Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 12 minutes
Skill level: easy
Makes: about a dozen, plus lots of tasty trimmings

Ingredients

• butter – softened – 113g
• light brown sugar – 146g
• 1 egg – beaten
• plain flour – 128g
• baking powder – ½tsp
• vanilla extract – 1tsp
• chocolate chips (or chopped up chocolate) – 90g

Preheat your oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5.

Grease 2 baking sheets.

In a bowl beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Beat in the egg.

Mix the flour and baking powder together and then stir into the butter mixture.

Add the vanilla extract and stir.

Finally stir in the chocolate chips of your choice.

Spoon dollops of the mixture onto the baking sheets – leave plenty of room between them as they will spread considerably.

Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.

Leave to cool on a wire rack.

If you want a neater cookie, trim with a cookie cutter (and eat all the trimmings).

Verdict: Crunchy on the outside, chewy in the middle, chocolate throughout. Very good indeed.

Drink: Makes a good dunker.

Entertainment: Sitting on the sofa with a poorly Yumblog Junior watching ‘Timmy Time‘.

Preparation time: 5 – 10 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes
Skill level: easy
Makes: 6 – 8

Ingredients

• plain flour – 100g
• baking powder – 1tsp
• caster sugar – 1tsp
• 2 free-range eggs – beaten
• milk – 75ml
• sweetcorn kernels (frozen/tinned or ideally fresh) – 350g
• ½ medium red onion – finely chopped
• 1 chilli – finely chopped
• fresh parsley – finely chopped – 2tbsp
• s & p
• a little olive oil for cooking

In a bowl mix together the flour, baking powder and sugar along with some salt and freshly ground black pepper.

In a jug mix together the milk and eggs.

Gradually stir the milk/eggs into the flour mixture to form a batter.

In another bowl mix together the sweetcorn, onion, parsley and chilli and season well.

Add this to the batter and stir everything together.

Heat a little oil in a non-stick frying pan and drop in about 3/4 ladle of the mix. Flatten down a little with spatula and cook for a minute or two until nicely browned on the bottom.

Turn over and cook on the other side.

Flip out onto some kitchen paper and keep warm. Repeat until you have used up all the batter – we ended up with an uneven seven.

Serve with whatever takes your fancy.

Verdict: Sweet and succulent with a hint of chilli heat. Experiment with different flavourings and extras.

Drink: Peroni and some left over white.

Entertainment: We’re back on the streets with Homicide.

Snow comes to Yumblog Cottage

Our constructed Colcannon soup can be found here.

Preparation time: 5-10 minutes
Cooking time: about 30 minutes
Skill level: so easy you should NEVER buy commercially made soup*
Serves: 2

Ingredients

For the soup part

• potato – peeled and diced – 450g
• onion – finely chopped – 120g
• butter – 50g
• vegetable stock – 1 litre
• full fat milk – 100ml
• fresh parsley – finely chopped – 1-2tbsp
• s & p

For the cabbage part

• cabbage (white or savoy) – 450g
• butter – 40g
• s & p

To make the soup, melt the butter in a large heavy pan, then add the potato and onion. Stir to coat everything in butter and season with salt and pepper.

Cover and sweat over a low heat for 5 minutes.

Add the stock, turn up the heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes until the potato is soft.

Liquidise with a hand blender and return to the heat.

Add the parsley and milk and season to taste – be generous with the pepper.

Meanwhile shred the cabbage very thinly – removing outer leaves and stalk.

Pour 3 tbsp of water into a large saucepan and add half the butter (20g) and a pinch of salt.

Put on the heat and when the butter has melted add the cabbage and toss everything together.

Cover with a lid and cook for a few minutes until the cabbage has softened but still has a little bite.

Add the remaining butter and season with salt and pepper.

To serve, pile the cabbage in the centre of a soup bowl and pour the soup around.

Verdict: This deconstructed version ensures the cabbage still has a bit if bite. Warming, comforting and as Gregg Wallace might well say ‘Like a big buttery smack on the lips’.

Drink: A mug of no nonsense Yorkshire Gold. ‘Let’s have a proper brew’

Entertainment: The ever brilliant Radcliffe and Maconie.

*The exception being Heinz tomato soup when poorly or hungover.

Another exception to this rule are the cheeky Hairy Bikers as we like their cheeky northern cheekiness and honest, hearty grub …and grub doesn’t get more honest and hearty than this excellent supper dish.

Now put down that book and get out of our house or we’ll release the hounds!

An artist’s impression of what Dave Myers’ Mam
might most probably definitely looks like.

Preparation time: 25 minutes
Cooking time: roughly 30 minutes – more if you need to make the mash from scratch
Skill level: easy
Serves: 2

Ingredients

For the fishcakes:

• cod fillet – 250g
• milk – 125ml
• mashed potato – 250g
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 free range eggs
• parsley – finely chopped – 1tbsp
• plain flour – some
• packet bread crumbs – the bright orange ones
• black and white pepper
• sea salt
• olive oil

For the cheese sauce:

• reserved milk from poaching the fish
• full fat milk
• butter – 50g
• plain flour – 2½tbsp
• mature cheddar – grated – 175g
• salt & pepper

If you don’t have any left-over mashed potato, now’s the time to make some.

Season the cod with salt and black pepper and place in a deep frying pan along with the milk and bay leaf. Cover with a lid.

Bring the milk to the boil, turn down the heat and simmer for about 5 minutes (depending on the thickness of your fillet) until the fish is beginning to flake.

Set aside to cool.

Once cool, strain (and keep) the cooking liquid and flake the fish.

Drop the flaked fish into a large bowl along with the mashed potato, one beaten egg and the chopped parsley. Gently mix everything together and season with salt and white pepper (the white pepper is essential for that authentic Mam flavour).

Divide the mixture in two and form both of your behemoth fishcakes.

Grab three dinner plates and lay them out in a row.

Put flour on the first, beaten egg on the second and breadcrumbs on the third.

Carefully roll the fishcakes in the flour, then the egg, then the breadcrumbs.

Heat some olive oil in a frying pan and cook the fishcakes on both sides until a dark golden brown.

Place in a medium oven to keep warm.

Next for the cheese sauce.

Add some milk to the reserved fish stock until it makes up 500ml.

Add the butter to a saucepan and heat until melted. Add the flour to form a paste. Cook for 3 minutes, stirring all the time.

Gradually add the milk mixture and whisk over a gentle heat until thickened.

Add the cheese and stir until melted and the sauce is silky smooth.

Season to taste.

Pour over your fishcakes and serve, possibly with something green and spherical such as peas.

Enjoy.

Verdict: There can’t be a better Saturday-evening-in-front-of-the-TV dinner than this. The fishcake is smooth and fishy on the inside and crisp and crunchy on the outside. The cheese sauce is smooth, unctuous and cheesier than cheese itself. There is a reason the Hairy Bikers are carrying a few extra pounds.

Drink: A few Duffs and a bottle of half price red from Morrisons.

Entertainment: A ‘Shoestring’ on DVD.

A birthday present from Blogger-D to Blogger-R.

Supermarket snobbery aside, I’ve never used fresh yeast before so I did an AW-T, slipped a packet up my chef whites and made a run for it.

Preparation time: 15 minutes plus at least an hour rising time
Cooking time: 30-35 minutes
Skill level: easy
Makes: 2 loaves (if you’re going to the effort of making your own bread, there’s little point in making just one loaf. Freeze the bonus loaf if need be)

Ingredients

• seed & grain white flour (Allinson’s) – 1kg
• fresh yeast – 42g
• sugar – 2tsp
• salt – 3tsp
• vegetable oil – 30ml
• warm water (1 part boiling to 2 parts cold) – 600ml

Fresh yeast is not as potent and dried yeast, so you’ll need three times the amount. Therefore if a recipe requires 2tsp of dried yeast (1tsp = 5g), you’ll be needing 30g of fresh yeast.

In a large bowl mix together the flour, salt and sugar.

Crumble the fresh yeast into the warm water and stir to dissolve.

Pour onto the flour and mix together to form a rough dough.

Add the oil and knead into the dough.

Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 10 minutes until smooth and elastic.

Divide into two and shape into round loaves and place on oiled baking sheets.

Cover with oiled clingfilm, and set aside until it has doubled in size. (This should take about an hour, although if your house is as cold as Yumblog Cottage it could take considerably longer. We often leave ours overnight.)

Preheat your oven to 230°C/Gas Mark 8

Bake in the oven for 15 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 200°C/Gas Mark 6 and bake for a further 15-20 minutes until golden brown and hollow sounding when tapped on the bottom.

Leave to cool on a wire rack.

Verdict: A good all rounder which is great either each end of a sandwich or toasted and heavily buttered. The was no noticeable difference between this loaf and one made with dried yeast … it did seem to rise a little faster though.

Drink: T or K4e

Entertainment: Watching with equal parts alarm and ammusement as Yumblog Junior gets ever more independent and bossy.

Preparation time: 10 minutes plus 2 days to cure
Cooking time: none
Skill level: easy
Serves: 4

Ingredients

• 2 fresh salmon fillets (skin on) – 400g
• 2 medium sized raw beetroots – grated
• course sea salt – 40g
• caster sugar – 40g
• fresh dill finely chopped – small bunch
• horseradish sauce – 75g

Place the salmon skin side down on a piece of clingfilm.

Mix together all the other ingredients and rub this mixture onto the fish.

Sandwich with the other fillet, skin side up.

Tightly wrap in the 3-4 layers of clingfilm.

Lay in a shallow dish (there will be some leakage), put a saucer/small tray/tin lid/etc. on top and weigh down with something heavyish (Bible/bowling ball/etc.)

Place in the fridge for 2-3 days, turning every 12 hours so the briny cure liquid thoroughly permeates the fish.

Unwrap, slice thinnish and enjoy with some horseradish sauce.

Gravalax will keep in the fridge for around 5 days.

Verdict: Although all three gravali were excellent, this beetroot option clearly stood out as the best. Sweet, beetrooty and bright pink.

Drink: Some sparkling, some red, some white and some dessert.

Entertainment: Listening to the ramblings of Mad Auntie T

This year Santa delivered Yumblog Junior a little extra Christmas treat – Chicken Pox.

Preparation time: 10 minutes plus 30 minutes for the batter to sit
Cooking time: 20-30 minutes
Skill level: medium
Makes: 10 – 12 crêpes

Ingredients

For the crêpes

• white flour – 190g
• pinch of salt
• 2 eggs
• full fat milk – 250ml
• butter – melted – 25g
• olive oil – for cooking

For the filling

• 2 shallots – finely chopped
• 1 clove of garlic – finely chopped
• butter – 15g
• soft goat’s cheese – 100g
• olive oil – 1tbsp
• chives – finely chopped – 1tbsp
• parsley – finely chopped – 1tbsp
• s & p

If your goat’s cheese is in the fridge, take it out so it softens to room temperature.

Start by making the batter.

Sift the flour into a bowl and then add the salt.

Make a well in the centre of the flour and break the eggs into it. Whisk the centre gradually bringing in more and more flour from the outside.

Next gradually whisk in the milk followed by the melted butter.

The batter should be runny enough to thinly coat the back of a spoon. Add a little more milk if too thick.

Cover and set aside in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

Now for the filling.

Sauté the shallots and garlic in the butter. You want them soft and translucent but not coloured.

In a bowl combine the shallots and garlic with the goat’s cheese.

Add the olive oil and mix until everything is combined and creamy.

Stir in the chives and parsley.

Season to taste.

Find a 8″ frying pan and make your crêpes in the usual way. If you don’t know how to do this there are plenty of videos on Youtube which will show you how … such as this crazy guy. Stack the crêpes as you make them … you should end up with 10-12.

Next construct your crêpes

Spread a spoonful of the cheese filling on a quarter of the crêpe. Fold in half and then in half again to form a triangle. Continue until you have run out of crêpes and filling.

Place in a moderate oven for a couple of minutes to warm through.

Serve with a crisp green salad.

Verdict: Tangy goatiness wrapped up in a soft blanket of pancake. Very good indeed. The quantity is right for two people although we could have eaten it all over again.

Drink: A few more Duff and a bottle of sub £5 red.

Entertainment: ‘A Question of Taste’. Kirsty Wark asks foody questions of (invariably) smug food bloggers and William Sitwell sits behind a Mac laptop with the Apple logo taped over and reads out interesting food facts from Wikipedia. As niche and awkward quizes go, I prefer ‘Antiques Master‘.

Incidentally welcome to 2012 – the year which in the future we will look back on as marking the beginning of the end. Quietus anyone?

Preparation time: 5 – 10 minutes
Cooking time: about an hour
Skill level: easy
Serves: 4 – 6

Ingredients

• waxy potatoes – thinly sliced – 1kg
• 1 large onion – thinly sliced
• 1 clove of garlic – crushed
• fresh thyme – 10g
• double cream – 250ml
• semi-skimmed milk – 320ml
• mature Brie – 250g
• olive oil
• s & p

*OK so this uses the wrong cheese and doesn’t contain any lardons so purists and pedants will probably insist this is not a true tartiflette.

Preheat your oven to 180c/gas mark 4.

Gently fry the onion in some olive until soft and beginning to colour. Set aside.

Strip the leaves from the thyme sprigs and finely chop.

Put the cream, milk, garlic and thyme in a large saucepan and bring to a simmer.

Add the sliced potato, cover with a lid and cook for 5 minutes.

Stir in the cooked onions and season with salt and black pepper.

Butter a suitably sized ovenproof dish.

Chop the Brie into slices.

Place half the potato mixture into the prepared dish and sprinkle over half the cheese.

Repeat, finishing with a layer of cheese.

(At this stage the dish can be set aside and cooked at a later time.)

Bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes until bubbling with a golden crusty top and tender when stabbed with a knife.

Serve as a side or main with a healthy salad.

Verdict: Potato and melted cheese works, this is a fact and this is another excellent example of the genre. Creamy smooth rich filling comfort food.

Drink: Red – we are still bravely drinking our way through our substantial Christmas stash of booze.

Entertainment: The third and final episode of ‘Black Mirror’ followed by Old Jews Telling Jokes.

Happy New Year – You decide when.

Preparation time: 10 minutes plus 2 days to cure
Cooking time: none
Skill level: ridiculously easy
Serves: 4

Ingredients

• 2 fresh salmon fillets (skin on) – 400g
• caster sugar – 40g
• coarse sea salt – 40g
• 1 star anise – seeds removed and crushed
• coriander seeds – crushed – 2tsp
• fresh coriander – a few stalks – roughly chopped
• fresh ginger – roughly chopped – 1cm piece
• mirin (or dry sherry) – 1tbsp

Place one piece of salmon skin side down on a piece of clingfilm.

Mix together all the other ingredients and rub this mixture onto the fish.

Place the other piece of fish on top, skin side up.

Tightly wrap in 3-4 layers of clingfilm.

Lay in a shallow dish (there will be some leakage), put a saucer/small tray/tin lid/etc. on top and weigh down with something heavyish.

Place in the fridge for 2-3 days, turning every 12 hours so the briny cure liquid permeates throughout the fish.

Unwrap, slice thinnish and enjoy with some thin strips of cucumber and a horseradish sauce.

Gravalax will keep in the fridge for around 5 days.

Verdict: Spicier (obviously) than gravalax #1. Tasty.

Drink: A shot or two of iced Vodka.

Entertainment: We had a guest, so technically we were the entertainment.

Box of shame

Every little helps