Category: stock

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mustard onion rosemary stock worcestershire sauce

perfect onion gravy

perfect onion gravy

I was asked to devise the ‘perfect onion gravy recipe’ and that’s a challenge I don’t take lightly.

So what should it be? For me rich and nourishing, with sweet and complex flavours. The onions are obviously key, but the stock makes a massive impact. Above all the gravy should positively drip umami. Lots of full, rounded savouriness.

I used a couple of resources to nail the perfect solution. I had to look at how the star of the dish, the onion, was treated. First, which onions? You can get good gravy out of red onions but not for the longish cooking time that I was after. No, it has to be the medium British brown onion. Perfectly round with appealing ivory skin, with a balanced sweet/sharp flavour, it has to be British onions, supporting British farmers. As for the cooking, I stumbled over this fascinating article at Serious Eats which really picked apart caramelizing onions. I gave it a try and I definitely had to incorporate elements of it in the final dish. It allows for delicious, sweet onions with perfect colouring.

I looked to my old pal Heston Blumenthal and his chicken gravy technique, involving roasting off a chicken carcass, separately frying off mushrooms and onions and combining in a pressure cooker with white wine. Personally I wanted a beefier, herbier background so that gave me ideas to use beef bones in the stock. This provides the structure of the dish. Chat up your butcher for some beef bones – if you can’t I find may supermarkets with an instore butcher will sell them for a nominal fee, 20p or so. You don’t need to make the stock yourself necessarily (it’s a bit of a time-hog) but if you have the time it’s amazing.

There’s also an alcoholic backnote I wanted to include: red wine is fairly typical, as is a stout, or my old chum marsala. But I recalled a great onion soup recipe from Giorgio Locatelli where cider was included And it’s perfect because it’s tangy and boozy with fruity hints. It’s the final element that crowns the gravy.

It’s rich, it’s sweet, it’s irresistible. I served mine with a steak and it sure didn’t last long.

Perfect onion gravy (makes about 1 ½ pints):

For the stock:

4 or 5 beef bones

Tablespoon of tomato puree

4 or 5 chestnut mushrooms

1 stick of celery, chopped

1 carrot, chopped

3 onions, halved

Sprig each of thyme and rosemary

  1. Preheat the oven to 170°C. Put the veg in a heavy baking tray and lay the bones on top. Smear the bones all over with tomato puree, then tuck the herbs round and about. Roast the lot in the oven for 30 minutes to give a rich intensity to the stock.
  2. Transfer the lot to a deep pot and cover with water. Bring to the boil and simmer for 1 ½ to 2 hours with a loose fitting lid. Remove the lid and boil hard for half an hour to reduce it down. Transfer to a large bowl or jug and chill until needed.

For the gravy:

1 teaspoon sugar

3 British onions, halved and sliced into half-moons (I recommend using a food processor with medium slicing attachment for uniformity)

1 tablespoon butter

1 star anise

¼ teaspoon baking powder (rarely for me, I advise you to be careful with this measurement as if you overdo this it will be bitter and chemical-tasting)

1 sprig rosemary, finely chopped

300ml Aspall’s organic cider

1 teaspoon English mustard

1 tablespoon flour

Beef stock as above (or 1 ½ pints of your favourite organic beef stock)

  1. In a wide frying pan heat the sugar over a gentle heat until it turns to liquid, and quickly before it burns add the onions, baking powder and butter. Turn the heat up to medium and stir well to coat the onions in sugar and butter. After a minute add the star anise and rosemary. Cook for a further 8 minutes or so until the onions start to turn a lovely shade of brown. Keep stirring to ensure they don’t burn.
  2. Start to deglaze the sticky stuff from the pan with the cider a splash at a time. Don’t add too much as it will reduce the heat in the pan each time. Once the liquid goes add the next splash until it’s all gone. The onions will now be glazed with a gorgeous appley shine.
  3. Add the mustard and flour and stir well to incorporate for a minute. Once all the white bits of flour have gone add the stock and bring to a simmer. Cook for at least another 5 minutes and then reduce until it is the desired consistency, then check the seasoning. Salt and pepper here are crucial, and perhaps a splash of red wine vinegar to balance the tartness. Remove the star anise before serving.
Categories
cream cheese leeks potatoes soup stock

leek and potato soup

If you’ve got some cracking ham stock knocking about from a recent joint, why not make some amazing leek and potato soup? Especially if Philadelphia give you a hand on Twitter. Stirring cream cheese through it right at the end leaves you with a creamy, tangy finish… lovely.

Adapted from Kraft’s recipe.

Leek and potato soup:

3 leeks, diced

5 maris piper potatoes, peeled and diced

2 pints ham stock (or equivalent other stock)

100g cream cheese

For the croutons:

2 thick slices of bread, cut into chunky cubes

1 tablespoon sunflower oil

Sea salt

Pinch of paprika

  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
  2. Heat a little oil in a large casserole pot. Drop in the leeks and cook gently for a couple of minutes, until the leeks have softened. Stir in the potatoes then add the stock. Bring up to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.
  3. When the soup is about halfway, toss the bread in the oil, salt and paprika. Pop on a baking tray and roast for 10 minutes, or until the bread is crispy and golden.
  4. When the potatoes are tender, use a hand blender to pulse the soup a little. I like it roughed up a little so there’s plenty of texture remaining. Whisk in the cream cheese in chunks and check for seasoning. Serve with the croutons.
Categories
beans beef paprika stock

cholent

I seem to be rather drawn to Jewish dishes. I don’t know what it is about them but all the flavours I crave are right there and exactly what I’m after. This is one such dish, a hands off dish of beef and beans called cholent.

I found this casserole in the pages of Leon 2, and it was my wife who twigged it was authored by Giles Coren. I’ll admit I’m a fan, heck the whole Coren clan is dead gifted. Victoria’s an amazing and intelligent presenter, and Alan Coren reminded me of my dear old Granddad. The only thing that stumped me about the dish was how to pronounce it, so I sought advice and have it on good authority that it’s pronounced ‘chollunt’.

I did mine in a slow cooker, so it bubbled away unbothered and had a jolly old time to itself. It was utterly delicious, with beef shredding to pieces, and a lovely rich liquor to boot. Comforting stuff, and something I’ll be bringing out again over the colder months.

Cholent:

500g beef brisket

2 onions, sliced

6 cloves garlic, peeled

1 tablespoon smoked paprika

1 litre beef stock

150g pearl barley

2 tins haricot beans

  • Get the slow cooker warming while you prep everything else.
  • Brown the brisket in an oiled pan on all sides, then put to one side. In the same pan, get the onions and garlic softened slightly, before adding the paprika and stock. Once it’s at a bubble, pop everything including the beef in the slow cooker, and cook for at least 10 hours.
  • Stir in some greens for the last ten minutes of cooking. Shred the beef and serve with a generous helping of the bean stew.
Categories
carrots chicken courgettes food rice stock

thai rice soup with chicken

It was one of ‘those’ Mondays; very little in the cupboard and mouths to feed. What I did have however, was some Tilda Stir Fry Thai Green rice and one of Jo Pratt’s recipe cards from a recent cookalong. Using that as a starting point I knocked up a ten min din which was slurpy, filling and had that tickle of heat rolling through your mouth and leaving you with a warm feeling in your belly.

The Tilda rice helpfully skips all the pastes and mounds of herbs and spices, which gives it a real authentic taste. It may sound like a complete shill but I believe in the product – we’re all busy people and these kinds of ethical prepared foods give us handy shortcuts. Sometimes you have the time, and you can bash down a Thai paste and simmer the ingredients gently. Sometimes you don’t and that’s where these come in.

I decided to use a yaki soba style sauce to enrich the broth, and yanked courgettes and carrots from the garden for veg. However my coriander was looking decidedly ropey and attempting to go to seed, so rather than use the leaves I went for a coriander “bouquet garni”, tying some stalks together and leaving it in the soup to give out flavour as it cooks. I’d prefer to use the greenery but it’ll do in a pinch.

(PS. Note the oversize teacup serving dish. I really must get around to buying Chinese style soup bowls – I have the spoons but no bowls!)

Thai rice soup with chicken:

2 chicken breasts, diced

2 cloves garlic, finely sliced

1 litre chicken stock

1 tablespoon chilli dipping sauce

1 pack Tilda Thai Green Rice

1 medium carrot, cut into matchsticks

1 medium courgette, cut into matchsticks

Bunch of coriander stalks, tied into a bundle

1 small red onion, cut into rings

Sesame oil

For the yaki soba sauce:

100ml light soy sauce

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

  1. Get the yaki soba sauce on: put all the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Whack down to low and allow to reduce gently until syrupy. Put to one side.
  2. Heat a little oil in a wok until smoking and add the chicken. Stir fry quickly until the chicken is white all over, then add the garlic. Fry for another 30 seconds and add the stock and chilli sauce.
  3. After bringing the stock to the boil add the carrot and rice. Continue to cook for another minute and then add the courgette, ½ the yaki soba sauce, coriander bunch and rice. Bring back to the boil and simmer for another few minutes until the chicken is cooked through. Taste to see if it needs more yaki soba sauce (if not this can be kept refrigerated for another day).
  4. Remove the coriander and serve in bowls, garnished with onion and a few drops of sesame oil.
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