Normally the granola bar is seen as the boring cousin of the
flapjack. Dry and often tasteless, I’ll be the first to admit that I’d side
with the flapjack if it was pitted against the granola bar in a fight. This may
have something to do with a lust for golden syrup that’s rarely sated but the
fact that so many granola bars are dry and hard, rather than moist and soft is
always a turn off for me. Last week however, I made the mistake of buying an
unsatisfactory coconut and after having shoved a quarter of it in a spicy
chicken pulao rice dish, I still had three quarters of the soft-fleshy thing
left. Always one to rise to a challenge, I went in search of recipes that could
tempt me and lo, the granola bar won.
I’m sure it has become obvious that I don’t get invited to
many parties. But that’s because University finished and there isn’t anyone
around! That’s my excuse for an early night, anyway. Roger, on the other hand,
actually has friends that he sees and everything and in a moment of madness last
week we invited a few over for some drinks. Essay season has just passed, so it
felt appropriate to push the boat out and celebrate by making some fancy jelly
shots and cookies.
Gyoza dumplings are some of my favourite nibbly things out
there. They cost a bomb to eat in restaurants and let’s face it, the North is
hardly blessed with places to eat them, unless you fancy braving Yo!Sushi and
its rotating belt of dubiously warm plates. However, they cost next to nothing
to make at home; all you need is to source the wrappers from a Chinese
supermarket and you’re set. I made these for our traditional Christmas Eve
buffet, which is a little nibbly things dream, peppered with dozens of amuses
bouches that I spent all day happily preparing.
It’s finally here! A day well spent in the kitchen preparing my favourite meal of the year. Tonight’s selection includes homemade prawn gyoza, parma ham, goat’s cheese and fig bundles, ham cooked in coca-cola with a treacle and brown sugar glaze, balsamic vinaigrette salad, crudités, potato salad and many more! Happy Christmas!
One thing that I love about the patisserie course is learning
new skills. I thought I was pretty clued-up before but there are always things
to learn and a few weeks ago it was puff pastry. Practicing pastry so often
doesn’t come cheap though and using butter actually makes the product unstable,
as it has such a low melting point. Although we were all shocked on our first
day to see Fabrice advocate the use of pastry margarine in lieu of butter, when
it comes to rough puff, I’m now a convert.
Now, though there may be a photo of a beautiful plum tart
here, this article is really to showcase a trade secret I learnt on the first
day of my part-time Patisserie course in Leeds (more posts on that to follow!).
And that trade secret is a little thing called almond cream. In my previous
ignorance, I’ve called almond cream a frangipane but was pulled up pretty quick
on this by my tutor Fabrice, who sighed very loudly when I described the recipe
in front of us as such. Apparently, a frangipane has twenty per cent crème patissière stirred into it. This
means that every recipe I’ve made in the past that’s called its filling a frangipane
has been downright lying to me. The cheek! Once I’d overcome this revelation,
in class we set about making the stuff. And boy is it good. Soft, sweet, moist
and dense. What’s not to like?
In my eyes, there can be no better holiday destination than
the Scilly Isles. To celebrate finishing the MA and the hand-in of the
dissertation, Roger and I travelled by taxi, train, ferry and then by smaller
boat to spend a few weeks on our favourite islands off the coast of Cornwall. A
weird coincidence with Roger is that when we first started going out, he once wistfully
described a book he used to read as a child that had a tiny little picture of
Tresco Island in it, and told me that he’d dreamed his whole life about going there
one day. This heart-rending tale set me off on an epic account of family
holidays and idyllic childhood memories, which made him rather jealous (most
things do), but it also drove my mum to the internet, where she immediately
sourced a free space on Bryher campsite for two weeks for me and Roger to live
out his dream. And so a summer holiday tradition was born.
