Food Matters

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Hi everyone.

We are in the process of a bit of a site reshuffle and are consequently not adding any more posts to Food Matters.

Food does, of course, still matter...it's just we have bigger and better things coming soon.  Please bear with us!

Pheasant's On

To mark the beginning of the pheasant shooting season, we wanted to find a yummy pheasant recipe.  This one, taken from the Game's On page of the BASC website, certainly lives up to that and is also very quick and easy.

For more delicious game recipes, for everything from hare to woodcock, visit Game's On.

Roast Pheasant with Sherry and Mustard Sauce

Use only young pheasants for roasting ­ older birds are too tough and only suitable for casseroles. Serve with potatoes braised in wine with garlic and onions, Brussel sprouts and bread sauce.

Ingredients (serves 4)

• 2 young oven-ready pheasants
• 200ml/7fl oz/scant 1 cup sherry
• 15ml/1 tbsp Dijon mustard
• 50g/2oz/1/4 cup softened butter
• salt and ground black pepper

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 2000C/4000F/Gas 6. Put the pheasants in a roasting pan and spread the butter all over both birds. Season with salt and pepper.
2. Roast the pheasants for 50 minutes, basting often to stop the birds from drying out. When the pheasants are cooked, take them out of the pan and leave to rest on a board, covered with foil.
3. Meanwhile, place the roasting pan over a medium heat. Add the sherry and season with salt and pepper. Simmer for 5 minutes, until the sherry has slightly reduced, then stir in the mustard. Carve the pheasants and serve with the sherry and mustard sauce.

British Food Fortnight

The sixth British Food Fortnight begins on the 22nd September and runs until the 7th October 2007. It prides itself on being "the biggest national celebration of the diverse and delicious range of food that Britain produces" and boasts a wide range of activities and events.

Click here to find out what's going on in your region.

"Bringing the farm to your fork..."

We just came across this rather natty site, called The Local Food Directory.  If you know any local producers, this might be a good website for them to be listed on.  I'm sure we're preaching to the converted, but here's a bit more about what they do:

"The Local Food Directory champions the best food producers and retailers in your area. It contains a straightforward search facility for finding local food, plus lots of information on seasonal foods and recipes.

Buying your food locally means putting money in the pockets of the people who work hard to produce it, sustaining local communities and the land. It also means that you know where it comes from, how it was made and what it really contains. Buying locally cuts down food miles, which is better for the environment.

Getting to understand the food we buy and eat is rewarding. There is a wonderful variety of food in Britain, changing constantly with the seasons, and its just out there waiting to be discovered."

Lavender Shortbread

MasterChef 2007 finalist, Hannah Miles, is back with another delicious recipe:

• 4oz butter
• 1oz caster sugar
• 1oz lavender sugar (see below)
• 6oz "00" plain flour (also called Italian flour)

1. Cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy.
2. Tip in the flour and mix to a soft dough with your hands.
3. If the mixture is too dry, add a small amount of milk.  If it's too sticky, add a bit more flour.
4. Wrap the dough in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for an hour.
5. Roll out to 1cm thickness and cut out cookie shapes.
6. Place the cookies on greased baking trays and bake at 180C/Gas mark 5/Aga roasting oven below a cold shelf for 8-10 minutes until golden brown.
7. Lift onto a cooling wrack and dust with caster sugar while still warm.  The smell as you take them out of the oven is delicious!

To make lavender sugar, layer caster sugar with culinary lavender in a jam jar in alternate layers.  Leave for 2 weeks to infuse.  This can be used in cakes, biscuits, icing etc.

Take a look at Hannah's fab food blog, which contains many of her recipes and also gives an insight into her village life.

Spot the Vegetable

Sorry - trick question - there don't seem to be any in this American family's weekly food intake. 

This is one of a series of pictures taken from a book by Peter Menzel called "Hungry Planet" and featured in Time's What the World Eats.  Interesting stuff - what would your picture have in it?

Some People Will Do Anything For Cheese

Now, we at Muddy Matches are partial to a bit of cheese ouselves but I'm not sure we'd go to such lengths to get our hands on some as these guys:

For those of you want in on the action next year, Cheese Rolling at Cooper's Hill in Gloucestershire is taking place on 26th May.  We're a bit slow off the mark posting this video here when it's July already, but when we found it on YouTube we decided we couldn't possibly let something this muddy pass us by! 

White Chocolate and Raspberry Profiteroles

MasterChef 2007 finalist, Hannah Miles, kindly gave us this yummy recipe to try:

• 50g butter
• 150ml cold water
• 60g plain flour
• 2 tsp vanilla sugar (or caster sugar if you don't have vanilla sugar)
• 2 eggs beaten
• 100g white chocolate, melted
• 284ml (half a pint) double cream
• 1 punnet of fresh raspberries, lightly crushed with a fork

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C/350F/gas 4.
2. Melt the butter in the water in a pan and bring to the boil.
3. Remove from the heat and quickly throw in the flour and sugar and beat with a wooden spoon until a smooth dough is formed which leaves the sides of the pan.
4. Add the egg a little at a time, beating really hard after each adition.  You should end up with a smooth, glossy dough.
5. Grease a baking tray with butter and place small teaspoons of the mixture a distance apart.
6. Place the tray in the oven (Aga roasting oven bottom shelf) and pour a small amount of water onto the oven floor.  This will create steam, which will help the buns to rise.  Bake for approximately 15 minutes, until they are golden brown.  Remove the tray from the oven and pierce each profiterole with a knife to release the steam.
7. Dip a fork in the melted white chocolate and "spin" over the tops of the profiteroles.  This will create a nice white chocolate pattern on each.  Leave to cool until the chocolate has set.
8. Whisk the cream until stiff peak and fold in the raspberries.  Place the cream in a piping back and pipe into each profiterole.
9. Pile the profiteroles high on a plate and dust with icing sugar.

For more recipes and countryside musings, go to Hannah's Country Kitchen Blog.

Food to Share

From muddy dates to muddy mates, Mark Gilchrist of Game for Everything is back with another recipe; this time one that is great to share with your friends.  Bear in mind that the rabbit needs to be prepared a few days in advance but, otherwise, this recipe is very quick and simple:

Poached Rabbit and Guacamole on Toast

Poached rabbit marinated in olive oil:

• 1 rabbit (click here if you need a bit of help dealing with a rabbit)
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and pepper

1. Rub salt all over the rabbit and then leave over night.
2. Boil the rabbit in water for 3 hours until the meat starts to fall off the bone.
3. Remove all the meat from the bone and season well.
4. Cover the meat with the olive oil and leave in the fridge for 2 days.

Sweet chilli guacamole:

• 2 ripe avocados
• Sweet chilli sauce
• Lemon juice
• Salt and pepper

1. Remove the avocado skins.
2. Place the avocado, sweet chilli sauce, salt, pepper and a dash of lemon juice in a bowl and mash together with a fork until smooth.
3. Place an avocado stone in the guacamole until serving as this will stop it browning.

Serve the rabbit and guacamole with pieces of toast and enjoy. 

MasterChef Finalist, Hannah, Tells Us About Her Experiences

In this entry, MasterChef 2007  finalist, Hannah Miles, has kindly agreed to tell us a little bit about her experiences on the show.  Keep an eye on Food Matters in the future for some of her fabulous recipes.

"My MasterChef journey was one of the most amazing experiences in my life and, although I didn't win on the final day, the show's catchphrase "This is going to CHANGE THEIR LIVES" really has come true.  The winner, Steven Wallis, is an amazing cook and has a palette unlike anyone I have ever known - he can make even the simplest things like scrambled eggs taste stunning, just by adding a dash of truffle oil and some chives - completely elevating the dish to a level I would never even have thought of.  I couldn't have lost to a better person and am very happy for him.

I was a last minute stand in for the programme and came to the heats with 24 hours' notice (hence the rather rushed decision to make blueberry duck and saffron mash - thank goodness I won't have to see "that" clip any more!!!)  I am so proud of what I achieved - I learnt so much with expert tuition from John and Gregg, who would quietly pass on useful tips when they were walking round the kitchen and who saw something in me which to this day I still find hard to see in myself, and the amazing Giancarlo Caldesi of Cafe Caldesi, who was there for me at my lowest point in the competition, who picked me up, dusted me down and taught me about getting amazing flavours from a few ingredients which give a dish the wow factor that I was seeking.  I was lucky enough to have been taught by some monumental chefs - particularly Helene Darosse in Paris, who was truly inspirational with her silent kitchen - I have never worked anywhere more calm and relaxed and really loved it, and also the Ritz Paris, which sadly never made the final programme, where we learned some remarkable dishes.

The highlight of the competition had to be cooking at 10 Downing Street for Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern.  10 Downing Street is not somewhere I would ever have imagined that I would visit, let alone cook in.  The kitchen itself was very small and there were just the three of us cooking.  The kitchen has no equipment and we had to pack everything we needed for our dishes from the studio.  There was also no one to wash up and, although we tried to stay tidy to start with, the kitchen soon descended into absolute chaos.  Luckily, John and Gregg stepped in and helped us out, which enabled us to get our food out almost on time.  There can't be many people in the country who can say they have kept Tony Blair waiting for 5 minutes!  I also loved cooking for the Michelin-starred chefs at the Savoy.  We cooked in the kitchens for 11 hours non-stop, just to make 8 plates of food.  Each course was a trio, with over thirty cooking processes (many of which we had not tried before) for us all to complete.  It was all so complicated and fiddly but I felt a real sense of achievement at the end of the day seeing the final result.  I had been so busy cooking all day that I had not had time to think about who we were cooking for.  It came as a shock when I entered the room to see Raymond Blanc, Marcus Wearing, Pierre Gagnier and Michel Roux (amongst others) sitting in front of me, eating my dessert!  To this day, I still can't quite believe the praise I was given by these amazing chefs for my dessert and am very proud of myself for what I achieved that day.

Since the programme ended in March, I have been really busy!  I have cooked a charity dinner for 86 people, joined the writing team of Country Kitchen magazine and will be writing articles for them on a monthly basis and am working on a cookbook.  I have given cookery demonstrations and made guest appearances at farmer's markets and fetes and was lucky enough to be invited to the World's 50 Best Restaurants Awards (the foodie equivalent of the Oscars).  This summer, I am providing Rose Petal Afternoon Teas and cookery demonstrations for the National Garden Scheme.

I recently spent time at the amazing Fitzbillies bakery in Cambridge, where I learnt so much from their wonderful patissiere, Tom, who is 79! Fitzbillies' speciality is Chelsea buns, which they send all over the world, and I was lucky enough to make over 350 when I was there!"

You can follow Hannah's journey on her wonderful food blog, which contains many of her recipes and also gives an insight into her village life.