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I have a new presure cooker and am always on the outlook for new and interesting recipes like this one found here.

2 lbs chuck, cut into bite-size cubes
5-6 garlic cloves, crushed or minced
1 Tbsp red pepper flake
2 Tbsp Kosher salt

2 Tbsp olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
3-4 garlic cloves, chopped
1 Tbsp tomato paste
1-2 c. white wine and/or stock
1 tsp allspice
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp cumin
1 cinnamon stick

Toss the meat, garlic, pepper flake and salt in a large bowl, combine well and let rest in the refrigerator for a couple of hours. The meat will turn a brilliant shade of red.

Sauté the onions and garlic in the bottom of the pressure cooker until golden. Add the tomato paste and cook another minute or so, then add the wine and spices. Add the meat, close up the pressure cooker and cook on high heat for 20 minutes. Allow pressure to drop normally; rapid-releasing pressure will toughen meat. When pressure has fully released, open the cooker. Skim off fat that has risen to the top. Bring remaining sauce back to the boil if you want to thicken or reduce it.

According to the cookbook, molha is traditionally served with boiled potatoes. We served it over buttered noodles and some roasted romanesco, and that was very nice indeed.

Ingredients
2 cups plain flour
2 tablespoons packaged ground almonds
180g butter
1 tsp grated lemon rind
1/2 cup icing sugar
1 egg yolk
1/2 cup milk, approx
2 cups fruit mince
1 egg, lightly beaten
Icing sugar

FRUIT MINCE
1 small apple, peeled, cored
1/2cup sultanas
1/3 cup mixed peel
2 tablespoons glace cherries, chopped
1/3 cup currants
1/3 cup blanched almonds, chopped
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1/2 tsp grated lemon rind
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 tsp grated orange rind
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp mixed spice
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
40g butter, melted
2 tablespoons brandy

Method
Lightly grease 2×12 hole shallow patty pans. Sift flour into bowl, stir in
almonds, rub in butter, then stir in rind and sifted icing sugar. Stir in
milk and enough milk to make ingredients cling together. Knead dough on
lightly floured surface until smooth, cover, refrigerate, 30 mins.

Roll pastry until 3mm think. Cut out 71/2 rounds, place into patty pans.
Drop tablespoons of fruit mince into each pastry case. Roll scraps of
pastry on lightly floured surface, cut out desired shapes. Brush each
pastry shape with egg, place egg side down on fruit mince. Bake in
moderately hot oven about 20 mins, or until lightly browned. Dust with a
little sifted icing sugar before serving.

Fruit mince – Finely chop apple and half the remaining sultanas, combine
in bowl with remaining sultanas and remaining ingredients; mix well.
Transfer mixture to sterilized jar. Store in refrigerator for at least 3
days before using. Makes 2 cups fruit mince.

Makes 24.

Thank god for google.  I put into the search field Banoffee Cheesecake best and came back with a link and it was a link to a heavenly recipe.  Originally by Silvana di Franco it is rich and satisfying without being sickly.

This is the link to the original recipe which I have replicated here.

Banoffee Cheesecake

*Crust:
85 gm [1/3 cup] butter – melted
200 gm gingernut biscuits – crushed

*Filling:
750 gm mascarpone (or cream cheese)
3 large eggs
2 Tbsp cornflour
140 gm [heaping 2/3 cup] golden caster sugar
finely grated zest of lemon
1 tsp vanilla

*Toffee Sauce:
50 gm butter
100 gm [1/2 cup + 1 Tbsp] light muscovado sugar
142 ml [1/3 cup + 1/4 cup] double/heavy cream

*Toppings:
2 medium bananas – sliced thickly
fresh lemon juice
284 ml [1 cup + 2 Tbsp] whipping or double cream

• Preheat oven to 350F/180C/gas mark 4.
• For the crust:
  1. Mix melted butter with the biscuit crumbs and press the mixture evenly into the bottom of a 23cm springform pan (preferably non-stick).
  2. Chill in the fridge for 10 minutes.
• For the filling:
  1. Beat all the ingredients in a bowl with an electric mixer until well combined.
  2. Pour into the cake pan set on a baking sheet making sure to level off the top.
  3. Bake for 50 minutes until golden brown.
  4. The top will be a little wobbly but it will set as it cools. Turn the oven off and leave the oven door open leaving the cheesecake to cool completely inside.
• For the toffee sauce:
  1. Melt the butter gently with the double cream and sugar in a saucepan while continously stirring until the sugar dissolves. Let it gently boil briefly.
• For the topping:
  1. Whip the whipping cream to soft peaks.
  2. Squeeze some lemon juice onto the sliced bananas.
• To assemble:
  1. Put the whipped cream on the cooled cheesecake in a swirling fashion.
  2. Wedge the banana slices in the cream.
  3. Drizzle a little toffee sauce on top and also serve on the side.

This is a great recipe for a dough which can be kept in the freezer. Just slice off what you need and bake for 10-15 minutes until golden at 180 degC.

Ingredients

225g butter
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla essence
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cream of tartar
3 1/2 cups of flour

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs and vanilla. Sift in dry ingredients. Mix well.

Roll into sausages and wrap in glad wrap. Chill and slice.

Bake at 180 degC until golden about 10-15 minutes.

Dough will late in the fridge for 2 weeks, or freeze dough to make it last longer.

I love new ingredients and new tastes.  I get excited when I spot something new at the market or the supermarket and for years I have seen recipes for Israeli Couscous or pearl couscous and the other day I spotted it in the self-service bins at the supermarket.  Bingo, a new taste.

The instructions were pretty clear, a ratio of 2:1 water to couscous, bring water to the boil, add the couscous and simmer for ten minutes.  Well, water does not add much in terms of flavour so I used a vegetable stock cube.  Much better.  This is definitely a keeper.

Ingredients

500 mls of vegetable stock
1 cup of Israeli Couscous
juice of 1 small lemon
tablespoon of olive oil
salt and pepper
1/2 red onion, finely diced
1/3 cucumber finely diced
30 grams of feta crumbled
2 spring onions
1/2 handful chopped black olives
1 tablespoon pinenuts, lightly toasted

Method
Bring the stock to the boil and add the couscous, then reduce to  simmer for 10 minutes.  Remove from the heat and strain.  Place in a bowl and mix in half the lemon juice, all the olive oil, salt and pepper.  Allow to cool stirring frequently.

Add in the remaining ingredients and stir to combine.

As I was talking this to work for lunch, I also made up a vinagrette with the remaining lemon juice, olive oil, rice wine vinegar, couple drops of tobasco sauce, salt and pepper which I added just before serving.  Nom nom nom.

I honestly dont know if I am ever going to be brave enough to try to make this, let alone try and talk the family into sampling it.

Ingredients

6 eggs
300 mls syrup
600 mls cream
90 grams Parmesan Cheese, finely grated

Method

In a saucepan combine the eggs, syrup and cream and bring to a simmer until it begins to thicken.

Add in the Parmesan cheese and stir until combined then pass through a fine sieve.

Churn as per Ice Cream Makers instructions.

This recipe come from The Complete Confectioner or The Whole Art of Confectionary printed circa 1790. It staggers me to see some of the recipes – one cake recipe calls for 54 eggs – and one of the ice dessertscream recipes is Parmesan Ice Cream. 
 

Ingredients

6 eggs
600 mls cream
1 lemon zested
3/4 cup of syrup
pinch each of cinnamon and mace
120 grams blanched pistachio nuts

Method

Break the eggs into a pan and beat them well with a wooden spoon.  Put in a pint of cream and beat well with the eggs.  Add the lemon zest and the syrup, cinnamon and mace and bring to  boil stirring until it becomes thick and comes to a curd.  Remove from the heat.

Pound the blanched pistachios in a mortar until very fine.  Mix it into the custard and cool.  Put it into an icecream maker and churn as per its instructions.

These are a great lunch box filler.  They are nearly fat free, freeze well and are really tasty.  I found them on the recipezaar website here.

Ingredients

It has taken me years to get this recipe out of Margaret my neighbour.
She grows the most amazingly tart organic blackberries in her back
yard. She only gets maybe 10 kilos of berries and she makes the most
fantastic sponges. She very kindly gifted me with a kilo of
blackberries but more importantly she finally handed over the recipe to
go with it.

This is her recipe as she gave it to me:

Beat till creamy
9 tablespoon sugar
9 tablespoon butter

Beat in 1 at a time
3 small eggs or 2 large eggs

Beat well (5 minutes)
Add 1 cup self-raising flour with
1 tablespon milk.
(Add more flour if you think you need it.)

Place on top of hot cooked fruit. Bake at 190 degC for about 40 minutes or thereabouts.

Update:  We made this again and this time I made a few changes.  Firstly the tomato compote; last time I used fresh tomatoes and I just didnt think that the flavour was quite up to spec.  This time I used whole tinned tomatoes which I squeezed the juice and seeds out off into a seive.  This I passed through the seive, collected the juice and reduce in a saucepan by about half.  I added this into the compote following the recipe below after I had put the flesh of the tomatoes in and heated.  This made the tomato compote just sing.  I also strengthed the flavour with the frying which really made it just sing.  So much, in fact that I will make a relish with the compote in future.

Also this time I made the seperate components well in advance.  Two days in advance.  This I stored in the fridge and really allowed the flavours to develop to their fullest.

Another change was that while I doubled the recipe, I changed the meat to be 40% pork chunks, 25% beef mince, and 25% lamb mince.

Heston Blumenthal’s tv show, In Search Of Perfection only recently became part of my viewing selection when the latest season of American Idol finished, so I only saw a few episodes.  There was the steak one, the fish and chips, and the spag bol.

I watched this episode about three times over a few weeks to make sure I truly understood some of the principals at work but as they say, watching is not the same as doing.  So I set out to do.

What started out as a meal intended to make the best of a bottle of wine I had been given, a Rockburn Pinot Noir 2006, for 3 people, became a marathon effort for 10 so required some juggling.  Also it took two days as half the guests suddenly could not come.  But the pause did not seem to hurt the sauce.

As you will see, there are 4 steps to the process.  First there is the onions which is pretty easy.  And yes, these do brown up best in a stainless steel saucepan.  Then comes the soffrito.  The carrots, onions and celery.  If you are doubling the recipe than I suggest you cook these in two batches otherwise they will not brown, but rather just sort of stew in their own juices.  I also recommend a very small dice to help the process along. Browning the meat is next and again, hot pan, and if doubling, brown in batches.  Finally comes the tomato compote.

I skipped the “frying” stage, and sorely wished that I had not.  The compote just did not seem to punch above its weight and I ended up dumping in loads of tomato paste to bulk up the flavour.  Also the tomatoes I used seemed to lack any flavour so depending on the tomatoes I can find next time I might follow my gut instinct and used tinned.  If I do used tinned tomatoes then I will try and remove the seeds because then can turn bitter.  I will also drain off a lot of the juice and try to reduce that down in a saucepan.

The whole experience was worth the effort.  There were several comments of “Like nothing I have ever had before,” and that was the point.  It really glammed up a traditional average dish with little in the way of expectations.

Oh and there are no photos because I just plain forgot.

Ingredients

For the sauce base:

125ml extra virgin olive oil
250 gram boned and minced oxtail
250 grams pork shoulder, in 1cm cubes
375 ml oaked chardonnay
1 star anise
2 large onions (about 450 grams), finely sliced
2 large cloves of garlic
2 large onions (about 450 grams), finely diced
3 large carrots (about 400 grams), finely diced
3 celery stalks (about 125 grams), finely diced
250 mls whole milk

For the tomato compote:

975 grams ripe tomatoes
1 teaspoon salt
200 mls extra virgin olive oil
3 large cloves of garlic
1 large onion (about 225 grams), finely diced
1 heaped teaspoon coriander seeds
1 star anise
3 cloves
4-5 drops of tobasco
4-5 drops of Thai fish sauce
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 heaped tablespoon tomato ketchup
30 mls sherry vinegar
1 bouquet garni (consisting of 7 sprigs of fresh thyme and 1 fresh bay leaf)

To finish the spagetti Bolognese

1 batch of tomato compote
100 grams of good spagetti per person
sherry vinegar to taste
Parmesan cheese
1 bouquet garni ( in a sheet of leek wrap 6 tarragon leaves, 4 sprigs of parsley and the leaves from the top of a bunch of celery)
unsalted butter
extra virgin olive oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Preparing the sauce base

1. Place a large, heavy-bottomed frying pan over a medium heat for 5 minutes. Crush the star anise and bag it up in a square of muslin. Add this to the pan, along with 25ml oil and the sliced onions. Cook for 20 minutes, or until the onions are soft and caramelised, stirring occasionally. Set aside.

2.  Meanwhile, preheat another large, heavybottomed frying pan over a low heat for 5 minutes. Mince the garlic. Pour 50ml oil into the pan, then tip in the garlic, onions, carrots and celery and cook this soffritto over a medium- low heat for about 20 minutes, or until the raw onion smell has gone. Transfer the soffritto to a bowl and wipe clean the pan.

3.  Place the pan over a high heat for 10 minutes. Pour in 50ml olive oil and wait until it starts smoking: it must be hot enough so the meat browns rather than stews. Add the cubed pork and the minced oxtail. Stir until browned all over. (To brown properly, all the meat has to touch the surface of the pan. If it doesn’t, do it in batches.) Tip the browned meat into a sieve over a bowl (to allow the fat to drain off), then transfer the meat to a large pot or casserole. Deglaze the pan by adding a splash of wine, bringing it to the boil, and then scraping the base of the pan to collect all the tasty bits stuck to the bottom. Once the liquid has reduced by half, pour it into the large pot containing the meat.

4.  Remove the bag of star anise from the caramelised onions and then tip the onions into the large pot containing the meat. Add the remaining wine and deglaze the frying pan (as in step 3). When the wine has reduced by half, pour it into the large pot. Add the soffritto to the pot as well.

5.  Place the pot of Bolognese over a very low heat. Pour in the milk and enough water to cover entirely, and simmer very gently without a lid for 6 hours, stirring occasionally. At all times the ingredients should be covered by the liquid, so be prepared to add more water. (Don’t worry if the milk becomes slightly granular: it won’t affect the end result.)

Preparing the tomato compote

1.  Bring a large pan of water to the boil. Fill a large bowl with ice-cold water. Remove the cores from the tomatoes with a paring knife. Blanch the tomatoes by dropping them into the boiling water for 10 seconds and then carefully removing them to the bowl of ice-cold water. Take them out of the water immediately and peel off the split skins. (If the tomatoes are not ripe enough, make a cross with a sharp knife in the underside of each, to encourage the skins to come away. They can be left in the hot water for an extra 10 seconds or so, but it’s important that they don’t overheat and begin to cook.)

2.  Cut the tomatoes in half vertically. Scoop out the seeds and the membrane with a teaspoon, over a chopping board. Roughly chop the seeds and membrane, then tip them into a sieve over a bowl. Sprinkle over the salt and leave for 20 minutes to extract their juice, after which you can discard the seeds and membrane, reserving only the juice. 3. Roughly chop the tomato flesh and set aside.

4.  Meanwhile, place a large, heavy-bottomed pan over a low heat. Add 100ml of the olive oil. Mince the garlic, then put it into the pan along with the onion. Cook for 10–15 minutes, until soft but not coloured.

5.  Crush the coriander and put it in a muslin bag, along with the star anise and the cloves. Add it to the softened onions and garlic.

6. Take the juice drawn from the tomato seeds and membrane and add it to the onions and garlic along with the tomato flesh.

7.  Add the Tabasco, fish sauce, Worcestershire sauce, tomato ketchup and sherry vinegar. Drop in the bouquet garni and cook over a low heat for 2 hours.

8. To add a roasted note to the compote, add the remaining oil and turn up the heat to high. Fry the compote for 15–20 minutes, stirring regularly to make sure it doesn’t catch, then pour off any olive oil not absorbed by the compote. Set aside a little to coat the cooked pasta. ( The rest can be stored in a jar and makes a great base for a salad dressing. The compote itself will keep in the fridge for a week.)

Cooking the Spagetti Bolognese

1.  Stir the tomato compote (including the bag of spices) into the Bolognese sauce and cook over a very low heat for a final 2 hours, stirring occasionally.

2. Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil for the pasta. For every 100g of pasta, you’ll need 1 litre of water and 10g salt. (If you don’t have a large enough pan it’s essential to use two pans rather than overcrowd one.)

3.  Put the spaghetti into the pan, give it a stir, then bring back to the boil and cook until the pasta is just tender but with a bite. Check the cooking time on the packet and use that as a guideline, but taste it every few minutes as this is the only way to judge when the pasta is ready.

4.  Before taking the Bolognese sauce off the heat, check the seasoning and then add some sherry vinegar (tasting as you go) to balance the richness of the sauce. Add a generous grating of Parmesan (but not too much, as it can make the sauce overly salty) and remove the sauce from the heat. Take out the original thyme and bay bouquet garni and the bag of spices. Replace these with the parsley and tarragon bouquet garni, stir in 100g of unsalted butter and let the sauce stand for 5 minutes.

5.  Once the pasta is cooked, drain, and rinse it thoroughly with hot water. Return to the pot to warm through. (Since the ragù is not going to be mixed with the pasta, it needs to be rinsed to prevent it becoming starchy and sticking together.) Add a generous knob of butter (about 50g per 400g of pasta) and coat with olive oil and the reserved oil from the final frying of the compote. To serve, wind portions of pasta around a carving fork and lay them horizontally in wide, shallow bowls. Top with the Bolognese sauce and finish with a grating of Parmesan.