Smoked Trout Mousse

Smoked trout mousse livened up with a little caviar and cucumber - isn't it pretty? I think the colours on the plate are amazing, and its a great quick canape for holiday events.

The past few weeks have already been packed full of parties, family gatherings, end of term parents get-togethers and dinner parties. So full in fact that I am running out of time to do the usual Christmas things like shop for presents and plan Christmas dinner.

In store this weekend is a book group night in, a friend's drinks party and a day out at the movies with the family. The only way to manage hectic days like these is to have a repertoire of very quick, but very beautiful, festive and tasty dishes to turn out of your kitchen. This one has minimum effort and maximum impact on a plate.

Smoked Trout Mousse with caviar

450g smoked trout fillets
250g cream cheese
5tbsp creme fraiche
Juice of 1 lemon
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
Freshly ground black pepper

to serve:
1 cucumber
a small pot of caviar (or some thin strips of roasted red pepper)

Flake the fillets of smoked trout into a food processor making sure none of the skin is attached.
Add the cream cheese, creme fraiche, lemon and cayenne pepper.
Blitz until light and fluffy. If its too thick, add a little more creme fraiche or a dribble of milk to thin the mixture down. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

to serve:
Slice the cucumber into 1/2cm slices, top with a dollop of the mousse and a tiny dot of caviar or a little roast red pepper if you prefer.

Indian Spiced Scones

I've not posted for a few weeks but with good reason I promise. I've been making hundreds of Christmas Cakes for our lovely cafe customers and developing a range of chutneys and relishes inspired by my wonderful big sister and her San Francisco based Chutney Company McQuade's Celtic Chutneys. This is one of the best recipes I've come up with to show off the products. I've been meaning to post this recipe for months but every time I make them, they are wolfed so quickly, I've not managed to stop and take a photograph.... really!

Unlike a regular scone, they are not served with sweet jam and cream but instead with strong gutsy flavours to complement the chilli heat in the dough. Sweet onion chutney takes centre stage inside a warm scone seasoned with chilli, garlic, ginger and Indian spices. This is a gorgeous canape for those upcoming holiday parties, lovely with a full flavoured red wine and cheese or cut slightly larger and served on the side of warming lentil soup.

Indian Spiced Scones

250g self-raising flour
1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp garam masala
125g butter (straight from the fridge)

1 clove garlic, crushed and finely chopped
2 tsp grated fresh ginger
2 red chillies,  finely chopped
1 egg, beaten
4 tbsp natural yogurt
2 tbsp mustard seeds

Preheat the oven to 200°C.
Line 2 baking sheets with baking paper. 
Sieve the flour, bicarbonate, baking powder, salt and garam masala into a large bowl. 
Add the cold butter and rub in until it resembles breadcrumbs. 
Stir in the garlic, ginger, chillies, egg and yogurt and bring together into a soft dough. 
Place on a well floured surface and roll to about 2cm thick.
Cut into rounds, either large to serve with soup or small to use as canapes.  
Brush each scone with milk and sprinkle with mustard seeds.
Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until risen and golden. 
Serve as canapes with cheese and chutney or warm and buttered with soup.

Red Cabbage with Cranberries and Rioja

Time to get cracking:  a week long creative project, interspersed with lots of parties, a significant amount of chocolate and far too much Champagne. I am trying to lay down a few more things in the freezer, just to get ahead of the game for the weekend and to ensure that I don't spend the whole of saturday in the kitchen when I could be playing with the toys and relaxing with guests.

There are traditional dishes that a Christmas table needs to keep the ancestors happy. Roast potatoes, root vegetables and red cabbage are just a few of them. Even if there is only one person remaining in the house who likes red cabbage, you can't miss it out. This version has the sharpness of cranberries and Granny Smiths melded with the warmth of Rioja and a little zing of chilli to finish. A perfect foil to the richness of a Christmas roast.

Red Cabbage with Cranberries and Rioja
1tbsp olive oil
1 onion, sliced thinly into half moons
1 small head of red cabbage, finely shredded
2 sharp eating apples (I used Granny Smiths), grated
100g fresh cranberries 
3tbsp soft brown sugar
350ml rioja or other fruity red wine
1 tsp red pepper flakes (optional)
Salt

Heat the oil in a large saute pan. Add the onion and fry slowly until softened but not coloured.
Add the cabbage, apples and cranberries to the pan and mix together well.
Sprinkle the sugar over the mixture and add the wine and hot pepper flakes (if using).
Cook at a very low heat for around 1 1/2 - 2hours until soft and melting together.
Season to taste with a generous sprinkle of salt and allow to cool.
The dish is now ready to freeze or leave in the fridge for up to 2 days until needed. The flavours improve with age.

Kilted Sausages and Cranberry & Apple Stuffing

Living in fear of being snowed in has led me to a new and very lovely place in my life: I am really quite organised for Christmas. Presents have been bought or (hopefully) are on their way. Cakes have been baked for home and for the Green Apple Cafe, canapes have been made and frozen and only interesting side dishes remain to be considered.

There is something so depressing about kilted sausages in a supermarket pack. Usually 12 miniature sausages with a wafer thin wrapping of bacon in a huge plastic pack. Why depressing? Well either you need lots of packs or you are getting one or at best two tiny sausages with your Christmas dinner. "That's enough for me," you might say, and while I might agree with you on the day, it is simply too frugal for that particular meal. So I need to make mine at home. Not rocket science but one of those little side dishes that is worth a little bit of time and effort sourcing the ingredients. A good butcher for the chipolata sausages (get lots), well cured bacon, I found some maple cured streaky bacon. Then simply run the flat of a knife along the streaky bacon to stretch it out a little thinner, then wrap each little sausage in a little kilt of bacon. Cook alongside the turkey as you would a very small pack of supermarket sausages. It is well worth a drizzle of maple syrup with a light hand just a few minutes before you take them out of the oven to accentuate the sweetness of the bacon.

A proper recipe this time for Cranberry stuffing. Another simple recipe but with the best ingredients, it makes a special addition to Christmas dinner. Either buy good sausages and split their skins to remove the sausage meat or speak to your local butcher and ask for their best shop-made sausage meat. This stuffing can be used in the traditional way to stuff a turkey but I prefer it cooked seperately

Cranberry, Apple and Pork Stuffing
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
500g good quality sausage meat
100g fresh cranberries, roughly chopped
2 green apples, peeled and grated
zest of one tangerine or small orange
1 egg

Pre-heat the oven to 180C.
In a heavy frying pan, heat the oil, add the onion and saute until transluscent but not coloured.
Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
In a large bowl, stir the onion together with all the other ingredients until well combined. The easiest way is to knead with your hands.
Either roll the mixture into small balls the size of walnuts or press into a loaf tin.(If you must, use it to stuff the turkey but this makes the turkey even harder to cook so I prefer to cook it seperately as a side dish)
For walnut sized balls, bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes until cooked through. For stuffing baked in a loaf tin, bake for 45-60 minutes until golden and cooked throughout. Serve with turkey or with any roast dinner.

Fig and Goat Cheese Biscotti

Don't know about you but I have done the trawling through busy shops, wading through slushy car parks, rushing to the post office for last posting dates and late night list making and now I am more than ready to get started on the nice bits of Christmas. You know? The bits that make it all worthwhile. Decorating the house with the children, wrapping presents with the Pogues playing in the background and making Christmas biscuits: It's time to turn on the oven and get into baking mode, snowy stars to hang on the Christmas tree for the kids and these gorgeous savoury biscotti for me. 

The cheeseboard is my very favourite part of any meal and at this time of year, the usual water biscuits and oatcakes are just not good enough. These biscotti are dense, rich and a great addition to a cheese platter although I quite like them on their own with a cocktail. You can't beat the mix of strong flavoured cheese with the intense sweetness of dried fruit. You could replace the goat cheese with a blue cheese or even with a strong cheddar. However, if you make them, it is definitely worth making double and giving these away wrapped in cellophane as a gift.

Fig and Goat Cheese Biscotti

350g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
2 tbsp milk
100g soft goat cheese, crumbled
100g soft dried figs, chopped into 1cm chunks

Pre-heat the oven to 180C

Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt into a large bowl.                                                       

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs and milk.
Add the wet ingredients into the dry along with the goat cheese and figs.
Mix together until the dough comes together, if it is too dry, add a little more milk until you have a workable dough.

Form into two long, wide logs (approx 7cm x 30cm) on a baking tray and bake in the oven for around 30 mins until risen and golden.

Allow to cool a little then cut the logs into 2cm wide slices.

Put these back on the baking tray and bake again for 10-15 mins till golden and crispy.

Brandied Chocolate Cranberries

Now this is a proper Christmas recipe to get you in the mood: cranberries, chocolate, alcohol all encased in a wee nothing-at-all of a nibble. Seasonal music is playing, snow is falling heavily outside so I am having an urge to create completely frivolous food , the sort of food you only have time and inclination to make during the holidays.

I found these Chocolate Cognac Cranberries in the American Oprah Magazine and such is my love of those extremely Christmassy berries, I was excited to find a new way to play with them. This recipe is fiddly to make and very messy but so grown-up and delicious it is worth all the effort. 

Brandied Chocolate Cranberries
300g sugar
juice of one lemon
300g fresh cranberries
150ml brandy
100g good dark chocolate (I used Green and Black's maya gold)

Put sugar and lemon juice in a saucepan with 500ml cold water.
Bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar.
Lower the heat to a simmer then add the cranberries and heat for 1 minute.
Strain the berries and allow to cool.
Toss the cranberries in the brandy and marinate for a few hours or overnight.

When you are ready to coat in chocolate, drain the cranberries (reserve any remaining liquid and use as the base of a champagne cocktail) and allow them to dry a little  on some greaseproof paper.
Melt the chocolate in a double boiler or in the microwave, then use two forks to toss each cranberry in the chocolate then place on greaseproof paper to set. Store in the fridge or freezer. Serve after dinner with coffee.

Butternut Squash and Beetroot Crumble with Dunsyre Blue

 

Ok, so we live in a small village - the shops here are great, but even they have been challenged this week with erratic deliveries and limited stock. I have been desperate all week to make a huge pot of winter beef stew (maybe with a touch of dark chocolate and a little cinnamon, reminiscent of a mole sauce) or a pot of my mum's amazing lamb stock soup but instead of beef or lamb bones, I left the ravaged shop with a pack of beetroot and a large butternut squash. 

Butternut squash risotto? Goat cheese and beetroot salad? I wanted (needed?)  rich, warming, comfort food. Something to match the weather, to warm us up after a day of sledging and trudging and shivering. This was rich, creamy and so calorific, it almost defeated the purpose of eating such healthy vegetables. Next time, I might make it with a base of tomato passata and marmite instead of cream but either way, with crusty bread, it will make a wonderful snow day lunch. Tomorrow however, I am venturing out to the big shops in Edinburgh and I WILL come back with beef and chocolate so bring on the beef stew.

Beetroot and Butternut Squash Crumble

1 butternut squash, peeled (approx 500g)

1 250g pack of vac-packed beetroot

1 284ml carton double cream

75ml milk

salt and pepper 

Preheat your oven to 190C.

Thinly slice the butternut squash and beetroot and layer in an ovenproof dish. Season each layer with a little salt and pepper.

Whisk together the cream and milk and pour over the vegetables.

for the crumble mixture:

100g butter

100g flour

75g oatmeal

100g Dunsyre Blue, (or other earthy blue cheese) crumbled

50g Parmesan cheese

Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips until it resembles breadcrumbs. 

Stir in the oatmeal and blue cheese. 

Scatter the crumble mixture over the vegetables then sprinkle the parmesan cheese on top.

Bake in the pre-heated oven for about 45 minutes.

  

The Quickest Ever Canapes -a book group special

I met with the girls in my book group last night. They are a discerning bunch and whoever hosts our monthly catch-up always tries to provide interesting food as part of the evening's entertainment.

So, my turn last night but between working a ten hour day, feeding the kids and trying to make the house presentable to adults, I didn't have much time to prepare unusual and stylish nibbles to accompany wine and book chat. Instead I had to fall back on a favourite quick but gorgeous d-i-y canape.

If you have time and inclination, make your own blinis, otherwise, buy them in and use all your creative skills assembling a platter of blinis, salmon and creme fraiche for everyone to help themselves to.

Lemon Vodka-Creme Fraiche Blinis
300ml creme fraiche
3tbsp lemon vodka
Zest of one lemon, finely grated
1 tbsp capers, chopped

Whisk together the creme fraiche and vodka then stir through the lemon zest and capers

To serve:
Smoked Salmon
Blinis - either home made or shop-bought

Dolcelatte and Parma Ham Gougeres

Oh baby its cold outside, so the idea of steaming hot cheese puffs is even more enticing than normal. The snow is falling thick and fast, the temperature is plummeting and warming food is definitely the order of the (very chilly) day. The best part is, they freeze well so I can make a huge batch and keep some to serve during the party season. These are usually made with gruyere but I wanted something just a little deeper in flavour and chunkier in texture. Using a stronger blue cheese, a gorgonzola or roquefort gives a great result but if you do, I wouldn't bother with the ham as the delicate flavour is overpowered.

Dolcelatte and Parma Ham Gougeres

250 ml whole milk

125g butter

salt and pepper

100g plain flour

3 large eggs

100g dolcelatte (or other mild blue cheese), crumbled

50g Parma Ham

Heat the oven to 220C/Gas 7.

Heat the milk, butter and a few grindings of salt and pepper in a saucepan until the butter has melted. Add the flour and whisk until the mixture starts to come away from the sides of the pan. Remove from the heat and add the eggs and cheese. Beat until smooth and shiny. Snip the Parma ham into little shreds and stir through the batter.

Using two teaspoons, place dollops of the batter onto a baking tray and bake in the hot oven for around 10 minutes until light and golden.

Serve immediately or allow to cool and freeze.

Cranberry Sauce with Shiraz

I am getting my Christmas groove back. All the tricky chores are almost finished and only the lovely things remain. Christmas crafts with the boys, present wrapping, parties, menu planning and the nicer side of cooking. For me the fun starts when school stops. We'll be making home made biscuits to hang on the tree, canapes for parties, sauces, treats and fripperies.

First off, cranberry sauce. I love when the shops start getting their Christmas sandwiches in: turkey, cranberry sauce and stuffing or brie and cranberry, and I love to make fresh cranberry sauce (the store-bought versions are so often more like overly-sweet jam than the requisite light fruity sauce) to see us through the post-christmas week of turkey, ham and cheese suppers. I've added a little bit of hot spice and limey zestiness to the usual flavours to cut through the sweetness of the cranberries. This is gorgeous served with baked camembert at a party and (obviously) perfect served with turkey or a hot spiced ham at Christmas lunch.

Cranberry Sauce with Shiraz

Juice and zest of 1 orange

Juice and zest of 1 lime

85g caster sugar

150ml shiraz or other fruity red wine

200g fresh cranberries

1/4 tsp allspice

1 hot red chilli

Dissolve the sugar in a pan with the red wine, orange juice and zest, and lime juice and zest.

Stir in the cranberries, whole chilli and allspice.

Cook uncovered for 10 minutes until the cranberries have all popped and softened and the juices are thickened. Remove the chilli before serving. Serve warm or cold.

Visions of Sugar Plums

Poetic sweeties. I love these these tiny, (almost fat free), traditional christmas bites filled with dried fruit, aromatic spices, orange juice and nuts. One of my favourite Christmas stories is Clement Clark Moore's "The Night Before Christmas" where "visions of sugarplums danced in their heads."

The exact nature of sugar plums seems to change depending on which historian you read but these seem to be one of the more recent incarnations of this particular tradition. This recipe is based on a Saveur recipe from a few years ago but I've found similar all over the web; some containing chocolate, others a different blend of fruit and nuts so play around with the contents as much as you like. They would be lovely with the sharpness of dried cranberries added.

Sugar Plums

50g toasted slivered almonds

100g honey
(preferably orange blossom)
Juice and zest of one orange

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1⁄2 tsp allspice

1⁄2 tsp nutmeg

100g finely chopped dried apricots

100g finely chopped dried dates

100g icing sugar

Combine honey, orange zest and juice cinnamon, allspice, and nutmeg in a medium mixing bowl. Add almonds, apricots, and dates and mix well.

Roll the mixture into little balls. Roll balls in icing sugar, then refrigerate in single layers between sheets of greaseproof paper in airtight containers. They will keep for a week or two but they will absorb the icing sugar so it is worth rolling them once again just before serving.

Serve with coffee or port.

Cranberry and Tangerine Scones

I have been neglectful of my Christmas cooking duties. December has been lost to one cold or sore throat after another and suddenly we have less than two weeks to go and nothing has been done!

So as of today I have to get cracking, every day I have something planned. Like a Martha Stewart monthly calendar, I have listed all the food, drink and

entertaining jobs needing done and assigned days and hours to the tasks. So christmas morning scones are today's task. These would freeze well to be heated up on the day - but unfortunately there are none left so expect I will  make them fresh on the day. It is the season for citrus fruit and I particularly love the taste of sweet tangerines but oranges, clemantines or even fresh juice out of a carton would give a similar end product.

Cranberry and Tangerine Scones

100g (4oz) fresh cranberries, chopped

1 tbsp caster sugar

350g (12oz) self-raising flour

100g (4oz) caster sugar

85g (3oz) cold unsalted butter

100 ml yogurt

50ml whole milk

1 egg

Juice and zest of 2 tangerines (or around  50ml orange juice) 

Preheat the oven to 200C/Gas 6.

Toss the chopped cranberries with the 1tbsp of caster sugar and set aside.

Mix together the flour and sugar in a bowl. Rub the butter in with your fingertips until it resembles breadcrumbs. Try to be as light-fingered as possible and handle the mixture as little as possible- this will keep the scones light and airy as they bake. Add the cranberries to the dry mixture.

Stir together the yogurt, milk, egg and the juice and zest of the tangerines. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix gently to form a soft dough.

Roll the dough out to 3cm/1inch thickness and cut out rounds with a cutter, I like these to be dainty and delicate, around 3cm in diameter. Collect the trimmings together, re-roll and cut out more rounds.

Place on a baking sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes until golden.

These are lovely topped with a tangerine and icing sugar glaze and served with morning coffee but I find this to be a little too sweet for breakfast. 

These scones can be prepared the night before for a quick breakfast. Leave the dry ingredients and fruit mixed together in one bowl, set the jug of ready mixed wet ingredients in the fridge overnight and in the morning, they can be mixed together, rolled out and baked.