Goat Island Iced Tea

Jul25

As it is a blazing hot day, yet again, I thought a cooling drink might be in order … Be warned, it is boozy. Very boozy.

In 2008 Chap and I had a wonderful six-week holiday in New Zealand. We stayed with my family in Wellington, and then did a tour around North Island in a campervan (nicknamed The Nostromo by us).

We both adore swimming and snorkelling, so a visit to the marine reserve at Goat Island (properly titled the Cape Rodney-Okakari Point Marine Reserve) was a must.

The beach at Goat Island marine reserve, with Goat Island in the distance. Photo by Inglenookery.

There is a lovely camping spot nearby, and we spent a couple of days there. The weather was not too clement, and the sea was very choppy and visibility was not too good, and on top of that the fish stayed away. One evening during that stay we walked from the campsite to a great restaurant: Leigh Sawmill Cafe. Before the meal I had the most moreish aperitif, Goat Island Iced Tea, a cocktail made with five (!) white spirits: vermouth, gin, white rum, tequila and Cointreau, topped up with ginger ale. The food was delicious, and the wine list introduced us to Hyperion Syrah (we liked it so much we later visited the vineyard at Matakana and bought a couple of cases). Needless to say, we staggered back to the campsite—luckily most of it was downhill.

We loved Goat Island so much that we visited again during our trip, and stayed at the same campsite. The sun shone for us on our second visit, and the snorkelling was amazing. As there is no fishing allowed in the area—commercial or of any kind at all—the fish are incredibly numerous, both in species and numbers. They are also bold and unafraid. We swam with groupers and rays and blue mau mau (also called blue cod, Parapercis colias). We dined and drank again at the Sawmill. Again, I had the Goat Island Iced Tea. Again, we rolled home. Happy days.

Blue maumau at Goat Island marine reserve.

Blue mau mau (Parapercis colias) at Goat Island marine reserve. Photo by Inglenookery.

I tried to get the recipe from the barman but quite understandably he wasn’t about to give away his trade secrets. I knew the ingredients from the description in the wine list, so I decided to try to recreate it back in Blighty. This isn’t a bad approximation:

Goat Island Iced Tea

50 ml vermouth

50 ml gin

50 ml white rum (such as Bacardi)

50 ml tequila

50 ml Cointreau

50 ml fresh lime juice or a good glug of lime cordial (I like Rose’s)

500 ml dry ginger ale (not ginger beer—that makes the drink too sweet)

Mix in a jug. Serve in tall glasses with lots of ice. I bung in some lime wedges and/or mint leaves too. Enjoy!

A scrummy pheasant recipe

Jul8

We were given a large frozen pheasant the other day (already dressed, so that’s one less messy job for me), and I spent a while riffling through my files to find a good recipe for it. I plumped for Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Pot-roast pheasant with chorizo, butter beans and parsley. (For transatlantic readers, butter beans = lima beans). It’s a bit of an odd one to have for a mid-summer evening meal, especially as we have been having such hot weather lately, but it was delicious.

Yum.

Pot-roast pheasant with chorizo, butter beans and parsley by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

Serves 4. Prep time 20 mins, cooking time 2 hrs, plus another 15-20 mins to rest.

A knob of butter
3 tablespoons rapeseed or olive oil
2 onions, finely sliced
4 garlic cloves, finely sliced
A few sprigs of thyme
2 bay leaves
2 oven-ready pheasants (I used one large one)
300 g cooking chorizo, skin removed and cut into 2 cm chunks
400 ml white wine
500 ml vegetable, chicken or light pheasant stock
400 g tin of butter beans, drained and rinsed
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 handful flat-leafed parsley, chopped

Directions

Place a large flameproof casserole (one that will accommodate both birds) over a medium heat and heat the butter with 1 tablespoon of the oil until foaming. Add the onions, garlic, thyme and bay leaves and cook for 10 minutes, until the onions are soft and slightly golden.

Cooking the onions, garlic, thyme and bay leaves.

Heat the remaining oil in a large frying pan. Season the pheasants all over with salt and pepper, add to the pan and brown on all sides over a high heat for 3–4 minutes.

Browning the pheasant.

Transfer to the casserole. Add the chorizo to the frying pan and fry for 3–4 minutes, until browned, then add to the casserole too.

Deglaze the frying pan by pouring in a little of the wine and stirring to scrape up any bits from the base of the pan. Add to the pheasants with the rest of the wine, the stock and the butter beans. The liquid doesn’t need to cover the birds but it should come at least halfway up.

Ready to go in the oven.

Bring to a simmer, cover and place in an oven preheated to 140C/275F/Gas Mark 1.

Cook for 2 hours, until the birds are tender.

Remove the pheasants from the casserole and leave to rest in a warm place for 15–20 minutes. If the chorizo has released a lot of fat, skim some off. Add the parsley and season to taste. Cut the birds into halves or quarters and divide between 4 warm plates. Spoon over the chorizo, beans and sauce, and serve with mash or lots of bread.

One note: I was working from the paper recipe I’d cut out of the Guardian; I see in the online recipe’s comments someone mentions he’s missed out the parsley, so I’ve added it above. The paper recipe also used dried, soaked butter beans rather than tinned ones, and has an optional pig’s trotter.

Focaccia with rosemary and sea salt

Jul1

I’m on a bit of a bread making spree, mainly because Chap bought some live yeast for me the other day for the Sturminster Newton Mill flour and I need to use it all up as it has a limited fridge life.

I decided to make some focaccia, using a BBC recipe by Lesley Waters, the first one I came to on a google search. This recipe makes two large focaccias.

Ingredients
30 g/1 oz fresh yeast
½ tsp sugar
600 ml/1 pint 2 fl oz warm water
4 tbsp olive oil, plus extra for oiling
680 g/1½ lb strong white flour, plus extra for dusting
2 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
1½ tsp coarse salt
leaves from 3-4 rosemary sprigs

Preparation method
Mix the yeast with the sugar in a small bowl for about 30 seconds, until the yeast becomes liquid.

Live yeast and sugar when I’ve just started to mix them.

Thirty seconds of stirring and it magically becomes liquid!

Stir in two-thirds of the water and the olive oil.
In a large bowl stir together the flour and the salt. Pour the yeast mixture into the flour and salt along with some of the remaining water, if needed. Mix with a wooden spoon and bring together to form a soft dough.

Flour, salt, oil, yeast and water mix.

Ready to turn out and knead.

Add more water if the dough is a bit dry. (I found I didn’t need to add any extra – the original 400 ml is plenty).

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for ten minutes until smooth and elastic.

After kneading, ready for proving.

Place the dough into a large, lightly oiled bowl. Cover with cling film or a damp cloth and leave in a warm place to prove (rise) for about 1½ hours until doubled in size.

After 1 hours of proving over our storage heater.

After proving.

Preheat the oven to 220C/400F/Gas 7.
When the dough has risen, knead it again for about five minutes on a clean floured work surface to ‘knock it back’.
Shape the dough into two rough circles (I did rounded rectangular shapes because that’s what fitted my baking sheets). Place the circles (shaped dough) onto two baking sheets, cover with a clean, damp cloth and allow to prove (rise) until double their original size (about 10-15 minutes).

When the dough has risen, use your fingertips to form dimples in the dough. Brush with the olive oil and sprinkle with the salt and rosemary leaves. (I used dried ones I collected and chopped last year; fresh are even better!)

Transfer the baking sheets to the oven and bake for ten minutes.
Reduce the heat to 190C/375F/Gas 5 and bake for a further 15-20 minutes until the loaves are golden and cooked through. If you like, you can spray the bread with water (using a mister) once or twice during baking so that it ‘steams’ in the oven.
When baked, turn out onto a wire rack to cool slightly. The focaccia is best eaten on the day it is made.

Cooling and ready to eat, with dried rosemary sprigs and sea salt.

In the version above I have reduced the cooking time given in the original recipe as my focaccia were done after 30 mins total cooking, and I didn’t bother with the misting. They freeze really well.

Yum!

Wholemeal bread

Jun25

I wanted to use the lovely wholemeal flour we bought the other week from Sturminster Newton Mill, and found a recipe online for Dutch wholemeal bread which seemed straightforward and hopefully foolproof. I haven’t had much success with bread making (we’re talking bricks, not airy doughy delights) and so approached with trepidation. I have doubled the amounts to make two loaves.

Ingredients (makes 2 loaves):

1 kg wholemeal flour
20 g salt
600 ml cold water
40 g tbsp live yeast
additional 200 ml water
olive oil

Preparation:

Measure out the flour and salt and mix into a pile on a clean flat work surface. Using your hands, make a well in the middle, making sure that all sides of this ‘dike’ of flour and salt is of an even thickness, so that the dam won’t break when you add the water. The well should measure about 8 inches across (about 20 cm), which is roughly the length between the tip of your thumb and the tip of your pinky finger when your hands are stretched out and your fingers are spread as wide as they can go.

Dissolve the fresh yeast in the water, by rubbing the yeast between your thumb and your forefinger until it’s completely dissolved. Add the water to the well. Just add a bit at first to see if the dike holds, and if it does, add the rest. Using the tips of your fingers start amalgamating the inner edges of the flour with the water and upping your tempo keep mixing until it starts forming a thoroughly mixed dough.

The well in the flour with the yeast and water mix added. Mud pie time!

Now start kneading the dough, pushing it away from you with the ball of your hand and using your fingers to bring it back towards you. Try to keep a good tempo here and knead for 15 minutes (you can also use a mixer with a dough hook attachment). Add up to 200 ml of additional water, making sure the dough is wet but not sloppy. After 15 minutes of kneading, the dough should feel wet and supple (spongy), but not sticky. If you stretch the dough into a ball you shouldn’t be able to see cracks on the surface and you should be able to stretch it (this means that the gluten has been activated).

Form a ball with the dough and wrap it in a (clean) warm, damp tea towel. Allow to rise for 30—45 minutes at room temperature. The dough will increase by about ⅓ in volume. Remove the tea towel, pummel the dough with your fists and then form it back into a ball, wrap in the tea towel and again allow to rise for 30—45 minutes.

After the second proving. Looks like elephant skin!

Grease a bread tin with olive oil. Wet the work surface with some water. Remove the tea towel from the dough and press the dough flat onto the wet work surface. Form the dough into a sausage shape with your hands, so that it is roughly the same length as the bread tin and place into the bread tin. Cover the bread tin with the warm moist tea towel and allow the bread to rise for another 30 minutes until it has increased by ⅓ in volume.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 220º C. Reduce temperature to 200º C and place the bread in the oven. Bake for 35—40 minutes. Remove the bread from the tin. If you knock on the baked bread it should sound hollow. If it doesn’t, return to the oven and bake a little longer. Allow to cool on a wire cooling rack.

The finished bread. I had to cut the crust off the second loaf (slices shown) as the nonstick finish in the loaf tin had stuck to the crust. Grrr! (Bad tin is now in the recycling bin).

The finished bread. I had to cut the crust off the second loaf (slices shown) as the supposedly nonstick finish in the loaf tin had stuck to the crust. Grrr! (Bad tin is now in the recycling bin).

The bread is absolutely delicious, largely due to the wonderful flour used. The Sturminster Newton Mill flour has a deep, nutty flavour. The recipe needs nothing added—neither sugar nor other flavourings. It is just perfect as it is.

Recipe via Karin Engelbrecht by kind permission of Fred Tiggelman, the owner of Hartog’s bakery in Amsterdam.

Eggy brekky

Jun19

Our lovely friend Linda keeps chickens, and the other day she kindly gave us some eggs. They are so pretty! I don’t think the photos do them justice – the colours are much more lively than in the photos, and the differences between them greater. (I really do need to get a decent camera, I think).

Delicious fresh eggs from happy chickens.

I asked Linda about the breeds, and she tells me, left to right, they are from:

The blue ones = Cotswold Legbar (a breed from the Cotwolds in England)

The little cream ones = Australorp (a breed from Australia)

The big white pointy ones = Ancona (a breed from Italy).

She also has Fayoumi chucks as well, but no eggs from them on this occasion. Fayoumis are an Egyptian breed.

So pretty.

Linda’s League of Nations chickens have a great life: they spend a lot of time wandering round her garden (and destroying her plants), and the eggs they produce are absolutely delicious and the best we have ever eaten.

Breakfast (one of the Cotswold Legbar eggs, poached). Yum!

I used Marcus Wareing‘s foolproof method for poaching, as detailed here.

A mess of pottage

Jun9

For Sunday lunch yesterday we had a roast chicken (most unusual for us to have a Sunday roast—that happens about twice a year), and in the evening I stripped the carcass and made a stock with the bones and skin and the onion that I had stuffed into the bird’s cavity.

Not a chicken: a house at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum.

Today I was looking in the fridge, thinking about what kind of leftovers supper I could make, and suddenly I had a brainwave—pottage! A few years ago Chap and I visited the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum, and in the Tudor kitchen there we watched a lady cooking pottage on an open fire, using just leeks, carrots, pearl barley and stock. She gave us some to try, and it was scrummy—a pleasant surprise as it looked none too appetising. This morning I realised we had the makings of the pottage we had tried: some nice leeks and some rather sad-looking carrots in the vegetable drawer, a packet of pearl barley, the chicken stock and a small jugful of leftover gravy from yesterday’s chicken. Hurrah!

I had a quick google around for pointers, and came across this video recipe—filmed in the very same kitchen at the Museum.

The video recipe has onions, leeks, parsnips, spinach, oats and herbs, and no carrots or pearl barley, but I gather that a pottage was a thick vegetabley stew using up whatever grain or pulse was to hand and whatever fresh produce was in season: no refrigerators or imported fresh foodstuffs in those days. Anything goes seemed to be the rule of the day.

So I winged it. Here’s how I made it:

Slice two leeks and four carrots, and sweat in a dollop of butter in a big saucepan over a medium heat. Season with salt and freshly-ground black pepper to taste, then add 100g (3.5 oz) of pearl barley. Stir around, then add the stock (I had about a litre of stock, I think, and I also added about 0.25 litre of leftover gravy (made with the chicken juices from the roasting pan, a tiny bit of cornflour, and water).

Pottage ingredients (from top to bottom): fresh homemade chicken stock, leftover homemade gravy, carrots, leeks, pearl barley.

Sweating the leeks and carrots in butter, with salt and freshly-ground black pepper.

Bring to the boil, cover and simmer for about an hour to an hour and a quarter (75 minutes), until the pearl barley is soft and has absorbed a lot of the liquid. Serve with crusty bread.

Supper, medieval stylee.

This recipe could easily be made into a vegetarian one by substituting vegetable stock for the chicken stock (and missing out the chicken gravy). As all the ingredients are pretty bland, flavour-wise, it stands or falls according to the quality (tastiness) of your stock.

Weald and Downland Open Air Museum website link.

Inglenookery

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