We can all use them, from time to time

Cookery shows on TV; you either love 'em or hate 'em. On the whole, I love them. It gives me great ideas for recipes, although I never follow them to the letter. As with all my recipes, they get adjusted to my own preferences and availability of ingredients. At the same time, however, there is something that thoroughly annoys me about them. Cookery shows want to help people cook certain food, eat better, waste less, eat healthier and so on. And so they fill you up with recipes and how to cook the dishes. That's all fine by me, what annoys me is that they don't tell you the numerous amount of hints, tips and tricks they have (there are some exceptions, but these just confirm the rule). And believe me when I say, chefs have practically a trick for everything they do. From chopping veg to juicing fruit, from rolling out pastry to seasoning food. And for everything in between...

Some of these hints, tips and tricks are being taught in college but mostly they are picked up when working in a professional kitchen. And I am going to share what I know with you, so 'Keep calm and Be a Chef'. That last part is a bit of a lie, by the way. As was pointed out to me by my husband... More accurately would be 'keep confidence and be a chef'. Which brings me to the best tip I can ever give: 'keep calm and hire a chef'...

I will add to the list below on occasion, so if ever you are stuck, come back here and see if I have a hint, tip or trick ready for you. Or leave a question in the comment section and I will come back to you. Any hints, tips and tricks you have are more than welcome too.

Hints, Tips & Tricks

Pastry:

1. The easiest way of rolling out shortcrust pastry is, probably, to roll it out between baking paper:
• This is great because you avoid using flour. Any additional flour will make your pastry taste less buttery, and most importantly there's no need to clean up any floury mess afterwards. Also, if you happen to be making pastry on a hot day and it's becoming too soft to roll out, you can simply slide the pastry into the fridge for 10 minutes to rest instead of having to scrape the soft pastry off the work surface. The golden rule when making pastry is to handle it as little as possible, otherwise it goes rubbery and tough. Using the baking-paper tip will certainly help achieve the perfect pastry
1. Cut off a piece of baking paper and place this on your work top
2. Place the pastry on top and cover with a second piece of baking paper
3. Roll the pastry out to the required size and preferred thickness
• Don't have baking paper? Cling film works equally well but sticks slightly more to the pastry
• Another great thing about this is that it makes lining a baking tin so much easier:
1. Peel of the top layer of the baking paper and lift the pastry (with the remaining bottom piece of baking paper underneath) onto 1 hand
2. Flip the sheet over, on top of the prepared baking tin (so that the pastry is inside the tin)
3. Gently ease the pastry into all the nooks and crannies (with the paper still on top)
4. Gently peel of the remaining paper and bake or fill as normal

Tomato-based sauces and soups:

1. Tinned tomatoes
• Using tinned tomatoes for a soup or sauce? Try adding a pinch of sugar to take away the acidic flavour. Use the sugar as a seasoning, so don't go overboard...
2. Fresh tomatoes
• Need to peel and finely chop fresh tomatoes?
1. Cut a tomato in half
2. Grate the flesh through the large holes of a vegetable grater until you get to the skin (hold on to the skin to keep it intact before discarding it)

Seasoning:

1. The reason most restaurant food tastes better is the correct use of seasoning. Chefs use salt, pepper and spices throughout the cooking process and season at every stage. Jacob Kenedy, Chef patron of Bocca di Lupo in Soho, once said: 'To live a long life, use less salt. To live a happy one, use more. Salt is the West's MSG – it gives food more flavour. "Correct" seasoning, to a chef, is as much salt as you can possibly get into the dish without it tasting too salty.'
• To achieve this, add (especially) salt at the beginning of the cooking process and then at every next step (with the exception of stocks destined for reduction). Make sure to taste before you add salt and add only a pinch at a time, tasting as you go 
• If you happen to over-season, you can try to bulk the dish out by adding something (barley to a soup, for instance), or to balance the salt with acid (a squeeze of lemon or dash of vinegar), or to kill it with fat (fat mutes flavours – so add butter or oil).

Tenderise (tough) meat:

1. To tenderise meat you can bash away at it with a 'meat tenderiser' or cover the meat with a piece of cling film and bash it with a heavy-based pan (brilliant if you want to work out some frustration, but you need to be careful as you don't want to wind up with pulp).
2. There is another option. You can use acid, such as lemon juice or vinegar, or kachri powder to tenderise meat. However, you should use either option sparingly, as it can leave a slight tangy taste if used excessively.

Juicing fruit:

1. To get the most juice out of oranges, lemons and limes, try warming them up slightly:
• Place the fruit in direct sunlight for half an hour or stick them in the microwave for 5 seconds on high

Stock:

1. Stocks are great to have on hand as they can be used as the base for soups, sauces and gravy. There is nothing wrong with using a stock cube but making your own needn't be difficult:
• Take lots of kitchen vegetable trim (celery, fennel tops, onion, garlic, carrot peelings) and place in a pot with all your bones
• Cover with water, then cling film and tin foil it
• Cook overnight at 140°C in the oven or cook on top of the stove for at least 3 hours
2. Want a clear stock?
• By cooking it in the oven (as above) all the impurities, that you would usually remove through skimming, stick to the bottom and sides of the pot
• If you have cooked the stock on top of the stove things become slightly more laborious but not more difficult:
1. When you put the pan on the heat, avoid boiling the liquid and do not stir (if you can). If you do have to stir, use a balloon whisk and try not to disturb the ingredients too much
2. During the cooking process, skim off the foam that forms on top (with a slotted spoon)
3. Leave the stock to cool completely: the top of the stock will look clear as all the heavier particles sink to the bottom of the pan (this will happen quicker if you haven't stirred)
4. Ladle the clear liquid gently into a jug or a clean saucepan without disturbing the sediment
5. Chill it until any fat has set into solid clumps
6. Remove as much fat as possible
7. Pour your stock into a large, shallow freezer safe container
8. Line a perforated tray, flat based colander, drum sieve, or other drainage utensil that has a flat base with cheesecloth or a clean fine-weave tea-towel or dishcloth (ideally, the container that you freeze the stock in should fit into the sieve or perforated tray lying flat)
9. Place this onto another catchment container underneath (the container underneath the sieve or tray should be wide and deep enough to gather the fluid without spillage)
10. Remove your stock ice block from its original container and place into the lined drainage tray or sieve
11. Cover with cling film and put aside, preferably in the fridge overnight if you have time
12. Allow the block to melt and the stock will filter out, leaving ice and the fine particles that would make it cloudy in the cloth
• For an even richer stock, follow from step 7 onwards for a second time
3. Freeze stock into an ice-cube tray. Whenever you need to add a bit more flavour to a soup, sauce or gravy, take out an ice-cube and add it to the pan. Let it dissolve, give it a quick stir and taste to make sure the seasoning is 'just perfect'

Ginger:

1. The easiest way to peel ginger is to use a teaspoon. This might sound silly but if you use the edge of the spoon (like with a knife) you can scrape the skin off the ginger very thinly without having to cut off all the knobbly bits (this saves you loads of time and ginger)

Spices:

1. If you, like me, use a lot of spices, it is cheaper to buy whole spices and grind them yourself as and when you need them. The flavour of the spice stays very vibrant for a longer time then with ground spices and you can crush just the amount that you need. The best way to grind them is the old-fashioned way; with pestle and mortar.
2. For the best flavour in your dish, add a ground spice at the end of cooking (to give it a little lift) or you can add them in whole at the beginning. Or toast ground spices in a dry frying pan until they become fragrant before you add the rest of your ingredients (make sure not to burn the spices as they will become very bitter)

I hope these hints, tips and tricks will come in useful. Let me know how you get on...

But most of all, no matter what you are making:

Enjoy

The way to someone's heart

My mother used to tell me that the way to a man's heart was via his stomach. Over the years, I have found that she was right in this. She just forgot to mention that the same was true the other way around: the way to a woman's heart is via her stomach. The only problem is that you first need to find out what he/she likes and dislikes. It might also be helpful to find out if there are things that they are allergic to. And then, if you do wind up cooking for them it is important to make sure that what you present him/her with is safe to eat...

Quite some years ago there was this man I really fancied. He wasn't the most gorgeous bloke you could ever come across but he had a twinkle in his brown eyes, was prone to laughing, was tall and had hands the size of coal shovels. We played for the same rugby club and had been chatting for quite some time when I learned that he was single (call me old-fashioned but I do not chase men that are in a relationship). So, on Saturday (after his match), I decided to take the bull by the horns; I invited him over for a meal with the excuse that I had made a chicken pie that was much too big for one. Especially as I had also made a massive apple pie (I was trying to work through a glut of apples at the time, that's my story and I will stick to it) (and a dash to the shop after the match made sure that I indeed had a glut of apples). He took me up on it and later that day he showed up, with flowers. Not sure what to make of that, I blushed when he passed them to me in the hallway. I am a hopeless romantic but never know what to do when a man gives me flowers or something of the sorts. I showed him to my front room and offered him a beer. The smell of the chicken pie was wafting from the kitchen and I told him I would be right back. I dished up the chicken pie, shoved the apple pie in the oven and took the plates to the front room. Two bites into the chicken pie, I realised that the chicken was underdone... Not just a bit pink, I wouldn't have been surprised if the beast had jumped of off my plate, clucking and well. Just thinking back to it, I can still feel myself go red as I tried to take the plate away from him. He, however, was determined not to say anything and pretend all was well. To cut a far too long story short; we moved on to the apple pie (which was fully cooked and delicious, even if I say so myself), had a nice chat and two hours later I let him out the door.
It wasn't until the following day that I found out he had been horribly sick. Partly because of the chicken but mainly because he was allergic to almonds. I had used almonds in the pastry and in the filling of the apple pie... I never did make my way into his heart, although we did become good friends. He just never ate at my place again...

In my defence, I was only 18 at the time and rather surprised that he had shown up. Oh, and it was the first time ever that I had cooked for someone I really fancied... All I could think about were those massive hands and his strong legs...
But I learned from my mistakes and have since not tried to poison anyone again. It was the day that I learned to enquire first into any allergies and likes/dislikes and to make sure that meat is fully cooked before serving... It must have worked because I married a lovely fellow who won my heart via my stomach. He didn't even have to cook, he just told me what he would cook for me if he ever got to meet me. Mind, I am easy to cater for; there are not a lot of things that I don't like and I am not allergic to anything... I won his heart by making a Risotto using plain rice, a can of chicken soup and frozen peas (I don't like peas but used them because I knew he loved peas). Doesn't sound great but it tasted wonderful and it was all we had in the cupboards at the time.

But, if you ever find yourself in the place where you want to find your way to a strapping lad's heart, here is my (now safe) recipe for

Chicken and Sweetcorn Pie

Ingredients:
For the filling:

• 1 chicken breast per person (you could also use 1½ chicken thigh)
• ½ tin of sweetcorn per person
• 50 gram bacon lardons per person
• 25 gram butter
• 35 gram flour
• milk
• salt, pepper and nutmeg
• (a little butter, lard or oil for frying, if needed)

For the pastry:

• 300 gram plain flour
• 175 gram cold salted butter (cut into cubes)
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tablespoon cold water

Method:

For the pastry:

1. Sift the flour into a bowl and add the butter
2. Quickly rub the butter into the flour
3. Whisk the egg yolk loose with the water
4. Stir in enough of the water and the egg yolk to form a soft dough; if the dough is too dry add a little water at a time until it comes together into a ball
• Do not knead the dough too much or the crust will be tough but this is a rather forgiving dough so don't worry too much
5. Wrap the dough in cling film and rest in the fridge until needed

For the filling:

1. In a dry frying pan, fry the bacon until crispy
   
2. Use a spoon to take the bacon out of the pan and set aside but leave the bacon fat in the pan
3. In the same pan now quickly brown the chicken on all sides, add a little butter, lard or oil if there is too little fat in the pan
4. Once browned, turn the heat down to low and cook for a further ten minutes with a lid on the pan
5. Take the chicken out of the pan and cut it into bite size pieces
• The chicken is not fully cooked at this stage but will cook through in the oven. This way the chicken will stay moist after it comes out of the oven
6. Put the butter in a sauce pan and let it melt, making sure that it doesn't brown
7. Add the flour and whisk until well combined and the flour starts to smell of biscuits
8. Whilst whisking, add milk until you have a thick sauce
9. Add the cheese to the sauce and let it melt
10. Stir in the bacon, chicken and sweetcorn
11. Season the filling to taste with salt, (freshly cracked) black pepper and nutmeg

For the pie:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200°C
2. Butter a pie tin
3. Take the pastry out of the fridge and roll out on flour dusted work surface
4. Place the rolled out pastry into the tin and cut off the overhanging pastry, bring the leftover pastry together and roll out to form the lid
5. Pour the filling on top of the pastry and cover with the lid
6. Crimp the pastry together, brush with a little egg wash and cut a steam hole in the top
7. Place the pie in the centre of the oven and bake for 30 minutes

Variations:

• If you don't like the flavour of nutmeg, leave out the nutmeg and
• fry some fresh sage leaves in the bacon fat
• take the sage out of the pan and set aside
• follow from step 3
• If you find the taste of nutmeg or sage too strong, use some fresh tarragon
• make the filling as above but when seasoning the sauce add some finely chopped tarragon with the salt and pepper
• Pie crust: in this recipe I have used just plain short-crust pastry but you could use (rough) puff pastry or suet crust
• If you choose to use (rough) puff pastry or a suet crust put the filling directly into the pie tin and roll the pastry out to form a lid (don't forget to crimp...)
• In stead of using butter in your pastry, you could use lard or margarine

I wish you all the best for your endeavours, and a safe journey into your chosen one's heart. If he/she has a gluten intolerance, this recipe works well with gluten-free flour. If he/she is looking after the waist line: find yourself someone else. Set on winning the heart of the dieter, even though my recommendation is to let them go? Try the following for a healthy option:

• Fry the chicken in some rapeseed or olive oil
• you can also boil the chicken in some unsalted water (for an even healthier option)
• Cut the chicken into bite-size pieces and set aside
• In a sauce pan, warm up 1 tablespoon of oil (of your choice) and add the flour
• Whisk as if your life depends on it
• Make chicken stock from a cube and add this to the pan, whisking like mad to prevent lumps, until you have a thick sauce
• Stir the chicken, sweetcorn and any other veg they like into the sauce and season to taste with salt, pepper and nutmeg (or sage or tarragon)
• Make a pastry with the lightest margarine you can find
• Assemble the pie and bake as above

This does taste very good but I stand by what I said; don't bother and find yourself someone who knows there is more to life than a slim waist. Oh well, can't say I didn't try...

It might all not sound like the most romantic meal but set the table with your best linen, and your finest plates and glasses. Bring the whole pie to the table and let nature take its course. The first time you cook for someone, the last thing you want to worry about is whether it is romantic enough or not.
So, stop fretting and

Enjoy