jackie kashian’s cheese penne bake

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jackie kashian macaroni cheese penne bake

I devour podcasts by the audio gallon. Since 2007 (late to the podcast party, I know) I’ve had a regular diet of banter, thought, review and revue. Many have come and gone from my queue, and I’m always happy to try new ones.

A few weeks ago I discovered The Dork Forest. Hosted by comedian Jackie Kashian she indulges her weekly guest in one of their obsessions, or ‘dorkdoms’. It’s a lot of fun, and if you like your podcasts rambly and occasionally educational, this is one for the playlist. On a recent episode her guest Tracey Ashley couldn’t praise her macaroni cheese enough. I don’t need asking twice; I raced off to try it.

Jackie’s original recipe is here, but be warned it’s written in American (Sticks of butter! Sharp cheese!). My rough Anglican version is below. I’ve not used Gruyere as it wouldn’t survive against the strong cheddar I used, an Asda mature cheddar with wholegrain mustard, part of their Asda Summer range. Any cheddar will do but the mustard flavour through it is really good. I’ve also subbed penne over macaroni. But it’s a great pasta bake, with a silky sauce and big flavour. I think it’s the breadcrumbs that make it.

Thanks to Asda for sending me the cheese to try.

Jackie Kashian’s cheese pasta bake (serves 4):

1 garlic clove, halved

4 tablespoons butter, melted

3 slices bread

3 tablespoons flour

500ml whole milk

2 teaspoons salt

¼ nutmeg, grated

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

400g cheddar cheese, grated

400g penne or other pasta

  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Take your garlic clove and rub it around the inside of a baking dish. Whizz up your bread in a food processor, stir in 1 tablespoon of the butter and set aside.
  2. Get your pasta on to boil in plenty of salted water, and drain when done. Meanwhile make your sauce.
  3. Over a low heat stir together the remaining butter and flour until you have a roux and continue to cook for another minute until pale in colour. Add all of the milk and whisk constantly for about eight minutes until thick and smooth. Add the salt, nutmeg, cayenne and cheese. Take off the heat and stir through, then fold in the pasta.
  4. Pour into your baking dish, top with breadcrumbs and bake for 30 minutes until golden brown. Wait 2 minutes before serving to let the sauce settle, and serve with a green salad to try and offset some of the guilt.
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heston blumenthal’s perfect pizza

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heston blumenthal's perfect pizza

Let me be clear: this isn’t Heston’s recipe for perfect pizza. But it is my approximation of it.

Driven on by In Search of Heston’s go at the pizza, I felt it was about time I tried it. As they had gone boldly before I took their suggestions and incorporated into this pizza recipe. I was particularly drawn to recommendations to skip the pre-ferment stage (which involves making a proto pizza dough a day before) and avoiding his fiddly and salty tomato sauce.

In tribute to In Search of Heston’s write-up, this post will be written in their style, with photos aplenty and the obligatory ingredients hero shot. So without further ado…

heston-pizzas-ingredients

The ingredients shot. For the base, anyway. Heston’s recipe calls for malt extract. ISOH liked the malt extract but you need half a teaspoon (!) for this one recipe. And is really obscure. So a little research down the baking sites led me to believe that malt extract gives a malty / yeasty flavour, with a little sweetness thrown in. So why not Horlicks and black treacle?

And surprisingly Tesco’s bread flour has exactly the protein count Heston requests, 12%.

heston-dough-mixerInto the mixer on a low setting they go. Confusingly the recipe mixes everything with water, it’s left to prove, and then the yeast is incorporated. I have no idea why it’s done in this order. I wouldn’t bother next time and just bung it all in. I also used the Paul Hollywood idea of leaving the water cold to let it expand slowly and naturally to develop the flavour.
 heston-pizza-bases

After kneading, rising, proving and shaping I’d made 4 9 inch pizzas of varying roundness. I’ve done this a lot so I’ve got a bit of a knack for pinching and stretching until there’s a neat shape.

While they proved, I could get on with the tomato sauce. I have a version of Gennaro Contaldo’s I really like, but this time I had a secret weapon: San Marzano tomatoes. Heston has banged on about these a few times, but finally I’ve found that Tesco do them. For £1 a tin. Brilliant! A quick simmer gives them a volcanic red colour (ironic, as they are harvested from Vesuvian soil).

san-marzano-tomato-sauce

And here are the pizzas ready for the oven. I let people roll their own, I went fairly minimalist at the back there. Look at that goat’s cheese mountain on the left!

heston-pizzas-ready-to-bakeStill the issue of cooking them remains a problem. Heston suggests a pan on the hob, followed by a grilling, but electric grills run off a thermostat which will cut out every so often. So I just went for an roasting oven with a pizza stone and upturned cast iron pan in. I could also only fit two in at a time, so cooked them in shifts. My oven got to 255°C, but after taking two out and putting the next two in, it plummeted to 220°C. It told in cooking the next two, as cooking time went from about 4 mins to 6 mins.

So how was it? The base was certainly just right: chewy, bready and with a pleasing crisp. And the tomato paste was great – San Marzanos are worth the hype. But the oven temperature just can’t get that puffiness that great pizza demands. I’ve dreamed of building a pizza oven in the garden for a couple of years now but just kinda lacking the vision to go and do it. That would be the perfect way.

Until then, this recipe it pretty darned good.

Thanks to In Search of Heston for the inspiration.

Perfect pizza (serves 4):

For the dough:

500g bread flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 7g sachet yeast

1 teaspoon Horlicks

1 teaspoon black treacle

250ml water

For the tomato sauce:

2 tins San Marzano tomatoes

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

Balsamic vinegar

Toppings as required (I went for mozzarella, olive, anchovy and red onion but your call)

Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl, stir the treacle into the water then combine in a food mixer on it’s lowest speed until it comes together. On a work surface knead for 10 minutes until elastic and pliable. Leave in the bowl with a drizzle of olive oil and cover. Leave for 2 – 3 hours until at least doubled in size.

While the dough rises, make the tomato sauce. Get a frying pan very hot and add a splash of oil. Crush in the garlic and them immediately add the tomatoes (caution: there will be spitting and sputtering). Add a dash of balsamic, and a pinch each of salt, sugar and pepper. Reduce over a fast heat until you can leave a trail through the thick sauce. Check for seasoning, pass through a sieve and put aside until needed.

Put the oven on top whack, and put a pizza stone or cast iron pan in to warm up – you should allow at last 45 mins for this. Beat the dough back down, divide into 4 and stretch and press into rounds. Cover and leave for another 30 minutes. (I dusted my chopping board with polenta so it would slide off easily).

Smear tomato paste over the pizzas, then top as required. Place into the oven until puffed up and brown, about 4 mins. Eat immediately.

exploding chocolate cakes

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exploding chocolate cakes

There are few simpler pleasures in life than cooking with your children. Baking cakes with a toddler can be a source of tremendous fun. We knocked these absurd little fairy cakes out one rainy afternoon, and had to make more the next day as they went down so well.

The secret ingredient is Heston’s Chocolate Popping Candy – great fun!

Exploding chocolate cakes (makes 12):

225g butter

225g granulated sugar

4 eggs

225g plain flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

25g chocolate-covered popping candy

For the chocolate sauce:

50g cocoa

50g icing sugar

  1. Preheat the oven to 180C. Cream the butter and sugar together and beat in an egg one at a time. Fold in the flour, baking powder and popping candy. Divide into 12 paper cases and bake for 10 – 12 mins until golden, risen and cooked through.
  2. While the cakes cool, make the sauce. Combine the cocoa and sugar and gradually add water a splash at a time to get an oozy paste. Slice the top off a cake, fill with sauce, replace the lid and drizzle a little more over to serve.

spaghetti with truffles

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spaghetti with truffles

Some good friends gave me some Carluccio’s black truffles as a gift; the least I could do was serve it back to them. I thought this recipe would be one that Carluccio himself would be pleased with as it has minimal ingredients and ready in under 10 minutes. Mof-mof indeed.

Spaghetti with truffles (serves 4):

250g spaghetti (fancy bronze-die cut stuff if you can get it)

30g butter

30g parmesan, grated

1 black truffle

  1. Cook the spaghetti in plenty of salted boiling water until al dente. Like, proper toothy.
  2. As the spaghetti is nearly cooked, gently melt the butter. When the pasta is ready add it to the butter at the same time as the parmesan. Toss like crazy and add a real big punch of black pepper. Serve immediately, grating over black truffle to taste.

oven fried chicken

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oven fried chicken

I previously named Leon 2 as my book of the year, so to get Leon Family & Friends for my birthday this year was a real treat. The slightly madcap layout, the “everybody pitch in” attitude, the waves of nostalgia splashed with modern food trends is pure LEON. It’s difficult to read this book and not smile, and I’m certain it’ll get a place in this year’s best cookbooks of 2013 list.

This chicken recipe is absolute dynamite. All the fun of crunchy, sleazy chicken but baked rather than fried to assuage (some of) your healthy fears. Pretty simple too, you just need to put it in the fridge the night before then bake the next day.

Oven fried chicken (serves 6):

For the marinade:

280ml buttermilk

½ tablespoon English mustard

½ tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 clove of garlic, crushed

1 bay leaf

2 teaspoons salt

3 dashes of Tabasco

10 – 12 chicken portions

For the coating:

100g flour

100g polenta

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon salt

Pinch cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 teaspoon dried thyme

  1. Stir all the coating ingredients together and then drown the chicken pieces in this mixture. Cover and leave to marinate overnight.
  2. The next day, preheat the oven to 180°C. Combine all the coating ingredients. Shake off the excess marinade and then roll the chicken in the seasoning. Get a wide pan on a medium heat and cover the base of the pan with oil. Brown the chicken on all sides, and then roast in a baking tray over a wire rack for 40 minutes until cooked through. Serve with lemon wedges, mashed potato and greens.

yoghurt tea loaf

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loaf cake

I hate slugs. Not for slimy, yukky reasons, but because they wreak havoc on my nascent courgettes. I accepted all kinds of advice, one of which was scattering broken egg shells around the plants. So this cake was a good excuse to break some eggs.

This is from The Yeo Valley Great British Farmhouse Cookbook. It’s a new book from the yoghurty people. It’s full of recipes like slow-roasted pork and apples, smoky bacon meatballs, and chocolate chip cookies. All of them are well-explained homely fare.

And that it’s downside really. It’s all good honest food but all predictable stuff. Nothing here is going to change the way you cook, nor probably anything that will linger long in the memory. It’s a collection of safe, comfortable recipes that you probably already have a method for. Much more interesting is the collection of DIY dairy tips – how to make your own creme fraiche, that sort of thing. I would’ve preferred a book that leaned heavier on their dairy specialism to give it a unique character.

This cake was taken from theirs; substituting their raspberries for chocolate. The eggshells didn’t deter the slugs though. I had to repot them to high shelves.

Yoghurt tea loaf (makes a 1kg loaf):

250g plain flour

2 teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt

115g soft butter

225g caster sugar

2 large eggs

100g natural yoghurt

25g ground almonds

100g dark chocolate, chopped

100g granulated sugar

  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Sift together the flour, butter and salt. Cream the butter and sugar together until fluffy then beat in the eggs one at a time. Alternately fold in the flour and yoghurt, followed by the almonds, then stir through the chocolate.
  2. Spoon the batter into a greased or silicone loaf tin and bake for 45 minutes. Cover with foil and bake with another 25 minutes until a skewer comes out clean. When cooked scatter some sugar over the top. After 5 minutes resting remove from the tin to cool. Serve in thick slices.

devonshire splits

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devonshire splits with clotted cream and strawberry jamApparently these are traditional – can’t say I’d ever heard of them. I made them to take round a friend’s house for tea and they certainly didn’t last like. Like a scone, but more like bread.

Based on a Waitrose recipe.

Devonshire splits (makes 12):

500g rice flour

½ teaspoon salt

25g caster sugar

1 x 7g sachet yeast

25g unsalted butter, melted

300ml milk

Clotted cream, jam and icing sugar to serve

  1. Stir the dry ingredients together and add the milk and butter. Bring it together and then knead for about ten minutes into a smooth, elastic dough. Cover and leave for an hour or so until doubled in size.
  2. Punch the dough down and cut into 12 pieces. Roll into balls and place on a greased baking tray. Preheat the oven to 200°C and leave the balls to prove for 20 mins.
  3. Bake for 10 – 15 minutes until risen and golden. Allow to cool, dust with icing sugar, slice and stuff with jam and cream.