I have never felt less like cooking than right now

379. Loin of pork with bay leaves
380. Rhubarb custard

These two recipes are from the first menu in the Dinner chapter. There is supposed to be a Casesar salad as a starter, but I was tired and it was cold, and I couldn't be bothered going out to buy fresh free-range eggs for the dressing (they're supposed to be eaten almost raw, so really fresh eggs are necessary).

I cooked this all after I returned home from work.

The pork loin is rubbed with a mixture of olive oil, bay leaves, peppercorns and garlic. (Mum, thankfully, went out to buy the pork for me during the day - I am so grateful.)


marinated pork

Then you place thinly sliced onions around the pork, and bake it at 200C until done.

While it was baking, I made the rhubarb custard - the final of How to Eat's many rhubarb recipes. The recipe says to stew some fresh rhubarb, but I had a bag of frozen pulp in the freezer, which I defrosted for the recipe. To make it, you whisk up eggs, egg yolks and sugar, then add pour over warmed milk and the rhubarb pulp. Pour it into a dish, and it needs to be baked in a waterbath at 160C for 1 hour (or until set). I did this in our rickety old microwave convection oven (which lives in the pantry and is hardly ever used for the oven purpose).


raw custard

So this is the cooked pork... mmm... golden and crunchy.


cooked pork

As it was resting, I made the side dish - tinned butter beans (Nigella says to soak and cook pulses from dried, but I was seriously not in the mood), warmed through with oil and garlic. Then I made the sauce by deglazing the pan with white wine and water.

You serve the pork slices with sauce drizzled over and surrounded by bay leaves.


pork slices


butter beans

Dessert time. This is what the rhubarb custard looks like when cooked.


cooked custard

Now, although it seemed quite set and not-liquid when I shook the dish, when we cut into it, most of the inside was still liquid.


mmm soupy

The edges, however, were set, and the liquid centre was warm and tasted like ordinary pouring custard (i.e. DELICIOUS), with the soft fragrance of rhubarb permeating through. It was quite lovely indeed.

Hot Jewish Potato Pancakes

Here is what Mum and I had for lunch today.

374. Char Siu 1
375. Char Siu 2
376. Latkes (Basics etc.)

Nigella has 2 recipes for char siu (AKA glazed roast pork loin, Chinese style) in the Low Fat chapter. She suggests making up char siu in advance, slicing it, and stashing it in the freezer to use when you want to add some meat to your low-fat supper. (e.g. soup noodles etc). I made both char siu marinades last night, and let the pork loins marinate overnight.

The first marinade contains:
- soy sauce
- tomato ketchup
- hoisin sauce
- sweet sherry
- honey
- dark muscovado sugar

I had all these ingredients in my pantry.


Marinade ingredients (1)

The 2nd marinade seems to just be made up of random shit that Nigella had lying around her fridge. It contains:
- soy sauce
- prune juice
- mushroom ketchup (huh??)
- miso
- mirin
- sesame oil
- garlic
- light muscovado sugar

I used regular ketchup instead of mushroom ketchup, and coca cola for prune juice (it was a long shot, but I just wanted something sweet. And hey, it worked for the ham).


char siu marinade (1 on the left, 2 on the right)

Today, I put the loins in the oven (200C for 15 minutes, then 160C for 30 minutes), and got on with the latkes. I do realize the total inappropriateness of having latkes (i.e. a hot Jewish potato pancake) with roast pork… but I just really, really need to get through these recipes right now. Besides, a latke is a “hot Jewish potato pancake” – there is nothing I don’t like about that description. How could I resist?

So to make latkes, you need to grate up a few potatoes (using a processor, natch)…


grated potato

...then drain the potato pieces, and mix them with some chopped onion, flour (or matzah meal), egg and salt.



Then you just gotta fry the pancakes in hot oil for about 5 minutes a side. I love frying food, it is just so much fun.


I believe I can fry


Latkes!!

Here’s the char siu. Both marinades were pretty decent, even the weird one with the coke in it. I wouldn’t ever use them as a substitute for the real, red-glazed, deliciously greasy char siu that you find in Hong Kong BBQ shops, but for the purpose they were intended (addition of protein to low-fat meals), they are fine.


char siu

Ooh, but those latkes! They’re fantastic! So crispy and oily and totally compulsive.


Lunch

They’re good plain, but I also served the latkes with cream cheese and smoked salmon, which was brilliant. Cream cheese + fried potato and onion = the same flavour combo as in sour cream and onion flavoured chips. In other words, I was in flavour country. It’s a big country.


smoked salmon on latkes

Check it out, I folded the smoked salmon pieces just like I used to at my old job at the buffet restaurant. Man, I remember having to fold hundreds of pieces of salmon a night, and arranging them on huge expensive glass platters to feed the greedy greedy crowds. It was such a crap job.

But onto dessert - the lemon balm and Sauternes jelly which I made last night. After lunch, I unmoulded the jelly, and ate it with my mum. We drowned it in cream, and it was lovely. Very refreshing and light. However, it was unexpectedly alcoholic, which is why I think it didn’t set very hard. Maybe next time I’ll use more sugar syrup and less alcohol. Either way, it tasted good.


sauternes and lemon balm jelly

Calming Winter Lunch

I think everyone in my house was in need of a bit of calm today, so I pulled out Nigella's CALMING WINTER LUNCH.

352. Roast Loin of Pork
353. Roast Leeks
354. Clapshot with Burnt Onions
355. Custard Tart

Mum and Dad went out in the morning to buy all the ingredients, and I got to cooking when they came back. The first thing to make was the custard tart - it needs to sit, out of the oven, for a couple of hours to reach "tepid heaven".

So the pastry is Nigella's sweet pastry (see the Basics etc.) chapter, which is simple to make in a processor. It needs to be blind baked (using my fab ceramic pie weights!), then brushed with egg white, and baked for another 5 minutes to set the glaze.


cooked pastry

The "custard" part of the custard tart contains eggs, an egg yolk and vanilla sugar, into which you beat some warmed cream and milk. Then you pour this custard mixture into the baked pie case (being careful not to fill it too high, lest it spill), and bake it for 45 minutes.


pastry with custard

I had HEAPS of custard leftover, so I took Nigella's suggestion of making some mini baked custards, putting them in the oven on the shelf above the pie.


teacups with custard

While they were in the oven, I got on with the pork. Dad bought this lovely piece of meat at Rendinas this morning - they boned the loin, removed the rind, rolled it and tied it... "like an artist", said my dad.


Porrrrk

You can season the loin (Nigella gives 3 options), or leave it au naturel... I chose the ginger & garlic option, as I already had jars of minced garlic and ginger in the fridge, thus making it the easy option.


with ginger and garlic

If you choose the garlic and ginger option, Nigella says to sprinkle the rind with ground ginger before cooking it, for "hot crackling".


Crackling

I stashed the leeks in the oven as well. For Nigella's roast leeks, you slice some leeks into squat logs, cover with olive oil and sea salt, and cook for 30 minutes in the same oven as the pork.

While they were all slowly sizzling away in the oven, I made the clapshot. This is basically equal quantities of swede and potato, which you boil and then mash. To make the burnt onion topping, you slowly cook a thinly sliced onion until soft and brown and slightly crispy (about 20 minutes), before adding a teaspoon of sugar, turning up the heat and cooking for 3 minutes until very dark and crispy.


clapshot with burnt onions


roast leeks


roast pork

The pork was delicious! And it was perfect for a cold Saturday afternoon. This lunch is, indeed, very calming.

Here's the custard tart.


custard tart

And the baked custards...


baked custards


slice of pie

The pie was lovely - just slightly sweet, light and delicate. It wasn't too heavy following the pork, thank goodness. And the baked custards were good too, even though I definitely prefer the pie. Mmm... I hadn't had pie in ages! I didn't realise how much I missed it!

PORK

Warning: VERY LONG POST

If you don’t like long, detailed, food-related, stream-of-consciousness type posts (then may I ask, what on earth are you doing reading this blog?) then feel free to simply scroll down to the bottom and look at the photos of today’s most wonderful lunch.

Introduction:

As I’ve mentioned many times previously, for about 6 years I totally avoided eating pork, or any pork product, and was very strict about it. It was only this year in August (the 6th, to be exact), that I re-introduced pork into my diet, with the decidedly uninspiring braised pheasant with mushroom and bacon. Since then, I have, on various occasions, eaten prosciutto, bacon, ham, and small slices of suckling pig. But I still hadn’t worked my way up to cooking or eating a huge hunk o’ pig – like a roast pork, or one of Nigella’s many hams. Until today.


Planning the lunch:

My good friend Liam happened to pop over last week, and when he did, I pounced on the opportunity to schedule him in for a meal at my house. (As I keep mentioning, it’s bloody hard to organize a free evening or afternoon when each member of my family is free, let alone outsiders!) So Thursday was the day. And the thing about Liam is – he is the King of Pig. By which I mean he loves pork products in all their forms, and has a massive appetite. It was time for Sarah to cook a huge hunk of pig.

Two nights ago, my friend DG (in England) and I spent a late night chatting on MSN trying to plan this bloody menu. You see, Liam, bless his cotton socks, is one of the fussiest fuckers I know. Well, I don’t know if “fussy” is the right word – he just seems to have a limited range of foods that he really likes and that he eats often. For example, rice, spices, Asian food, vegetables and apple pie all definitely do not feature in the Liam diet. So I chose the plainest of plain roast porks (no spices, no herbs, just salt and a bit of mustard powder), crackling, with mashed potatoes (at Liam’s request), and cabbage (for the rest of us), with the microwaved chocolate pudding from the Fast Food chapter for an easy, crowd-pleasing dessert.


The day before:

I went down to Rendinas Butchery (I practically live there now) and got a massive pork leg. I asked for “a pork leg for a roast”, and the butcher came out with this huge fuck-off hunk of pork. I suddenly got scared.

Me: Er, how many’s that gonna feed?
Butcher: About 10 people, easily.
Me: Ok, I’ve only got 5 people so could I have half of that?
Butcher: Yeah, no problem!

Even when he halved it, it looked worryingly large. I just had to keep reminding myself, "Liam is a big eater, and it is the Nigella way to never knowingly undercater". I also got the butcher to score the rind, and cut it off and drape it over the pig. Now, I’m not usually super keen on the smell of pork, but I have to admit, this fresh, free-range, properly reared Otway Pork did smell pretty darn good.

Later that night it was time for another convo with DG on MSN.


Sarah says: Should I make a sauce or something?

DG says: Yeah, some people can’t eat meat without sauce.

Sarah says: Ok, apple sauce?

DG says: Wait, I think there’s a Swedish rhubarb sauce somewhere in HTE.

Sarah says: No there’s not.

DG says: yeah, there is, I’m sure of it.

Sarah says: Nah, there isn’t. Look, I’ve read HTE back to front, and I’m sure there’s no recipe for rhubarb sauce with pork.

DG says: Wait, I’m gonna look for it.

Sarah says: Ok, whatever. You’re crazy.

10 minutes later…

Sarah says: I told you it’s not in there.

DG says: yeah it is I’m still looking for it!

30 minutes later…

Sarah says: Just give up!

DG says: no no no, I’m not going crazy! I'm sure it's in here, where is this fucking thing?

20 minutes later…

DG says: OMG I FOUND IT I FOUND IT I FOUND IT! Page 314.

This Swedish sauce of rhubarb mixed with bottled horseradish sauce is mentioned in the last two sentences of the recipe for Apple Butterscotch Tart. How random.

After all that, I couldn’t exactly say no to making the rhubarb sauce now, could I?


On the day:

191. Roast Pork (Weekend Lunch)
192. Swedish Rhubarb and Horseradish Sauce (Weekend Lunch)
193. Seven-Minute Steamed Chocolate Pudding (Fast Food)

I got up at the crack of fucking dawn this morning to put the pork leg in the oven. Based on the guidelines of 55 minutes per kilo plus 25 minutes on top, I reckoned that my pork leg would need 4 hours in the oven. Four fucking hours! I got up at 8am, rubbed the rind with salt and mustard powder, shunted the pig in the oven, and went back to bed for an hour.

When I properly woke up at 9:30, I had breakfast, a shower and all that, and then went to my local grocers to get the rhubarb and horseradish cream for the sauce. It’s summer now, and we’re getting pretty evil-looking rhubarb, but it all worked out in the end, deliciously.

When I came home, it was about 11:00 o’clock. I boiled the potatoes, then made the rhubarb sauce. All you’ve got to do is cook the rhubarb in a bit of water until softened, then mash it up and stir the horseradish cream through it. It looked a bit like disgusting, and I was unsure of how it would taste.


khaki rhubarb

With the chocolate pudding, you just have to put all the ingredients in the processor, and then scrape the mixture into a buttered dish, and cover it with clingfilm. It can sit like this until you’re ready to cook. (It only takes about 5 minutes to cook).


choc mixture

Liam arrived at about 12:30, at which time I was mashing the potatoes. After that, I took the magnificent roast out of the oven to rest, and peeled off the crackling. I was about to, upon Nigella’s suggestion, put it back in the oven to crisp up, but was stopped by Liam.

Liam: Why? Why would you put that back in the oven?! It’s perfect! Look at the crispy outside and the chewy underside. Just leave it!

Liam is the roast pork master, so I trusted his decision.


crackling underside

Dad and Daniel happened to be out shopping at this time, which I’m sure was very frustrating for our hungry guest. I stirfried some cabbage in butter, oil and caraway seeds, and just as it was ready, Dad and Daniel came home, so it was time to carve!


Liam thumbs up


pork


pork on board - incidentally, this is the first time that Mum's let us use her wonderful Peer Sorensen chopping board for more than just displaying bread. Thank-you Mum!!


A picture of health

Now, I wasn't even going to make a gravy at all, as Nigella doesn't suggest making one... but when the pork came out of the oven, I noticed that there were a LOT of tasty-looking brown juices in the bottom of the pan, which would have gone to waste otherwise, so I boiled it up with a spoonful of flour to become a tasty tasty brown gravy.


Sarah, NOT kylie

I have to say, I am, in general, a pretty shite carver, but this pork was so tender and juicy, and my knife so sharp, that it was easy to carve the beast up into manageable slices.


LUNCH! Pork slices, stir-fried cabbage, rhubarb sauce, crackling, mashed potatoes


Pork slices


Meal

This was amazing!! The crackling was fab (even though I could only stomach a mouthful before I started worrying about my poor arteries), and Liam ate most of it. The pork was tender and juicy, and the mashed potatoes and cabbage were the perfect accompaniments. Bizzarely, my dad absolutely loved the rhubarb horseradish sauce, despite its feral pink colour!

Dad: This sauce is great with the pork! And the pork really good! I was afraid it was going to be really dry, but it's good!

When we got to the "langourous-picking-at-the-remains" stage, Daniel put on a DVD of The Office, which was brilliant. (Yes, we have a small TV and DVD player in the kitchen - I do spend most of my time in there, after all). This just totally added to the fun and relaxed atmosphere of the afternoon.

Now, about dessert.

Liam once said to me, “Sarah, we both love food. But you love quality, and I love quantity. Oh yeah, I love quantity”.

Of the seven-minute steamed chocolate pudding, Nigella writes, "This recipe comes from Barbara Kafka's Microwave Gourmet and I have kept to her quantities for 8 people because I am greedy. If you - unlike me - think 4 people won't eat enough for 8, then halve quantities". I knew that we would have no trouble eating this. Liam is the only human being I know who was able to eat 2 slices of Nigella's enormous Chocolate Fudge Cake (Nigella Bites) in the one go. In fact, I remember one time I made this cake, Liam was already onto his second slice while my friend Nathan and I (with more conventional appetites) were slowly working our way through our first piece.

Anyway, about the pudding. Once we'd finished lunch, I stuck the pudding in the microwave for 5 minutes, then pulled it out, stabbed the clingfilm with a knife and covered the dish with a plate (to keep it hot, apparently), and let it set for 10 minutes. In the meantime, we cleared the table and set it up for dessert.


pudding

This pudding totally rocks! I can't believe how easy it is! It's a thousand times easier than the chocolate surprise pudding (Weekend Lunch chapter) and even tastier, in my opinion (no crusty top though, which isn't a huge loss). It does look a bit unnatractive though, hence the dredging of icing sugar over the top. Nigella suggests crème fraiche as an accompaniment, which I duly followed. However, after the first mouthful, we all concurred that vanilla ice-cream would indeed be a superior choice.


pudding and icecream

After the dessert, Daniel, Liam and I staggered over to the loungeroom and lazily watched a few hilarious episodes of Futurama before I had to leave for work in the evening. What a perfect way to extend the afternoon!

By the way, there were lots of leftovers, so I packed Liam a doggy-bag for later.


Care pack - pork, mash, gravy

Later that evening, I went to work and proudly showed my co-workers the photos of my fab lunch. (I'd been crapping on about it to anyone who would listen the day before). I think they thought it was a bit odd that I take photos of food, but I'm beyond being embarassed about that sort of thing by now. And anyway, the general response was, "That's making me hungry. You made that today and THEN came to work? WOW!" And so on, and so on.