Blackurrants.

Apparently we have blackcurrant bushes in the garden.
I wasn't aware of this fact until my brother and sister proudly brandished a large bowl of the things in my face this morning.
Despite my obviously marvellous and astounding talent of being able to eat a lime like an orange, I find blackurrants too sour, so whatever we decided to make with the haul, it had to involve copious amounts of sugar. (And so it did! A whole kilogram, in fact.)

After one initial boiling with just a bit of water, we strained them to remove all the skins and tiny stalks and possibly insects. The thicker stuff that came out was mixed with sugar and combined with cream to make a delightful fool.



The rest was boiled again with sugar and a few pieces of ginger. Whilst skimming, I took the time to enjoy the pyschadelic swirls of colour in the pot.

Okay, so it doesn't look too impressive, but trust me, it was.
Kind of. I'm clearly very easily amused.
Anyway, after the syrup was boiled I squeezed in one lime to make a blackurrant, ginger and lime cordial. It's scarily addictive in its un-watered down form - tart and sweet, slightly hot and tantalising from the ginger, and fragrant with lime. I needed a bigger lime hit however, so I trickled some cordial into the squeezed out lime and sucked it all back out. I love lime, did you know that? My teeth were squeaky and my stomach hurt after repeating this process many times, but it was worth it.


I think I also might have invented my own cocktail. This cordial + gin + tonic water = a good drink? I know nothing about cocktails, but the family seemed appreciative. (The kiddies, of course, got an alcohol free version.) Can I ™ that? I'm going to ™ that.

That's the non-alcoholic version. It was pretty cool the way this foamed right over the top of the glass, and it does make a beautiful - and entirely natural - colour. The parents christened this a Bloody Sophie, which they found hilarious. I most certainly did not, and would love and suggestions for an alternate name before that one sticks..

The last blackurrant related item were some cupcakes with blackcurranty icing. My sister is having a sleepover as I type and apparently children these days require sugary treats at ridiculous hours of the night. We ran out of cupcake cases, so I hedged my bets with some petits fours cases - adorable, but labour intensive. What would have been 12 normal cakes turned into roughly 45 mini ones.

Icing them was not fun, let me tell you. Here is a 10-year-old brother's hand to illustrate the size:

Cute, but annoying.

Italian beef stew.

Well, I say Italian, but it's nothing authentic.
This is a great way to make the most of a so-called 'inferior' bit of meat - after a few hours of cooking it becomes incredibly flavourful and everything melds together wonderfully.
There's also the added bonus of it being incredibly easy to do. Even though it takes a good 3 or 4 hours to cook, you're don't have to be anywhere near the stove during that time. It'll just bubble away quietly while you do other things. All in all this requires just 20 minutes of hands-on time.

Ingredients:
1 kilo of braising steak, cut into chunks
3 medium red onions, finely chopped
4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
olive oil
salt + pepper
1/2 bottle of good red wine
1 tin of tomatoes
1 beef stock cube
3 bay leaves
4 large carrots
and an optional sprig of thyme, rosemary, oregano, whatever you have to hand

Serves 8


How to do it:
1. Chuck the onion and garlic into a big pot with the olive oil. Add a pinch of salt and cook over a low heat until softened.
2. Turn up the heat to medium and add the meat to the pot.
3. Add the wine, tinned tomatoes, stock cube and herbs. Grind in a fair amount of black pepper.
4. Top up with water and leave to simmer away for as many hours as you can, but a minimum of three. This makes the meat incredibly tender.
5. An hour before you plan to serve, add the carrots into the stew. You could also add mushrooms.



Today we had the stew with crushed potatoes and buttery pan-fried leeks.
It's also great with pasta, or even just some crusty bread to mop up the meaty juices.

P.S. I hate how stew always looks like dog food in photos. Delightfully delicious dog food, but dog food nonetheless.

Lamb.

I stuck a lidded pot full of lamb (on the bone of course), whole garlic cloves and whole shallots, in the oven three hours ago. And my, my, my, it is smelling gooood.
After rifling in the fridge for a bit I settled for carrots, new potatoes and beetroot to be roasted alongside the lamb. There was also a monster celeriac lingering in the fridge drawer that really had to be used soon, so it was promptly sliced very thinly, and layered in a buttered baking dish. Some cream was chucked over, a few lumps of butter dotted were over the surface, and into the oven that went. Sort of like a celeriac dauphinoise I suppose, as there was no cheese involved.
Celeriac & I have a fraught relationship, as it's smell when raw is reminiscent of some vile medicine I had to force down as a child. How unfortunate then that I still have celeriac-odour lingering in my hands, despite having washed them three times. It's also the bane of everyone's veg box, sitting there all lumpily like the prize no-one wanted at a fair. Poor, poor celeriac. It's not really it's fault that it happens to be a hideous root, desperate to be loved as much as the humble potato.

The photo really isn't up to much, so I'll describe it instead: the beetroot stained the carrots an amazing vivid purple, the celeriac was delicious and creamy (I'll have to take sister no.2's word for it since I didn't eat any), the beetroot was outstanding and went surprisingly well with the lamb, but the best part was the roasted garlic and shallots which we squidged out of their skins. They were mellow and soft and utterly beautiful.



10.00pm: Mother just made a chocolate and beetroot cake to take into work tomorrow. Why must I be tempted with cakey wafts of goodness coming from the kitchen? Ugh.

Cupcakes.

There seems to be a huge following for cupcakes nowadays, which is attracting more and more people every day. It is understandable - they're sweet and cakey enough to feel like a treat but, crucially, small enough to not feel like you're pigging out. They also now come with a plethora of pretty designs which helps matters somewhat.
I've always liked cupcakes, so the other day I made a tray for my younger sister's tennis match. I reckoned it's what a bunch of preteen girls would like. Safe bet indeed - they were a hit, and had the mothers angling for one, too. I used the usual equal butter-flour-sugar & two egg mixture, and topped with a generous amount of vanilla buttercream.
Unfortuently, I was using my mother's oven and the cupcakes got a little more brown, and rose a little more unevenly, than I would have liked (said oven has a door that leaves a 2-inch gap, and only two temperatures: warm gently & blitz).
However, the most best part was when one girl ate the blossom flower, thinking it was intended to be consumed, and proclaimed it to taste 'a bit funny'. In hindsight, it would probably have been a good idea to point out that the decoration was not edible.
Ah, fun times!