Christmas Dinner Burritos

One thing my girlfriend and I have tried to do each year is make Christmas Dinner a little different. I've yet to complete a post about Christmas 2016's festive Salmon En Croute with Mixed Veg, which we prepared for my folks when we stayed with them for a couple of nights over the festive season, and last year's turkey burgers were a bit of a disaster because I'd foolishly assumed that a burger should be 100% meat, regardless of the type of meat.

This year, we didn't need much discussion to decide on our alternative Christmas meal style. I'd been considering burritos for some time before Courtney even brought up the subject of making Christmas dinner plans, so that was my first suggestion... and she agreed straight away. I then started researching options for Christmas-appropriate rice as part of the filling, while Courtney looked into seasonal 'slaw recipes. She opted to use What The Cluck? from The Vegetarian Butcher, while I picked up a couple of packs of Bernard Matthews turkey chunks. In place of a salsa, we both agreed that a dollop of cranberry sauce would be reasonably appropriate, and so the plans were in place.

For the rice, I came up with a shortlist of three existing recipes from around the internet:

• Puerto Rican Rice with Pigeon Peas, from Saveur.com
• Festive Rice, from Taste of Home.com
• Christmas Pilaff, from DeliciousMagazine.co.uk

After due consideration, the Festive Rice option was selected, but was prepared in a pan, on the hob, rather than by baking, the 1/4 cup of butter and the mint were both entirely omitted, while the Feta was added to the burrito rather than incorporated into the rice mix. Courtney's 'slaw was a mix of red cabbage and red onion (both sliced quite thinly) with pomegranate seeds, as well as lime and orange juice, seasoned with a little salt and pepper. She'd intended to also add some chopped Brussels sprouts - which she'd bought especially - but it slipped her mind at the time.

Now, since we all know that turkey tends to be a bit on the bland side, and mixing up some gravy for the purposes of a burrito seemed rather pointless and wasteful, I figured I'd heat it up in a pan after coating it with Peri-Peri Salt. This involved just dumping a bit of sunflower oil into a small frying pan and then chucking the coated turkey chunks in once it was heated up and stirring them about till they started to brown in places. I somewhat underestimated how much oil I'd need, which led to small pieces of turkey adhering to the pan, but it worked well enough aside from that.

Assembling the burrito was a simple case of serving out a portion of rice onto a tortilla (warmed for 10 seconds in the microwave to ensure they were flexible enough for filling and rolling), crumbling over some Feta, scooping over some cranberry sauce, then adding some of the slaw. Courtney further embellished her burrito with some jalapeños and coriander, but neither are particularly agreeable to me, so I just had to make do with the basic ingredients. As a finishing touch, the burritos were returned to the pan for a bit of browning, and to help seal the seam.

The end result turned out really well - we're both fans of burritos, but have previously tended to rely on supermarket-bought sets for making them, and we tend to omit staples like the rice, focusing instead on the seasoned meat (or meat substitute), packed-in salsa, some sour cream and, at most, a home-made guacamole. Having a somewhat seasonal rice recipe, further spiced up by the Peri-Peri Salt, then sweetened by the fresh pomegranate, it was a comparatively light and sweet burrito, but filling nevertheless. This was also probably the first time we - or I, at least - have tried to properly roll our burritos rather than turn them into makeshift tubular pockets. I had to look up a couple of YouTube videos for the technique, and still got a bit confused, to be honest.

All in all, this is one of the most successful 'alternative Christmas' ideas we've had so far, yet it's still ripe for exploration into alternatives. I'm particularly keen to try the Puerto Rican Rice option - I felt that was probably the best fit for a burrito, albeit at the risk of overpowering everything else, but that was a risk I was willing to take with Bernard Matthews turkey chunks - and, having thought about it a little more, I'm wondering if mixing up a little gravy for the turkey wouldn't be such a bad idea after all.

We have sufficient leftovers of the rice and slaw for a decent dinner tonight, as well... I'm considering some Boxing Day 'sushi' using some sliced salmon I picked up a few days back, along with some Christmas spiced streaky bacon acquired in Iceland... Hopefully will be adding a few photos of that in the next few days.

I'll leave you with a Binging With Babish-inspired cross-section, with apologies for the quality of the photo, as it was taken quite hurriedly, on my phone:

Iceland/Ed's Easy Diner Selection

I've been a bit of a fan of Ed's Easy Diner since a friend dragged me into one some years ago. I'd seen them around - frequently wandering past a London branch while on the way somewhere - but, having eaten in a few diners of that style while on holiday in the States, I had been understandably reluctant to sample a British attempt at replicating the classic American Diner experience. Seemingly Ed's Easy Diner has had some financial difficulties in recent years, and it appears all the London branches have now closed... So perhaps it's fortuitous that Iceland have partnered up with them to create a line of microwaveable foodstuffs from their diner menu.

I picked up an initial selection of these almost two weeks ago, and had planned to write about each one individually, but ended up losing momentum and deciding to make a single, collective post instead. Unfortunately, in the meantime, popular YouTuber and microwave gourmet, Stuart Ashen has already covered some of them.

Still, this is snacks & the single man, so I'm pretty much obliged to mention them, if only to break the excessively long hiatus I've had from this blog.

'Breakfast' Options

3 Pancakes with Bacon & Maple Syrup
I'd always been a bit dubious about the sweet-savoury combination that is pancakes with bacon topped with maple syrup but when I tried it for the first time while while on holiday, as a hotel breakfast, I loved it. Pancakes, bacon and maple syrup shouldn't work, but it does... and the same - more or less - can be said about this frozen option. It works as pretty much a simple 2-stage process in terms of 'cooking' (technically reheating), with the pancakes going in separately, side-by-side, then the bacon going on the side with the pancakes stacked. Once everything's cooked, the bacon gets put on top and the maple syrup poured over the top.

I don't think I've ever had microwaved pancakes before (then again, I wouldn't necessarily know, in some diners) but these were surprisingly good, if perhaps a touch soggy due to condensate. The bacon is a little undercooked by my standards, and not especially flavourful, but I wouldn't tend to expect much from microwaved bacon. The maple syrup is actually genuine maple syrup rather than maple syrup-flavoured goo, and a decent amount is provided. Perhaps not enough for everyone, but certainly sufficient for me. I think my only real complaint would be that there's really not enough bacon... but, as a snack breakfast/brunch/lunch option plucked from the freezer and prepared in so short a time in the microwave, it's better than I'd expected.

A pretty good start to my experience of this new selection, overall, though my second experience of this was somewhat less positive due to the very much not-crispy bacon being, in fact, rather rubbery.

Breakfast Muffin with Hash Brown & Sausage Pattie

This was in my second sampling of the Ed's Easy Diner range, and I had my suspicions that it ran the risk of being pretty plain even as I picked it out of the freezer cabinet. It's literally just a single hash brown, a sausagemeat pattie and a muffin. Frankly, I was surprised that no sauce of any kind was included and somewhat concerned by the absence of any form of egg. Hell, even Iceland's own brand had a mini-omelette. A hash brown is nice, but it ain't a proper breakfast muffin without some egg. Cooking is another multi-stage affair, with each part getting some time in the microwave prior to final assembly.

The end result doesn't taste bad - the sausagemeat pattie is a touch plain, and the hash brown lacks any seasoning, but both came out moist after being blasted in the microwave. Even the muffin survived quite well, without becoming overly soggy at the bottom. However, the absence of any condiment, some egg, or even a slice of burger cheese, renders this a very dull snack. Pretty sure that, if this is on the menu at Ed's Easy Diners, there'd be a bit more to it than this. 

Burgers & Hot Dogs

Mac'n'Cheese Burger With Bacon

Here's where the selection started to go a little downhill, for several reasons. I have to admit that I wasn't sold on the idea of a burger with added bacon and mac'n'cheese that had to be prepared in a microwave, but this thing let me down before I even started cooking it. It's supplied with the bun frozen together, the tiny portion of bacon frozen to the underside of the bun, the burger stuck to the bacon and the most miserly portion of mac'n'cheese you'll ever see, taking up less than half the capacity of the plastic bag it's supplied in.

Trying to separate the bun led to the top half breaking. Microwaving led the bun to become dry and crumbly. The mac'n'cheese just gets dumped in a bowl of hot water to thaw, then heated briefly in the microwave, while the burger and the bacon worked about as well as could be expected in a microwave. Assembling the finished burger probably would have been easier if the bun hadn't broken.

However, since the burger is part beef, part chicken, it looks anaemic and has very little flavour - some additional seasoning may have worked wonders, but an increased beef content would have been preferable. The mac'n'cheese isn't so vile an addition to a burger as I'd expected, but it's both unseasoned and not particularly cheesy. The main disappointment was that there was barely enough bacon to add any flavour to the finished burger.

There are instructions included for part-cooking this (basically just the bun) with a toaster rather than the microwave but, personally, I'd say the better option would be to set the bun aside ahead of time to thaw on its own. Toasting it at that point might prove more effective, but use of a microwave is absolutely not recommended for the bun.

Chilli Dog

This is another one I didn't have high hopes for, not least because my relationship with hot dogs generally hasn't been great. I like the idea of hot dogs - particularly the smokiness of a really good one - but some of the ones I've had, even in bricks-and-mortar diners, let alone from supermarkets, have been pretty awful. Add to that, my experience of any chilli other than freshly-made has been diabolical, and so-called 'nacho cheese sauce' is frequently vile.

So imagine my surprise when this turned out to be pretty delicious... Although, thinking back, I can't say that any individual component was outstanding. The sauce is fairly inoffensive, pretty bland, even. The chilli is a little thin, but the flavour is OK and, coupled with a halfway decent hot dog, it works quite well. The main downside - and this is kind of a running theme with the line - is that the bun doesn't do well in the microwave. The outside becomes dry and flaky, and the cut for adding the hot dog isn't really deep enough so I ended up cutting it a little deeper before loading it up.

This one had also cooled down quite a bit before I took my first bite - I wasn't very organised, and didn't bring a camera into the kitchen until after I'd assembled the hot dog. These kinds of things really have to be eaten piping hot, lest the unnatural textures and weak flavour become too apparent.

Classic Hot Dog

My subjectively positive experience with the Chilli Dog encouraged me to give this version a whirl, since it's a more traditional, simple hot dog. Coming just with a sachet each of mustard and ketchup and a sachet of crispy onion pieces, its preparation is far simpler - thaw the sauces, irradiate the bun, then the hot dog, put the two together, add the sauces, and then sprinkle over the onion...

...Unfortunately - and surprisingly, given that the hot dog itself is surely identical to that included in the Chilli Dog box - this one really didn't work for me. The bun dried out so much that it just broke in half when I tried to put the hot dog into it, the sauces were beyond bland, the onion was virtually flavourless and not remotely crispy, while the hot dog had the consistency (and something approaching the flavour) of rubber. I was able to finish it, but it's left me less enthusiastic about picking up the Chilli Dog again, in case I just got lucky with the first.

Pizza

Pepperoni Stonebaked Pizza

While I'm a conscientious objector when it comes to microwaving pizza (with the exception of leftovers from the night before - they're fair game), I'm quite a fan of frozen pizza generally, even though the excessive oiliness of some - Iceland's own brand in particular - can sometimes upset my stomach. My first impression of this, just going by the box, was that it was small to the point of being wholly inadequate as anything other than a snack, or as just one part of a larger meal. Opening up the box revealed - to no-one's surprise - that the pizza itself is appreciably smaller than the box, not least in terms of height when laying flat... You could probably fit three of them in the box, two at least.

Nevertheless, after a brief burst of microwave radiation, I'd have the describe the pizza as reasonably competent. Naturally, it's more base than topping, and there's a paltry fraction of the cheese depicted in the product shot on the box. Naturally, the act of microwaving it leaves the underside a little sweaty, but the same can be said of any and all microwave pizzas.

Taste-wise, it's certainly not bad, though I found the pepperoni a little anaemic, lacking the punch even of some of Iceland's own brand products, and certainly not as good as the Chicago Town 2-pack mini-pizzas or pizza subs which, I would say, are one of this product's closest analogues. As expected, though, I was still rather hungry after polishing this off.

Desserts

2 Waffles with Chocolate Sauce

I had a great sense of foreboding about this since, when microwaving things from frozen, there's a certain inevitability of one of two outcomes: it'll be too dry (like the burger and hot dog buns above) or it'll be desperately soggy... and neither is conducive to the enjoyment of waffles.

Granted, as with the burger buns - and even the pancakes - there's the option to heat them in the toaster and, upon reflection, that would seem to be the better - perhaps only - method for this dessert. Because, following the microwave instructions to the letter here, the end result was droopy, soggy waffles. Sure, they tasted OK, but part of the waffle experience is the delightful, subtle crunch surrounding the still-moist innards, and the way they soften as the sauce or ice cream start to soak in. There's something truly sad about a waffle that sags, since their lattice structure is intended to keep them rigid while minimising the amount of mixture needed to make them.

The only other let-down was the chocolate sauce, which was very, very sweet and not particularly chocolaty. This is fairly common with things called 'chocolate sauce', which can sometimes be so sugary they burn the back of my throat. This was was just a bit gunky, so I'll probably give the version with salted caramel sauce a go at some point... Making sure I cook the waffles in the toaster.

The Ed's Easy Diner range presents very much a hit-and-miss selection, not just in its individual products, but in repeat experiences of those products. Having now had a second set of the pancakes'n'bacon, I've been put off trying them again because the fat on the bacon was like chewing gum. I wouldn't touch most pre-packaged burgers with a bargepole simply because my experiences of supermarket meat-based burgers have been largely regrettable. I may try the Chilli Dog again but, having disliked the 'Classic' version so thoroughly, I'm not convinced it would be worth the risk, even at the typically low Iceland price.

The bottom line, I guess, is that none of these would be especially difficult or time-consuming to make from scratch, seasoning to taste, and adding such condiments as are desired. Hell, I've already done it myself. The Breakfast Muffin was particularly dull and, given that sauces were included in pretty much every other product, it's baffling that there wasn't even a sachet of ketchup included.

Your mileage may vary. Your experience and expectations of burgers, sausagemeat patties and hot dogs may be very different from mine. However, I can be reasonably certain that either thawing the buns naturally, rather than relying on a microwave, or using the toaster where possible, would yield better results.

Christmas Dinner... Burger-style!

I have to confess that, despite largely eschewing this blog this year, in favour of quick-and-easy, hashtag-enhanced Instagram posts, I'd thought my Christmas Dinner pizza was a more recent event than it actually was... Perhaps my recollection had become 'slightly' skewed by the emergence this year of Pizza Hut's take on my idea (which is heartily recommended, BTW - the Red Wine Gravy base alone is delicious, though the use of rotisserie chicken rather than turkey makes it a little less authetic), but it was way back in 2014... and I didn't even get round to writing up my 2016 magnum opus, the salmon en croûte with cream cheese, cranberry sauce and orange zest that Courtney and I made for my parents as Christmas Dinner that year.

Nevertheless, it had occurred to me a month or so back that it'd be nice to follow that up with another form of junk-food-ised Christmas Dinner, and the most obvious option seemed to be burgers... While Courtney and I have eaten fewer burgers at home this year than previously, I did end up visiting the McDonald's round the corner from my last Temping placement, in Islington, a little too frequently while I was there.

She was very much on board with the suggestion, so I went ahead and started looking into how best to make turkey burgers from scratch. In the end, largely through lack of care and attention, I made the most basic option in the world - just turkey mince (500g of 2% fat turkey mince from Tesco), seasoned only with salt and pepper, and formed into two patties. These were pan-fried, one at a time, in a little vegetable oil, with the use of a meat thermometer to ensure they were properly cooked all the way through, since I couldn't easily eyeball it.

Turkey is only part of a good Christmas Dinner, though. I also wanted to add a patty of stuffing and a Christmassy hash brown at the very least, while thoughts of cranberry sauce and lightly toasted slices of Brussels sprouts seemed to round off the concept nicely. Courtney mixed up a red cabbage coleslaw, because we had some red cabbage, and it went well with her planned vegetarian option.

For the stuffing patties, I had the option of going for something simple, like sage and onion, but ended up choosing a pork, chestnut and onion stuffing from the Tesco Finest range - a 400g pack divided up into four patties. The hash browns were home made, using a mixture of parsnips, rainbow carrots, onion and potato with egg and potato flour added to aid binding. These were pan-fried and still didn't hold together especially well, but the rainbow carrots added some seasonal colour to what could otherwise have been quite anaemic hash browns (hash beiges?). The sprout slices were simply chucked in the oven, unadorned, alongside my stuffing patties and Courtney's vegetarian sundries, while the hash browns and burgers were being cooked on the hob.

Of course, it wouldn't be Christmas without pigs in blankets and, rather than buy them oven-ready, I decided to piece together my own using a combination of Pork and Caramelised Onion cocktail sausages and Chestnut Smoked Streaky Bacon, both from the Tesco Finest range. Weirdly, the packs were of different sizes - 18 cocktail sausages versus 16 slices of bacon - so I ended up with a couple of unwrapped sausages. However, about 30-35 minutes in the oven created a tray full of pigs in blankets, with enough leftovers to cover my lunches for the following couple of days.

Bun-wise, I'd originally ordered a pack of Warburtons' Brioche Burger Buns but, with the only delivery slot available to us being the 18th December, these would have been out of date and probably growing stale before Christmas Day, so we ended up using them for other things and buying a pack of standard sliced buns locally, a couple of days ahead of time.

The buns were assembled with a helping of Courtney's red cabbage 'slaw on the bottom, the stuffing patty, the turkey burger, some cranberry sauce, and the toasted sprout slices substituting for that old burger staple, the pickled gherkin slices. I only got one of the hash browns, because Courtney miscounted, and they hadn't held together very well anyway, so much of the mixture ended up in a pile on her plate. I served my pigs in blankets on the side, and nicked one of her Brie Bites (Tesco's own brand) for a bit of variety, since my plate was largely made up of meat.

The results were a little mixed... and, unfortunately, my hastily taken, blurry, poorly-lit photos don't help...

The pigs in blankets were excellent and, for once, I was able to taste the difference between fancily-smoked bacon and the normal kind, these rashers having a pleasantly sweet, spicy edge to them rather than just being super-salty.

The stuffing patties tasted great, but I misjudged their size before baking them: their circumference shrank, while their height increased - I'll know to take that into account if I try this again in future, and make them shallower and wider before putting them in the oven... though the chunks of chestnut might make that a bit tricky. Courtney's red cabbage 'slaw was nice on its own, but ended up becoming rather overwhelmed by the rest of the burger, including the bun itself. The hash browns turned out really well other than their tendency to fall apart - we'll really need to research how to make them stay together... Personally, I suspect a mold may be used for the shop-bought kind or, at least, some sort of press to compact them together rather more before they're cooked.

Less impressive were the turkey burgers, since they ended up very dense and very dry. I'd definitely like to try making them again, but actually following one of the myriad recipes out there, in the hope of a more succulent result. At the very least, there should have been some additional seasoning - I had been reluctant before starting, since the other contents of my burger were, theoretically, going to be seasoning of a sort. Some of the recipes available online also feature things like egg white and breadcrumb, and these may have helped considerably. Part of the problem, though, was that I split a 500g pack of minced turkey into two 250g patties, which ended up being far too large in and of themselves. Considering a Quarter Pounder burger would only be a little over 100g, I really overdid it. Another part of the problem is that minced beef - the main constituent of a normal burger - would tend to comprise more than 2% fat... and the leanness of this minced turkey contributed to the dryness of the end result. Topping the burgers with cranberry sauce added surprisingly little to the flavour but, again, a smaller burger may have made all the difference.

Possibly the most disappointing part was the toasted sprout, which ended up getting utterly lost in the burgers. In retrospect, I suspect they should have been seasoned and oiled... So I'll know better for next time.

We're already considering options for next year's non-traditional spin on the traditional Christmas Dinner, and a curry is the front runner. We just need to look into how things like nutmeg, cinnamon and ginger into a curry sauce that can accommodate both turkey and whatever vegetarian substitute Courtney ends up using...

Beaver Tails with Maple Buttercream Icing

Sometime after my girlfriend moved in with me, we started introducing each other to things like our favourite movies, books, TV shows and YouTube channels. In the latter category, one of Courtney's favourites is Simply Nailogical - ostensibly a nail art channel which has more recently branched out into a nail varnish brand (Holo Taco) and a stream-of-consciousness/discussion podcast (SimplyPodLogical). This may seem like a strange subject to bring up on what is technically still a food blog (even though it's been without updates in over a year because I started using Instagram for the majority of my foodie output), but there's a connecton, honest.

Basically, one of the recent episodes of SimplyPodLogical was devoted to discussing some common Canadian stereotypes and, during the course of the conversation, Cristine and Ben mentioned a chain of pastry shops called 'BeaverTails'. They are purveyors of what is essentially a flatbread version of the classic fried doughnut, with a variety of toppings on offer, from classic cinnamon sugar to various types of icing, chocolate spreads, crushed biscuits, fruit, etc.

Naturally, I was hooked.

Since they don't have any UK branches (and, y'know, there's the Lockdown to consider anyway) I looked into recipes for making Beaver Tails myself, and realised it was something I could probably manage quite comfortably, despite the fact that I've done very little cooking from scratch in ages, and what little I have done used recipes from Gousto, where all the ingredients came supplied in the proper, premeasured quantities, and the instructions were given in clear, simple stages. I've not bothered writing those up here because it seemed a little rude (not to mention legally shaky) to recreate their recipes, and because it worked better to simply photograph and Instagram the results.

But Beaver Tails... They're precisely in line with the raison d'être for this blog, so I couldn't resist going the longform option... Not least because I can demonstrate how adaptable these fried delicacies can be.

Ingredients:

Maple Buttercream

• Room Temperature Butter, salted or unsalted - I used salted (225g)
• Icing Sugar (120g)
• Maple Syrup (120ml)
• Vanilla Extract (2 teaspoons)
• Salt (a pinch, only if using unsalted butter)

Preparation Time: 5-10 minutes

Beaver Tails

• Hot Tapwater (60ml)
• Sugar (50g)
• Yeast (7g)
• Milk (60ml)
• Butter (3 Tablespoons)
• Egg (1)
• Salt (1 Teaspoon)
• Plain Flour (335g)
• Oil for Frying
• Topping (cinnamon sugar being the usual recommendation)

Preparation Time: Approx 2 hours, including resting

Tools Required:

• Large Mixing Bowl (for the dough)
• Medium Mixing Bowl (for the icing)
• Small, Microwave-safe Bowl
• Stirring Implements, eg. spoon, spatula, whisk (some form of electric mixer is recommended for some parts!)
• Sharp Knife
• Rolling Pin
• Frying Pan or Saucepan (of sufficient size to accommodate at least one portion of the dough)
• Tongs (because you don't want to burn your fingers with hot oil!)

The Process:
Let's start by making the buttercream, because doing that after making the Beaver Tails could be problematic. Cube the butter and dump it into the medium-sized bowl, then add the icing sugar and start to stir. While I'd heartily recommend some sort of electric mixer (either a stand mixer or an electric whisk), it's best to start this process off manually, either with a spoon or spatula, because the icing sugar will be inclined to puff out all over the place under the influence of an electric mixer. Once the icing sugar is at least partially bound into the butter, it'll be safe to switch over to electric. Add in the Maple Syrup, the Vanilla and, if using unsalted butter, a pinch of salt. Personally, I found it perfectly acceptable to cut out the middle-man and simply use salted butter - the combination of icing sugar, Maple Syrup and Vanilla is easily sweet enough to take the edge off the saltiness of the butter, and vice versa. Keep mixing till everything is as smooth as possible, then set aside.

Note that this mixture will be inclined to separate over time, and may not even bind into a particularly smooth consistency in the first place. This is a common issue with adding liquids to buttercream, but we're aiming for an authetic Maple Syrup flavour, and genuine Maple Syrup is very much a liquid. As long as you're not seeing clumps of butter, it's probably good to go, and will just need a little extra stirring before it's applied to the Beaver Tails.

Making the dough for the Beaver Tails themselves is rather more complicated a process than I've encountered for bread and cakes, largely because I've normally only dealt with ready-made mixtures. I think the only other time I've used yeast anywhere on this blog was in my failed attempt at crafting home-made Cream Soda, but we seemed to have some more recently-purchased yeast in our cupboards.

Start by pouring the hot tapwater into the larger mixing bowl with a teaspoon of sugar (this can be taken from the measured 50g - that still leaves plenty for the remainder of the recipe), add the yeast, stir and set aside for a few minutes so it can proof. What you'll end up with is an off-putting, yeasty-smelling, frothy beige mess. Believe it or not, this is a good thing.

Add the butter, milk, and the remaining sugar to a small bowl and microwave (carefully!) to melt it all together. Stir it up and allow it to cool for a few minutes before adding to the yeast mixture in the large bowl - it needs to be hotter than room temperature, but if it's too hot it could ruin the yeast. Stir the two mixtures together, then crack in the egg, add the salt and whisk together. Start slowly adding in the flour, a little at a time, and keep stirring until a dough is formed. Knead this for a few minutes, adding flour as necessary. The end result should still be quite sticky, but very definitely a dough rather than a paste.

Cover the bowl - if it has a lid, so much the better, otherwise cling film will do the job - and leave it aside somewhere warm to allow the dough to rise. About an hour should be sufficient, but I had to make way for Courtney to take an online cookery class at this point, and only returned to my dough quite late in the afternoon, by which time it was very puffy and smelt strongly of yeast. Beat the dough back down to its original size, then divide into eighths - I rolled mine into a fat cylinder, as that seemed the easiest way to cut it into portions semi-accurately. Roll these out flat, to something in the region of half a centimetre in depth, then set aside for frying. Just for fun, I cut a grid pattern on one side of mine... Not sure why, but the idea had occurred to me, and I was curious to see how they'd end up after frying.

Fill your chosen frying pan or saucepan with cooking oil, just enough that the dough sections will be able to float, then put on what's described as "a medium heat". I gather from the recipes I found online that you'd be aiming for about 180°C/350°F, but it's a tricky thing to judge because hobs aren't marked that way, and they often have different sized burners available, each offering a different range of temperatures. For me, "a medium heat" usually seems to be the lowest setting on the mid-sized burner, but that isn't entirely consistent so your mileage may vary. I ended up tearing off a small chunk of the dough and using that to judge whether the oil was hot enough.

Place the dough pieces into the oil carefully to avoid spitting or splashing. Depending on the size of your chosen vessel, you may have to do them one at a time, or you may fit two or three. Fry each side till golden brown - depending on the vaguaries of the hob and the actual temperature of the oil, this may be anything between 30 seconds to a couple of minutes... though I suspect I may have overdone a couple of mine. Once done, pick them out of the oil (allowing the excess to drain off) and add the topping of your choice while they're still warm.

The Results:
To be honest, this went better than I'd expected, albeit perhaps not perfectly. For starters, I didn't get all my ingredients ready and set out before waking up the yeast, so that was left going rather longer than recommended in any recipes (maybe about 15-20 minutes, while I got everything else together?). I'm not sure if there's an ideal point in the proofing process, after which something can go wrong... but certainly nothing exploded. I actually started the yeast off in a tiny bowl of its own rather than in the large mixing bowl and, by the time I started bringing everything together for the dough, it looked as though it would have overflowed if I'd left it there much longer.

Still, the dough came together very well, but it did leave me coveting those mixers with dough hook options, because mixing what ends up as quite a tough, sticky dough was not fun with a standard spoon. I also had trouble with the dough's stickiness... Sure, it's described as "sticky" in recipes, but how sticky is that? Once I'd mixed in all the flour and started kneading, quite a bit of the dough stuck to my hands. I suspect I should have added a little more flour at that point, but didn't want to overdo it. This is probably something I'd know better if I made bread regularly (and from scratch). Nevertheless, it rose very well in its covered-over bowl... and ended up being left for several hours rather than the recommended "one hour or so". Whether or not this worked in my favour, I'm still not sure. Beating it down and dividing it up was easy enough, so I figure I can't have gone too far wrong. My only concern was that there was a very strong yeasty smell to what was supposed to be quite a sweet dough - or so I thought.

Frying went well, but I'm still pretty vague on hob temperature settings, particularly with large quantities of oil. Plus, the dough had a habit of developing pockets of air underneath, so some of the individual doughnut-things ended up with patches on the underside that looked undercooked. Still, they puffed up nicely, and I was pleased to find that my grid patterns looked pretty good after frying. I tried one 'bare' after letting it cool a little, and have to admit that the yeasty smell persisted after I tore it open. It was light and fluffy, though, so a coating of cinnamon sugar would probably have overpowered whatever yeastiness was left.

I was aiming slightly higher than mere cinnamon sugar, though... and my Maple Buttercream icing made for an excellent topping. However, I'd got a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the icing the day before I started making the dough. I first tried a small batch using a fraction of the necessary ingredients, and that turned out OK... But then I decided to make the full batch late in the evening, because I realised that my time in the kitchen would be interrupted by Courtney's cooking lesson, and I figured getting the icing done ahead of time would help. Storage presented a problem that I hadn't fully considered, though. I didn't want to leave it out overnight, so ended up stuffing it in the fridge. This naturally made it harder to dole out, even after stirring it thoroughly again to undo the separation that occurred, and it never quite became as smooth as one would normally expect of a buttercream icing.

I think I was a little hyperactive for a while after eating a completed Beaver Tail slathered with icing, so I didn't have a second. Later on came the sugar crash, which left me feeling a little unwell and headachy for part of the evening. The four Beaver Tails left after dinner were boxed up and stuck in the fridge, with the excess icing (because there was quite a lot!) scooped into a small plastic tub for storage in the freezer.

Not even the threat of another sugar crash was enough to deter me from having one of the remaining iced Beaver Tails for breakfast, and chilling them overnight certainly took the cloying edge off the icing, though the Beaver Tail itself had become a little dry and hard. They're definitely a dessert to be best enjoyed when fresh.

At Courtney's suggestion, I had another one - topped with three rashers of unsmoked bacon - for lunch, since the concept wasn't too far removed from some of the breakfast/brunch options I've seen available in American hotels. This, too, turned out to be delicious... and I'm not normally one to mix sweet and savoury on a single plate.

Cake Angels' TransFormers-Branded Chocolate Biscuit Kit

Knowing that I'm a bit of a fan of TransFormers, not to mention chocolate biscuits, my girlfriend bought me a boxed, TransFormers-branded kit for making my own choccie biccies with chocolate icing and printed wafer pieces featuring Optimus Prime and Bumblebee from the most recent TV show to carry the name "TransFormers: Robots In Disguise".

The kit contains two separate bags, containing a biscuit mix and an icing mix. The former requires only the addition of butter, the latter only a little water... and yet, despite how easy it would be to prepare, I put off making the biscuits for absolutely ages - one year, three months past its Best Before date, to be precise - before making a start. In all honesty, it probably would have been longer, and the box would have languished, untouched, in a cupboard for another few years, were it not for the obvious upset in Courtney's voice the last time the subject came up: "I bought it for you as a present..."

Part of the issue, I guess, is that I am a fan of TransFormers, but really not a fan of some of the random, licensed tat that bears the name... and a biscuit-making kit certainly falls under that banner. Still, there was no good reason for not making them, and I had the time today, so I finally cracked it open and had a go.

Both of the mixtures were quite strange to deal with. According to the instructions on the box, the icing only needed about 15ml water. Added slowly - effectively a half teaspoon at a time - I seemed to be stirring a small clump of powdery icing through a mass of pale brown, chocolate-scented icing sugar for ages, only for it to suddenly resolve itself into a thick, dark brown, glossy paste. Similarly, the 40g of room-temperature butter - cut up into small chunks so it'd soften quicker - seemed not to be blending with the cake mix at all until suddenly I had a lump of biscuit dough. Well, I say 'suddenly', but mixing it had taken absolutely ages, and both wrists were aching by the time it finally happened.

After chilling the dough in the fridge for 10 minutes, it needed rolling out - a thickness of 1cm was specified in the intructions, but I wasn't especially accurate with my rolling pin. Two stencils are printed on the back of the box, to cut out and keep (little stands are also included, to turn them into tiny standees once the biscuits are done), and these are simply laid on top of the rolled dough so they can be used to cut out one of two of each shape with a knife. The dough then needs to be balled up and re-rolled to cut out another round of biscuit shapes. The box says it makes six, and I ended up with slightly more than one biscuit's worth at the end, so I simply molded it into the shape of the stencil.

The instructions then recommend placing the biscuits onto a greased baking tray, but I object strongly to the washing up that requires, so I simply put some greaseproof paper on a cookie tray and laid the six slabs of dough on that before slamming them into the oven.

About a quarter of an hour later, the biscuits were cooked, so I took them out and let them cool briefly before battling with the icing, which preferred to stick to the spoons I was using to scoop it out of the bowl, rather than any of the biscuits. Surprisingly, there seemed to be far too much icing, and it threatened to drip over the sides of the tiny biscuits... The final touch was a case of rushing to get the wafer pieces popped out of their pre-cut sheet and slapped into the icing before it started hardening.

The end result looked like this:

Bearing in mind these were meant to be chocolate biscuits, I was a little surprised - and disappointed - to find that the flavour was more sugar than chocolate... So much sugar, in fact, that they actually left a burning sensation on my tongue and at the back of my throat. The texture left something to be desired as well - think gluten-free shortbread and you wouldn't be far off... only these were even closer to sand. There was no crunch, just crumble.

Whether this was due to being over a year past the Best Before date of the mix I'm not certain - it seems unlikely, given that such dry goods tend to last quite well. I'd say it was more due to the miniscule amout of butter, so there wasn't enough fat to properly bind the mixture and keep it moist through baking. The icing, in isolation, tasted vaguely of chocolate but, on the super-crumbly biscuit, that was all but lost. The wafers are basically puffed-up rice paper, and the print on them is very faint and faded - a shame considering the bold colours of the characters in the TV show.

I'm going to assume that these things are aimed at young kids, to give them a simple introduction to home baking (under supervision, given that a rolling pin, knife and oven are all potentially dangerous in young hands), but I can imagine a lot of kids being as disappointed as I was in the lack of chocolate flavour. I'd toyed with the idea of getting some cooking chocolate drops to add in, or maybe molding the shapes by hand, perhaps creating fewer, larger biscuits with some sculpted detail... but, in the end, I'm glad I didn't. This wasn't an especially good product, and does nothing to change my low opinion of TransFormers-branded tat... I'm sure it's reasonably lucrative, both for Hasbro and for Cake Angels... but anyone interested in making biscuits would be far better off looking up a recipe online and making them from scratch, rather than using this dry, disappointing mix.

In fact, maybe I'll do just that... I have a really good cookie recipe already, and I'm sure I could mold some vaguely TransFormer-ish shapes... Be interesting to see how they survive the baking process, though...

Crispy Tofu Katsu Curry

Hot on the heels of the shop bought Wasabi dish - and because I just haven't shut up about how good it is compared to supermarket own-brands - my girlfriend decided to look into katsu curry sauce recipes. The original intention was that she'd cook something to accompany it but, the moment she mentioned it, I told her I was basically honour-bound to do it myself - partly because I've done so little cooking recently aside from the occasional Gousto boxes we've ordered.

In all honesty, this was probably a bit more advanced than I'm used to, and the instructions were a little vague (not great when my grasp of my own hob is still a little shaky) and weirdly presented, so I'm going to detail it all here in my usual style...

Ingredients:
Kombu Dashi stock

• 500ml water (approx. - a little more won't hurt)
• Dashi Konbu dried kelp (1 section of approx. 10x10cm)

Preparation Time: About 30-45 minutes

Katsu Curry Sauce

• 30ml Sunflower Oil
• Red Onion (one should be sufficient - meant to be white, but we ordered Morrisons' Wonky Onions, and that's basically pot luck)
• Ginger (for convenience, I used ready-chopped, frozen ginger - about 1 teaspoon)
• Garlic (2 cloves, crushed)
• Mild Curry Powder (1 tablespoon)
• Plain Flour (2 tablespoons)
• Kombu Dashi stock (made earlier, using ingredients above!)
• Light Soy Sauce (2-3 tablespoons)
• Honey (1 tablespoon)
• Rice Vinegar (1 tablespoon)
• Garam Masala (2 tablespoons)

Preparation Time: About 30 minutes

Crispy Tofu

• Tofu (I used Cauldron's - a 396g pack)
• Egg (ended up using 2)
• Plain Flour (about 100g will be more than sufficient)
• Panko Breadcrumbs (about 75g will be more than sufficient)
• Salt & Pepper (a pinch of each)
• Sunflower oil (sufficient to fill a frying pan to a depth of a little over 1cm)

Preparation Time: About 10-15 minutes, once the tofu is drained

Additionals:
Rice (for convenience, I used a 250g pack of Morrisons long grain rice, microwaved)
Spring Onions (to garnish)

Tools Required:

• Sharp Knife
• Garlic Press
• Grater (if using fresh stem ginger)
• Chopping Board
• Frying Pan
• Saucepan
• Measuring Jug
• Funnel
• Coffee Filter
• Receptacles for all the ingredients
• Stirring Implements (several required!)
• Heavy Book (to aid the draining of the tofu)
• Kitchen Roll (also to aid the draining of the tofu) 
• Tongs (to get the tofu into/out of the frying pan)

The Process:
First and foremost, the Kombu Dashi must be prepared. Cut a section of the kelp, about 10cm², and wipe off any salt residue with a damp cloth. Pour about 500ml of water into a saucepan, immerse the kelp and heat on a low setting on the hob - the idea is to get the water hot, but not let it boil... you're essentially brewing a weird, kelp-based tea - and simmer for about 25 minutes. Scoop off the froth that will start to build up every so often. After about 25 minutes, you should have a yellowish liquid, which you then need to filter into a jug for the time being. The easiest was is to stuff a coffee filter into a funnel and pour the liquid through. Set this aside to drain while you proceed with the other steps.

Next, the tofu will also need to be drained - it's generally packaged with a lot of water and absorbs quite a bit, but will need to be reasonably dry for this. Take the tofu out of the packaging and set it on a plate covered with some kitchen roll or a dishcloth. Cover the tofu itself with more of the same, then put something heavy on top (with some kind of non-absorbant barrier if you're using a book like I did - I used a small chopping board under a copy of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman). Leave this to squeeze the water out of the tofu, and move onto the sauce.

Start by dicing the onion, crushing the garlic and, if using a chunk of ginger, chop or grate about a teaspoon's worth. Add 30ml of sunflower oil to a saucepan and heat over a medium setting on the hob. Add the onion, ginger and garlic to the saucepan and cook for 2-3 minutes, by which time the onion should start to become tender. Add the curry powder and stir thoroughly, allowing it to cook for about another minute - a wave of curry scent will let you know it's ready. Slowly add the flour, stirring constantly to blend it into the mixture, but try to avoid letting it cake on the sides of the saucepan.

Next come the first of the liquid ingredients: slowly add the Kombu Dashi, mixing in the soy sauce and honey as you go. Allow to simmer so the sauce thickens, stirring occasionally to avoid a skin developing on the top. Finally, add the rice vinegar and garam masala and cook for about another minute. This now needs to be set aside - but kept warm - until the tofu is sorted. The aroma will start to whet your appetite, so it's best to move quickly from here on...

By this point, the tofu should have had most of the water squeezed out of it, so slice the block into strips about 1cm thick. Sprinkle or grind over a little salt, and leave them aside for about 10 minutes, on a sheet or two of kitchen roll. During this time, start preparations for the Panko crumb coating.

You'll need two plates and two shallow bowls. Pour the flour onto the plate and mix in a little salt and pepper for seasoning. Break an egg or two into the first bowl and beat it - adding a little salt here, if you wish. Into the last bowl pour the panko crumbs. Take each slice of tofu and first coat it in the flour. Next coat it in the beaten egg as evenly as possible, then quickly transfer it to the panko crumb bowl and try to ensure it's thoroughly coated. Put the coated strips onto the second plate, then fire up the hob with a frying pan filled to a level of about 1-1.5cm with oil. Once it's hot, transfer in as many of the crumb-coated tofu strips as you're comfortable frying at any one time (I managed three, though my frying pan could probably accommodate a couple more!). Fry each batch until they're nice and golden (depending on the temperature, it'll be about 1-2 minutes), then transfer out and allow to rest on some kitchen roll to dry out a little.

Stick the rice into the microwave and cook according to the pack's instructions - you'd generally be looking at 2 minutes but, obviously, if you prefer to cook your rice the traditional way, you'll need to start that a little earlier in the process, in another saucepan, and have it set aside for this step. Add half the rice to each of a couple of bowls, top with the fried tofu strips and pour over the sauce. If you're feeling fancy, you could add some sort of topping, like spring onion or grated carrot. Serve up, and scoff down.

The Results:
This was probably one of the more involved processes I've tried, but still reasonably easy to break down into stages so I didn't have to split my focus between two tasks. Having to make the Kombu Dashi stock was quite frustrating, and I'm not convinced that worked properly - the photos I saw online showed a clear, yellowish liquid but, even after filtering, mine was quite cloudy. Additionally, the packaging recommended steeping the kelp for 6-8 hours before heating it. Since neither Courtney nor I had seen or anticipated this instruction, we ended up using a 'plan b' method which took only half an hour... It's entirely possible this method wasn't as effective, so I may try to make another batch of the stock by the recommended method at some point.

Everything else is pretty straightforward - the sauce is really easy to make, though it does use quite a lot of different ingredients that have to be added at specific points. Personally, I'm always wary of adding any powdery ingredients into a pan containing very little in the way of liquid ingredients, since it tends to just stick to the sides of the pan and become really difficult to wash up afterward, but this one worked out OK. Once the sauce had thickened up, the rest of the recipe was quick enough that I was able to take the sauce off the heat entirely until just before serving up. It stayed warm, and needed only a little stirring now and then to prevent a skin forming. Admittedly, I put it back on the hob briefly just before serving, but only to ensure it was piping hot rather than just warm.

I'm still not used to working with tofu, and I'm not convinced I drained it sufficiently... but it's a difficult judgement call: it has to be able to pick up the flour, but it shouldn't immediately soak through the flour. The egg part was very frustrating, because it should apparently only need one large egg... but I ended up beating a second because, with nine strips of tofu to crumb-coat, I'd run out of egg by the sixth or seventh, even though some of the strips weren't as thoroughly coated as I'd have liked. The egg didn't bind very well with the flour-coated tofu, but ended up getting my fingers very sticky. Consequently, I ended up with more panko breadcrumb on my fingers than on the tofu strips... or so it felt. As it happened, I think they were all sufficiently coated. Frying them was nice and easy, though I ran out of sunflower oil and had to supplement it with some Crisp'n'Dry... which, upon reflection, would probably have been the better oil to start with, as we'd just got a new bottle that morning. Since I'm also not used to shallow frying, there was quite a range of shades in the finished crispy tofu strips - from slightly anaemic through to "Oh, shit! I'd better get that out of the frying pan now, or it's gonna burn!" - as the last batch seemed to need less cooking time than the previous batches.

Now, clearly I'm quite fussy about my katsu curry... While I certainly enjoyed this - particularly the delayed kick of spiciness in the sauce - I'm not entirely convinced it was actually katsu. Maybe it was the use of red onion rather than white, maybe I needed to add a bit of additional seasoning to the sauce (I was quite conscious of the salt being added to various things already!). Not to say it wasn't nice - I really liked it... but something about it wasn't quite according to what I think of as 'katsu curry' flavour. I think the quanity was just about as perfect as it could be for two people - enough to cover the tofu strips and rice without utterly swamping it. What was interesting - both to me and to Courtney - was that there's nothing especially unusual or unique about the curry itself: it uses a standard mild curry powder and garam masala. Perhaps using both is a little odd, but even the use of honey in something that's meant to be savoury isn't without precedent.

What I don't enjoy is wastage... and if wasting most of the second egg used for the crumb coating wasn't bad enough, the original recipe specified 125g of plain flour and 100g of breadcrumb. Frankly, I think one could easily get away with half that considering how much was left over - which is why I've reduced the quantities above and noted that they'd be "more than sufficient". I'm guessing the original quantities were given more to ensure sufficient volume of flour/crumb to roll the tofu around in rather than as any indication of actual usage within the recipe. One of the reasons I'm not used to shallow frying is that I really hate working with that much cooking oil. We've taken to filtering and recycling ours but, obviously, it has a limited lifespan (unless you want to turn it into biofuel for a car). Additionally, putting this together also piled up an awful lot of washing up even before the food was served up and eaten.

Still, if you can put up with that, it's actually quite a fun recipe and I'm definitely going to try this again sometime, perhaps ensuring I use white onion and truly fresh ginger, maybe adding some salt to the curry sauce... Certainly trying to do better with the crispy tofu.

Wasabi Chicken Katsu Curry with Rice

Since I've not posted in a few months, I figured it was about time to put something up... and, in the absence of any new cooking (other than what's been going up on Instagram), it's going to be a conveniently quick post about a conveniently quick ready-meal.

It seems that the restaurant chain Wasabi Sushi & Bento have started producing packaged ready-meals, for cooking either in the oven or the microwave and, of the five boxes currently available, I found two options in my local branch of Sainsbury's: Chicken Katsu Curry and Sweet Chilli Chicken. Considering the number of own-brand Chicken Katsu Curries I've picked up in various supermarkets over the years - and having been thoroughly disappointed by all of them - I figured that I owed it to myself to try one that carries the brand of an actual restaurant chain that I frequent.

Approaching it with low expectations, I elected to cook it in my microwave - instructions are given for 700w and 900w, so I had to pick a mid-point for my 800w model - since cooking it in the oven requires one to decant the contents of the plastic packaging within the waxed cardboard box into separate, oven-friendly containers, to be covered over with foil (or lids where available). Since that would only add to the washing up I'd have to do later, the simple act of piercing the film lid and sticking the plastic tub in the microwave seemed like the most logical option.

It takes about 6-7 minutes to cook, and then has to be transferred to a plate, bowl, or my personal preference, the platey-bowl, which is a bit of a mission, as the rice and chicken have to be served up before the sauce can be poured on from the container... This still seems a little faffy for my liking, and I wonder if putting the sauce into a sachet, to be laid over the top of the rice and meat for shipping and storage purposes, might be the better plan. Nevertheless, here's the end result:

The first major difference between this and the average supermarket-bought Chicken Katsu Curry is the presence of large chunks of potato, carrot and onion in the sauce. In most others, there are no solid bits of veg at all and, on those rare occasions they are present, they tend to be fairly small. Straight away, this product looks better than the average supermarket fare.

I must confess that I was a little underwhelmed by the size of the katsu breadcrumb-coated chicken piece, and was a little concerned initially that the portion of rice was also on the small size. Conversely, when the sauce was poured over, it looked as though there was far too much, and that it would swamp the chicken and rice. Upon reflection, I'd say it's not as excessive as I first thought, but I could still stand to lose a few spoonfuls, while the quanity of rice is just right. A bit more chicken wouldn't go amiss, but the overall portion size is pretty good.

As to flavour, I find the sauces in most supermarket ready meals are Katsu Curry flavoured, rather than having the bite and spiciness of a true Katsu Curry. I'm happy to report that this bucks the trend completely. I can't quite remember how it compares to what a Wasabi restaurant would serve, but it's so much better than anything else I've bought from a supermarket. The chunks of veg in the sauce add to the texture and make the overall package that little bit more filling in the absence of a larger portion of meat, and I found this package very satisfying. The rice, sensibly, is plain but cooks very well in the package, while the chicken is prone to drying out at the edges. It doesn't become inedible or rubbery, just more difficult to cut, so perhaps I should try heating the package in two stages, reorienting it on the turntable halfway through.

Weighing in at £4.50 in store, or £4 via the website, it's in the same ballpark as Sainsbury's own 'Taste the Difference' line, but unlike the supposedly high-end own-brand, I really could taste the difference versus Sainsbury's cheaper, own-brand Chicken Katsu Curry tubs.

In fact, it's got me thinking that I should look into Katsu Curry sauces generally - either buying it ready-made or seeking out a recipe - and trying to make something like this myself, it get a better idea of how to get the spiciness just right. The only downside is that Courtney, being veggie, would not appreciate a chicken Katsu, so I'd need to identify an alternative... Perhaps Quorn or Tofu would suffice...

I've also tried Wasabi's Sweet Chilli Chicken box, which is nothing special overall, but the sauce again has a real kick to it. I think I'll need to seek out a bigger branch of Sainsbury's if I want to look at the rest of the line...

Experiments with Gousto #9: Mediterranean Fish Stew & Sunny Aioli

Here we are with the final entry in the current run of Gousto recipes, and any others will be appearing on Instagram, while my more 'experimental' efforts, or anything particularly fun or interesting, will continue to appear - sporadically - on this blog. This recipe is the one where I ended up eating both portions because my girlfried was away - I had one portion on the Friday, when I did the actual cooking, and the second for lunch on the Saturday.

This turned out to be a Very Good Thing as it didn't all go according to plan on the Friday.

As before, I got the chopping out of the way ahead of time, attempting to be clever and using the mandoline for the onion, but mistaking the 'julienne' attachment for the 'fries' attachment and consequently setting the blade too low. This still gave me sliced onion, but with deep grooves cut into it rather than allowing it to separate into nice, small chunks. I did the carrots the old-fashioned way and chopped the garlic as finely as I could (news flash - still not that fine), where I'd grated it for a couple of the previous recipes and got uncomfortably close to grating my fingers. I should, perhaps, have used the garlic press for broadly similar results, but that didn't occur to me at the time.

The second step of this recipe confused me: heating a frying pan with "a drizzle" of olive oil and 15g of butter. Why so vague with one measure and so specific with the other? And using oil and butter? Surely one or the other would be more usual? Nevertheless, I followed the instructions as described. The stew part of the fish stew was easy enough, but puzzling on at least one other point: the inclusion of star anise. Now, clearly, I'm no expert in culinary matters, but star anise is described online as "one of the central spices in Chinese cooking", and supposedly has a strong anise flavour - whatever that may be - and a licorice-like aroma. I'm a big fan of licorice, and I have to say there was no licorice aroma. I couldn't say whether its presence in the making of the stew had any effect on the final flavour, but it had none that was discernible to my palate. I'd have to try cooking this again without star anise to be certain.

As with the previous recipe, I started preparing the stock ahead of time as well, though this one required the addition of turmeric to turn it into the required "yellow stock". Turmeric may well be the bane of my existance, but we'll get into that shortly... For now, let's focus on the stew. Any recipe which can be completed in one frying pan or saucepan is always going to be a winner, so I really liked that every stage of preparing the stew was simply a case of adding the next thing to the frying pan. With the onions, carrots and garlic cooked to the point where the onion was softening, the tomato paste went in, followed shortly by the stock and the olive, and the whole thing was left to reduce on a low heat while I switched over to preparing the sunny aioli and baking the rolls, which I'll go into separately. The fish caused an interesting complication, in that I was preparing the stew in a frying pan which has no lid, so I had to improvise - upending a wok and balancing it on the rim of the pan for the few minutes required to cook the fish. The final stage was simple enough - add in some of the fresh parsley, remove the star anise (which took longer than expected because it had managed to disguise itself very successfully), then serve with more of the parsley as a garnish, a ciabatta and the sunny aioli...

...Which is where it went awry for me. It's not often, even with an amateur like me working in the kitchen, that a recipe goes so wrong that something actually breaks. Sure, I've had cheap-and-cheerful bits of kitchen equipment break (most recently the Ikea can opener that was part of my kitchen starter kit, basically dissolved thanks to its cheap, plastic construction... it's almost 10 years old, but barely used). The sunny aioli seemed to be going swimmingly, too, until I lost my grip on the bowl I was using to mix it, allowing it to tumble to the floor - trailing sunny aioli - break unrecoverably and spill what little of the sauce wasn't already staining the white plastic/rubber of my fridge. Hence, the first photo features no sunny aioli.

It's probably a good thing my girlfriend wasn't around for this one, because I came very close to losing my temper over the breakage and spillage, and spent the evening grumbling to myself and cursing the bowl for its slipperiness. It had all been going really well up until that point, so falling at the last hurdle was a huge disappointment.

My second attempt, for lunch the following day, went far better, and the sunny aioli really added to the overall flavour. I may have to figure out other ways to use a similar sauce. This is a really lovely fish stew, and I'd definitely like to try making it again... though I'm not quite sure what the ciabatta adds to the meal, other than being something to soak up the last few drops of the stew.

In retrospect, I'm puzzled by the instruction to drizzle olive oil over the ciabatta rolls before sticking them in the oven. I ended up doing one with and one without the oil and, yes, there's a massive difference in the result... but the one with oil ended up extremely tough and crusty, while the other was more like what you might buy in a shop. I'm not massively keen on super-crusty bread, but each to their own...

Snackshots...

Something I've realised while working on Gousto recipes over the last few months is that writing up my experience of cooking these meals has actually become a little dull. I've always much preferred doing things from scratch, and documenting the whole thing like a scientific experiment. It's also been a little repetitive as I tend to have much the same impression of each recipe: dealing with the chopping ahead of time is advisable as I'm not that quick or accurate, and I can never quite match their timings as I still haven't got used to the temperature settings on my hob.

To this end, I've set up an Instagram account so that I can at least show photos of each recipe I try, adding a few pertinent notes to the caption.

Still, it's actually been fun to do the cooking so, once I get back into the frame of mind where I feel confident about getting a bit more experimental in the kitchen, hopefully I'll be able to post something a bit more detailed in this blog. For the time being, have a quick look at my Instagram account, and perhaps you'll see more frequent posts there.

I've got one more Gousto recipe as a draft, and hope to finish that at some point... but further recipes of that sort will likely be Instagram only, unless there's something particularly exciting about them.

Experiments with Gousto #8: Wholesome Haddock & Apricot Tagine with Bulgur

And so we come to the penultimate post in this new round of Gousto recipes... and if there was a duffer in the selection, this would be it. Not that it was bad, just not as outstandingly good (or fun to prepare) as the others. This recipe also featured a couple of tasks that had to be kept on the go at the same time, which isn't something I find particularly easy in the kitchen. The daftest part, for me, was the opening instruction, which breaks down into three separate tasks: boil a kettle (the quantity of water isn't specified, but is more than my kettle can handle, for reasons I'll explain shortly), peel and chop the onion, peel and dice the carrot. Since I knew that peeling and chopping/dicing the veg would take more time that the boiling of a kettle, I did that - along with pretty much all the other chopping - before even filling the kettle, and feel that's the safest option. It's not as if step 2 (actually steps 4 and 5, if we're being fussy) makes use of the boiled water, and step 3 (AKA steps 6 and 7) doesn't start with "Meanwhile...", yet the actions in step 2 take 5-8 minutes. Thus, following the recipe to the letter would result in the water cooling off during that stage, throwing off the timing for the rest of the recipe.

Going from memory, I think I also prepared the vegetable stock before starting to cook the carrot and onion pieces, because step 4 (steps 8-11) includes making the stock as its last instruction before switching back to working on the onions and carrots in the pan.

I did, for a while, have the bulgur wheat and the early stages of the tagine cooking simultaneously, but the alarm going off for the wheat pretty much shattered my concentration. I also found that the full kettle of water I started out with wasn't sufficient for the 10-15 minutes cooking time... Not sure whether that means I cooked it for too long, or just that I need a bigger kettle (or to boil the water in the pan rather than using the kettle at all), but I had to boil the kettle again to top up the pan at about the halfway point, because it looked as though it would boil dry otherwise.

Like the previous recipe, the instructions say to add a lot of dry stuff to the pan ahead of the stock and, again, I find this counterintuitive. Not to say I didn't do it that way, or that I don't think it works, just that it doesn't make sense to me to add three lots of ground spices, chopped garlic and ginger and a relatively small quantity of tomato paste to a pan of onion and carrot, cooked in a drizzle of olive oil. Granted, the onions will start to sweat some of their fluids out, but it's still a fairy dry pan, and the spices will tend to clump. The next instruction is to cook "until fragrant"... which is tricky to follow, as I'm not sure I trust my nose in the kitchen... particularly with allergy season in full swing, and not long after chopping the onions...

Nevertheless, from here on, the recipe became much easier to follow, except inasmuch as I really need to figure out what constitutes 'low heat', 'medium heat' and 'high heat' on my hob... Its highest setting always seems a little too aggressive, but the general idea at this stage was to boil off some of the water to thicken up the sauce. That said, the instruction to aim for "a curry-like consistency" isn't especially helpful to one who doesn't tend to eat a lot of curry. I had a broad idea of what was meant, and did a fair job, I think, but still wasn't convinced by the finished product.

Probably the hardest part came when the fish was added, because ensuring white fish is cooked through when it's in a strongly-coloured sauce is a bit of a fine art - it needs to get to the stage where it flakes easily, but not so far along that it starts drying out. Since the instructions say to chop the coriander and mint at this late stage, I made sure to do it in advance to avoid any last-minute stress, or the risk of over-cooking the tagine.

Curiously, while the instructions say to "serve the haddock & apricot tagine over the bulgur wheat", all the photos show the two served side-by-side and very separately. The problem with following the instruction rather than the images is that the sauce is inclined to soak down into the wheat, so what I served up looks much less impressive... and not just because of my haphazard chopping of the coriander and the mint. It also seemed very anaemic - the photos depict a tagine that's bold and warm-looking, all browns and reds... mine ended up more beige and orange.

Now, I described this as the duffer of the set and should explain why. I liked this meal - as did my girlfriend, who actually had her share when she got back home late that evening - but the flavour wasn't as captivating as some of the other recipes. By comparison, I have to say I found it a little bland. It's worth noting that the recipe describes "diced apricots", but what was supplied was a bag of diced, dried apricot, so it's possible that working with fresh fruit would yield better results. Haddock doesn't have a particularly strong flavour of its own, but it didn't really pick up as much from the sauce as I'd hoped... and then the wheat was extremely plain. My girlfriend suggested some kind of seasoning for the wheat, so perhaps cooking it in another batch of vegetable stock would improve it... or, at the very least, adding more than just salt to the water.

With the end result of this being so underwhelming, I'm somewhat keen to try it again sometime - perhaps I missed something, perhaps the incredients weren't quite ideal in some way, perhaps I needed to chop the onion and carrot a little more finely. I'd also argue that, going by the photos on the recipe card, the quanity of mint and coriander supplied for the garnish was far in excess of requirement.