The Daily Spud » Nuts

Spud Sunday: Potato Dipping

Daily Spud — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 17:00:19 +0000

My garden is full of surprises.

One day last month, when I was moved to do a bit of tidying up outside, I found this:

That's one funny lookin' Christmas tree...

Having long ago resigned myself to the fact that the romanesco cauliflower I had planted earlier this year had come to naught, there it was, a single specimen, presenting its wonderfully fractal head for inspection. At times like these, you really have to hand it to Mother Nature.

I was as pleased as punch with my discovery, but, very quickly, a dilemma ensued: how to do justice to this prince of brassicas? A vegetable that’s somewhere between cauliflower and broccoli, with a faintly nutty taste and good raw or cooked.

It seemed to me that, in fact, I should do as little as possible. The romanesco was harvested, split into individual spiky florets and presented for consumption with a creamy, nutty, garlicky and potato-y dip. Justice was done.

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Skordalia – a Greek Potato and Almond Dip

This recipe comes to me by way of the Reluctant Gourmet and his e-book of Great Potato Recipes. I am, of course, always interested when books of potato recipes come my way (and yes, I own several) and this e-book, with over 100 recipes and some solid spudly advice, more than holds its own in their company.

Though there were many recipes in the book that I wanted to try, the one that really caught my eye was this one for Skordalia, a Greek dip involving garlic, potatoes and almonds.

Yes, a dip with potatoes. It’s not such an outrageous idea for a spud.

I had actually seen a different version of the same dish recently over at Noble Pig, so it seemed like it was high time to give it a try. I was very glad I did. Nutty, garlicky and very more-ish. It complemented the romanesco very nicely, though you could, of course, dip other crisp veggies or pita bread into it too. I daresay you could spread some of this onto a piece of crusty bread and complete the sandwich with some leftover Christmas meats if you felt so inclined. Whip up a bowl or two if you’re doing some yuletide entertaining, you’ll not regret it.

I have adapted the recipe slightly, by giving the almonds a light toasting. I also didn’t have marcona almonds, which the recipe suggests, but I didn’t let that put me off.

You’ll need:

1 small head of garlic
olive oil for roasting the garlic
100g almonds
450g potatoes, preferably a floury variety
6 tblsp extra virgin olive oil
100g natural yoghurt (or add 50g more for a softer consistency)
3 tblsp lemon juice
1 tsp coarse salt or to taste
freshly ground black pepper to taste

You’ll also need:

A potato ricer is handy for mashing the potatoes, as is a spice grinder or food processor for grinding the almonds and blending the oil and garlic.

The Steps:

Preheat your oven to 200C.
Remove the outer layer of papery skin from the garlic and slice off the top of the head, just to expose the cloves. Wrap the garlic in foil and pour about a tblsp of olive oil over the exposed clove. Roast for around 35 minutes or until the cloves are completely soft and, meanwhile prepare the almonds and potatoes.
Spread the almonds on a baking tray and place in your hot oven for around 5 minutes or so. Remove, allow to cool a little and grind finely using a spice grinder or food processor.
Peel your potatoes and cut into roughly even-sized slices, around 1-2cm thick. Rinse them under cold water.
Bring about 1l of water to the boil in a saucepan, add about 1 tsp salt and the potato slices. Bring back to the boil and reduce to a simmer. Simmer gently, covered, for around 15-20 minutes or until just fork-tender. Alternatively, you can steam the potatoes until they reach the same stage.
When the potatoes are done, drain well and return them to the saucepan. Then either let them sit, covered by a tea-towel, for about 5 minutes or place the pan over a low heat and stir the potatoes gently for a minute or so while they dry out.
Put the dried and still-warm potatoes through a potato ricer and into a large bowl, or mash gently in the bowl using a masher.
Blend together the olive oil and roasted garlic cloves, add to the potatoes and mix to combine.
Then add the yoghurt, lemon juice, ground toasted almonds, with coarse salt and black pepper to taste. Add more yoghurt if you want a softer consistency. Serve warm or at room temperature with pita bread or fresh, crispy veggies (and romanesco if you’ve got it).

The Variations:

This works just as well with almonds that are simply blanched and not toasted.

The Results:

Dip for 6-8 festive guests

The Taste Of Christmas Past

Daily Spud — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:32:59 +0000

Well, it’s about time that I got my Christmas baking boots on, now, isn’t it?

For weeks, my feed reader has been choc-a-bloc with blog postings stuffed with festive baked goods, and I can only hold out against that kind of onslaught for so long. So, having realised that resistance was futile, I closed my eyes and let my mind drift across the sea of baked possibilities. I ended up in Spain.

Huh?

While I was still, unquestionably, in Ireland, I had found myself dreaming of that Spanish confection known as turrón. It’s made primarily from toasted almonds and honey, and varies in texture from break-your-teeth hard to soft and fudgy. When I was a kid, my brother, who lived in Spain, would bring a selection home at Christmas and I have been a sucker for turrón, particularly the soft variety, ever since. It’s just as well I can’t lay my hands on it too easily here – I inhale and it’s gone. And while the brother hasn’t lived in Spain for years, in my head Christmas is still flavoured with almond and honey. So I thought that I would try to capture that in festive shortbread form. I was very pleased that I did.

Shortbread, inspired by Christmas past

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Almond, Honey and Orange Shortbreads

These little shortbread bites are crumbly and melty in the mouth and just the thing to have with coffee. They actually started out life as a recipe for pecan puffs, one of the many items covered in the Bake course with Rachel Allen, but the pecans made way for toasted almonds, vanilla was ditched in favour of orange zest and amaretto, the sugar lost out to its cousin honey and the crumbly shortbread texture was emphasised with the addition of a little rice flour. I also dipped them in chocolate, just because.

Use a nice floral honey if you can. I actually had some wonderful honey which was harvested by some friends in Spain and it seemed a very appropriate choice. The orange (which was one that I got in my regular organic veg deliveries from Absolutely Organic) was deeply orange and fragrant. I used the amaretto to underline the almond flavour but they’re also good without.

You’ll need:

100g almonds
100g plain flour
25g rice flour or cornflour (cornstarch), or substitute additional plain flour
good pinch of salt
100g unsalted butter, softened
2 tblsp honey
zest of half an orange (about 1 tsp)
1 tsp amaretto (optional)
25g icing sugar, sifted, for coating (optional)
approx. 50g good quality dark chocolate for dipping (optional) – I used Ó Conaill 70% dark chocolate

You’ll also need:

A food processor or similarly bladed instrument for grinding the almonds, plus a large baking sheet for baking the biscuits – mine was around 24cm x 30cm – and a smaller sized baking tray for toasting the almonds.

The Steps:

Preheat your oven to 150C.
Spread the almonds out on a baking tray and toast in the oven for 10-15 minutes or until the flesh of the nuts starts to brown (which you’ll see if you remove an almond and slice through it). Allow to cool a little and grind finely using a food processor.
Whisk the plain flour, rice flour and salt together well in a medium-sized bowl. Add the ground toasted almonds and whisk again.
In a separate bowl, beat the butter until light and fluffy (or use a food processor or stand mixer to do the job for you).
Add the honey, orange zest and amaretto to the butter and beat well.
Gradually incorporate the flour and almond mixture into the butter. When done, you should end up with a ball of dough which will be just slightly tacky to the touch.
Scoop heaped teaspoonfuls of the dough into the palm of your hand, roll into balls, then place on the baking sheet and flatten slightly, either using the palm of your hand or the base of a glass. You should end up with little discs, around 3cm wide and 0.5-1cm high.
Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the biscuits are just starting to darken at the edges.
Allow to cool slightly for about 2 minutes, then toss the biscuits in the icing sugar and leave to cool fully on a wire rack.
If you fancy dipping the biscuits in chocolate, then chop the chocolate finely and either melt in the microwave (zapping it until barely melted) or in a heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of hot (not simmering) water. Once melted, dip roughly one half of each biscuit in the chocolate and leave to set on a wire tray.
When cool, dust with some more icing sugar and enjoy with your Christmas tea or coffee.

The Variations:

Replace the orange zest with some espresso powder and/or replace the almonds + amaretto with hazelnuts + frangelico

The Results:

Makes around 30 to 35 biscuits, though I eat around ~~3, no, 5, no~~ 10 at a time, so you’ll probably want to double the recipe.

By the by, for those of you who were wondering, the winner of the box of tayto was Orla Doyle. Congratulations Orla and enjoy the crisp sandwiches!

Going Nuts At Christmas

Daily Spud — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 00:19:21 +0000

There has been an ad running of late on Irish radio for a new play. The ad includes an excerpt from the play, which runs something like this:

They eat nut roast… Nut roast? …the only nuts I want roasted at Christmas come covered in chocolate and wrapped in shiny paper…

This says a lot about the bad rap that the classic vegetarian Christmas main course of nut roast gets, and sometimes with just cause. Food for the token vegetarian at the Christmas table very often comes in a distant second to main meat event and, to quote Alice Waters, can be the kind of stridently vegetarian food that leaves us “feeling somehow punished by dishes most memorable for their meatlessness”.

Fortunately, my own experience in this department is quite the opposite, having been shaped by this glorious cheese and nut loaf recipe from Edward Espe Brown’s Tassajara Recipe Book (from where the Alice Waters quote also comes). I first had this at Thanksgiving many years ago with my friend Tim’s family in Boulder and have been making it as a special occasion dish ever since. It’s rich and satisfying and works really well with the rest of the non-meaty trimmings on the Christmas table. I now can’t imagine Christmas dinner without it!

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Tassajara Cheese and Nut Loaf

The Veg Mix:

1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 small green pepper, cut into small squares
125g mushrooms, chopped
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp dried marjoram
1 tsp dried savoury
0.5 tsp dried sage
salt and freshly ground black pepper

The Cheese, Nuts and Other Stuff:

150g walnuts, chopped (or substitute brazil nuts, hazelnuts or a mixture)
60g raw cashews, chopped
175g cooked brown rice (about 70g uncooked weight)
350g grated cheese: choose a mature cheddar or gruyere or a combination of both, plus some parmesan
4 eggs, beaten
150g cottage cheese (or substitute natural yoghurt)
1 fistful of chopped fresh herbs: I use flat leaf parsley and thyme, you could include some oregano or marjoram also

The Steps:

Preheat the oven to 180C (or see below for an alternative microwave method)
Heat some oil or butter in a pan over a medium heat.
Add the onion to the pan and cook until it starts to soften.
Add the mushrooms, green pepper, garlic, dried herbs and a little salt and black pepper to the pan and cook until the mushrooms and pepper are soft.
Place the cooked veg in a large bowl and add all of the remaining ingredients and mix well.
Check the seasoning. Leave it a bit undersalted as the saltiness of the cheeses will become more apparent later.
Cook using either the conventional or microwave methods below and serve with a mushroom or yeast-based gravy and your choice of vegetables. Makes around 8 servings.

To Oven Cook:

Line the bottom and sides of a 9in square baking tin with two crossed rectangles of baking parchment or foil, leaving about 3 inches overhanging on each side. Liberally butter the lined tin.
Add the cheese and nut mixture to the tin, rap sharply to remove any air bubbles and smooth with a spoon or spatula.
Fold the overhanging paper over the top and bake in the preheated oven for about an hour or until firm to the touch.
Cool on a wire rack for 5-10 minutes before turning out onto a serving platter.

The Alternative Microwave Method:

Discovered through a combination of necessity and desperation at Thanksgiving one year in a friends house, when none of the assembled cast of characters could figure out the trick of getting the conventional oven turned on… This method is convenient if you don’t want to cook the full loaf all at once.
Divide the cheese and nut mixture between 4 microwave dishes.
Cook each individual dish at full power until the edges start to brown and the loaf is firm to the touch. Depending on the oven and the mixture, this could take somewhere between 10 and 15 minutes.
If you don’t need to cook all of the mixture straight away, you can freeze the individual bowls of uncooked loaf mixture and then cook in the microwave from frozen (though it will obviously need more cooking time in this case).

Sweet Rosemary

Daily Spud — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:32:49 +0000

I first made my acquaintance with rosemary early in life. As children, we were often sent to fetch rosemary and thyme from the bushes of same that grew along the avenue which lead to our house. It was important to learn to distinguish the two and not return with the wrong one! The rosemary, though, I only ever remember being used with meats and in savoury dumplings for beef stew. Much later, I developed a liking for slices of courgette fried with rosemary and finished with a splash of lemon juice. Then, a few years ago, MGH gave me a little rosemary plant which, despite massive doses of neglect, has thrived in my garden, but was only pressed into use in the kitchen occasionally and, even then, always for savoury purposes.

It actually came as quite a surprise to me when I discovered recently that rosemary has a role to play in baking. I’ve lately made my first batch of rosemary sugar, thanks to big sis #1, who says she uses it to add an extra little something when she’s making fruit crumbles. I also have my culinary sights trained on Nigella Lawson’s rosemary loaf cake, which makes use of both fresh rosemary and rosemary sugar.

Meanwhile, my rosemary sensors have become very active and I have been taking note of rosemary appearing in (what are to me) alternative guises. This is why this recipe for rosemary cashews piqued my interest – it’s a combination that’s both sweet and savoury and makes for an excellent party nibble.

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Rosemary Cashews

These I spotted on the Lottie and Doof blog and was naturally intrigued. The recipe is an Ina Garten one – someone who is well-known to those Stateside but (until recently at least) not at all familiar to me over here on the other side of the Atlantic pond. This makes quite a large batch, but it’s easily halved.

You’ll need:

450g raw cashews
4 tsp chopped fresh rosemary leaves (increase to 2 tblsp if you’d like a bigger rosemary hit)
2 tsp light brown sugar
2 tsp coarse sea salt (add more if it’s to your taste)
0.5 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tblsp unsalted butter

The Steps:

Preheat the oven to 170C (or 160C if fan-assisted)
Spread the cashews on a baking tray and place in the oven.
Remove when a nice golden colour, which may take about 20 minutes or so. The nuts can burn easily so check them every few minutes and give them a stir around.
Meanwhile, remove the leaves from some sprigs of rosemary and chop finely, giving enough for 4 tsp.
Melt the butter and add the chopped rosemary, sugar, salt and cayenne.
Toss the warm nuts in this mix and serve warm or at room temperature.

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Rosemary Sugar

You’ll need:

1 kg granulated or caster sugar
3 or 4 sprigs of fresh rosemary
1 litre screw-top preserving jar

The Steps:

Place the sprigs of rosemary in the jar and pour the sugar around them.
Seal the jar and leave for 10-12 days, after which the sugar is well-infused with the rosemary scent.
Remove the rosemary and keep the sugar for use in fruit crumbles or cakes. Nigella Lawson also suggests using small amounts in meat or tomato sauces for pasta.

A Tale Of Two Tassies

Daily Spud — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 01:16:18 +0000

Tassie: noun (plural: tassies)

(Scotland) A cup or goblet for drinking wine.
A small tart or miniature pie.

From French tasse, meaning cup, and from Arabic tassah, a bowl or basin for drinking.

Walnut Tassies

My internet travels had lately brought me to a recipe for pecan tassies, taken from Gourmet Magazine’s favourite cookie recipes 1941-2008 by way of the Cooking… by the Seat of My Pants blog. Tassies, in the miniature pie sense of the word, were entirely new to me, but the description piqued both my interest and my tastebuds, in an anticipatory kind of way.

My recent baking efforts have found me operating at the gluten-free end of the kitchen (with varying degrees of success) but I felt that these little golden cups should be made in all of their gluten-filled glory first, before taking any recipe detours (and I can do that ‘cos I’m not the one on the gluten-free diet). I took advantage of the absence of she-who-is-avoiding-gluten to make a batch…

Ah, such addictive little gems. The first lot were barely finished, and gluten-free sis had returned, when Tassies Mark II made their debut after a very successful gluten-free makeover. This was, however, not before I first (a) discovered the existence of and (b) discounted the use of, gluten-free vanilla. The theory that says there is gluten in vanilla extract is based on the premise that the alcohol involved in making the extract is usually derived from gluten-containing grains. I happened across an interesting post here which argues that the gluten doesn’t survive the distillation process and that a good natural vanilla extract is just fine. That’s what I chose to use here.

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Walnut Tassies

This is essentially the Gourmet Magazine tassie formula, with walnuts substituted for pecans, and a little more added vanilla. I have also replaced the cup measurements with weights. Even though I possess a set of US measuring cups, I’m more naturally inclined to use my weighing scales. Thus the only cups involved in this recipe are the tassies themselves, little cups of dough holding a glorious walnut filling.

The Pie Base:

110g unsalted butter, softened
80g cream cheese, softened
200g plain flour or, for gluten-free tassies, use a mix of 150g rice flour, 50g corn starch and 0.5 tsp xantham gum

The Filling:

50g walnuts or pecans, chopped
175g demerara sugar
1 egg
1 tblsp unsalted butter, softened
0.25 tsp natural vanilla extract
pinch of salt

You’ll also need:

24 mini-muffin tins

The Steps:

Preheat the oven to 180C.
Butter the muffin tins very well.
Cream together the butter and cream cheese for the shell, either using an old fashioned wooden spoon and elbow grease or with a stand mixer or food processor.
Gradually add the flour to the butter and cheese and mix until the whole things starts to come together as a ball of soft, sticky dough.
Divide the dough evenly among the muffin tins, pressing it into the bottom and up the sides of the tins, forming little cups of dough.
Chop the walnuts or pecans and distribute amongst the tins, pressing them gently into the dough.
Beat the egg lightly with the sugar and mix in the vanilla, salt and remaining tablespoon of butter.
Spoon this mixture over the walnuts.
Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the tops are puffed slightly and the shells are golden.
Let them cool completely on a wire rack before easing them gently from the tins.

The Results:

Makes 24 tassies, which will disappear fast

A Bunch of Flours

Daily Spud — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 23:40:43 +0000

Just some of the bunch...

Uh oh. The latest rash of flour purchases has finally pushed (the contents of) the baking cupboard over the edge. Jostling for position on the top shelf now are all of the following:

plain white flour
self-raising flour
strong white bread flour
wholewheat flour
rye flour
buckwheat flour
2 different kinds of maize flour
corn starch
tapioca starch
rice flour
manioc flour
chickpea flour

…not to mention the cornmeal, oatmeal and 5 different kinds of sugar. Ok, so it’s not quite the equivalent of Imelda Marcos and her shoe fetish but it does tell me that I need to get to work further down the baking production line!

With that in mind, I did undertake my first gluten-free baking experiment, making some rice cookies from the wonderful new Cornucopia At Home cookbook (for those who don’t know, Cornucopia is a vegetarian eatery in Dublin that’s been catering, not only to veggies, but to those with various allergies and food intolerances for many years).

All Cookie, No Gluten

The book gives a basic rice cookie recipe which you can vary as you like with the addition of nuts, chocolate chips and whatever flavourings take your fancy – for my first outing I made the basic recipe plus walnuts, and was pretty pleased with the results. These are cookies which are defiantly gluten-free – they don’t even pretend to rise or stretch but are comfortable in their own status as dry, crumbly, shortbread-like biscuits, just the thing to have with a nice cup of tea.

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Rice Cookies With Walnuts

The Cookie Bits:

225g rice flour
100g caster sugar
100g butter or a veg-based margarine for dairy-free cookies
1 egg
0.5 tsp vanilla extract
50g chopped walnuts

Also:

One large baking tray, covered with a piece of baking parchment

The Steps:

Cream the butter or margarine and sugar with a wooden spoon or electric mixer.
Add the egg and vanilla and beat ’til smooth.
Fold in the rice flour and walnuts to make a soft dough.
Sprinkle some rice flour on the baking parchment.
Form the dough into balls, place on the tray, then flatten to a height of about 0.5cm.
Bake at 180C for about 20 minutes, until golden.
Allow to cool on the baking parchment for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack.