Changing seasons of the farmer’s market
Desperately clinging on to the bearable weather here in Dubai, KP and I went for a late breakfast on the terrace of Baker & Spice in Souk Al Bahar. The food was excellent and the setting strangely tranquil considering you are just across the water from the tallest building in the world. 
We enjoyed it so much we went back a week later and even though the car temperature guage read 44C at 10am as we made our way down the highway we left the air conditioning and braved it outside (we were not alone). We ordered shakshuka both times. This Tunisian dish of tomatoes, peppers and spice (cumin in the B&S version I think) with lightly set eggs poached on top comes in a frying pan fresh out of the oven and just begs for some crusty bread to dip into it.
The tranquility outside is because everyone has suddenly gone inside, including the farmer’s market which is less bustling and a bit smaller. I bought a Bokashi bin there but saved my organic vegetable shopping until over the road at Dukkan Al Manzil where they also sell organic produce outside the other Baker & Spice branch.
So where can you get fresh, local organic vegetables in these last few weeks of the growing season in the U.A.E.? Mazaraa, the organic farmer from Abu Dhabi, has halted its deliveries to Dubai, apart from the Souk al Bahar market, until after the summer. Curiously and of great interest, a new organic delivery service and market has launched called Bumble Box with the first event this Saturday (21st). Am I going? You bet!
Who could have predicted that we would have a choice of local, organic produce when the Nazwa Farm Shop closed last year?
My shopping basket was a joy to behold on both weeks and also included bread from Baker & Spice and some organic free range eggs that tasted great. I’ve poached them Turkish style, and made my own version of shakshuka (with @boozychef’s home-grown pepper).
Baker & Spice – Souk Al Bahar Tel +971 4 4252240 and Dukkan Al Manzil Tel +971 4 4279856
Farmer’s Market – Souk Al Bahar – Fridays 9am – 1pm, located by Urbana Cafe (at the end of the last alleyway on the right hand side as you walk from the car park towards Baker & Spice).
Manzaraa – Download location map and details here Tel +971 2 4479933
Bumble Box – Box delivery service plus market at the Dubai Garden Centre on Tuesday and Saturday from 9:30am (starts 21.05.11) info@bumble-box.com
If you like local markets (wherever you live in the world) you might like a lovely new website called Exotic Markets. You can submit photos of markets you’ve visited too.
Luscious lobster – Come Dine With Me Dubai (part 1)
Imagine inviting people for lunch who then snoop round your home, critique each course and vote on it at the end. Imagine that the guests are all food bloggers. Sounds like your worst nightmare? Why did I volunteer to submit myself to this excoriating challenge? The chance to eat four fantastic lunches prepared by some of the most talented and enthusiastic cooks, of course. For that I’m prepared to put up with a little torture myself. Don’t get me wrong, I love cooking for a bunch of friends – but this audience is seriously discerning.
Who is this exalted company (I’ll use initials so you know who I’m talking about)?
Anja’s Food for thought – Personal food journal and cookbook exploring new ways of healthy eating, “healthy” being based on mostly natural ingredients. If you think healthy means boring think again (especially with Anja’s gorgeous pics). A
Sips and Spoonfuls – Desserts dominate this beautiful blog with exquisite photography. She’s a perfectionist! S
The Hedonista – What doesn’t she know about food and wine? All expressed in way that makes me think and often laugh out loud. H
Jonathan Castle – Food, wine and whisky are just three passions. Fast cars and travel also tick JC’s boxes. J
Much was revealed at this lunch including the amazing marathon-running goals A has set herself; J‘s previous appearance on Masterchef (in the days of Lloyd Grossman) – wow!; that this was S‘s first ever Western style meal at someone’s house; and that most of the table list watch Come Dine With Me regularly as a guilty pleasure. A confessed she had been having nightmare-style dreams “You guys didn’t like my steamed unsalted plain broccoli for a starter and sneaked into my kitchen to eat my chocolate because you were so hungry…….”
J looked bemused as we whipped out our cameras (he hasn’t hung out with a gaggle of food bloggers before).
My teens had sent me off with strict instructions to rifle through H‘s shoe cupboard in the manner of the TV version of Come Dine With Me. I was immediately seduced by her light airy villa, gorgeous table setting and warm welcome so felt I couldn’t possibly betray any secrets of my hostess…could I?!
We’d submitted our menus in advance to S (the only rule being no pork or alcohol in the food). H‘s menu:
- Starter- Salmon Carpaccio
- Main- BBQ lobster with Tarragon and Mustard
- Dessert- Sticky Date Pudding with mascarpone cream (see recipe here on H’s site)
H‘s salmon carpaccio had been replaced by tuna as she hadn’t found salmon fresh enough and was appalled to learn that the Tasmanian wild salmon sold in Carrefour was fresh (i.e. had been on a 14 hour plane journey) not frozen. As fish starts to deteriorate the minute it leaves the water you need to consume within hours or freeze immediately.
Doesn’t this look divine? A lemongrass dressing and a salad of endive, radish and green mango was the perfect foil for this silky rectangle of tuna.
We all made little cooing noises as the next plate appeared but a few, including me, were a bit tentative about how to tackle the beautiful Omani lobster. When curiosity about food unites nothing is taboo so we felt at ease asking for advice (which you wouldn’t if at dinner or a restaurant). We probed the inside of the shell with our knives as instructed and revealed fronds of tarragon lining the curve of the shell imparting a subtle but relevant flavour to the sweet white lobster flesh. It came with lemon risotto and mustard greens.
Sticky date pudding ended the lunch and a ‘proper’ cafe latte. I’ll just let the pictures do the talking here (and the scraped clean plates).
We drank iced lemon and ginger fizz, sparkling date drink and Wither Hills Sauvignon Blanc. S asked and we tried to explain the taste and appeal of alcohol – I don’t think she was convinced!
Overall verdict? The bar has been set super-high. I would eat the whole menu again – today. H was disappointed by her risotto (al dente but not creamy) which perhaps was the only flaw, but grilling lobster to perfection and producing risotto at the same time was a real challenge.
S throws down the gauntlet next week and I’m looking forward to it already. Tweet with us via #comedinewithmedxb
No, no, no – I couldn’t possibly reveal any secrets. What? Oh alright then. Just don’t tell H.
Spotted! A kitsch fish tank and baskets of shoes to rifle through
Hooray the mangoes have arrived
“even these mosquito bites will look like juicy, juicy mangoes”
One of my favourite lines from the film Bend it like Beckham (uttered by the dressmaker and directed at flat chested Jess who is being measured for a bridesmaid dress).
It’s juicy, juicy Alphonso mango season in India and Pakistan (both nationalities will tell you theirs are the best) and they are available in our Dubai shops either individually or in crates for 10 dirhams a kilo or less (that’s less than £2 /3 US$). Having bowlfuls of this exotic fruit in my house makes me think I’m in a Paul Gauguin painting (not topless I hasten to add).
These mangoes look like a Gauguin painting to me
Choosing a good mango is easy. Look for a firm, smooth, unbruised skin where the colour is more gold than green. Cup the mango gently in your hands and inhale. The honeyed, exotic scent will make you want to keep smelling it, but resist and get down to the business of eating. You can wait until they go completely orange but I like a little bit of tanginess in the taste to offset the nectar-like sweetness.
Now you could make a mango trifle or pavlova, a fruit salad with blueberries or even a mango smoothie – but my favourite way is to cut off the cheeks, criss cross the flesh, turn each half inside out, squeeze on some fresh lime juice and eat with a teaspoon. Less a recipe more a way of life. Really sorry if it isn’t mango season where you live (but believe me I envy you asparagus eaters).
Cut, carve, flip, douse in lime and eat (remember to wipe your chin)
Not wanting to gild the lily too much I offer you this simple pud – again more of an idea than a recipe.
Grilled mango with margarita cream (oh yes – this recipe again because it’s so divine)
1, Cut the cheeks off the mango with a sharp knife following closely to each side of the stone. You can take the peel off the stone portion and nibble the sweet flesh – a cook’s perk. You will have to floss afterwards but it’ll be worth it. You know that saying the nearer the bone the sweeter the meat? Well this applies to mango flesh and stones too.
2. Brush the surface of the mango with a little lime juice. Heat a griddle pan until very hot and place the mango piece, flesh-side down, onto the pan. Leave for about 3 minutes until the flesh in warm and slightly caramalised in the places the bars of the griddle touched it.
3. Place on a plate with a dollop of magarita cream with a little more lime juice added than normal (taste to check the flavour).
There are loads more ideas for produce in season now collected by my new favourite foodie Ren on Fabulicious Food. What’s seasonal in your part of the world right now and what do you look forward to coming available most?
Eating out in Istanbul
Bitterly cold weather, hundreds of well-fed cats (and dogs) roaming the streets and a profusion of tulips. I was prepared for none of these things when I escaped for a weekend in Istanbul with a group of girl friends at the start of May. But I was prepared for eating some fantastic food. Choosing where to eat was out of my hands as one of the group arranged everything (she’d lived in Turkey). All I had to do was point my feet in the right direction and turn up in a series of stunning locations.
In the car from the airport we looked with consternation at the heavy coats people were wearing out on the streets and true enough we all wrapped up in every layer we had to venture out into the city. It was a shock after Dubai but a novelty too. Our first stop was Alaturka where Eveline Zoutendijk (who is Dutch) has a beautiful Turkish restaurant and cooking school. The scents were wonderful in this cosy but bright little place but fully booked so she directed us to Balikci Sabahattin tucked away at the end of some tumble-down wooden houses by the railway line. There were pumpkins outside, and lemons inside and at one point a couple of sheep wandered through. We sat in the bright conservatory and ate the freshest, flakiest white sea bass, simply cooked served with bread and salads and a vegetable which was a bit like samphire. Our first encounter with Turkish wine was surprisingly OK – no prize winners but drinkable. What a great start to our trip.
Cooking Alaturka, Akbiyik Caddesi 72a, Sultanahmet Tel: (+90) 212 458 59 19
Balikci Sabahattin (+90) 212 458 18 24
For the evening we hopped on the tram from Sultanahmet to Kabatas and took a taxi to Ortakoy. Food stands and other interesting stalls lined the streets down to the waterside. We reached Banyan down a narrow street, climbed some stairs to be greeted by a huge open log burning fire and a glass-sided, open-ended dream of a restaurant. With views extending right along the Bosphorus and down onto the Ortakoy mosque quite honestly they could have served us anything. It was an Asian fusion menu and while not extremely spicy the sharing platter of satay, dumplings, samosas and tempura shrimp was the perfect partner for our fresh pomegranate martinis. Green chicken curry, Singapore noodles and more fabulous sea bass followed but our lengthy stay watching the lights change colour over the bridge and mosque from possibly the coolest bar in the world make this a little hazy.
Ortakoy Banyan Restaurant Muallim Naci Cad.Salhane Sk. No 3 Tel: (212) 259 90 60 70
The Grand Bazaar of over 5000 shops is a retail challenge which was well-met by the Olympic-standard shoppers in our group who spent hours haggling over carpets, pots, trays, bags, jewellery and leather jackets. As the shops shut for midday prayer we found a table in front of the entrance to Havuzlu by a little marble fountain. You order by pointing to trays at a counter inside (among other enthusiastic and jostling diners) while the chefs empty and rearrange the dishes at lightening speed. Somehow we made our choices and were brought a selection. Dish of the day was lamb in a lightly spiced orange sauce with hazelnuts, dried apricots and figs served with that Turkish speciality that KP is so fond of – creamy, smooth mashed potato. A lamb cutlet wrapped in grilled aubergine topped with a white slightly cheesey sauce was meltingly good too. The kebab was grilled meat doused in a tomato sauce with chips on top. An aubergine salad similar to mutabal but more creamy and without tahini was refreshingly good and the simple tomato and cucumber salad was doused in just the right amount of seasoning and lemon juice. Straightforward Turkish food at its best.
Havuzlu Tel: (+90) 212 527 33 46
More shopping via the spice souk, a wander over the bridge and up the steep lanes to the Galata Tower, a few drinks in a bar overlooking the square with picturesque ancient trams gliding in and out and we had worked up an appetite for dinner. Sadly my camera battery had died by the time we reached Leb-i Derya in the Richmond Hotel so I’ll just have to describe yet another stunning view of the Bosphorus. The sun was just setting casting a pink rosy glow over the matchbox houses to the left. The water stretched out ahead, deep blue, with the coast curving round to the right displaying another huge and grand mosque (not really sure which one). The interior is pared down, smart and elegant with an air of being the place to hang out. The food was perhaps slightly overcomplicated. Our mixed sharing starters included a superb fava bean dip and one of smashed chickpeas both very moreish. But the main courses tried too hard. My sea bass fillet with chard came with the former wrapped in the latter in beehive shapes. However the service was excellent, the Turkish wine flowed once more and we wandered home, through the thronging streets of Taksim, replete and very happy.
Leb-i Derya Richmond Tel: (+) 90 212 252 54 60
The shopping hounds and culture hounds split up the next day. I’m the latter and with the sun shining and temperatures rising spent a really fascinating day seeing the Hagia Sophia, Cistern, Topkapi Palace and Blue Mosque. Our guide took us to a restaurant where people were queuing outside but after she had a quick exchange with the doorman and some people left we were herded in and up a flight of narrow stairs, and another, and another. The staff had walkie talkies to keep the place running like clockwork. There was a menu but the place was full of Turkish families and they were all eating the same – which we ordered too – kofta with rice, salad and spicy pepper sauce. We ordered helwa to finish. It’s not a bit like halva more like a solid, grainy, set milk pudding sweetened with honey. It was pretty bland but strangely addictive. Strangely they serve no hot drinks.
Tarihi Sultanahmet Köftescisi – Tel: (+90) 212 520 06 66
We walked down to Eminönü, for our coffee and sat at a cafe in the sunshine at the back of the spice souk and new mosque (actually building commenced in 1597) a fabulous vantage point for riveting people watching (including the purchasing of leeches for medicinal purposes – eeuw!).
Stopping on our way back up the hill for a freshly squeezed pomegranate juice we looked up and saw that the highest rooftop restaurant was at our own hotel which had opened up the top floor due to the sunshine. Once installed at the Seven Hills Hotel with a cold beer we watched the sun descend over the Hagia Sophia, Blue Mosque and the Bosphorus. The light changed every minute making it more and more beautiful (see first picture). Fireworks appeared over the water as if they were put on solely for our entertainment.
I ask for some succulent-looking white fish cooked on the bone and which I saw the waiter serve earlier and carefully fillet – and some big chips. We get talked into a mixed fish plate – it isn’t that great but the chips are very good. The waiter knows he’s sold us a dud and goes from friendly and charming to ellusive. The temperature dips and we are offered blankets – the food is irrelevant as we savour this fantastic viewpoint and we are nearly the last to leave the rooftop.
In the morning we order menemen – a dish of fresh tomatoes, mild green chillies, spring onions and scrambled eggs, sizzling in a clay dish fresh from the oven. The mediocre food of the night before is forgiven as we look over the sparkling Bosphorus. The hotel has been a good choice for service, comfort, cleanliness and, above all, location.
Other edible notes from Istanbul
The thing I wish I had bought – a dolmades machine.
All ice-cream sellers where the same costume and constantly dig at the ice-cream with a big rod.
We didn’t find the source of the best Turkish Delight. It certainly wasn’t in the spice souk – beware.
We travelled Fly Dubai from Dubai to Istanbul. With a four-hour flight time and one hour time difference it was easily done in a long-weekend and on a low t0 medium budget (excluding retail therapy).
Custard – a tale of unrequited love.
A match made in heaven?
I’ve got to get this out in the open, you may have suspected this but I cannot hide my feelings any longer. I am hopelessly in love with custard. It started as a childish crush, innocently measuring the powder out from a Bird’s sachet, combining it with sugar and a little milk until it turned into a bright orange paste to mix with hot milk. Its yellow skin caught my eye, but also my sister’s and we battled over its affections until my Mother drew a rota on the dining-room wall (yes, actually on the wallpaper). I realise that ‘custard-skin-haters’ might stop reading at this point.
My tastes matured but it was love at first bite in all its guises, from a nutmeg sprinkled custard tart glimpsed in the baker’s window to a light, primrose cream hiding under a caramel shell of a crème brûlée.
But how to make this relationship last? How to capture it and make it my own happy ever after fairy tale? Custard is so tricky, gets bored and is thin company, take your eye off it and it splits, gets the hump and goes lumpy. I’ve watched with envy with other people – take my Mother-in-Law for instance, six free-range local egg yolks and farmhouse cream transformed to divine perfection in the microwave, no less. Perhaps my love-struck nerves get the better of me – tragically, custard eludes me in my own kitchen.
perseverance has been my middle name – in the wake of many heart-rending break-ups. This time I turned to a cheeky mockney for advice (shielding my eyes from the dubious ‘Naked’ undertones) and he introduced me to Portuguese custard tarts. Would packet puff pastry sprinkled with cinnamon and an ‘aggressive’ method in the saucepan yield success? Alas the pastry mantle was too thin, and the eggs, cream and vanilla transformed not into thick, unctuous creaminess but bland lumpiness. A whizz in the blender and the addition of a splash of orange-flower water patched it up temporarily but the union with the pastry was not a happy one. The whole date was an ‘epic fail’.
So what now? Do I try a new improved quick version from the aforesaid matchmaker or flirt with alternatives?
“The path of true love never did run smooth.” Will I ever achieve my Midsummer night’s custard dream or be doomed eternally to milk-pudding nightmares? Stay tuned for the next installment…
Street party daydreams and margarita creams
We sat outside in the garden the other night with friends visiting from the UK. They were in search of some sun over the Easter holidays while we were yearning for some fresh breezes and Spring flowers. The weather is in a ‘changeover’ period (from balmy to searing) and even though there was a small shower of rain we were all too hot because of the humidity and went inside for our pudding.
The alarm wakes me earlier to take the dogs out at a cooler time. The streets are empty, the exotic flowers are at their peak of bloom and seem to glow – almost vibrating colour.
I’m lucky to be off to my first ever trip to Turkey – a long weekend in Istanbul with some girlfriends. I will be packing a jumper…and maybe an umbrella. The only thing I’m going to miss is the Royal wedding. I’m not an ardent Royalist (although I wouldn’t support abolition of the Monarchy) but it sounded like a great excuse for a party. I had already planned the bunting, decorations and, of course, the menu in my head.
Cucumber sandwiches
Blue tortilla chips with blue cheese dip
Fairy cakes
Trifle
Big bowls of strawberries
Flourless lime cake with Margarita creams
Are you seeing a bit of a theme here? Red, white and blue….
Table crystals - bling Lawson style
I’ll be able to catch up on the Street party spirit over at Maison Cupcake Forever Nigella ‘Street Party’ and can’t wait to 
see the Nigella inspired goodies everyone comes up with. Eat, Live, Travel, Write, set the scene with style.
Pop over here for the Flourless lime cake with Margarita creams recipe. Was I wrong to let my teens eat dessert containing tequila (they are sublime)?
Let me know if you party on Friday – royal, street or otherwise.
Dessert roses for the bride
Market shopping and a tart
Food shopping at a market is different from the supermarket kind. When I usually set off for the shops I’m clutching a list and have a few recipes for meals in mind. When you enter a market, the produce leads the way.
I met up with a group of friends (who also all happen to be food bloggers) at the Souk al Bahar famer’s market recently. We based ourselves in Baker & Spice, tucked into their fabulous range of pastries (no photo of my almond croissant as I ate it so quickly) and had a session of swapping photography knowledge. Then we made forays out in to the market which was in full swing outside. It’s not a big market but the producers are enthusiastic and the choice and variety fresher and more unique than anything you can find in the shops here.
The time flew by and we all learnt a huge amount from each other. Baker & Spice were really welcoming to our group as we stuck our lenses into their gorgeous food and the manager kindly picked up the bill.
Mucking about with my camera in B&S
My basket from the market included deep purple shiny peppers, slender baby leeks, Greek and Genovese basil, aubergines, stripy beef tomatoes and tiny cherry tomatoes and a punnet of mulberries which tasted of honey and lychees. The free-range chicken sold out before I could buy one (you choose them live). The produce is very reasonably priced and super fresh. There are only a few weeks left before the market closes for the season.
So what did I do with my lovely goodies? The mulberries were nearly all eaten on the way home. Leeks made a beautiful gratin (with toasted cheese sauce), the tomatoes were stuffed, as were most of the peppers and the remainder turned into this tart with the aubergines and cherry tomatoes.
The Art of the Tart by Tamasin Day Lewis is the cookery book I turn to most often. There is something so satisfying about buttery pastry often filled with a sweet or savoury custard and other glorious flavours. But Ottolenghi’s Plenty was my inspiration this time adapting the ingredients to my shopping basket and cupboard.
I’m sending this over to Cook Sister who is hosting this month’s Mingle themed ‘Topless Tarts’ (brainchild of Meeta of What’s for lunch, Honey?) You can see everyone else’s tarts here.
Roasted vegetable tart – recipe adapted from Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty
Ingredients
2 purple peppers (or whatever colour you have)
2 large red chilli peppers (mild)
Olive oil
1/2 butternut squash, diced
1 aubergine, diced
1 small courgette, diced
2 medium onions, thinly sliced
2 bay leaves
300g shortcrust pastry (I made this with 300g plain flour, 1/2 teaspoon salt and 160g butter)
8 thyme sprigs picked
120g ricotta
120g feta
7 cherry tomatoes, halved
2 eggs
200ml double cream
Salt and black pepper
Preheat oven to 230C .
Remove the stalk and seeds of the large peppers and place on a ovenproof dish or baking tray. Pierce the chilli peppers and add to the dish. Drizzle with olive oil, salt, pepper and place it in the oven.
Mix diced aubergine with 4 tablespoons of olive oil, salt pepper. Bake in oven
After about 12 minutes, add the diced butternut squash to the aubergine tin and roast for a further 10 minutes. At this point the peppers should be brown and remainder of vegetables cooked. Reduce the oven to 160C.
Whilst the vegetables are roasting, heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a frying pan on medium heat. Saute the onions with bay leaves for 25 minutes until they turn brown and soft. Remove from heat and discard bay leaves.
Lightly grease a tart tin or baking dish. Roll out the pastry to 3mm and line the tin leaving some hanging over the rim. Line the pastry case with baking parchment and fill with baking beads before blind baking for 30 minutes. Remove the beads, and bake for a further 10 minutes.
Spread the onion on the bottom of the pastry and top with roasted vegetables (with the peppers cut into pieces and the chilli peppers seeds removed) and thyme leaves. Scatter chunks of both cheeses and then tomato halves cut-side up.
Whisk the eggs and cream together in a bowl with salt and pepper and carefully and evenly pour this mixture into the case. Bake for 35-50 minutes until the filling sets and rest for 10 minutes before serving. When slightly cool, cut the overhanging pastry level with the top of the tin.
Braun Multiquick giveaway – I wrote all the names of people who commented on a piece of paper and added duplicates for Tweets and Facebook comments. Then I closed my eyes and pulled one out of the bag. I am delighted to announce that the winner of the Braun Multiquick is Grace. Congratulations Grace – I hope you enjoy your new and useful gadget.
Hot cross buns and hot choc buns
I love a good hot cross bun and I think this is shared by a lot of people in England as they seem to be in on sale the shops permanently when I visit the UK. This is a shame, as like seasonal fruit and vegetables, the anticipation is part of the treat. However, I am guilty of tucking in out of season, but to atone for this and with Easter coming up (and Sarah from Simply Cooked setting them as the Fresh From the Oven baking challenge) I set about making some.
Who knew that Hot Cross buns were so simple to make? They turned out soft, with a firm crumb, the blandness of the slightly sweet dough dotted with fruit and spice and layered with an unctuous, sticky glaze. They froze really well too, which was essential as no-one in our house likes dried fruit (except me). What a shame that my family wouldn’t be sharing my bun indulgence. A quick Google later and I found the ideal recipe for them – a dark chocolate bun with chocolate chips, aromatic with spice and orange glaze but sans raisins. They went down a storm. The recipe is here and was a doddle using a dough hook on my KitchenAid.
For the traditional version, I didn’t use Sarah’s original recipe exactly as it made 24 (which I knew I would eat single-handedly) and I wasn’t up to converting it. I also fancied a traditional pastry cross and a glossy glaze that I’d seen in my Baker & Spice book. I made my pastry a bit stiff for piping so they are not the most delicate but they tasted great.
Happy Easter to you if you are celebrating. If not it’s worth taking the plunge with these buns. You can see how everyone else got on at the end of the month on Fresh From the Oven. (Sorry FFTO crew, mine is early, but Belleau Kitchen, then Things We Make were rebels and I couldn’t wait!)
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- Hot choc buns just out of the oven
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- Hot cross buns
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- Hot cross buns
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- Choc buns ready for the oven
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- Hot choc bun dough
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- Freeze some for later (if there are any left)
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- Hot choc bun
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- Adding spice and orange zest
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- The orange and spice is lovely for both sorts of bun
Hot Cross Buns (adapted from River Cottage Handbook – Bread by Daniel Stevens)
Makes 8
Ingredients
250g strong white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
250g plain white flour
125ml warm water
125 warm milk
5g fast-action dried yeast
10g salt
50g caster sugar
1 medium free-range egg
50g butter
100g sultanas and currants (or a mixture of dried fruit)
1 dried apricot, cut into small pieces
finely grated zest of half an orange
1 tsp ground mixed spice
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
pinch allspice
For the crosses:
1tbsp sunflower oil
2-3tbsp water (or enough to make the dough into piping consistency)
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon milk
100g caster sugar
50 ml orange juice
You can do this by hand but the dough will be sticky so I recommend using a food processor or free-standing mixer with a dough hook. Warm the water, milk and butter together very gently until the butter melts and when it has cooled to blood temperature (feels barely warm when you stick your finger in it) mix in the yeast and leave for 5 minutes. Combine the flours, milk yeast mixture, salt and sugar in a bowl and fit the dough hook. Add the egg and mix to a sticky dough. Now add the dried fruit, orange zest and spice and knead on a low-speed until silky and smooth.
Cover the dough and leave to rise for about an hour, or until doubled in size.
Knock back the dough and divide into 8 equal pieces. Shape into rounds and dust with flour. Place on a floured board and leave to prove, covered with a linen tea towel (or in a large plastic bag) for about 30 minutes until doubled in size.
Preheat the oven to 200°C and make the paste for the crosses by beating the water and oil into the flour until smooth . Transfer the paste into a piping bag with a small nozzle. Beat the egg and milk together.
Make a cross with a sharp knife across the top of the buns. Brush with the egg wash and then pipe crosses onto the indentation and bake for 15–20 minutes.
Transfer to a wire rack. Dissolve the sugar in the orange juice in a small saucepan and bring to the boil. Brush the glaze over the buns. Cool to room temperature before pulling apart and eating plain or halved with butter.
Stirred not shaken – lamb burgers with mint
Fortune tellers, tarot card readers, horoscopes – I wish that just for fun I could believe they offer a grain of truth, but I just don’t get it. Same could be said about ordering a burger in a restaurant. Don’t get me wrong, I like burgers. I’ve been through that stage of life of staggering into a burger joint late at night with alcohol fuelled hunger (this was in the days that John Gummer was feeding his daughter hamburgers in front of the media). I do wonder occasionally whether I have become a mad cow…but I digress. I like to eat burgers fresh from the barbecue or cast iron griddle and preferably when no one is watching to see the mayonnaise and gherkins slide down my chin.
I was invited the opening ceremony of a new burger joint, heavy on nostalgia. It sounded like fun.
The concept was based road side burger stand – something remembered fondly by many Americans by all accounts. As a Brit it seems like an equivalent affection for the kebab van on a Saturday night but I even found one stand in Hollywood given landmark status to stop it from closing.
The staff were super-friendly, the welcome warm, and around me, lots of diners, many of whom had queued to eat this food in the US, were in heaven. But I was a bit mystified by it all.
We live in a culture of supply and demand and who can blame businesses for supplying food that people will queue up for. But it’s still ‘fast food’ and my burger and fries contained 1879 mg of sodium (the RDI in the US is 2400 mg and 1600 mg in the UK).
The UAE has one of the biggest obesity and diabetes issues in the world. Why celebrate someone else’s cultural nostalgia when there is so much fantastic and healthy Middle Eastern food to draw from? Wild Peeta has shown how it can be done, but why aren’t there more imitators of this sort of concept?
So I’m campaigning for the kofta! I have no way to prove that this lamb burger is better for you than the ones served up in a burger joint, but replacing cheese with home-made hummus, using fresh mint and tomatoes from my garden, with olive oil, makes sense to me. No one can stare when I’ve got crumbs on my chin either.
Lamb burgers with hummus and mint (adapted from a recipe by Alistair Hendy in Home Cook)
Makes 6 large or 12 small burgers
Ingredients
1 tablespoon cumin seeds
1 tablespoon sesame seeds
1 tablespoon sea salt
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
500g lamb mince
1-2 teaspoons dried red chilli, crushed
black pepper
1 bunch of mint
pitta or arabic bread
approx 150g hummus
1 lemon
olive oil
Toast the cumin and sesame seeds in a non-stick or cast iron frying pan (dry-fry them) until then start to turn golden. Mix them with the sea salt (you’ll have much more than you need for this recipe).
Fry the onion and garlic with 2 teaspoons of the salt mixture in a little olive oil until the onion is soft and transparent. Mix this with the lamb, about a third of the mint, finely chopped, the dried chilli and some black pepper.
Shape the lamb mixture into burgers. If you don’t want your burgers slightly pink make into 8 smaller rounds (more like kofta). Brush with some oil and fry in a pan or grill on a barbecue until dark brown on the outside and cooked to your liking in the middle. 2 minutes each side, especially with the larger sizes, will give you pink lamb.
Warm the bread, split open, spoon in the hummus generously, stuff with the mint leaves and lastly the burgers sprinkled with a little extra seed salt and a squeeze of lemon. A grilled slice of aubergine is also a great addition.
Love to hear your thoughts about this one.
Kitchen kit part 2: My favourite soup (and a great giveaway)
Our tomato harvest is the best ever this year. Just before I left the UK in early September, my bargain hunting Mother took me to the local garden centre where they’d reduced all their packets of seeds to just 50 pence each (3 AED). I brought back packets and packets. Our favourite have been the very nobbly ones that remind me of ones I ate in Spain (20 years ag0) – they knocked the spots off the perfect round tasteless spheres from Holland. We’ve had to start picking them early and leaving them to ripen on an outside table as the birds are attacking them with a vengeance. This seems to work better than using plastic snakes like the dxb gardener.
Our bounty is still quality rather than quantity (unlike boozychef’s haul) but luckily local tomatoes in the supermarket are now red and ripe and I had an urgent craving for my very favourite soup. I think that you crave things for a reason and should indulge (although if it’s for chocolate you should go for a brisk walk to get the happy hormones flowing) and maybe I needed some vitamin C or just a chilli fix. To get soup just the right texture a stick blender is a brilliant piece of kitchen kit. I bought my Braun Fusion at least 14 years ago in Saudi Arabia and it’s still going strong. It has earned its place in my kitchen for making smoothies and blending soups alone.
So when the Braun people sent me a Multiquick Cordless I was happy to try it out as I’d had such a good experience with my old one. I whizzed up the finished soup in a few seconds (you can use directly in the pan and rinse under the tap afterwards). This new model is cordless and recharges on a neat little unit – molto conveniente. It has a locking button (a safety precaution I appreciate – those blades are sharp). There’s a jug for chopping plus an ice crushing attachment – both useful for small amounts. I tried it for chopping basil too (surprisingly good). My teens have used it constantly for smoothies since it arrived.
Braun Multi-quick giveaway
The good news is that Braun are giving one away for you too. If you live in the United Arab Emirates you can win one (sorry if you are outside this area). To enter just write a comment on this page about why you’d like to win a Multiquick Cordless. You can increase your entries by additionally sharing the link to this post on Twitter (be sure to mention @sally2hats in the tweet so I know) and by commenting on My Custard Pie Facebook page. I’ll pick one at random on Tuesday 26th April 2011 so you’ve got two weeks to enter.
So to my favourite soup; it’s from Jamie Oliver’s very first book The Naked Chef. There is something about the slightly sweet, spicy layers of taste that make me want to eat bowl after bowl. I used the last of the purple basil from my garden to drizzle and ate with a hunk of Nigella’s brown loaf (use 200g each of rye flour, wholemeal and strong white bread flour and a bit more water – plain, not potato). KP took a container to work and sent me an e-mail entitled ‘Verdict on the soup’ – message ‘scrummy yummy!
Note about the recipe: Jamie says to deseed the tomatoes after peeling them (the easiest way to do this is to cut in half horizontally and gently squeeze over the sink). I didn’t bother this time and it didn’t seem to make any difference. I used the Braun jug and chopper to cut them up which saved time. Be careful with the chillies – 1 tablespoon of fierce red chillies would make this searingly hot. I used one small hot one and one larger milder one.
Fresh tomato and sweet chilli pepper soup with smashed basil – adapted slightly from The Naked Chef by Jamie Oliver
Serves 6
15 ripe plum tomatoes
3 medium red peppers (capsicum)
approximately 7 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon chopped fresh seeded red chilli
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 clove of garlic, roughly chopped
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, or to taste
600 ml chicken or vegetable stock (I used Swiss Marigold vegetable bouillon)
2 good handfuls of fresh basil leaves (I used purple basil)
Score the tops of the tomatoes, blanch in boiling water for about 20 seconds or a little longer and remove the skins. Grill the peppers until blackened all over (I perch each one on top of a gas burner and turn carefully with tongs). Rest in a covered bowl until they are just cool enough to handle. Hold the stalk and, with a knife, scrape the blackened skin downwards to remove. You won’t get every tiny bit off but please do not be tempted to rinse them. Remove the core (I use my usual method) and roughly chop the peppers finely (a few bursts in the Braun jug was perfect for this).
Put the chopped peppers in a warmed, thick-bottomed pan with 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and the chopped red chilli. Add a pinch of salt and cook slowly for about 5 minutes. Add the chopped garlic and cook for a further 2 minutes. Then add the roughly chopped tomatoes and cook for about 10 minutes with another pinch of salt and the red wine vinegar so that they start to soften and combine. Add the hot stock and simmer for 15 minutes. Season to taste and use a stick blender in bursts to puree slightly (leave some small chunks – you don’t want it completely smooth) .
In a mortar and pestle (or a food processor – I used the Braun jug) smash the basil to a pulp with a pinch of salt. Stir the remaining olive oil and a drop more red wine vinegar. Serve the soup with the basil mixture drizzled generously over the top. This makes an excellent first course or a nice lunch alongside a toasted cheese sandwich.
Loved hearing about your favourite items in the kitchen last time – really appreciate the comments. Is there any bit of kit you’d never have in your kitchen?
My Custard Pie 