In and out of the kitchen

It has been a week of dipping in and out of the kitchen, with no time for leisurely cooking and experimentation.  To be honest, it's been one of those weeks when I seem to have been constantly busy, with no evidence of what I have achieved.  I have had innumerable forms to fill in for all sorts of bureaucratic reasons; quarter end figures to pull together for the tax man; the last of the washing and shopping for our two student offspring to take back to university at the end of their all too brief Easter holiday and a fair bit of pan assembly and packing as we have been short handed in the workshops.  We operate a policy of never asking someone to do a job we would not be prepared to do ourselves, so when necessary, I will roll up my sleeves, don my Netherton apron and start oiling pans, waxing handles, screwing on lid knobs and wrapping, boxing and labelling orders.

Whilst the order book is still never quite as full as we would like it to be, things are picking up, thanks, in part, to you lot, who help us spread the word.  And we have been talking to two exciting restaurants in London - more of which soon, I hope.
But I still need to be selling, selling, selling; finding potential new stockists and the time to talk to our existing stockists.  We know we need to grow to survive, but we do not want to turn into some sort of anonymous corporation, out of touch with those who make us what we are.

Last night, the cupboards cleared by the locust raid of the students, I was scratting about for something for dinner.
We started with leek and Halloumi fritters, with a dish of potatoes layered in a loaf tin with a mixture of yogurt, chopped wild garlic and melted butter and baked in the oven. And then I noticed we had some slightly wrinkly apples in the fruit bowl, bought in expectation and abandonned when their taste did not match their looks.

So with the brevity of Damien Trench in the Radio 4 classic, "In and Out of the Kitchen"; recipe:

Pour 250ml full fat milk into a saucepan and add 4 cloves.  Bring to the boil, turn off the heat and leave for an hour for the flavour of the cloves to infuse into the milk.

Take 4 apples, peel core and quarter.
Melt 50g butter in a 10" prospector pan over a low heat and then add 120g sugar.
Cook continuously until it turns golden brown.
Add the apple slices, cover and cook for 10 minutes until the apples have softened and taken on some of the caramel colour.
Remove the lid and increase the heat.  Cook until the caramel has turned a rich mahogany and most of the juice has evaporated.

Pre-heat the oven to 170ºC

Remove the cloves from the milk and return the pan to the hob.  Heat gently.
Beat in 50g buckwheat flour, a teaspoon of vanilla extract and 100g sugar.  Add 2 beaten eggs and mix vigorously.
Pour over the apples and pop it into the oven.  Cook for 20 - 25 minutes until the top is firm.

Remove from the oven and leave to stand for 10 minutes.
Invert on to a serving plate and serve with clotted cream.

NB because I have used buckwheat flour, this pudding is gluten free.

Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2018 ©

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

Apples

Having been held responsible for the downfall of womankind, when Eve tempted Adam; hailed as the first superfood, an apple a day keeps the doctor away;  the ultimate scholarly bribe, an apple for the teacher and despite not being a native to these shores, the apple has a long and cherished place in our culture and is an intriguing indicator of how our relationship with food evolves.

The National Fruit Collection at Brogdale in Kent has over 2000 cultivars of fruit trees, many of which the majority of us will never have heard of, seen, let alone tasted.
There are cookers, eating apples and cider apples, each with their own characteristics and uses.  We have 3 old apple trees in the garden and I think they are Howgate Wonders, but I can't honestly say I am 100% sure of that.

There was a time, not too long ago, when the choice of apple available to the consumer shrank and shrank and those of you of a certain age will remember when English varieties were completely overwhelmed by the demand for the insipid French Golden Delicious apples.  The supermarkets' desire for uniform, pristine fruits led to a triumph of appearance over taste and our senses became dulled as a consequence.
Fortunately we have seen a revival in interest in flavour over looks and a genuine desire to protect, preserve and promote old varieties.  
Our stockist in Dulwich, Franklins Farm Shop has the best selection of apple varieties I have ever seen on sale in one place.  Well worth a visit if you are in that part of London, a taste of the countryside in town.
If you want a fascinating read about how a new/old variety of apple was found in a hedgerow not far from us, please take a look at this lovely read from a fascinating man, Ivan Rendall, who sadly died last year.  The Wychenford Wonder lives on in the hedgerow.

So many apples, so many recipes. Just a quick reference to my recently inherited copy of Mrs Beeton came up with several pages of recipes, including 3 for apple water and there have been countless recipes written since.  What's more it is the perfect partner for blackberries, plums, oranges, dried fruit, almonds, pork, sausages, cheese .....................

I have concluded that it is impossible to come up with a completely new recipe using apples, for me at least.

And what I am going to share with you is not even a recipe, as I haven't weighed out the ingredients, so you, clever reader, will just have to take this as it is intended; an inspiration to make your apple pies a bit differently once in a while.

Cook 2 large cooking apples in just enough water to stop them burning and carefully dry off as much liquid as you can.  You want a smooth puree.
Make enough sweet pastry to line a 10" prospector pan or a pie dish;  I use 8 ounces of flour, 4 ounces of butter, 2 ounces of icing sugar, 1 egg yolk (you will be using the white for the filling) and enough cold water to bind it together.
Any leftovers can be rolled out and baked as biscuits, then iced when cold.

Grease the prospector pan and line it with around ⅔ of the pastry and set the rest aside.
Blind bake for about 10 minutes at 180ºC and then remove from the oven.  Allow to cool and then spread the base with a thin layer of raspberry or damson jam.
Sprinkle over a thick layer of ground almonds.
Whisk the egg white with 2 ounces of sugar until it forms soft peaks.  Carefully fold this into your apple puree and spread this over the almonds.
Roll out the remaining ⅓ of the pastry and carefully lay this over the apple meringue mix.  Seal the edges.
Bake at 180ºC for 20 minutes.
Serve at room temperature.

Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2017 ©

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

Toad in the Hole

Do you remember our trip to Finnebrogue and the rucksack full of sausages that we brought back with us?
Well this is what happened to another pack of them; a simple addition to an old favourite.

The key to a good Toad in the Hole is the temperature of the oven and of the oil when you add the batter.  Our Prospector pans are great for really hot cooking, but please remember that if you are using them on induction, you need to start them on a very low heat and increase the power gradually.
As they are made of 99% pure iron, you will struggle to find anything with better performance on induction stoves.

Good Little Company pork sausages, 2 per person

1 tart apple, I used a Granny Smith

150g plain flour

2 eggs

Milk, approx 200ml

Salt and pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 220ºC

Put the flour into a large mixing bowl, season with salt and pepper

Add the eggs and half the milk.  Whisk together.

Add more milk until you have a batter with the consistency of double cream.

Heat 1 dessertspoon of oil in a Prospector pan over a medium heat.

Place the sausages in the pan and brown on all sides.

Quarter the apple and remove the core, there is no need to peel it.

Add to the pan and continue cooking for another 2 minutes.

Turn up the heat and when the oil is smoking hot, pour the batter over the sausage and apples.

Place the pan immediately into the hot oven and cook for 20 minutes until well risen and golden.

Ours was accompanied with carrots, peas and cider gravy.

© Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2016

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

Apples - waste not

If you have been following our social media, you'll know that we have signed up to Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's War on Waste not campaign.  Please take the time to sign up if you agree with what he is trying to achieve

We have always been keen on the reuse/restore/recycle mantra and of course, our cookware is designed with long life and sustainability in mind.

The flax oil coating can be restored again and again, so there is no need to throw away your cookware. what's more we offer a full range of spares, so you can sort out any minor problems.

You may also have seen that we are lucky enough to have some heavy cropping apple trees in our garden and the route between home and workshops is lined with wild fruit trees.

Kate has expressed more succinctly and eloquently than I could hope to, the view that food education is a key factor in the throw away culture in which we live.

I agree wholeheartedly with what she says and regularly rant about this from the dizzying heights of my personal soap box.  I urge you to read and comment on her beautifully written and well set out blog post.

I am on a personal mission to educate our scout group about food in general, alongside teaching them to cook something more sustaining than cup cakes.So many of them are reluctant to touch raw meat and have no idea how to prepare veg.

Enough of the moralising..... what did I do with all the apples from our trees this year?

Chutneys - beetroot and apple, using up some slightly wrinkled beets, and a spicy apple chutney based on a recipe in my battered copy of Jams, pickles and chutneys, which I've mentioned before and which is sadly out of print.

Crumbles, pies and cakes..... More on pies in a new blog coming soon.

Bags full of chopped apples stored in the freezer

Apple sauce to go with the pulled pork posted last week....

Added to red cabbage with juniper, cider and brown sugar and simmer for ages
......and juice.

and this is how I made my own, delicious Howgate Wonder apple juice

Quarter the apples, no need to peel or core

Put in a pan - just choose the right size for the number of apples you've got.

On this occasion I had so many that I used my trusty old pressure cooker, the biggest pan in my kitchen

Add water to the level of the apples and simmer until the apples fall apart.

Press through a sieve, until all you have left are skin and pips.

Then strain the pulp through a muslin.

                            

You will now have a bowl full of juice and cloth full of purée.

Return the juice to a pan and add sugar to taste, our apples, Howgate Wonders are quite sweet already so I only added 2 Tblsp sugar to 3 litres of juice.

Bring to the boil, making sure the sugar is dissolved.

Allow to cool and either bottle or pour into jugs and store in the fridge.

Won't keep for long, so enjoy it while it lasts

And as for the purée, what about a special apple pie...........recipe coming soon.

© Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2015

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

Slow cooked pork

It would seem that everyone has a recipe for pulled pork these days, I'm not even sure when the phrase became so ubiquitous and I make no claims for originality or authenticity for the version I'm about to share with you.  An amusing tweet I saw claimed that someone's "pushed pork" simply hadn't taken off, but who knows, it could just as easily have been the latest craze.

This one was dreamt up when I was catering for the Scouts' Bonfire Party and wanted something that we hadn't offered before, alongside the traditional hot dogs and home made baked beans.
The speed with which it disappeared gave me the verdict I needed to turn this into a formal "recipe" and share it with you guys..... no kneckers or woggles required.

1 large shoulder of pork joint - the size is entirely up to you.
Remember, you can always freeze the leftovers for another occasion.
¼ head of white cabbage
1 large cooking apple
1 dessertspoon black treacle
1 dessertspoon white wine vinegar
200ml water
Salt and pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 150ºC or use the slow cooker.
Coarsely chop the cabbage and put in the bottom of a casserole dish
Cut the apple in quarters - no need to peel it - and take out the core.
Cut each quarter in half and add these to the cabbage.
Lay the pork on top of the cabbage and apples and season with salt and pepper.
Mix the treacle, water and vinegar and pour into the casserole.
Cover with the lid and place in the oven or on the electric base of the slow cooker
Cook in the oven or on the LOW setting of the slow cooker for around 5 hours

Remove the casserole from the oven and turn up the heat to 200ºC

Cut the skin off the pork and place in a prospector pan. Season liberally with salt and return to the oven for about 15 - 20 minutes to become crisp.  Cut into shards

Meanwhile, shred the pork using 2 forks and keep warm over a low heat.

Serve in bread rolls with apple sauce and shards of crackling, all washed down with a good cider.
Alternatively, served with baked or roast potatoes and buttered carrots, but always with apple sauce.

© Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2015

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk