Category: cider

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chicken cider food mushroom mustard

chicken in cider casserole

ade edmondson's chicken in cider casserole

I seem to have a thing for baldy guys with glasses.

No, not that one this time. I’m talking about Adrian Edmondson.

I was a fan of the Young Ones growing up. Though I suspect I was too young I would sneak a look at my brother’s VHS tapes. Hole In My Shoe was the first song I bought. I kinda liked Filthy Rich and Catflap but I didn’t understand why Vyvyan and Rik were so different. Then Bottom arrived and I was smitten. Rude, comically violent and puerile slapstick was just what I wanted. GAS is one of my favourite 30 minutes of television ever, it’s just outrageously funny.

When someone says “do you want to have dinner with Ade Edmondson?” I barely stopped to breathe before replying yes.

Held at the wonderfully eclectic Food at 52, Ade was presenting a dish of his own devising: a cidery take on coq au vin. Fitting as the night was hosted by Merrydown cider. Not a cider I was familiar with but that was just another reason to say yes.

It was a very silly evening with bucketfuls of cider, Morris dancing and Ade plugging away at his casserole, enjoying himself and talking about his recent Celebrity Masterchef win (“I only had to beat 14 people!”). Reining in the urge to bark “squashed potatoes, your maaaa’am?” I took the opportunity for a quick chat. He seems to be over his comedy background and wants to move on to food and music; in fact a few days after the event he was off to Australia with his band. Ade also told Kavey and I he dreams of opening a pub with a menu that changes daily.

I promise you, the hat belonged to the Morris dancer

Aside from one toe-curlingly awkward moment where someone asked him if he’d ever tried stand-up (going to happen if you invite lots of young ‘uns I’m afraid) it was an evening of good food, good drink and lots of laughs.

I made the dish for friends only two days later, and it’s cracking. Dead easy too, just bung things in gradually and let it tick away. It’s the mustard seeds that make it. Don’t leave them out.

The recipe below for chicken in cider casserole (or “coq au cider” as he calls it) is Ade’s in all his own words. Many thanks to Merrydown for hosting an hilarious evening.

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chicken in cider casserole

Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 4 chicken legs complete with the thigh
  • 1 teaspoon mustard seeds
  • 120 g lardons
  • 1 tablespoon Olive oil
  • 100 g butter
  • 3 cloves garlic chopped
  • 2 medium sized onions chopped
  • 2 sticks celery sliced
  • 2 medium sized carrots sliced
  • 4 sprigs fresh thyme
  • 2 leaves bay
  • 1 tablespoon flour
  • 1 large bottle Merrydown medium cider
  • 200 g small chestnut mushrooms

Instructions

  • Pour a glug of oil into a heavy bottomed pan or casserole dish. Once it is hot add half the butter. Once that has melted add the lardons and fry until they are very nicely browned, then remove them from the pan with a slotted spoon.
  • Season the chicken with salt and pepper and brown them in the oil, butter and left over fat from the lardons, then remove them from the pan too.
  • This is the fun bit – add a heaped teaspoon of mustard seeds to the fat and put on the lid. A glass lid is the most fun, as after a couple of minutes you can watch the seeds burst and fly about all over the place. The make shift tin foil lid is fun too though, as the exploding seeds cause brilliant indentations on the underside.
  • Once the seeds have all popped (after a minute or so) add the onions, garlic and celery, and gently cook them off until the onions are translucent.
  • Add a tablespoon of flour to the pan and stir until it has been absorbed – a kind of makeshift roux.
  • Pour in a little of the cider and stir, and keep adding more, stirring each time, until the cider has absorbed the roux.
  • Now add the carrots, return the chicken and lardons to the pan and add the sprigs of thyme and the bay leaves. You need to make sure the chicken is completely covered by the cider. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and leave to simmer, and cover it almost entirely with the lid – almost, but not quite – you want it to reduce, but not very quickly.
  • Leave to gently simmer away for an hour, checking occasionally – if it looks like it’s drying out too much add more cider.
  • When the hour is nearly up slice the chestnut mushrooms and fry them off in the remains of the butter – you want to get them nicely browned – once they are done, add them to the pan and leave it for a further 10 minutes. Serve with boiled potatoes to soak up that delicious sauce.
Categories
apples cider food pork potatoes red onion

pork chops with bubble & squeak and creamy apple gravy

If there’s ever leftovers from a Sunday roast, just try and stop me making bubble and squeak. This is proper Autumn grub, with apples, cider, pork… just the kind of thing I could eat all season long. The pork here comes from Farmer’s Choice, a lovely butcher’s providing excellent meat delivered to your door.

Pork chops with bubble & squeak and creamy apple gravy (serves 2):

250g leftover mash

250g leftover cooked veg (maybe carrots, sprouts, spinach, parsnip – anything really)

1 red onion, sliced

2 pork chops

1 teaspoon dried marjoram

250ml cider

250ml creme fraiche

2 firm apples, peeled and sliced

  1. Get two frying pans on a medium heat. Season the pork chops and scatter over the marjoram.
  2. Mix the potato and veg together in a bowl and season well. Form into little patties and add a little oil to each pan.
  3. Put the pork chops in one pan and cook for 5 or so minutes until coloured on one side, then flip over. Add the onions and apples to the pan.
  4. Meanwhile fry the bubble ‘n’ squeak patties on both sides until golden brown. Drain on kitchen paper before serving.
  5. When the pork chops are done, transfer to a board to rest and cover with foil. Turn up the heat and deglaze the pan with cider.
  6. When the cider has bubbled away to almost nothing, add the creme fraiche and reduce the heat right down. Stir well to combine with everything in the pan, check for seasoning and serve over the chops with the bubble on the side.
Categories
cider leeks sage sausages

catherine wheel sausage with leek gravy

This is largely based on a recipe from Jamie’s 30-Minute Meals (yes, I still haven’t cooked them all) but without the crazy Ryvita-apple salad (?). I’ll be honest: the only reason I made it was to have a squirly-whirly sausage which somehow makes me grin more than regular daisy-chained sausages. But the leek gravy is the surprise star, all sweet and silky. I’ve added a dollop of creme fraiche to make it even more smooth and tasty. Great stuff as the nights draw in.

Catherine wheel sausage with leek gravy (serves 4):

12 linked chipolatas

1 large teaspoon dried sage

500g potatoes, peeled and diced

3 cloves garlic, peeled

2 leeks, quartered and sliced

1 chicken stock cube

1 tablespoon flour

200ml cider

50g butter

1 heaped teaspoon wholegrain mustard

1 tablespoon creme fraiche

  1. Get the grill on medium, and two lidded saucepans on a low heat. Fill one of the pans with boiling water, add the potatoes and garlic, a large pinch of salt and get them simmering away.
  2. Allow the sausages to unravel and squidge the meat together so you get one long sausage as opposed to lots of links. Push a couple of skewers through the sausage to hold it in place. Douse with olive oil and sprinkle with half the sage. Pop under the grill for 10 minutes.
  3. Chuck the leeks along with some olive oil and the remaining sage into the other pan and a splash of boiling water, then clamp the lid on. Let these whistle away for 5 minutes until tender, then sprinkle in the stock cube and flour. Stir well and when well combined add the cider. After a minute or two bubbling away top up with the same amount of hot water and simmer.
  4. Flip the sausage over for a further 5 minutes or so until browned. In the meantime check the potatoes are cooked through; when done drain well and add the butter and mustard. Allow to sit for a minute and then mash until it’s a smooth as you like. Check for seasoning.
  5. Take the leek gravy off the heat and whisk in the creme fraiche. Serve up the sausages with a pile of mash and drown with leeky gravy.
Categories
beef cider

24 hour roasted beef

(Let me get this out of the way: the title is a slight lie. But with good reason – read on).

The slow-roast of a chicken as nabbed from Heston Blumenthal is a winner. No question. So why has it taken me this long to transport this idea to beef?

I was finally spurred on to try it by two things. Some dear friends bought me Heston’s Family Food for a belated birthday present. It’s leagues away from his Total Perfection series, a more everyday approach to food. It’s quite touching how he talks about how you can explore food with your family, encouraging them to try different things.

The second thing was being sent a Heston Blumenthal meat thermometer. I was so overjoyed at getting hold of one of these I had to cook something that demanded a thermometer immediately. This seemed perfect.

Heston’s recipe for slow-cooked beef favours the wing rib; a little pricey for me. I settled on that old favourite, brisket. But would the same principles apply to a different cut? Broadly I was confident, but I had to be sure. Some searching later I found a series of blog posts from Cuisiniers Kitchen investigating slow cooking brisket.

(You can read all three parts of the ‘slow cooked brisket’ series here, here and here. It’s a lot of words but fascinating stuff.)

In summary, the preferred method was to brine, marinate then cook for less than 24 hours. Past a certain point the collagen ruptures and develops a tougher texture. So I went for a cidery brine for 12 hours, followed by a 12 hour roast at 70°C. Finally a quick frying in a hot pan to give lovely browned

I chucked it in at 7am and took it out at 7pm. A quick prod in a couple of places showed that it was 70°C throughout so perfectly cooked. The thermometer did the job, sturdy enough to stay upright and a very easy to read screen. The temperature also came quickly, something I have a gripe with my current thermometer. As I expected there was little colouring from this roasting and a little puddle of blacky-brown liquid in the pan, which of course I had to try. It was pure Marmite, heavenly umami. There were also an odd rubbery sheet of stuff from one side, which I suspect was congealing blood ‘n’ stuff (why do we only use pig’s blood for black pudding?).

After some reasting and frying, it was absolutely delicious. Crisp, wobbly fat and full-flavoured soft meat that tore apart into lovely flakes. The cider was a surprising touch: when I carved into the meat an appley perfume came off it; in the mouth a pleasing sweetness. If you’re wondering about the lack of seasoning, the brining takes care of that. But the beef flavour was the king. Completely brilliant.

(PS I’ll be exclusively giving away some Heston Blumenthal kitchen equipment to you lovely lot in the very near future, so keep reading!)

24 hour roast beef brisket:

700g brisket

500ml cider

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tablespoon black peppercorns

1 star anise

50g butter

  • Prepare a brine with 8% salt and add the sugar. Stir well to mix, add the cider, pepper and star anise and submerge the beef. Cover with cling film and brine for 12 hours in the fridge.
  • Preheat the oven to 70°C. Pop the beef in a baking tray and leave for 12 hours, or until the beef is 70°C throughout (this should be medium rare to medium). Leave to rest, covered in a clean teatowel for an hour.
  • Put a pan on the hob with a very high heat and add the butter. When it starts to foam, add the beef and sear on all sides until it develops a brown crust all over. Carve as thin as you can and serve.
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