Thing Number Ten, revisited

I wanted to have another go at the macaroons because I didn't feel they turned out quite the way I envisaged.  This time I went with white bread, and didn't grind the breadcrumbs up quite so fine (this did mean the finished macaroons were slightly bumpier than the last lot).  I also used a slightly smaller quantity of breadcrumbs (75g instead of 100g).  I used lemon essence (because it was to hand) and - most importantly - took the macaroons out of the oven after 20 minutes regardless of whether I thought they were done.  I sandwiched them with the buttercream left over from last time, so these were effectively lemon-and-ginger macaroons.

These were way better.  Soft, chewy, yummy.  I was pretty sure after last time that the concept was solid and the problem was only that the execution needed tweaking, and this confirms that.  Hurrah!

Thing Number Eleven - Fattoush

Fattoush is a Lebanese salad, and is one of those things for which there are basically as many recipes as there are people.  It pretty much definitively includes stale pitta bread, cucumber, tomatoes, and sumac (a sour, lemony sort of spice).  Beyond that, there are all kinds of things that might or might not be included, depending on your mood and personal take on the subject...

I'm making a biggish bowlful that would do one person (me!) for lunch on its own, or would work as an accompaniment to something else for probably two or three people. 

First off, tomatoes - good ones if you possibly can.  Tomatoes are one of those things it's never a good idea to scrimp on.  Go with a couple of large tomatoes, or an equivalent quantity of smaller ones, and chop them up.  I personally like this salad to consist of fairly decent-sized chunks of its component parts - especially if I'm eating it on its own - but feel free to go smaller if you prefer.

Next up is cucumber.  I know some people would take off the skin and get rid of the seeds, but really, who can be bothered?  I only do all that if I'm cooking cucumber.  If you feel especially strongly and have time on your hands, feel free, though.  This is probably about a quarter of a cucumber. 

I went with spring onions for this (a couple, chopped fairly small) but I've seen recipes with red onion, and recipes with nothing oniony at all.  Go with whatever you have available/like best. 

I chucked in a few sliced-up radishes, mainly on the grounds that a) I like radishes and b) there were radishes in the fridge. 

Because I think it helps to enhance the sourness that you want with this salad, I also added pomegranate seeds - probably about a quarter of a large pomegranate.  You basically have to cut it open and then pick it apart to get the seeds out. 

Next I chopped up some mint.  This is another one of those opinion-is-divided ingredients; most recipes include one or both of mint and/or flat-leaf parsley.  Some also include some shredded-up lettuce - something small and pale and tightly-curled, like Little Gem, shredded up fine. 

For the dressing, finely grate or chop a clove of garlic...

...and then mix it up with a glug of olive oil, the juice of half a lemon, a pinch of salt, and half a teaspoon of ground sumac.  (Sumac is a deep, bloody red and brings a sharp-sour kick to the salad - you might find it in a really big supermarket; otherwise check Middle Eastern grocers).  I tend to make salad dressing by just chucking everything in a jam jar, putting the lid on, and shaking it. 

Pour the dressing over the salad, and mix well.

Now for the pitta bread part.  Again, there are differing views on how to do this.  Some people just add bits of stale pitta to the salad and let it soak up the juices.  Some people toast it first.  And some people fry it.  Normally, I would throw my lot in with the toast brigade, but in this case the pitta bread I'm using (a wholemeal one that's been buried at the back of the freezer for so long it's gone pale and brittle and completely dried out) is so ancient and depressing that I decided to fry it, just to cheer it up.  So, I dropped shards of pitta into a hot frying pan drizzled with more olive oil, and fried them until they were golden.  Whatever you decide, the pitta pieces get mixed in with everything else.

Check the seasoning, and add a bit more of anything you think it needs.  For a final touch, I added a drizzle of a couple of things I turned up while I was out buying the sumac - firstly, sumac sauce (on the grounds that in a recipe where it's one of the key flavours, it would make sense to bring it to the fore); and then pomegranate molasses (a gloriously sour, sherbet-y, tarry gloop which I add to everything I can justify adding it to on even the slenderest of pretexts). 

The verdict

This turned out really well - fresh, summery, sharp and sour.  And, as a way of redeeming pitta bread that seemed to be entirely beyond saving, it was better still!  It's really easy to make, and you could add or subtract ingredients depending on what you like and have available.  Go experiment!

Thing Number Ten - Bread-and-butter Macaroons

And just like that, we're into double figures. 

Those egg whites leftover from the bread-and-butter pudding?  They're back.

After the breadcrumb mince pie topping turned out so macaroon-y, I couldn't help but wonder whether it would, in fact, be possible to make actual macaroons from breadcrumbs.  Time to give it a go...

I used 100g of wholemeal breadcrumbs (these need to be ground up very fine, practically to dust), sifted in 175g icing sugar, and mixed the two together.

In another bowl, whisk two egg whites until they form soft peaks.  (When you're whisking egg whites, everything wants to be as clean and dry as possible.  Delia reckons you should wipe the cut side of half a lemon round the bowl, just to be sure there's no lingering grease, but I've always thought this was rather a waste of half a lemon.)

Then whisk in 1tbsp caster sugar, and a splosh of whatever flavour of extract you like.  (It should be 'extract', though, not 'flavouring'.)  I was digging around in my baking cupboard looking for vanilla when I came across a bottle of ginger essence, and I thought it would be able to stand up to brown bread quite nicely, so I went with that.

Fold in the dry ingredients.

Dollop the whole lot into a piping bag with a biggish plain nozzle, and pipe small rounded discs onto a baking tray lined with baking parchment.  (You can get special silicone trays with circular indentations to guide you, but I sort of mentally file them in the 'magic stone' category.  I do basically already know what circles look like).  Flatten down any points with a damp fingertip, and then leave the macaroons alone for 15 minutes or so before you bake them.

They'll basically start to dry out - you should be able to give them a gentle prod without getting covered in gloop.

Put them in a fairly cool oven (130C or so) for about 20 minutes.

They should end up fairly smooth on top with a little frill around the bottom.  (A few of mine did sort of explode, though).

Make buttercream by smooshing together a 1:2 ratio of butter to sifted icing sugar, along with a teaspoon or so of boiling water and a driblet of whatever flavouring you used for the macaroons.  (Don't skip the sifting.  I wouldn't normally care, but you'll regret it here.)  I did 100g:200g but it was loads; half that amount would be plenty.

Make sandwiches of pairs of macaroons, sticking them together with buttercream and, if you feel like it, a bit of jam.  (I felt like it, partly because I thought the jam-sandwich effect was quite fun, and partly because I actually left my macaroons in the oven for too long; more like half an hour than 20 minutes, and so they're much drier and brittler than they should be, and I was trying to counter that a bit).

The verdict

It's kind of hard for me to tell how well these work, because of overcooking them.  This batch are much too dry, but that's entirely my fault (I was worried they weren't going to come off the tray in one piece, and I wimped out, basically, and left them in there waaaay too long).  I was pleased by how macaroon-like they turned out, appearance wise.  In term of flavour, you can really taste the brown bread - I suspect white would be more anonymous - and the ginger works well with that.  Now I've done a batch as proof of concept, I'll definitely try them again, just to refine them and see how they work...

Thing Number Nine - Croutons

I can never get that excited about croutons.  They just don't really do much for me.  Nevertheless, making croutons seems like a legitimate way to use up bread, so I thought I'd give them a go...

Something to go with croutons

On the grounds that it would be a bit odd to eat croutons on their own - and I do end up having to eat this stuff, once it's made, after all - I made a bowl of lettuce and pea soup.  Feel free to skip ahead if your enthusiasm for croutons outpaces mine...

As ever, this is an exercise in using things up; in this case the posh lettuce that's been lurking in the fridge for some time and which I'm going to have to eat sooner or later (and preferably sooner, at this point).  If you've never cooked lettuce, do try it.  It sounds weird, but cooking it brings out a flavour you might not even have known was there.

So.  I sweated a chopped-up red onion in a bit of butter.  (If the lettuce weren't a bit purple, I might have worried about what red onion would do to the colour of the soup, but since it is I was anticipating the end result will be fairly sludgy anyway.)

Add the vaguely-chopped lettuce, and keep stirring it over a gentle heat while it wilts.

Then add some frozen peas.  (Not really sure of the quantity, here.  However many fitted in the lid of my butter dish...)

Also add some stock (in this case, half a chicken stock cube's worth).  Simmer everything gently for ten minutes or so...

...then take it off the heat and blend it.  Since I still had some cream kicking around from the bread-and-butter pudding, I stirred a bit of that in, as well, though it would be fine without.

The croutons

So.  Croutons.  I've decided to treat croutons as being about delivering flavour as well as adding texture, on the grounds that it might make them more interesting...

Chop up some past-its-best bread into cube-ish pieces.  Crusts off, here, I think.

Rub the surface with the cut side of half a clove of garlic (just like with the pan con tomate).

With the bread cubes on a baking tray, drizzle them with some olive oil infused with whatever flavour you want to go with the thing the croutons will end up on top of.  I used basil oil.

Then sprinkle on some grated parmesan and black pepper.

Put the tray under the grill, and watch it like whatever watchy-thing watches best in your house.  (I burned them, and then had to chop bits off and do that side again.)  Once they've browned, turn them over, add a bit more cheese, and brown the other side.

Some very slightly burnt croutons.

The verdict

Well, I'm still not going to rush to make croutons the centre of every meal, but using them to add extra flavours actually works quite well.  You could add all sorts of things to them, really - maybe spicy croutons with chilli oil and coriander seeds, or lemony-sugary ones to go with stewed fruit...

Oh, and this soup works.  Hurrah for soup!

Thing Number Eight - The Best Bread-and-Butter Pudding

There are three things you need to know about Panettone and Seville Orange Curd Bread-and-Butter Pudding.

1. Making it involves an immense amount of faffing around - it calls for special ingredients, requires you to make custard (or its relatives) from scratch not once but twice, and you can't even eat it the day you make it (or, not if you want to eat it at its best).
2. It calls for vast amounts of cream, butter, milk and eggs at a time of year when you have probably foresworn all of those things and vowed never to eat anything interesting ever again.
3. It's absolutely worth it.

The first time I made this, it was genuinely a response to having leftover panettone and feeling I ought to use it up (although in practice it never actually seems to dry out or go stale).  Every year since, I've plotted and schemed and jealously guarded stashed-away panettone, just so I could make it again.  (This task was aided, this year, by Wilkinson randomly selling proper full-sized panettone for three quid each.  Initially I thought this was some error on their part, and promptly bought two.  They kept selling them.  I kept buying them.  Now to open any cupboard in my house is to risk a panettone avalanche...)

This is a gloriously seasonal recipe, coupling panettone that's on its way out with the first appearance of Seville oranges.  (They, if you've never come across them, are the very bitter oranges used to make marmalade.  Think of them as like orange-flavoured lemons; anywhere you might use a lemon, a Seville orange does the same job and just makes things more interesting.  You absolutely wouldn't want to eat them as fruit, though; partly because flavour-wise they don't mess around, and partly because they tend to be full of loads of pips.)

Right, away we go.

Seville orange curd

(This is basically Nigella's lime curd recipe, only with an obvious orangey substitution.  If you can't find Seville oranges, you could go with a mixture of ordinary oranges and limes, for something approaching the same effect.)

First, zest and juice however many Seville oranges it takes to get 125ml juice.  (I needed five.)  Do it in that order - zest then juice - and not the other way round, or you'll drive yourself crackers.  It's also a good idea to strain the juice as you squeeze it, to catch the many, many pips.

Then melt 75g butter over a gentle heat.

Add the juice and zest, 75g caster sugar, and three eggs.  Make sure to keep the heat very low, and keep whisking this the whole time.  You want everything to meld together and gradually thicken.  You do not want orange-flavoured scrambled eggs.

After a while of wondering whether anything's happening and whether you should just throw caution to the wind and turn the heat up, you'll start to suspect it may possibly be ever so slightly thicker than it was.  After that it'll come together quite quickly.  You want to be able to spread this, once it's cooled down, so let it get fairly thick - it should coat the back of a spoon.

Then pour it into a bowl or jar or whatever, and let it cool.

Pudding assembly

I usually reckon on needing about half a large panettone for this.  Slice it however you like.

Now make sandwiches of panettone and orange curd.  Because of its shape, you tend to end up with uneven-sized slices when you cut up this much panettone, so I tend to cut each slice horizontally down the middle; that way each slice is its own partner when making sandwiches and there's no tricky matching up of compatible-sized pairs.  (You won't need all of the orange curd for this.  You'll be using a bit more later, and any left after that will keep quite happily in the fridge for a while.)

Cut the resulting sandwiches into smaller chunks, and arrange them in a (buttered) ovenproof dish of whatever size will fit them.  How they're put in is how they'll stay, so feel free to do tasteful things with the points, if it makes you happy; and do try to avoid the crusts being upwards as they're already browned and might burn in the oven.

The custard

Put 500ml whole milk and 500ml double cream in a large pan and put it on the heat.

While it's heating, keep half en eye on it and prepare the other ingredients.  You need one whole egg, and four egg yolks.  (Yes, four.)  I know some people do the whole passing the egg-yolk back and forth between the two halves of the shell thing, but I always think there's a risk you'll snag it on a sharp bit.  Safer, if messier, to just hold the egg yolk gently in your hand and let the white slip through your fingers...

Beat the egg and yolks together in a good-sized bowl or jug, along with 3 tablespoons of caster sugar, and a couple of spoonfuls of the leftover orange curd.

When the milk and cream are just about to come to the boil, take the pan off the heat and pour the contents into the egg mixture, whisking like mad the whole time.

If this were custard for eating with something, it'd be going back on the heat; but because it's going in the oven it doesn't need any more cooking at the moment.  Pour the whole lot over the panettone sandwiches, making sure to splosh some on every bit of the bread.  Then leave it alone for a quarter of an hour, so the bread can soak up the custard and the whole thing can start to meld together.

Trannsfer it - carefully! - to the oven, and cook it at 160C or thereabouts, for about three-quarters of an hour.  When it's done, it should be golden on top, and the custard should be basically set but still a bit wobbly.

Now for the hard part.  Leave it alone.  Let it cool completely, cover it with cling film, and put it in the fridge until tomorrow.  However good it is now, it'll be better then.  If you're really desperate, eat some of the leftover orange curd on toast, or something.  Seriously.  Leave it alone.

By the way...

Yes, there are four egg whites now going begging.  The thing is, every now and then I try out a recipe for bread-and-butter pudding that uses only whole eggs - because it's less hassle! and there's no waste! and surely it'll be OK? - and every time, I'm disappointed.  It's just too bouncy.

Instead, I'm bagging the egg whites up in twos, and bunging them in the freezer.  They'll be quite happy, and I have an idea for them that I might try out in a week or two...

It's tomorrow.

You're now allowed to eat it.  Don't heat it up; have it cold, or at room temperature.  What you'll have, by now, is a soft, orange-scented custard, where you can't really tell what's bread and what's not anymore.  Go to it. 

(Yes, I had it for breakfast...)