Weezl and friends Phase 3 - sitting pretty with Kitty

weezl74

Avocet wrote: »

On the menu tonight at Le Bistrot Avocet -- tomato and olive pudding, served with carrots. I chickened out of cooking potatoes as well, because I thought that the pudding crust would probably be sufficient in the carb line. As it turns out, this was a good decision because there are only three of us eating tonight, and the potato-eaters wouldn't have had room to polish off the fourth portion if they had filled up on potatoes as well (my husband thought that potatoes would have been a good idea, but my son thought they would be too stodgy on top of the pastry). While I think of it, a side question about the potatoes... what do you do about the absence of butter on this plan?

ok the potato-less meal is 572 cals vs 724 inclusive of them. I'm aiming for 1950 for kitty and 2300 ish for the menfolk, so I think for planner purposes they probably need the spuds, but I think/suspect that most folk using the recipes on an ad-hoc basis may well want to lose the spuds edit: yes sorry about the lack of butter! I fully intend to write up the croatian potato salad Have you seen the wedges recipe?

Avocet wrote: »

Back to the main event... The pastry was quite easy to make and took about 100 ml water to mix, using brown self-raising flour (because that is what is in the self-raising flour tub at the moment). It was easy to work with, and easy to line the basin.

great!

Avocet wrote: »

I'm not at all sure about the instruction to "fry" the filling ingredients, because there is no oil. Is there oil missing from the recipe? Or does it mean "boil" or "heat" or "simmer"? I opted for just boiling everything together. To further complicate things, I wasn't sure how long the filling ingredients should be cooked for, so I gave it three or four minutes, then assumed that the lentils would finish cooking in the prolonged steaming session. This turned out to have been just about right, although another couple of minutes wouldn't have hurt, because the lentils in the finished dish were just cooked but still holding their shape.

right ho I shall suggest 5-10 mins of simmmering/dryfrying instead

Avocet wrote: »

Adding the filling to the basin was a bit of a panic. I had started by making the pastry 1 cm thick, as instructed, but this left room for only half of the filling. So I hastily spooned the hot filling back into the saucepan and used the back of a large serving spoon to spread the pastry thinner (and higher up the sides of the dish). The heat or moisture of the filling made the pastry easy to spread, but a little slimy looking, and I was very relieved to find that the filling fitted in when I tried again, because I was worried about spreading it any thinner when it was so wet and tomatoey. Anyhow, it all fitted in (the pastry was only about 5mm thick at most), so I attached the pastry lid, then popped the lid on the basin and steamed it.

well rescued!

Avocet wrote: »

Which brings me to the equipment I used. I used a 2-pint plastic pudding basin with a lid (the sort that Christmas puddings come in), and steamed it for 2 hours and 15 minutes in the Intellichef. Actually, I didn't use the Steam setting, because the pudding basin didn't fit into the Intellichef with the trivet in place, so I took the trivet out, poured in some water, folded some kitchen roll to act as a buffer between the basin and the non-stick cooking bowl, and set it to Stew for 2 hours 15 minutes.

Hmmmmn, is my basin smaller then? I will pour pints into it and adjust!

Avocet wrote: »

Variations we have considered -- Rolling the pastry thinner so that we can fit in a bit more sauce. Adding a bit of garlic to the filling (although the occasional garlicky bit in the olives was good). Adding dried herbs to the pastry crust. Using black olives instead of green, and more of them. Adding some more vegetables, like mushrooms. Intensifying the tomato flavours with a touch of sugar and a dribble of balsamic vinegar. Making a different filling altogether (cries of "treacle pudding" rend the air, but I'm thinking of trying Sussex Pond, which I've never had before). But these are just gilding the lily, because the dish was a big hit just as it was, and we liked it very much.

oooh ooh spookily enough I have been debating a frugalised sussex pond pudding as one of the standalone recipes for ages, since reading about it in William Black's book!

A volunteer family with hungry menfolk would be a real delight

weezl74

sistercas wrote: »

just thought i would de-lurk

i have been following the thread with great interest and thought i would let you know i have tried a couple of recipes.

I made the onion tart yesterday which went down an absolute storm I ended up making more pastry and onions as i dont have any scales at the moment and have to guess . it made 1 large tart (9inch dish) and a small one (5inch dish) the small one is in the freezer for another day the large onion tart was demolished as everyone had seconds ( i served it with mini jacket potatoes with a tiny scoop taken out with a knob of garlic butter sitting in - yummy) and peas

I also made the risi e bisi the other day too , again i made far to much so we ended up having it for lunch the following day too, it was lovely and very easy to make ( the only different ingredient i put in was a splash of wine as i had a little that needed using up )

thanks to all of the hard work you have all put in , its a fantastic resource :T:T

:Athank you for your lovely feedback I'm so glad the recipes worked well for you, the pastry is proving tricky for some of our testers so I'm glad it worked out well for you and yours. Please do keep coming back to tell us how you've found things :T:T:T:T

weezl74

MadDogWoman wrote: »

Nice to see you too - should have come earlier as I love to cook.

Chicken pie was a hit even my DH who doesn't like onions enjoyed it

Katie adores the apple curd, she licks it off then asks for more, I used bramleys and there are little bits that won't blitz down so I'll sieve it next time - I've got 2 jars in the freezer so it will last a while.

I even put it on her porridge or weetabix instead of sugar. It's nice in rice pudding too.

I'm also tempted by the scones as it's something I can involve Katie in, she beginning to like cooking as much as her mummy

ETA: I've also made the very yummy carrot cake, Katie liked it too, especially as she'd made it, DH will not eat anything that contains dried fruit so he missed out.

wow good results all round!

I look forward to hearing how the mum/daughter scone team get on

Feel free to say no, but I would very much like to use the part in bold as a tip on the website, how would you feel about that? I will of course put 'my daughter' rather than katie if you prefer

weezl74

I have made a few adjustments to the tomato olive pudding recipe in line with feedback, I hope they read well

System

weezl74 wrote: »

oooh ooh spookily enough I have been debating a frugalised sussex pond pudding as one of the standalone recipes for ages, since reading about it in William Black's book!

I haven't read William Black's book, but I have read a couple of recipes over the years in weekend newspapers and cookery books (did Nigel Slater do it in one of his?).

Inspired, I have put one on to cook for lunch, using your mock-suet-crust pastry.

SUSSEX POND PUDDING (experimental)

Ingredients
300 g self-raising flour (mine is brown)
a pinch of salt
90 ml rapeseed oil
100 ml cold water (more or less)
125 g light brown muscovado sugar
125 g butter, cut into cubes
1 unwaxed lemon, well scrubbed, with the woody end removed

Method
1. Make pastry with the flour, salt, oil and water.
2. Line a 2-pint pudding basin with 2/3 of the pastry.
3. Add half the sugar and half the butter.
4. Stab the lemon all over with a sharp knife so that the juices will run out in cooking.
5. Add the remaining sugar and butter.
6. Seal the pudding with the remaining pastry.
7. Put the lid on the pudding basin (or do the greaseproof paper and pleated foil equivalent).
8. Steam for 3 to 4 hours.

I'll let you know how it turns out. I'm guessing that it will serve 6 because it is jolly calorific (531 calories each, if shared between 6!). But it is quite affordable -- even using Ocado/Waitrose ingredients with rather expensive brown self-raising flour, my version still comes to only £1.31 in total, or (for six) 22p per head. I haven't got the Asda SmartPrice prices handy, but it will come in a bit cheaper, if only because of switching to ordinary self-raising flour (which I would have used myself if I had had any).

Fingers crossed! :-)

Dick_here

artybear wrote: »

However I do feel that going to the point of finding out the salt content of the brine of a small jar of olives is going past the point of nutritional research and into the realms of obsessive pedanticness:o.

Did you mean 'pedantry' ?

artybear

!!!!!!_here wrote: »

Did you mean 'pedantry' ?

I probably do but spelling isnt my strong point:p

weezl74

Avocet wrote: »

I haven't read William Black's book, but I have read a couple of recipes over the years in weekend newspapers and cookery books (did Nigel Slater do it in one of his?).

Inspired, I have put one on to cook for lunch, using your mock-suet-crust pastry.

SUSSEX POND PUDDING (experimental)

Ingredients
300 g self-raising flour (mine is brown)
a pinch of salt
90 ml rapeseed oil
100 ml cold water (more or less)
125 g light brown muscovado sugar
125 g butter, cut into cubes
1 unwaxed lemon, well scrubbed, with the woody end removed

Method
1. Make pastry with the flour, salt, oil and water.
2. Line a 2-pint pudding basin with 2/3 of the pastry.
3. Add half the sugar and half the butter.
4. Stab the lemon all over with a sharp knife so that the juices will run out in cooking.
5. Add the remaining sugar and butter.
6. Seal the pudding with the remaining pastry.
7. Put the lid on the pudding basin (or do the greaseproof paper and pleated foil equivalent).
8. Steam for 3 to 4 hours.

I'll let you know how it turns out. I'm guessing that it will serve 6 because it is jolly calorific (531 calories each, if shared between 6!). But it is quite affordable -- even using Ocado/Waitrose ingredients with rather expensive brown self-raising flour, my version still comes to only £1.31 in total, or (for six) 22p per head. I haven't got the Asda SmartPrice prices handy, but it will come in a bit cheaper, if only because of switching to ordinary self-raising flour (which I would have used myself if I had had any).

Fingers crossed! :-)

15p per portion using asda prices divided into 6 serves- I was hoping for 8, which would be 11.5p but I'll wait to see how full your family are! that price assumes white sugar though :)

Allegra

Pudding ready to be steamed:




Cooked pudding:




Ready to eat:




Swede cloddies:

Allegra

Verdict: me likey the tom pudding Me had seconds, and the other half is safely tucked away in the freezer for another half.

The mess of a side-dish in the photo, btw, is 200g of boiled potatoes and 80g of sliced boiled carrots, with a handful of chopped fresh parsley thrown in, all thrown together into a frying pan with some hot oil then swirled around until nice and hot.

Swede cloddies - nice enough, although !!!!!! thought them a bit "bland" (a catch-all for anything he does not really like) - as has been said before, though, a good way to disguise a disliked vegetable, nice and easy to prepare, and filling. Think I'd chuck some chilli in next time though.

As the weekend has been rather busy, I didn't have a chance to make either pea soup or pancakes, so will try to do them some time next week.