The Pie

Continuing with our alternative lunch, here's The Pie – you don't have to use the same veggies, I chose what I liked – the world is your rutabaga! (the vegetarian equivalent to “the world is your oyster or lobster”).

Christmas Vegetarian Pie

3 medium carrots

3 medium parsnips

3 shallots

1 bulb Fennel

6 large Charlotte potatoes

2 x garlic cloves (leave as is – don't peel)

or 2 tsps of garlic paste

salt and black pepper

glug of Rapeseed oil

Quick Onion Sauce (with star anise powder)

250g vac-pack of chestnuts, chopped

150g dried cranberries

puff pastry sheet

1 egg, beaten

Top, tail and peel the vegetables and dice to a similar size

Pre-heat your oven 180fan/200c/Gas 6.

Tip the vegetables and garlic cloves into a roasting pan (or foil dish) season and drizzle with a glug of rapeseed oil. Bake and check after 20 minutes – you want your vegetables firm when you test with a knife.

Whilst your vegetables are roasting make a “Quick Onion Sauce” - I'm going to substitute the nutmeg with a tsp of star anise powder for a change – entirely optional.

When your vegetables have cooled, fish out the garlic cloves and “pop” the purée into the vegetables and mix.

Add the onion sauce, chestnuts and cranberries to the vegetables and taste to ensure the seasoning is good – add more salt and black pepper to your own taste - tip into your pie dish (or in my case a foil tray!!!). Add your pastry lid and brush with beaten egg – bake for 30 minutes, check after 20, until golden brown.

This pie will serve 4-6 as a main course – depending on appetites – if you want to use the pie as an accompaniment then it will serve 8.

Quick Onion Sauce

3 medium onions, peeled and roughly chopped

Good glug of rapeseed oil and generous knob of butter

30g plain flour

500ml milk

salt and white pepper

freshly grated nutmeg

Soften the onion in the oil and butter, sprinkle over the flour and mix.

Gradually add the milk, stirring continuously. Use and spatula to stir, you'll cover the base of the saucepan and stop the sauce from going lumpy.

Let the sauce boil when you've added all the milk, then remove from heat and season with the salt and pepper and nutmeg if you wish.

You can prep the vegetables and the onion sauce whenever you have time and freeze them – if you are cooking a roast on a Sunday you could prep extra veg and roast them at the same time – you know how I like to use all the oven and multi-task too.

You could prep the pie filling, pop into a dish and freeze it, adding your pastry lid when you want to serve.

If you are catering for gluten free guests, you could do worse than to use the shortcrust pastry recipe mentioned in “Next up … techniques for your Smoked Fish Pie”.

If you struggle with what to serve to any vegetarian and/or gluten free guests then this recipe is really easy, especially if vegetarian cookery isn't your bag. This is a pie that I've served and has been demolished by meat eaters – if you need any more convincing.

If you collect useless pieces of information you might like to know that a rutabaga is a North American swede – I just love the word – great quiz question! 

The alternative lunch

As with most of my posts, nothing is set in stone - if I trigger an idea of your own or inspire you to tweak, then my work here is done. The following menu could be taken as a vegetarian alternative or, give you choices that you may like to include as part of your own lunch.

Bread and Butter or

Cheese & Pecan Loaf with Butter

The Pie

Roasties

Maple glazed beetroot

Stir fried sprouts

Judy's Jars

I promised in the post The Method in my Madness – The Creaking Table that the Cheese & Pecan Loaf was on its way, here it is – have a glance at the photos – scrummy. Who doesn't like bread and butter – if you wanted to you could serve the bread and butter with the winter coleslaw – add cheesey, nutty and crunchy to the scrummy – you could even kid yourself it's healthy – NOT!

The Pie ticks the vegetarian box if you need to cater, alternatively you could serve it as part of your turkey roast – just add a sprout or six!

The roasties can be made ahead and frozen. I've always used Nigella's roast potato recipe and on the basis if it ain't broke I have no intention of fixing it.

Maple glazed beetroot – sweet and colourful.

Stir fried sprouts – sprouts are like Marmite you either love 'em or hate 'em. This suggestion would firmly squash the idea that contrary to popular belief they do not need to be cooking on the hob in October to serve on Christmas Day!

Judy's Jars is my bit of fun – created for my friend's birthday in December, it's a sharing pud – there's nothing quite like a fight to get to the last crumb!

Cheese & Pecan loaf

60g Parmesan cheese, grated

350g plain flour

1 tbsp baking powder

pinch cayenne pepper

125g mature cheddar cheese, cut

into small cubes

60g chopped pecan nuts (or walnuts

if preferred)

4 spring onions, trimmed and chopped

250ml full fat milk

1 large egg

170ml tub of sour cream

salt and black pepper

900g (2lb) loaf tin, well buttered and

lined

Pre-heat your oven 180c/160fan/Gas 4

Sprinkle half the grated Parmesan cheese into the loaf tin to coat the base and sides.

Mix the flour, baking powder, cayenne pepper, 1 tsp salt and lots of black pepper into a large bowl. Mix in the cheddar cubes, nuts and spring onions.

In a separate bowl whisk the milk, egg and cream together then fold into the dry ingredients.

Spoon in the loaf tin, smooth the top and sprinkle with the remaining grated Parmesan cheese.

Bake for 50/55 minutes until golden brown – skewer test i.e. insert skewer into loaf, on removal should be clean. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, turn out and transfer to a rack to cool.

Serve warm with lots of butter.

I shouldn't be blowing my own trumpet but having a savoury tooth rather than a sweet one, this is my kinda food.

You can freeze this – defrost thoroughly before you want to use it – slice thickly, wrap in foil and pop into a warm oven for ten minutes before serving.

It's easy but I would suggest that you do your mise en place – in other words, weigh out all the ingredients, ahead, it's just a bit time consuming so if all the boring stuff is done you don't even notice.

More to follow ….

Klutz – or how to create a table centre for the artistically challenged!

Take my word for it I am an absolute klutz when it comes to anything remotely artistic – sticky back plastic and all things Blue Peter ain't my thing at all so, if I can do it, anyone can.

Here are the results of my valiant efforts.

The vase came from a discount shop and measures 10x10 cms square x 12cms high. I bought circular oasis from Wilko's – it measures 8 cms approximately in diameter. A pack of 4 costs £1.50 – doesn't break the bank.

Glue the oasis to the base of the vase. Gently ease the candy canes into the oasis. Tie a ribbon around the vase – wire edged ribbon is the best, the bow stays where it's put. Finish off by filling any gaps with wrapped chocolates of your choice. Hey presto – one table centre.

I've attached a photo of the finished product, along with one of the vase and the oasis.

And :

Recipe

take one clear glass vase, height doesn't really matter, bear in mind that you'll be filling it with chocolate or sweets of your choice so I suppose it depends how extravagant you feel

arrange candy canes over the top of the vase then fill with chocolate or sweets

who would have thought it could be so easy although I don't think Kirstie Allsopp is in any danger - photo attached.

Meri Kirihimete!

Cast your mind back …

...to the coolers I mentioned in Sweet Surprises for summer – here's another, dressed differently and looking pretty for the festive season.

There are three photographs – the cooler, a small storage box and a hat box. This idea appeals to my sense of thrift and fun too. They are filled with chocolate for everyone but you could fill them with sweets, chocolate money or a mixture of all three and the boxes come in handy afterwards.

You could even use the cooler as a table centre.

The coolers went to the grown-ups, the box went to young grandchildren and the hat box to an older granddaughter so you could tailor the “box” to suit the age and the likes/dislikes of confectionery.

These might give you gift ideas too!

Crossword Clue: 1954 Film & Song – 5 and 9

My Sister-in-Law sent me this recipe and, as you now expect, I've tweaked it.

Before I go any further I should say that whenever I produce any new recipe it gets tasted by someone other than me. Yesterday I took a tub of the latest offering to my friend, who will always tell me the truth, whether its good or bad.

“It's better than Rocky Road!” - so, with feedback like that I felt it only right to share :

500g white chocolate

35g Rice Krispies

160g sultanas

140g pecans, roasted and

chopped coarsely

160g dried apricots

130g dried cranberries

105g pistachios, roasted and

chopped coarsely

1 tsp ground cinnamon

Melt the chocolate in a large bowl over simmering water ensuring the water does not touch the bowl. When the chocolate has melted add the remaining ingredients and tip into a tray bake – size 32 x 9 cms approx. “Fridge” it for 2 hours.

If you want to add an extra level of flavour, before you chop the pecans and pistachios, heat a small knob of butter in a frying pan and, when foaming add them with a large pinch of sea salt flakes. Stir over a medium heat for 3-4 minutes or until toasted – you'll smell them when they are ready. Tip onto a baking sheet to cool and then chop.

Cut into small squares and serve as a petit four or you could bag it for sweet treats as a place setting.

Here are two photos showing a bowl with the petit four version and bagged as a place setting idea.

Got another call today, my friend with more feedback – she'd passed the treat around the family – huge hit!

I'm sure that you've got the answer to my feeble attempt at a crossword clue – yep, not surprisingly it's White Christmas!

Canapés

As can be seen from extensive advertising the canapé has morphed into big business. I appreciate it's a fiddly, time consuming exercise, which is probably why the advertising is so successful and they make an absolute mint.

This is not a bah humbug moment - cast your mind back – of all the bits and pieces you've served over the past months what has been the most popular – you know what I mean, you've made a truck load and it has all disappeared?

So, why not stick to what you know, will vanish without trace and be a huge hit – the bonus is no waste and, if by chance there should be any left over, wrap and “fridge” and serve later as part of your supper/midnight snack.

Here's my contribution :

The smoked trout mousse mentioned in “Madness II – the Recipes” can be piped into Croustades and garnished with fresh chopped chives – photo of the Croustades attached to help. 

MiamMiam Cookery And The Last Croustade!

You could if you prefer use smoked mackerel paté – here's the recipe

Smoked Mackerel Paté

250g smoked mackerel

250g quark (it's a soft cheese made from skimmed milk – not nice on its own but great as a low fat product for healthy paté!)

Glug of lemon juice

Black pepper

Two tsps of creamed horseradish

Skin the mackerel, break up and put into food processor. Add the quark and blitz with the mackerel, then add the lemon juice, black pepper and horseradish, blitz again. You can gauge the consistency of the paté to your personal taste.

You can then add, for example, chopped onion, chopped capers.

Serve with anything you like, toasted bread, rice cakes or add to warmed pitta slit, with salad or, in this case, piped into Croustades.

If you can't get hold of quark you can use cottage cheese - low fat of course!

Remember the post on Crostini – check out “Lucky Dip” for the list - choose a couple of your favourites.

A friend uses the tuna and parsley rolls recipe all the time – it's on my list too - she never travels without it – by that I mean that she serves it when she's at her home in France. Check out “Summer Holidays” for the recipe.

The Croque Monsieur using festive cutters is bound to be a candidate I'd say.

Bake a batch of cheese scones and use a smaller cutter, serve warm.

What about the retro baked Camembert mentioned in “Bank Holiday Breeze”. Whilst it's potentially a smidge on the messy side – you could serve with cheese straws placed in a straight tumbler.

Finally, before I bore you beyond all reason, if you chose Option 2 of the suppers or you're not using the Festive Three Cheese Tart as part of Option 1, then I'd be making them individually, with or without the cranberries, as one of my canapés. Its a reliable, kind recipe and doesn't suffer at all from being made ahead and frozen.

Nadolig Llawen!

Breakfast

On a serious note – if you are the cook it's really easy to be so intent on making sure everyone else is fed and watered that you forget to eat yourself. Is this ringing any bells? A cranky cook is not a good look – if you like the “chef du petit déjeuner” idea, effectively what you're doing is spreading the load – who knows it could be the best thing you've ever done. It's also about timing – if you know that friends and family are dropping in late morning and so you won't be serving lunch until mid to late afternoon then by eating breakfast you're not going to wreck your appetite and spoil your lunch later. Alcohol on an empty stomach is not good either – not to be confused with the cook's privilege of a glass of whatever is your pleasure – there is no bah humbug here!

There are heaps of traditional breakfasts - from the bacon butty, probably everyone's absolute favourite - to smoked salmon and scrambled egg - full English if you must - to the more exotic – kedgeree, or my personal favourite - a really posh seafood omelette - smoked salmon and cream cheese on toasted bagels, yada yada yada.

Back to the “chef du petit déjeunner” and “keep it simple”. I don't think I know anyone who doesn't enjoy a toasted sandwich so, how about a festive Croque Monsieur for the inaugural breakfast? The beauty of this idea is that it can be assembled and wrapped beforehand – either way it's not challenging and in reality doesn't require any technical ability. For the vegetarians you can adapt the Croque Monsieur omitting the ham – bingo!

I know that the Croque recipe was first mentioned in GOM: Chapter 9 Class day – no pressure but for ease of reference, here it is again :

Festive Croque Monsieur

4 slices of medium sliced wholemeal bread

2 tsp Dijon mustard

75g (3oz) Gruyere cheese (grated)

2 slices of ham

30g (1½oz) unsalted butter

Festive cutters of your choice

Serves 2

Preheat oven to 150fan/170c/Gas 3.

Spread ½ tsp of mustard over each slice of bread.

Spread half the cheese on two slices of bread followed by the ham, remaining cheese on top and sandwich together with the other two slices of bread. Cut out the festive shapes of your choice.

Heat the butter in a frying pan until foaming – fry your festive croque monsieur for 1-2 minutes on each side and then transfer to a baking tray and keep warm in the oven until ready to serve.

Serve with festive pickle or chutney of your choice – caramelised red onion chutney is delish.

There are other breakfast/brunch recipes mentioned in Break out the brunch – Part I and Part 2 if you want more alternatives.