#18 - Chocolate cake/mess?

So my lovely friend T signed me up to a subscription for Oive magazine for my birthday this month - this is us celebrating the Royal Wedding in style (well champagne and PJ's!)

Having seen the front of the current magazine showing a gorgeous chocolate cake my flatmate J suggested this would be a good recipe to try out for Royal Wedding day - this is what I was trying to recreate:

ummm - yummy!

Suffice to say mine didn't *quite* turn out like that!:

The chocolate ganache icing just wouldn't set - so mine was more a chocolate soup with a rather large crouton in the middle.... however as you can tell from the picture, this didn't stop people from eating it and given the large quantity of sauce, the overall verdict?:

Fudgy 'death by chocolate'...

Next time its suggested to use less cream to allow the ganache to set quicker - will let you know what the outcome is when that happens!

The recipe if you are interested in trying it out for yourself can be found here:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1190635/bestever-chocolate-layer-cake

The Camden Road Cook

#17 Pancake day!

So for pancake day this year we had an extravaganza!!

Starting out with the basic pancake - read crepe - recipe by Delia:

2 eggs
110g plain flour
pinch of salt
200ml milk mixed with 75ml water
2 tbs melted butter

Sieve the flour & salt into a large mixing bowl, then make a well in the centre and break the eggs into it.

whisk the eggs - with a fork or electric whisk if you have it - incorporating the flour from around the eggs bit by bit.

then add small quantities of the milk/water mix gradually - ignore any lumps becuase they'll disappear

the batter should end up smooth with the consistency of thin cream

when you are ready to cook the pancakes add the 2 tbs melted butter into the batter and stir in

melt a small amount of butter around the pan & tip excess out - next get the pan really hot and then turn down to medium - pour in about 2 tbs batter (you'll need to test for the optium amount for your pan - yum!), and swirl around until the pan is evenly coated with batter

cook for about 1/2 minute and then loosen from the plan and get ready to flip!

The result:

Savoury fillings came first:

A ham, mushroom, garlic, cream and parsleymix:
Et volia:-

Sweet fillings:

Banoffee pie! Bananas, duche de leche (sp?) and the ultimate base - crumbled oreo cookies:


All rolled up ready to devour!

Enjoy!

The Camden Road Cook

#16 - Exploding lentils! (way to cook salmon no1)

So whilst trying to create a short cut for dinner tonight I managed to explode a pack of ready made lentils all over my clean microwave.....





I'm sure I followed the heating instructions ok!





Anyway tonight's dinner was grilled salmon with lemon juice and chilli flakes, with ready made puy lentils (tomato & basil flavour - can be found in Waitrose).





To tart the lentils up, especially after losing some of the pack by *wallpapering* the microwave, I fried some sliced red peppers and mushrooms in olive oil and added chopped parsley et voila:




The Camden Road Cook

# 15 - ninja breadmen!!

The ultimate in Christmas ginger breadmen!!

The recipe I nicked from channel 4 food website - principally as it didn't involve treacle as well as golden syrup (which I've discovered comes in squeezy tubes = less mess!)

http://www.channel4.com/food/recipes/baking/gingerbread-recipe-07-12-06_p_1.html

Couple of top tips - if your egg and golden syrup mixture leaves the dough a bit dry and crumbly add a little water to help it stick (but not too much else you won't be able to roll it).

I used a medium egg and the mixture wasn't quite wet enough - a large egg and a heated spoon so the golden syrup slides off easier would have probably helped too - but water worked fine!

The ninja breadmen cutters I found from Urban Outfitters I think - but you can find them on amazon too:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ninja-Bread-Men-Cookie-Cutters/sim/B0045EQ8VC/2

Hope you have as much fun making them as I did!

The Camden Road Cook

# 14 - Chicken soup for colds...

My most favourite chicken soup because its easy to make, luxurious yet (fairly) low calorie, oh and tasty of course!

Beautiful pics! but now to the scientific stuff...

The recipe is from the 'cook yourself thin' cookbook and should serve 6 - but with my friends you need accompaniments with it if its to go that far (e.g. garlic bread!)

you will need;
2 teaspoons oilve oil
1 onion finely chopped
3 cloves of garlic (well it will scare a cold away!), peeled and chopped
300g risotto rice
200ml dry white wine
2 litres of chicken stock (I used stock cubes)
200g chestnut mushrooms, wiped and sliced
1 tbs low fat creme fraiche
1 tbs flat leaf parsley finely chopped
20g freshly and finely grated parmesan
1 cooked chicken breast, skinned and shredded
salt & pepper

start off by heating half the oil in a pan (in this case my lovely large le creuset - remember you need to fit 2 litres of liquid in here) & gently fry onion & garlic over low heat for 5 mins until softened

add the rice and fry for a further minute stirring and coating the rice with the oil

pour in the wine & stir until its all absorbed. Pour over chicken stock & bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 15 mins or until the rice is tender (it doesn't matter if it gets well cooked).

The soup will be quite thin but fills out when you add the other ingredients.

Meanwhile heat a large frying pan & fry the mushrooms in the remaining olive oil for 5 min until golden brown.

When the risotto is cooked stir through the creme fraiche, parsley, parmesan, chicken and mushrooms et voila!

the camden road cook

# 13 - Sushi koko

So for Christmas this year I got a sushi making lesson at Yo! Sushi in Poland Street.


I went along on Saturday morning ready to learn what makes good sushi and I can tell you that the following are definitely required:

• sushi rice - cooked properly (I still need to pin this one down!)
• fresh fish
• fresh nori
• sushi rolling mat
• lots of practise in making!

Once you've cooked your sushi rice you need to spread it out and let it cool and then season with vinegar (or prepared rice seasoning you can buy in the supermarket).

Then for thin rolls (maki) you need half a sheet of nori and 80g of rice. Spread the rice evenly over the sheet from one edge, leaving a few cm uncovered on the other long side:

Me with nori sheet and sushi rice - you need to spread it out evenly... (this helps when the rice is cooked properly!)

When your rice is done, you add the filling eg. cucumber, down the centre of the rice (not the centre of the nori else it rolls off centre) and using the sushi mat roll the rice covered edge away from you to the uncovered edge.

The uncovered nori then acts as a seal - once your roll is formed like this increase the pressure to ensure the rice and filling is compacted and then shape - for beginners square is best as its easier to cut neatly.

The finished article - with classic beginner mistakes (the cucumber is off-centre and none of the rolls are in the 'right' shape).

Fillings you can use - cucumber in maki, but also tuna/salmon avocado etc

For larger rolls e.g. california inside out roll, this classically uses crabsticks, avocado, mayonnaise and sesame seeds, with the twist being that the rice is on the outside of the roll, rather than being inside (the stickiness of the rice ensures that it stays on!)

When I've had a chance to practise these and the very pretty hand rolls I'll post some more photos so you can either a) marvel at my progress b) spot the mistakes!

The Camden Road Cook

# 12 - Cookie monsters

I think most people love cookies...

Recently rediscovered my favourite cookies - and they are almost healthy!!

From the most comprehensive cook book I own - The Joy Of Cooking, the best cookies are the classic oatmeal ones.

Right ingredients & quantities are quite important in baking so I will actually write them out!

First pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Cand grease baking sheets (I also line them with baking parchment so that I can slide all cookies off in one go for endless rounds!)

For a half size recipe - about 20 odd cookies - you need the following quantities:

125g plain flour
1/3 teaspoon bicarb of soda
1/3 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg (although I seem to have lost mine....)

whisk these ingredients together thoroughly

beat the following ingredients on medium speed until well blended

115g unsalted butter softened (really make sure its soft if doing by hand!)
150g light or dark brown sugar
22g sugar
1 egg
1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract

stir the flour mixture into butter mixture until well blended and smooth. Stir in:

80g dried cranberries (original recipe says rasins, but T recommended cranberries and they work really well - any dried fruit could be substituted)
175g rolled oats

Now the recipe says drop the dough, but whenever I make it, it turns out more a roll-mixture than a drop mixture :) (think I might need to use bigger eggs, or else actually remember the vanilla extract or something?!)

Anyway drop/form in hands about a tablespoon of dough for each cookie, leaving 8 cm between them on the baking sheet, press down lightly to flatten into 1 cm thick rounds

Bake 1 sheet at a time until the biscuits are lightly browned all over (turn halfway through cooking) and almost firm when pressed in the centre - 6 to 9 minutes

Remove the sheet from oven and let stand for 2 minutes until the biscuits firm slightly and then transfer to a rack to cool

When cool enough to eat, do so.

If feeling kind distribute to friends, colleagues and other cookie monsters (like PP ;P)

Else just eat :)

The Camden Road Cook