we didn't spend any time in there at all. Oh no. We made jam. Quickly, and unexpectedly, at around ten in the evening, having been out all day picking fruit in The Gower.

That probably sounds like an act of complete madness, and I suppose that, actually, we did only decide to set out on a preserving marathon on a whim. Basically, when we realised that each one of us had picked a whole kilo of fruit: what were we going to do with it all?

In typical 'oh, let's just wing it' fashion (for us lot at least), we picked up some jam sugar from the supermarket, picked out and washed some jars from the recycling bin, and dried them off in the oven. We then read (and largely ignored) the instructions on the sugar packet, and got busy. I don't think any of us thought it would actually work.

Process, process!

The loot.


Ideally, you'd have Lucy helping you. She's more thorough than I am.


The fragrance! The aroma!

But it did! The two jams we cobbled together that night are sensational, so much better than anything you could ever buy. The texture is perfect, and because the fruit was so fresh, the flavours just sing. Can flavours sing? Well, these do. A fruity symphony of Summeriness.

I urge you all to get jamming. If you use jam sugar, and follow the instructions on the paper bag, you don't even have to check for the setting point. It's easier than boiling an egg!

One final word from me though: wear suitable shoes. We'd been at the beach earlier in the day when we felt the preserving urge, and so were barefoot. We escaped without injury, but jam splashes burning your toes is a snafu I can do without having on my conscience.

Go on: find your inner Grandma and make some jam.

The Barefoot Jam Makers' Jam

You will need:

Summer berries
Jam sugar

1. First, make sure you have clean jam jars. Wash them in hot soapy water, rinse, and put them on a baking sheet to dry in a low oven. About 100°C is fine. Boil the lids for ten minutes and put them in the oven too.
2. Pick over your berries, and remove all bad fruit and green leaves/ stalks etc. Weigh them, and prepare an equal amount of jam sugar.
3. Put the sugar in a large pan, and either add the fruit whole, or mash it in. You can purée it in a blender if you like (we did for the strawberries).
4. Over a low heat, stir with a wooden spoon until the sugar dissolves. Then turn up the heat and, still stirring, bring to a full rolling boil (this is described on the packet as one that bubbles and causes the mixture to 'rise in the pan, and cannot be stirred down').
5. Allow to boil without stirring for 4 minutes.
6. Enjoy the aromas. Wow!
7. Remove from the heat, and pour into the jam jars, filling them almost to the very top. I use a jug for this.
8. Put the lids on straight away, seal tightly, and allow to cool.
9. You now have jam!

Blood Orange Marmalade

Not so very long ago (in fact, this was just last month), I was having breakfast with some work friends in Milan.

Now, I know how that sounds, but let me just make very clear from the start that we weren't lounging glamorously, sipping espressi and nibbling crostata on the terrace of some lovely bar near the Duomo (obviously - this was January; nobody was doing that!). No, we were in Linate Airport, waiting to catch a flight back to London.

(I know, I know... Dreams shatter, the romance that filled the air becomes a mere memory... Welcome back to the real world.)

Anyway, the breakfast we ate was completely unremarkable - can't even remember what we had - but the orange juice they brought us to drink with it has been on my mind ever since. Well, not constantly, but I enjoyed it enough to remember it, put it that way.

I say orange juice, but actually, this stuff was crimson. Sanguine. Red-as-you-like. It would easily pass for tomato at a Fruit Juice Fancy Dress, no questions asked. Or indeed, blood, but I prefer the rather more appetising lure of my first comparison. Feel free to choose which you like better.

Anyway, it turned out that I like blood orange juice very much indeed, and not least because I am just crazy about the way Italians serve freshly squeezed juice - as it comes, bits and all, and at room temperature. It was so good I ordered a second, risking terrible acid indigestion (which thankfully never came), convinced I would never have the chance to enjoy such an elixir ever again.

So far, I am sorry to say, I have been proven right, but let us not dwell too much on the negatives in life. I did succeed in finding some blood oranges in the greengrocer's last week, and wasted little time in buying several kilos, full of hope that I would be drinking freshly squeezed, blood-red OJ at home all week.

It was not to be.

We can go about this the easy way, or the hard way, but the long and the short of it is that my blood oranges were anaemic. No sanguine juices for me. I didn't even bother to photograph the juice they produced, as it was just too devastatingly orange.

Since I wasn't going to bother making juice anymore (we always have regular orange juice in the fridge, and I am not going to get all busy in the kitchen when there really isn't a need. Call me lazy. Go on.), I was at a loss over what to do with all the citrus lying about my kitchen.

Until I went out into the shed, that is.

Have I told we we always keep our empty jars? I have now.

And have I told you that I eat more pickled gherkins than anyone else in the British Isles? Ditto.

I like to think that it is a simple and easy to follow equation:

Oranges + Jars = Marmalade.

I didn't have much time for this though, owing to a roster change, so I decided to use the whole fruit method, which is meant to be a lot quicker than the sliced fruit method (that I used to make Lemon-Vanilla Marmalade), and has the added benefit of making your kitchen smell like a Sicilian orange grove. Always a bonus, I'm sure you'll agree.

A quick note - said roster change meant that I had to photograph this marmalade immediately after jarring, (with awful food styling; I have failed you, I know) while it was still hot and liquid. I'm not trying to encourage dangerous behaviour in the kitchen, but have to tell you that there really is nothing to rival just-made, hot orange marmalade on a buttered crumpet. The flavour of the oranges is incredible. I haven't had a chance to try the fully set preserve yet - I'm away - but if it is even half as zingy as the straight off the boil stuff, then this is basically the best thing I have ever made.

Blood Orange Marmalade

You will need:

1 kg (that's six!) blood oranges
2 kg granulated sugar
3 lemons

1. Wash, scrub and remove the ends of the oranges. By ends I mean the little nubbly bits and stems.
2. Put them in a pan, cover them with plenty of water and bring to the boil. Simmer, covered, until soft. This should take two hours, so you can clean away the breakfast things, hoover or do the ironing while you wait. Or all of those things. I can clean the whole house in two hours.
3. Allow to cool slightly, and remove the oranges. Slice them as thin or thick as you like and put into a large pan. Measure the liquid you boiled them in, and either add more water to make 1.7 litres, or boil away more until you get that much. Add the orangey liquid to the oranges in the pan, along with the sugar and juice of the lemons.
4. Stir and heat gently until the sugar has dissolved. Then bring to a rolling boil, and maintain the high heat until the setting point is reached. This took 40 minutes for me.
   Allow to cool for 10 minutes, and pour into sterilised jars. I filled four great big ones (450g capacity), and one small one. Seal immediately. Unless you want to try it hot like I did, in which case proceed carefully, and don't burn your tongue!

If you don't know what the setting point is, or how to sterilise jars, see here.