Recipe Collection Thread (recipe board)

Ingredients

• 500g sugar
• 250ml orange juice
• 2 strips orange rind
• vanilla bean
• 600g of mixed dried fruits (i.e. pineapple etc)
• 250ml dark rum

Method

PLace sugar, orange juice, orange rind and vanilla in a pan and stir over a low heat until all of the sugar has dissolved. Bring to the boil for 5 minutes, then pour over dried fruit. Stir in dark rum. Spoon the fruits into a warm, clean 1 litre jar and pour in the syrup. Tap to remove air bubbles, seal and invert for 2 minutes. Leave in a cool dark place for at least 1 month before using. Store for up to 6 months.

Fills a 1 litre jar.

This is a recipe for Stilton and Walnut crunchies from Good Food mag, Christmas prezzie article, I have made this quite a few times so I can recommend it

8 oz plain flour
4 oz butter cut into small pieces
5 oz stilton
3 oz broken walnut pieces
2 egg yolks
beaten egg to glaze and coarse salt for sprinkling.

process the flour and butter till fine breadcrumbs
crumble in 4oz of the stilton and 2 oz of the walnuts
whizz VERY briefly to mix in
add the egg yolks and whizz briefly again
heat the oven to 180c/ gas 4 /fan 160c
grease 2 oven sheets
roll out to 1/4" and stamp out circles
arrange on sheets, brush with egg, sprinkle over a little coarse salt, cheese and walnuts
bake 15 -20 mins...freezes well

Because I had been making yogurt for a while I decided to use some for a cheesecake, I had strained a batch for 4 hours until it was like Philadephia then followed my normal cheesecake recipe, it was just perfect :j and so cheap in comparison to the Phily.

This recipe is a very flexible one that has a number of variations, it will take all flavours easily

This amount makes one 8" or two 6" foil dishes (these are a similar size to bought cheesecakes)

This is the basic recipe that you can add flavours to

3 oz butter, melted
5 oz crushed digestives
12 oz philadelphia or yogurt cheese
3 oz castor sugar
juice of half a lemon
3 tabs of cold water
1 sachet of gelatine
1/4 pt double cream whipped but not stiff

mix the butter and biscuits together and press into your flan tin (if it has a removable base it's easier to serve) the base of a tumbler is fine for this, chill

beat the cheese and sugar together, add the lemon juice

put the water into a small bowl, sprinkle over the gelatine and leave to soak for a minute or so until it's spongy then heat gently to melt (either in a pan of hot water or in the microwave but only for 2 or 3 second bursts) cool for a few minutes

add the gelatine to the cheese mixture

fold in the cream

pour into the case and chill

this freezes perfectly

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The variations I use are as below, these flavours are added after the the cheese and sugar are mixed

lemon or orange - add the finely grated zest of either and the juice of one piece of fruit

rum and raisin - soak 2 tablespoons of raisin in 2 tablespoons of rum until the rum has all been absorbed, add after the the cheese and sugar are mixed

Baileys - add 3 tabspns of Baileys and 1 teaspn of very strong black coffee - add more Baileys if you want to - it won't go too sloppy if you add another spoonful or 2

Christmas Pudding - 5 oz of dried fruit including cherries, soak in brandy or rum overnight, add a little mixed spice and orange rind

chocolate mint - add a drop or two of peppermint essence and some broken after eight mints, if you have any mint liqueur a tablespoon will go very nicely.
You might want to add a little more lemon juice or another tab spoon of water as the gelatine may set too quickly if it's not very wet.


Notes

If by chance the mixture does set instantly you can microwave the whole mixture VERY gently till it softens again.

If you want to make this for a vegetarian you can use vegetarian gelatine or miss it out altogether, you won't be able to slice it very easily so make it individual dishes or wine glasses

This is a great one for the hot weather as there's no cooking involved. You also get to use up your stale-ish bread!

In a food processor, blitz together:

3 slices bread, crusts and all
2 small handfuls of walnuts
1 garlic clove (half will do if you're scared)
5-6 basil leaves
3 spigs parsley
A big glug of olive oil, about 3 tablespoons
A big glug of milk, as above.

The resultant paste can then be thinned to your desired consistency with a little extra milk, or with the some reserved pasta cooking water

Toss the sauce with hot pasta and add peas, runner beans, tomatoes if you like and serve with grated cheese. Extra parsley is a good idea to tame the garlic...

Chicken (or meat) pulao is very simple - just boil chicken/meat (on the bone is tastier) with some spices and then brown onions with more spices and cook rice using the resulting stock! Suitable for kids too as can make it as spicy as you like! Contrary to popular opinion, we (are pakistani) don't eat a lot of chilli hot food! We like tasty, spicy food - not bottom searing stuff!
Though having said that my mum and hubby do like to have raw green chillies as a side dish! :eek:

CHICKEN OR MEAT PULAO

(serves 3-4)
if cooking for more then double up everything EXCEPT the spices - I would just increase those by half, but feel free to experiment to suit your own taste!

This is not a hard and fast recipe, just guidelines - or as my mum says use a little bit of this and a little bit of that and cook it until it is done!

Ingredients:
1lb meat(Lamb or chicken – preferably with bones)
4 cloves garlic
10 Black peppercorns
10 Cloves
1 tsp whole Coriander seeds
½ tsp whole Cumin seeds
1½ inch stick Cassia or Cinnamon bark
½ medium Onion quartered
1½ tsp salt
1 Bayleaf
2 – 3 cups water (or enough to cover meat)
2 cups Basmati Rice (approx 8oz cup) washed and soaked for min. ½ hour
½ medium Onion chopped
3 tbsp Oil or Ghee

Method:
1. Rinse meat and place in saucepan with all the above stock ingredients and enough water to cover meat.
2. Bring to boil and skim off any scum from surface.
3. Reduce heat and simmer gently until meat is cooked (- meat comes away from bone with hand). Can leave to cool.
4. Drain meat from stock and strain stock into measuring jug/bowl. Measure out 1 and a half times the amount of rice used i.e. 3 cups stock. Remainder can be frozen for later use. If you don’t have enough stock – top up with water.
5. Half an hour before you want to eat, wash & soak rice.
6. Brown chopped onion in oil until dark golden brown – the darker the colour of the onion, the darker the colour your final dish will be. (Don’t panic if the onion goes too dark – just use about 1/3 less. Remember that the onion will continue to cook in the hot oil even if you remove it from the heat! To stop it cooking further add a couple of tablespoons of the stock or water.)
7. Add meat to browned onions (carefully as it will spit) and fry meat until lightly browned. Then add stock and bring to the boil. Check salt at this stage and adjust to taste.
8. When stock is boiling , add drained rice and bring back to boil. When the liquid has been absorbed and steam holes start to appear, cover pan with tight fitting lid, reduce heat to very, very low (can put into low oven if ovenproof pan used) and leave for 15 minutes. (I recommend using a timer!).
9. After 15 minutes, remove from heat and turn out into serving platter/dish. Fork through lightly to fluff up rice and serve.

If want a 'hotter' end dish, add a couple of green chillies to the stock when cooking - can leave in or remove before cooking rice.

Plain Pulao:
Start at step 5 and instead of adding meat at step 6: add ½ tsp cumin and ½ tsp ground coriander, 1 tsp ginger and garlic puree and peppercorns, cloves etc as above, Fry lightly until can smell the spices then add water and continue as step 7.

Vegetable Pulao
Add vegetables after spices as above. Fry lightly and continue as step 7.

Serve on its own or with other curries (eg chicken, mince,lentils,chickpeas etc.)
Side dishes
Simple Red Onion salad:
1 red onion finely sliced into rings (and tomato if liked) sprinked with a little salt and juice of 1/2 lemon - leave to marinate for about 10 mins.

Chickpea salad
Soak approx 250g dried chickpeas overnight.
Drain and sprinkle with 1/2 tsp baking soda, mix well ensuring that chickpeas are well coated. Leave for 1/2 hour then boil until soft - cool
Then drain & mix with:
1 chopped red onion
handful chopped fresh coriander
3 - 4 diced tomatoes
4 - 6 diced boiled small new or salad potatoes
2 - 3 chopped green chillies (to taste)
salt (to taste)
and juice of 1-2 lemons.
Mix well and serve as a side salad or with plain yoghurt and tamarind chutney as a snack

Tamarind chutney:
2 - 3 tbsp tamarind paste boiled for a few minutes with similar qty water, 1 - 2 tsp sugar, 1/2 tsp each red chilli powder, ground cumin, ground coriander until thickened slightly. Cool and serve. Quantities guideline only - adjust to suit your taste

Yoghurt raita
1 large tub plain yoghurt
250gm diced boiled potatoes (more or less to taste)
handful of boondi (crispy gram flour balls refreshed in hot water for few seconds and drained - available in indian supermarkets or some large Tescos!)
salt to taste
1tsp sugar (to taste - should be slight sweetness not overpowering but can omit if preferred)
Mix well, thin with a little milk if too thick and then sprinkle pattern with
red chilli powder
ground cumin
ground coriander

Green Coriander, Chilli and Garlic Chutney
Blitz a good couple of handfuls of fresh coriander in a blender with 2 small cloves of garlic (crushed) and a couple of green chillies (chopped) and a little water. Can freeze any extra (use ice cube trays so only take out as much as you need)
Can also blend in a handful of fresh mint leaves for Mint Chutney
Use neat or can mix with natural yoghurt to taste.

Well that is it for now - hope you enjoy these - will be interested to know how they go down!
My mum (now she is a real oldstyler!) Grows her own chickpeas, coriander etc! Always makes everything from scratch (and this is while working and bringing up six kids!) has loads of recipes but only problem is that they are in her head! Will share as I manage to write them down!

Basic recipe here for Aloo Baingan/Potatoes and Aubergines, Chicken curry and variations etc.
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=1551669#post1551669

Happy eating!